The importance of back up plans

The year was 1993, the month was January, the day was probably Wed, - though that's one detail I don't remember - the venue was Adamstown.  I was lined up in my bright yellow Donald Duck tee-shirt and my bare feet ready to take part in my first cross country race.

Now, 20 yeas later, almost to the day, I'm sitting in Dublin Airport waiting for a flight to Liverpool for the North of England Cross Country Championships.  The flight has already been put back from 07:45 to 10:15, but that's an ever moving target and until the inbound flight leaves Liverpool we won't actually know when we'll be flying.  And while the race was reported to still be going ahead at 07:50 this morning, that could still all change.  It's ok though.  I have a back up plan.  After a moment of madness last Monday I entered a 3,000m Indoor Race for tomorrow, just in case something like this happened.  I've not raced indoors for about 12 years, and I'm nowhere near track shape, so I'm still keeping my fingers crossed for eight kilometres of mud and snow today.  But I must admit, there is something very comforting about having a back-up plan.

And all this delay has given me some time to think.  Time to think about that first race 20 years ago.  Time to think about what I've achieved.  Time to think about what I've learned.  And time to think about back-up plans.

The gun went and I shot off like the proverbial bullet; straight to the front of the field.  I think I even created a bit of a gap on everyone else.  But then I was tired.  I had to stop and walk.  Loads of people passed me.  But I got going again and started to hold my place.  I even managed to pass one or two up the final hill to the finish.  I ended up 10th.  It was a county schools race.  There were lots of people behind.  I was ridiculed by my classmates for my naive tactics.  I didn't care.  I hadn't held anything back - those who know me know that I rarely do - and I thought that maybe, with a bit of practise, I could give this running lark a bit of a go.

I've been trying to think what my goals were back then; what I wanted from running, and if I ever achieved it.  I'm sure that Olympic stardom featured in my dreams at some stage, but back then I think I just wanted to be able to maintain the effort for the whole race, to win races like that, and to be looked up to by my classmates rather than be given a hard time by them.

Three or four months later other girls were upset because I statred to beat them.  The old guard of medal winners was being disrupted.  Four into three didn't go.  I had started to feature, and by May that year I won my first county title. 

I may never have realised my Olympic dreams, but running has given me so much more than the medals I've won or the dreams I've realised.  Corney as it may sound, it's made me the person I am today.

When I do deliver workshops with young performance athletes I ask them to list some of the skills and qualities that competing in sport has given them (particularly so that when they come to apply for jobs for which they have no obvious experience for they can look to their transferable skills), but I've never actually done that exercise myself, at least not until now.

And so what has running given me?  Well, aside from the fact that every educational or career decision that I have made since I was 15 has either been determined by the fact I am an athlete, or resulted from my direct and indirect experiences as an athlete, it has shaped my personality and my skill sets.  It's given me memories to cherish and most of all it's given me more enjoyment than I could even have imagined.

I didn't have many friends at school.  Truth is being a geek just isn't cool when you're 13.  Running though gave me a tiny bit of credibility, and it gave me a friendship circle away from school.  It showed me that if you work hard enough you can achieve things.  It showed me that there is more than one 7 o'clock in the day.  It thought me about setting and achieving goals, managing expectations and dealing with nerves.  It thought me to accept defeat, and to be humble in victory (a little easier when you always finish 2nd of course).  It thought me to manage my time, and it thought me to be a good team player.  It thought me the importance of a back-up plan.

And when I'm sitting here thinking about what I've learned, I'm also reminded about the things I've forgotten.  Unfortunately I've long forgotten to run like a naive 13 year old; to let everything out, and not to conserve too much; I've forgotten how to manage my life; and some days I've forgotten how much I enjoy running and racing like my life depends on it.

While I accept that the way I ran that race in 1993 isn't the best way to run a race, I do think sometimes that we can be too obsessed with the 'right' way to race.  Sport should be a way for us to express ourselves, and to demonstrate a little bit of our personality.

And so, when this plane eventually takes off, and I eventually get to Knowsley to race, I'm going to paint with my feet a little bit of me in that snow.

And so to the importance of a back-up plan.  The importance is not that I have something to fall back on if Plan A doesn't work out; it's that I have something to take my mind off the fact that Plan A isn't exactly going according to plan.  Oh and also that when I'm lined up with 8km ahead of me later today, I can think that no matter how bad it seems, the alternative, a fast 3km in a packed stadium, would have been so much worse.  

Unless of course I don't get to Liverpool.  In which case, wouldn't a 3,000m in the warm indoors make a pleasant change??!!!

Update

At 09:50, the estimated time of departure was again adjusted - to 11:45 - too late for me to make it to my race.  Seats were offered, however, on the slightly delayed 10:10 service to Manchester.  We landed in Manchester at 11:30, I ran all the way to the train station, made the 11:40am train to Liverpool with about 30 seconds to spare, got a lift from the station to the race and made it to the course spot on time for the warm up.  And through it all I was as cool as a cucumber.

To say that the course was a challenge would be an understatement.  Where there wasn't six inches of snow, there was six inches of mud.  But then I love a challenge, and true to myself, I rose to that challenge.  The muddier the course got, the deeper I dug.  And what's more, I enjoyed myself every step of the way.  Beats being stuck in an airport - that's for sure!

Guest Blog 2 - Adriaan Geldenhuys from Lesotho

In this, the second of our guest blogs, South African athlete Adriaan Geldenhuys talks about his experiences altitude training in Lesotho.  Lesotho is a small country completely surrounded by South Africa, and which has the distinction of being the only country in the world completely above 1,400m altitude.  And from the photos Adriaan has taken, it looks very beautiful too.

Adrian himself is a1500m runners, and started taking the sport seriously just after finishing high school.  He had a successful season racing in Europe in 2012.  He is studying sports science in Potchefstroom, under Jean Vester (who coached Olympic silver medallist Hezekiel Sepeng), and hopes to make the South African team for the 2013 World University Games.  We wish him every success, and thank him for taking time out from his training to tell us about Lesotho and all it has to offer.

Altitude training in Lesotho

Afriski in Lesotho is a skiing resort through the winter months of June - August. The mountain adventure sport activities and training camps take place during summer months of October - April. It’s located in the Maloti Mountains 3222 m (10570 ft) above sea-level, operating in Southern Africa near the northern border of Lesotho. The resort is approximately 5 hours' drive from Johannesburg, South Africa via the steep Moteng Pass and the Mahlasela Pass. It is considered to be the highest road pass in Southern Africa.

Most roads here in the Maloti Mountains of Lesotho are gravel roads running through the scenic mountains. The road to Afriski namely the A1 is still a gravel road close to Afriski. It is best to train on this road because it's not that hilly. The other roads are mainly 4x4 tracks and run steeply into the hills and is only used by 4x4’s and the many local shepherds. In Afriski itself there is a road on top along the few condos witch is a straight flat gravel road for approximately 1200m where faster repetitions can be done, its about 3100m above altitude with no virtually no traffic. 

We do a few sessions including a uphill fartlek and a uphill tempo run up the last stretch of the Mahlasela Pass reaching almost 3300m before it winds down 4km to Afriski. This is my third year and we have done some tests before and after the 21day training camp. The red bloodcell count increased a lot. The first year (2010, November) I came straight from sea level, my hematocrit count increased from 43 to 48%. Other athletes who train all year round in Potchefstroom with its medium altitude of 1400m resulted in a increased hematocrit count from around 45-46% to 48-50% in only 21 days. 

We go down to do some steady runs 15km from Afriski down the Mahlasela Pass where the road run past Oxbow Lodge. The altitude is approximately 2450m and you can feel the difference in the 800m fall.  If you go further down the Moteng Pass you drive through a lot of villages and huts scattered alongside the tarred road. The tarred A1 runs from the border up the Maloti Mountains and stop at Oxbow Resort 15km before you get to Afriski. Long runs can be done up in the Maloti mountains without travelling from Afriski where we base, without big hills if you follow the A1 away from Afriski. Long runs can also be done down by the villages where the altitude ranges between 1850-1900m. 

The border into South Africa is approximately 85km from Afriski. We go once a week down to the border and into South Africa to the town Fouriesburg (10km from border) or Bethlehem(45km from border) to do some training on the Tartan track in Bethlehem or Fouriesburg a gravel track witch are both around 1800m above sea level.

Afriski are still developing more and more for the summer months' activities. They’re getting some gym equipment like stationary bikes, treadmill and free weights aswell. The accommodation is exceptional by any standards.

We eat three balanced meals a day at the Sky Restaurant witch is the highest restaurant in Africa. There you can find Wi-Fi aswell.

The athletes range from 800m to 5000m runners and are all top South African athletes, mostly from Potchefstroom and then some other athletes tag along aswell from other training groups throughout South Africa. Guys from France and the UK have joined us too.

The reason why we choose to train here in Lesotho are when we go back to Potchefstroom to train with the other international athletes, we can train harder for longer and recover faster, thus it results in better performances and faster times every year for everyone. It is also a great place to build some natural power for running the hills and the roads are extremely good for the legs to keep you injury free. 

Ryan Sandes uses Lesotho in his preparation for endurance races aswell. In 2010 he became the first competitor to have won all four of the 4 Desert races, each a 250-kilometre (160 mi), 6/7-day, self-supported footrace through the Gobi Desert in China, the Sahara Desert in Egypt, Atacama Desert in Chile and lastly Antartica.

The Lesotho Olympic distance athletes also train here in the Maloti Mountains. It's a regular training facility for triathletes aswell.

Adriaan Geldenhuys, 16/1/2013

Guest Blog 1 - Tom Fairbrother from Kenya

As I've not been doing any travelling for a while now, and have very little to blog about these days, I have invited some other athletes to contribute guest blogs about their adventures at altitude.

Below is the first post from Tom Fairbrother who is spending some time in Kenya at the moment.  The postgives an interesting insight into his first impressions of Kenya, how easy it is to meet famous athletes there, and the drawbacks of trying to train at altitude when not fully fit.

Tom will be blogging regularly on his own blog: http://runnersguidetotheworld.blogspot.ie/ during his stay in Iten.  If you're training at altitude and have some interesting ovservations to report or photos to share, please do get in touch (info@altitudetrainingcamps.com).

 

Kenya - Week One

Having spent a great Christmas and New Year's Eve with all my friends and family, I set off for my three month stay at the High Altitude Training Centre in Iten, Kenya.

Since booking the trip in September, I ran a great first Half Marathon in 1:12:30 but unfortuantely picked up a calf injury at mile 21 of my first Marathon, eventually finishing in 2:38:55 in Munich, which was 4-5 mins slower than I hoped for.

This subsequently heavily affected my training up to Christmas. I had a three week spell where I literally did not run at all and I had to pull out of several races, missed the whole XC season. When I did start to feel better and get back running, I found I would pick up little niggles that would mean 2-3 days off.

However, I still set off to the tiny village in Africa, which is still home to numerous WR holders and Olympic Champions from 800m to Marathon. I arrived after what seemed like an eternity, leaving my house at 3:30pm on Wednesday and not reaching the Camp until Friday at 10:30am.

I did not get through unscathed as I somehow managed to lose my bank card in transit, so I had to cancel it and request a new one. Natwest will only send it to your home address, so I will need to get my mum to post it out to me. Luckily I have enough cash to last a while.

On my internal flight and bus transfer to the camp was a UKA team, consisting of numerous high class athletes. Amongst them were Scott Overall (2:10 Marathon), Lynsey Sharp (Olympic 800m runner), Tom Lancashire (1500m), Michael Rimmer (800m), Eilish McColgan (Steeplechase).

Last by no means least is Mo Farah. He arrived today, with his room being fitted out with his own sofa, his own TV (the only other is in the lounge) & his own pillows/duvet! 

It will be great to watch him train, although it is probably optimistic hoping to tag along to one of his easy easy runs as I imagine he will keep himself to himself. I may however try and make sure I am conveniently starting my run as he heads out, and see what happens!

Training in Iten poses many challenges; for a starters it is located at an altitude of over 8000 feet, which is almost twice the height of Ben Nevis, the highest mountain in the UK! In addition, the miles and miles of orange trails are very firm and rough, with the routes themselves extremely undulating. 

As well as the British athletes, in the camp are a Dutch Marathon runner (forgot his name) ranked 5th in Europe & USA 1500m Olympic finalist Morgan Uceny, with more UK athletes expected next week. 

After unpacking and relaxing, I ran an easy 4m at just under 8:00 mile pace. The first run at altitude is always tough, simply due to the lack of oxygen being this high up. I actually felt okay, but am very conscious not to push things this early. A general rule is that your pace will be around 30secs a mile slower at altitude. 

My first full day (Saturday) I headed out at 7:10am with a runner called Nic from Colchester for an easy 5m (7:30 pace). Due to the location of the camp, which is situated on the top of a hill, the last 2 and a bit miles were all up hill, so I was blowing a little towards the end, although I did drop Nic with about 1 mile to go. 

After an hour of stretching, followed by a gym session, I had a massage as I was struggling with quite a sore back from the flight. The therapist who massaged me said he has worked with many champions at St Patricks School. He informed me that David Rudisha will be in Iten from the end of January and will be using the gym here at the camp.

The massage itself was brutal, lasting over 1 hour 15 minutes and costing only £11. He found my agonising pain hilarious, and said UK massages are to easy! 

I was relaxing in the Lounge and met Lornah Kiplogat, multiple World Champion and owner of the Camp, as well as the Chairman of the Kenya Athletics. As you do.

Saturday night I felt quite tired, which was definitely the case as I slept for 10.5 hours! I headed out for an easy run to check out the infamous Kamariny Stadium, where all the great Kenyans past & present do their track sessions.

Located 1.5 miles from the camp, I arrived at around 9am to find it completely empty, so I couldn't resist running on it. I ran 6 easy laps around the track. There is much speculation as to how long the track actually is, from 400-410m!

I then headed 1.5m back to camp, reaching 6:55 pace. However, I still managed to get dropped by a local wearing jeans and a shirt who I ran past. He was walking when I passed him, so I can only assume he couldn't resist smoking a foreign runner!

I did some more stretching on my return, followed by a core session in the gym and more sunbathing (29 degree again!) and then an easy 2.5m recovery run, making 7m total for the day.

So after my first two and a half days in Kenya, I have managed 17m and two gym sessions, so productive but still very watchful and cautious. I would say the biggest benefits of training in a camp is the extra time you have, normally occupied by work/family etc.

You have so much more time to warm-up, stretch, workout in the gym & mix with other runners. In addtion, the food is all cooked for you and is all perfect running fuel, low fat carbs, organic veg, protein etc. 

I am missing my friends and family, but the camp has wifi so I am in regular contact through FaceTime, and more successfully, WhatsApp, and I am only here for 13 weeks and will be home in no time.   

Being around such top athletes is certainly inspiring, so hopefully on my return in April I will be a leaner, stronger and faster runner, and more importantly have learned and benefited from the experience of living in Africa for three months. 

Tom Lyle Fairbrother, 6th Jan 2012  

Altitude Training versus EPO use

Something’s been annoying me recently, and when something annoys me I do what I do best, I moan about it.  Below is my slightly tongue-in-cheek take on the differences between EPO use and altitude training.  In the interest of keeping things simple (and lets face it, when I argue, things need to be kept as simple as possible), when I refer to a drug’s secretion naturally in the body I give it it’s full name (e.g. erythropoietin), and when I’m referring to the drug in it’s synthetic, exogenous or administered form, I refer to it in abbreviations (e.g. EPO).

And, so, for those who I haven’t lost already, let’s cut to the chase….

‘Legalise EPO’ they say, ‘because you can’t ban altitude training, and they’re essentially the same thing’.  ‘The only difference between EPO use and altitude training is that one is banned in sport and that the other isn’t’, I’ve recently heard people argue.  ‘They both increase red blood cells, so they must be the same thing’; a simplistic, and ignorant, statement which not only misinterprets how EPO and altitude training work, but completely ignores the ethos behind drug-free sport.

People’s arguments suggest that if there were different legislators in sport, altitude training might find itself on WADA’s prohibited list, or that one day we might see EPO legalised in sport.  As somebody who has strong anti-doping convictions, but has benefited from altitude training, for me, EPO use, and altitude training are worlds apart. 

To argue that EPO use and altitude training are the same thing because they have similar effects would be the same as saying that steroid use and weight training are similar (they both increase muscle size), and that taking an afternoon nap following training would be just as unethical as injecting HGH, as to do so would cause an increase in human growth hormone secretion and expose the body to it’s benefits.  In fact, hill training, endurance training, recovery runs, fartlek training, plyometrics, good nutrition, heat acclimatisation… and pretty much every other form of training, increases the body’s ability to perform through increased hormone secretion, increased tissue growth and/or increased neural adaptation, and it would be ridiculous to suggest that any of these are on the same moral footing as using banned performance-enhancing drugs.  Training is very much allowed!

The drug EPO is not only banned in sport, but it is a prescription-only drug, designed to help keep individuals with an inability to produce it naturally healthy.  It is not (or at least should not be) available for healthy individuals to purchase and use without medical reason.  Conversely, individuals around the world have the right to be born or live at any altitude at which human life is possible.

The use of EPO is extremely dangerous.  Prolonged or excessive use can have at least two fatal consequences in humans.  EPO increases red blood cell production, and the more red blood cells you have, the thicker your blood becomes.  Blood can in fact become so thick that your heart is no longer able to pump blood around the body.  If that happens, you die.  Additionally, EPO use can affect your body’s natural ability to produce erythropoietin.  Without erythropoietin you can’t produce red blood cells, and without red blood cells you can’t transport oxygen around the body.  Oxygen, I hear, is fundamental for human life (and not just in life involving sport), so that’s pretty crap.  Of course you don’t have to die, but you do become dependant on EPO.  Altitude exposure at or below 3,000m, even over a prolonged period of time, though not without it’s side effects (crazy dreams for example), is unlikely to kill you!

And now to the scientific bit, and the crux of my argument. Just because two things have the same end product, doesn’t mean that they are the same thing, physically, morally or legally.  We’ve already agreed (unless you’re the real argumentative type), that training in sport is allowed, and indeed encouraged if you want to be any good at sport, and call me an idealist, but I feel that injecting ourselves with any substance (when not medically required) to take a short-cut to enhanced performance is not in line with drug-free sport, irrespective of whether that substance is banned or not.

Now, I will agree that a large portion of the response to EPO use, and to altitude training, is the same, but there are some fundamental differences.  As we mentioned before, EPO use increases red blood cell production; increased red blood cells carry more oxygen around the body; and a greater oxygen carrying capacity increases endurance performance.  The main way in which altitude training is proposed to work is that the reduced atmospheric oxygen stimulates the body to increase erythropoietin synthesis, which in turn increases red blood cell production, increased red blood cells carry more oxygen around the body; and a greater oxygen carrying capacity increases endurance performance.  Taking EPO makes training easier.  It allows the body to recover quicker (because the body is not the one synthesising the EPO, which believe you me is stressful business for the body), and allows you to train hard day after day.  Altitude training on the other hand is a nightmare!  It’s impossible to breathe, you sleep 14 hours a day, simple tasks like walking to the shops can tire you out, you can’t run as hard or as long as you can at sea level, and think again if you think you’re going to do session after session after session.  Like lots of other beneficial training methods (e.g. weight training, hill reps), you need to recover.  Increased EPO increases red blood cell production.  More EPO creates more red blood cell production.  Altitude exposure increases erythropoietin, and subsequently red blood cell production, to respond to the reduced oxygen in the air, but once it’s adapted, it doesn’t keep on producing erythropoietin.  More altitude exposure doesn’t mean more erythropoietin.  And the real catch is that some people’s bodies are so against the whole erythropoietin synthesis lark that they don’t bother.  Yes, not everyone responds to altitude.  The good news though is that these people are usually the freaks that find altitude training easy.

For me altitude training and EPO use are as different from each other as helping old ladies cross the road and sticking needles in little babies’ eyes.  Other methods of increasing endurance such as altitude tents, altitude masks, iron injections, blood transfusions and blood doping may fall various degrees closer to the proverbial fine line, but training your ass off in difficult environments is not the same as injecting yourself with a drug, which you’ve acquired illegally, to make the route to the top easier for yourself.

Now, I don’t’ know if all of you, or in fact any of you, have managed to read through my waffle, but I have sure as hell enjoyed putting up my side of the argument.  If you’d like to agree or disagree, then please leave your comments below.

I’ve been Elizabeth Egan, and, I’m for drug-free sport (and afternoon naps).  Thanks for reading!

Thirteen things I won't miss about London

Since it's been a while since I last blogged, I thought it was time for an update.

And no surprises; Eliz is on the move again.  Not to altitude again, but back home to the Emerald Isle to get this book done and dusted at last.

I was having a little think yesterday about some of the things that I dislike about London, and in the interest of readability (and to prevent too much moaning), I've summarised them into 13 things that I won't miss about the city (I tried to keep it to a nice round 10, but just couldn't):

13. Police sirens.  Not a day goes by that I don't meet an emergency vehicle of some description when going to or from work.  One day I met 7 police cars in a journey that is no more than 4 miles.

12.  People thinking I'm strange for refusing a plastic bag when buying a single pint of mile from the corner shop less than 100m from my house.  Or maybe that's just me getting used to the idea that I'll soon have to pay for plastic bags again back home.

11. Feeling like I'm the only white person living in my postcode.

10. Noticing that I'm the only white person living in my postcode.

9. Having a postcode.  I've had 4 postcodes (2 work ones; 2 house ones) in the 16 months that I've lived here, and it's not convincing trying to remember the right one when providing information to prove my identity.

8. Dangerous drivers doing u-turns in front of me at every available opportunity, or pulling halfway across the road knowing that the traffic will just have to stop.  Oh and drivers inability to pull over/get out of the way when an emergency vehicle is coming through.  It's not like they don't get enough practise.

7. Other cyclists cycling through red lights, especially those that do it to get in front of me, and then cycle at two miles an hour so that I have to keep passing them.

6. Pedestrians who don't look when they are crossing the road.

5. The constant smell of weed.

4. The constant smell of wee.  Well poo to be more precise!  Did you know that they Jubilee Greenway is built on a massive sewer?

3. Getting caught up in the rat race every time I make a tube journey, and becoming irate every time somebody blocks my way on the escalator, like as if getting through life is one big race.

 

2. The constant fear of becoming the person that London has the potential to turn me into.

1. Feeling like I'm coming across as ungrateful because I'm not in love with the place; almost like I'm denying someone else the great opportunity to live in this wonderful city just by me being here.

I guess it hasn't been all bad though.  There are a few things that I will miss...

...like...

...well...

...let me see...

...Hold on a second...

...I'm thinking...

...Well there is the...

...Well, no... not that either...

...Wait now, I've got it...

...There was the Olympics!  Wow, what a few weeks that was!

Of course, how could I forget the Olympics.  One of the reasons I came here in the first place.  After being in or near a number of Olympic stadiums during my travels, it was great to actually be in one where there was some actual Olympics going on.  And what a night to get my first taste of action - Saturday 4th August. PM. Forever to be known by the Brits as Super Saturday.  Three gold medals for the hosts in the space of just over half an hour.  What an atmosphere that was.  Some days I feel that I am very privileged.  And that was very definitely one of those days.  Surprisingly, the Brits become way more tolerable when they're winning stuff. 

And of course there were two gold medals for the Irish, and two renditions of Aramhan na Fhian, in the same night in the Olympic Stadium during the Paralympics.  I was there that night too.

And there was Beth Tweddle, the greatest British Gymnasts never to win Olympic Gold, finally win an Olympic medal.  I was there for that too.

And there was Dean Miller, someone who I've seen grow from boy to man, and endure some heartbreak along the way (well metatarsal break to be more precise), run his first Paralympic race and give winning a medal a very gallant attempt.  I was there for that too.  And I was just nine rows back from the starting line.

I guess I was pretty lucky to be there at all.  To see that many races and events, I was privileged.

And of course, a green stadium.  You can't beat that!

All this talk of green; it's making me sound like I'm terrible homesick.  I'm not.  But I do know when it's time to move on.  And I do know London's not for me.  And so Ireland, here I come.  And book, well time to get you finished once and for all!

Fifteen Venues Later

It's 10th June 2012, and I'm sitting in yet another airport.  The final destination has been visited, and another Olympic venue to add to my list.  St Moritz was everything that I expected, and more; the perfect place to finish my travels.

To say that the weather is temperamental is an understatement.  In the space of eight days I saw rain, snow, wind, cloud, and sunshine.  The snow I guess was the biggest surprise, but it wasn't a great deal - two inches is easily melted by lunchtime, and for once my 'owl' personality played to my strength!  This morning I had not choice though, and I was out in the snow for my final run at altitude for a while.  The beauty of running in the snow at that time of the morning is that the only footsteps are yours - there's a certain sense of pride in knowing that you're up, out and at it while everyone else is sleeping.  The downside of course is that, despite being alone, if feels like you're in the middle of a giant snowball fight - the trees periodically lightening their branches of their load.

Already in the past two years I have been at or inside the Olympic stadiums of Mexico City, Moscow, Barcelona, Melbourne and London.  While Winter Olympic cities don't have a stadium in the same sense as the Summer Games do, they do usually still have a central arena of some description.  St Moritz, home to the Games in 1928 and 1948, has a building which overlooks the old ice rink (now a driving range), just beside the world's longest natural bob run.  The stadium building looks the same on the outside as it did all those years ago, but has since been converted into residential apartments inside.

St Moritz is very much the home of winter sports.  It has held the world bobsleigh and skeleton championships a record 21 times and in 1904, the world’s longest, and last remaining natural bob run was opened.  It was chosen as the venue for the 1948 Games because of Switzerland's neutrality during the war, and because the facilities used for the 1928 Games gave them the head start they needed with only 18 months lead-in time. 

St. Moritz isn't just about snow though, and is ideally set up for training is almost any sport.  For athletes like me who love a bit of variety, and prefer off-road routes, it's like heaven on earth.  I did 14 runs while I was there, and no two of them were the same.  In fact if I had stayed another week, I would still be discovering new routes.  And the best bit - the trails started just 10 metres outside of my apartment.  For a runner, you can't ask for much more than that.  Well you could ask for a track close by I suppose.  Well what do you know, that was less than half a mile away.

Apart from the running, there hasn't been much to report.  I celebrated a birthday - well I spent all my pocket money on a small pastry, enjoyed it with a cup of tea, and acknowledged the passing of another year.  I've been pretty organised for me.  The flights have been booked since Christmas, the accommodation sorted 3 weeks ago, and the transport from Zurich to St Moritz researched well in advance. Incident wise it's been pretty plane sailing - no missed trains or flights, no last minute hick-ups,  no clumsy accidents.  Ok, that's a lie.  But I was doing well until yesterday when I was on an escalator.  Absorbed in getting photos of the fine artwork displayed I managed to forget that I would reach the top at some stage.  The escalator delivered me to my destination, I was standing still, back facing the wrong way, and almost fell over right in front of a group of people.  Luckily I do the embarrassed look very well (years of practice I suppose), so they didn't need to say anything.  I walked away with nothing hurt but my pride, and they got a smile out of it.  Everyone's a winner!

 Anyway, I mentioned something about not missing a flight - better go catch this one back to London.

Off to St Moritz

Yesterday I left work at 3:00pm in an sort of excited haste.  Not only was it nice to leave the office early for a change, but I was excited to be commencing my final journey for this project, and I didn't want to miss that flight. Not that I'm glad that the traveling is ending - in fact I'm already planning a follow-up tour to promote the book - but it's more the sense of satisfaction that comes with reaching the final straight; that boost that you get from completing something, especially since there seemed to be little chance of me completing the journeys while still owning the clothes on my back.  At 6:10pm yesterday evening I was on my way to Zurich.

This trip is sentimental in more way that one.  It marks the final trip of the most exhilarating journey of my life but, just over a decade ago, my last visit to Zurich was the start of another very significant period in my life - my PhD years.  During the week I was trying to recall that visit, but could remember little of it.  In fact, I couldn't even remember what time of year it was.  As the plane touched down on the tarmac at Zurich International Airport the memories started flooding back.  It was not long after the September 11 terrorist attacks and security was tight.  I was in the middle of a long-distance relationship.  I had nearly missed the flight, which, despite what my family might have to say, was the only time I had seconds to spare before check-in officially closed.  The flight was delayed some 2 hours.  I was confused by all the signs in the airport - I had mistakenly thought that French was the main language in this part of the world.  Everything was expensive.  There were lots of churches.  It was very pretty.  It was a crisp Autumn day.  I only had 24 hours in the place.  It was my first tip outside the EU, and only my second time to continental Europe.  I took lots of photos with my little film camera.  I bought a lot of chocolate.  A lot has changed since.  Nothing has changed at all.  Zurich is still expensive and I'm still taking lots of photos.

Like then, I had little time to spend in Zurich this time round, and this morning I left for St Moritz by train.  Not long after leaving the station the beautiful Lake Zurich appears on our left.  As the train makes it's way away from the city I see the picture postcard Switzerland that seems so familiar: rugged mountain tops, green meadows reaching right to the forests; grazing cows precariously hanging on to the steep slopes, steep-roofed log houses set into the hills.  The rivers and lakes are a beautiful turquoise; the clearest I've ever seen.  The houses seem to have no boundary fences; the Alps provide all the garden they need; the fields and forests their playground.  The train makes it's way along the valley floor, passed all this beauty, until we Chur.  There I change trains, from the fast moving inter-city one, to one that is build more for climbing and twisting and winding.  This train is built for sightseeing, and not for speed.  At that's ok, because I have all the time in the world.

The Albula and Bernia lines of the Rhaetian Railway form only the third railway in the world to receive World Heritage status.  As it travels between Thusis to Tirano it winds through the mountains, gaining and loosing altitude through the dramatic countriside utilizing a series of clever spiral tunnels.  Between Bergun and Preda the line gains 400 metres in altitude inside a horizontal distance of 5 kilometres.  As the train croses over and back the valley and does 360 spirals through the mountains, you sometimes think that you're about to had back home.

At every corner there is breath-taking beauty, meadows full of flowers, snowcapped mountain peaks, trees, trails, waterfalls, rivers.  And then we arrive in St Moritz.  And I can't wait to explore!

A day in Fez

This morning we left the rain of Ifrane behind.  After 10 days of training in the fresh air it was time to travel back to London.  Just a short trip to Fez, and another leg of the journey would be over.  Though I'm disappointed to be heading home, I've had a huge smile on my face all day today.  Usually when I come to the end of a trip I'm ready to go home; ready to get on with the rest of my life.  This time around, another week would have been greatly appreciated.  As hard as I wished though, it was not to be.

And so why do I have a smile on my face?  Well because I'm really enjoying my last day in Morocco I suppose.

This morning after inadvertently bargaining with a taxi driver (the jist of the story is I walked away from taxi driver because I couldn't understand what he was saying, he thought I thought the price was too high, he gave us the ride for a song), we headed down the hill towards Fez.  It was nice to see the country in daylight, even if it was through the pouring rain.  As we approached the city the rain stopped and I knew then it was going to be a great day.

We got a mini taxi from the new town to the gates of the medina in the old town and then stepped into what can only be described as a dream.  Along the narrow winding streets were tiny shops which sold everything from colourful pottery, wooden carvings and intricate silverwork to tacky plastic toys and big cotton knickers.  The smell of food from the small restaurants and stalls was divine, and the sight of a fully laden donkey trotting down steps in alleyways barely wide enough for two people to meet only added to the feeling that we were in a different world.

As we're are flying later today, both AnnMarie and myself had our small trolley suitcases with us, something which brought us a lot of attention.  We were offered all manner of accommodation for the night, and one guy even promised the luxury of an indoor shower.  Such a shame we couldn't take up on the offer.  We soon warmed to all the attention, and it was nice to hear English been spoken again - the perfect reintroduction to out everyday lives.  In fact we really got into the swing of it, and smiled as we said 'no hotel required' and made an areoplane imitation before the friendly locals could even get the word 'hotel' out of their mouths.

And it wasn't just hotels that we were offered.  One young man seemed particularly obliging.  'What is it you're looking for?' he said.  'Hotel? Food? Husband perhaps?' Alas the thousand camel I thought he was offering turned out to be just a cow and camel.  Beggars can't be choosers I suppose, but for some reason I didn't even think that offer was completely genuine, and passed on this occasion.

We seem to be getting the hang of the 'point-and-hope-for-the-best' approach to ordering food.  For 10 dirhim (about 80p) we managed to get a large selection of cookies and pastries from a small bakery where nobody spoke English.  And before we left the medina we had a delicious £6 3-course meal which will hopefully see us through to home.

And just like that our few hours in Fez was over.  Time to go to the airport and board a plane back to London.

This has been one of the most enjoyable trips so far.   Morocco may not have been how I expected, but it was definitely what I needed. I'm sad to leave, but already excited because I know that some day I'll be back. Let's just hope that it rains a little less next time round.

Back in Africa

Although it was almost dark as I touched down in Africa again, the greenness of the countryside greeted me, and surprised me yet again.  Even though all my previous preconceptions of Africa have been wrong, Morocco I was sure would be dry and barren!  Wrong again it seems!

As I take the 1 hour taxi ride between Fez and Ifrane, I can tell that there is a stark contrast between North Africa, and the sub-Saharan parts of the continent which I have previously visited.  Despite this, I can also see the similarities.  In the dark and teeming rain, the drive up the mountains to my home for the next 10 days has all the dangers of driving on the roads of Africa, but none of the excitement.  Darkly clothed people walk on the verge of the unlit road, making their way home in the downpour; the lights of the taxi silhouetting them, and saving them, at the last moment.  As the road twists and turns further up into the middle atlas, the taxi driver makes halfhearted attempts to pass laden trucks, pulling alongside them, before the lights of an oncoming car makes him think better of it.  I look forward to seeing some of the countryside in daylight.  When we eventually arrive in Ifrane, I can tell that the town is nothing like the Africa I have seen before; the light dusting of snow which has just fallen reminding me that I'm a long way from the sun-drenched plains of the rift valley.

As my first day indicated, Morocco is anything but dry.  In fact it rained almost all day, and only just before evening fell on Friday could I eventually venture out and investigate my new surroundings again.  After hurting my little toe earlier in the week, I decided to give it one more day to recover, so a run wasn't planned, but it was nice to finally get out of the apartment.  I had awoken earlier in the day to the sight of a stork on a nearby rooftop.  I quickly crept out of bed, grabbed my camera, and carefully opened the window to catch a shot without frightening her away.  Ten days later she doesn't seem to have moved, and I later realised that there are about 8 other storks nesting within sight of my bedroom window.  In fact the town is full of them.  On that first evening, I also discovered some monkeys playing at the edge of the forest; the closest of them within touching distance of me.  Unfortunately my camera wasn't so close this time, and I haven't spotted them since.  Just my luck.

I was very apprehensive about coming to Morocco.  As a Muslim country I was worried about running around, particularly on my own, and was very glad when AnnMarie joined me on Sunday for the remainder of the trip.  In fact, now it's difficult to see what I was so apprehensive about, and why I would ever have left a place like this out of my research, just because I might get a little bit too much attention!  Apart from our distinct lack of French, we're doing just fine.

Ifrane is a university town of approximately 10,000 people, situated at just over 1,600m in the Moylen (mid) Atlas.  In the forest just above the town sits the green-roofed royal palace, the summer residence of the Sultan of Morocco.  During the winter months, the town is a ski resort, and with it's distinctively European, rather than Moroccan, architecture, the town has a very alpine feel to it.  The town was built as a hill station during French occupation, a place where the colonials could go and feel like they were at home.  While there's not much to do on rain days (of which we've had many), Ifrane offers a plenitude of lovely walks, and of course lots of places to run.

Morocco have a great tradition in distance running, and legend Said Aouita was the first to use Ifrane as a training base.  Today numerous Moroccan and French athletes train here, and it's easy to see why.  Good food, relaxed atmosphere, cheap cost of living, smoothly surfaced roads, and miles and miles of trails make Ifrane perfect for running.  Shame about all the rain though!

Another Journey Home

Alas, another journey has ended, and again I find myself in transit. The past week in Dullstroom has been very enjoyable, mostly training, and relaxing. Rather than bore you with the details, here are some of my favourite photos of the area and the trails, and some photos from my visit to the Birds of Prey Rehabilitation Centre just down the road.

South Africa has been very different than I expected; yet again Africa throws up some surprises! The two training sites that I visited were each very different, and my brief stops in Johannesburg and Pretoria, highlighted to me just how diverse this South Africa is – and that’s without visiting the coast. I’ll definitely come back at some stage, but for me the country lacks some of the ‘soul’ of east Africa. Of course that means much less of the hustle and bustle of east Africa, which isn’t always a bad thing.

Next stop: Berlin half marathon on April 1st, followed by Morocco the following week for my penultimate altitude venue. Almost there now!