Being injured and not allowed to do any exercise until 9 th August has left me with plenty of time to watch TV, read magazines and browse the internet. I’ve been staggered by the number of products making fitness and health claims. This has probably...

This is a tough post for me to write because it is about the Ultra Trail South West and it is about life and death quite literally. The Ultra Trail South West took place at the weekend and had been the focus of my training all year. Training had gone...

I thought it would be hard writing a running blog entry when I’ve been told I cannot run for between 2 & 4 months, but it’s not. Lots of good things have happened. The ultra running community, especially the extended family I have acquired...

The blog title was inspired by the Rudyard Kipling poem ‘If’ ; particularly the lines, 'If you can fill the unforgiving minute With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run, Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in...

My teenage daughter started her Sunday job a few weekends ago and needed me to drive her into Bude. We live in a remote location about 10 miles north of Bude with a limited bus service. She needed picking up 4 hours later so rather than drive back home...

Two related incidents gave rise to this blog post. The first was giving some advice to someone who wanted to train for the Kalahari Augrabies Extreme Marathon and the other was reading a blog entry on Mimi Anderson’s website . My advice about...

A few years ago someone gave me this great piece of advice. "Don't compare your inside to other peoples' outside". I was reminded of this on my run this morning. I was struggling up a long step hill looking enviously at a woman infront...

Some of you may know that I’m an experienced ultra runner, but a bit of a plodder. That is why I’m rather worried about finishing the 100-mile Ultra Trail South West in the time limit. All my experience tells me that I have to do something...

We all have a different genetic make up and that will obviously affect how fast we can be, but that is not what I’m talking about. When you start to run big D istances two things become extremely important, N utrition and A ttitude. Get these wrong...

First of all I am sorry I didn’t manage to write a blog post last week. I had so much going on something had to give and it wasn’t going to be my training. Last weekend I was in Scotland, on a sales trip for the Ed & Phil business,...

Haweswater Half-Marathon It’s a long time since I’ve taken part in a road race or a half-marathon; I did both on Sunday at the Haweswater Half-Marathon in the Lake District. It was cold, but beautiful, an out and back course mostly alongside...

I’ve had a great week of training preparing for the Endurancelife 100 mile Ultra Trail South West on 23 rd June 2012. I ran on 6 days and 3 of those were quality sessions design specifically with the event in mind. This is what the week looked like...

No I’m not thinking of giving up, but about when it’s right to give up and when you should stay in there and grind it out. I’ve run well this month and today, when it was sunny and warm, I thought back to the beginning of the month when...

You don’t need a big change to make run fun. This week I look at how to put in some hard training and have fun. Or should it be have some fun a get some hard training in by accident. But first an apology for being a little bit late posting...

Normally I run straight from the house, but the other day I took the dogs with me so I drove to the start of the off-road area. Just before I left the car I heard the Calvin Harris song The Girls. I do not like his grammar, but I certainly agree with...

I'm extremely lucky and live in a beautiful part of the country; north Cornwall. About a mile from my house is a lovely valley to run through and there are a variety of routes I can take, so I can have a different run there every day of the week....

I've had a two week break due to a chest infection, which has been really frustrating because January was the start of my training plan for the Ultra Trail South West in June. I'm now two weeks behind schedule, but I'm relaxed about it. Being...

Unfortunately I haven't run since my last blog post. My chest infection is taking its time to clear up; a short, slow test jog a few days ago resulted in a huge coughing fit, so I am going to leave it another week before I head out again. I'm...

I know that most people will think there is nothing in common between accountants and Olympians, but if you read on I will show that there is more than one connection. Since my last blog post I have not run, I have a chest infection and quite sensibly...

I am very fortunate to have two informal coaches, my wife Vanessa and Paul Bateson. Vanessa provides day-to-day practical assistance, whereas Paul influenced my training strategy. I mentioned Vanessa in last week's post; she is still using the mantra...

I discovered this week that my wife reads my blog; she has certainly read 'Pants and door handles'. I was lying in bed making excuses for not getting up for an early morning run when she gave me a withering look and said "You know how to...

The title does not have the eloquence of Bedknobs and Broomsticks or The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe (actually that's quite appropriate), but it does accurately describe two important issues that I want to talk about and they are related. I will...

I have been sticking to my training regime of running short, fast efforts and not putting in any longer runs. This isn't working. I am not enjoying it and I am putting on weight. There are two reasons why I am putting on weight; I am not running long...

My training at the moment is completely different from what I'm used to. Tuesday, for example, I did a warm-up followed by drills (heel flicks, high knees etc.) then some hill sprints before heading back home. It was all done in 45 minutes, half the...

This week's blog is dedicated to the humble sock - an unsung hero. I think of socks as being similar to car tyres, very important, but seldom talked about. People talk about how big an engine their car has and about abs braking systems and traction...