Happy New Year (albeit belatedly), hope you all had a Christmas to remember.
It's been quiet on the fundraising side of life this past 4 weeks, mainly due to it being Christmas. However there was one big plus side ... after posting about the success from raffling the 4 Ospreys tickets I was contacted by Aspire2Be who have offered 4 tickets for a match for their hospitality box .... so watch this space ... there'll be some form of auction / raffle for this coming shortly !
Christmas was peaceful and quiet in the house and I was spoilt a bit ... as well as new trail trainers I was given a Go Pro video camera. Here's my first proper attempt at stringing together some pictures and video, its of a race I took part in on the 10th Jan, it was called The Fan Dance
The route for the race is up one side of Pen y Fan, down the other side via Jacobs ladder, along the roman road, and a forestry track, then back the same way, up Jacobs ladder and down Pen Y Fan the other side. As you'll see from the pictures and videos, the conditions were testing to say the least ... climbing up jacbos ladder in what amounted to blizzard conditions was a particular highlight ! Although the official results aren't out yet, I believe I came 5th in the masters category ( that's over 45s in case you're wondering !)
On the training front it was fairly quiet in the run ( excuse the pun) up to Christmas and during the festive period. Though I did manage a run on xmas day itself, well I had to test the new trainers and video camera didn't I !!
The first week of Janaury was when I'd planned to up my mileage and test myself by running long every day for a week, with some weight on my back, in order to replicate the type of running I'll need to be doing in the desert.
I compiled a rather geeky spreadsheet to keep a record of all the runs and cumulative totals for the week. After 7 days of running, it turns out I had run 102 miles, with an elevation gain of 10,878feet ... running for a total time of 19 hours 18 minutes and using up just shy of 18,000 calories ... all of which was completed with a 3.5kg backpack. I took the opportunity to mix up the running in different locations and different surfaces. So as well as on the road around Penllergaer, I also covered miles in Penllergaer Woods, Velindre, Llangennith Beach / Rhossili Downs and the Brecon Beacons ... so as well as running a few miles I also covered quite a few getting there and back !
All the runs were great fun for differing reasons but I think you'll see from the video above why the fan dance was the most fun ... epic conditions to run in. In the other runs, I should mention the time I got stuck in a quagmire in Penllergaer woods, where I'd gone so far through knee deed mud there was no way I was going to turn back, so I crossed the nearby river, it wasn't until I got in did I realise that it was waist deep ... a bit of a shock to the system in January ! Geeky spreadsheet thing below !
Here's a pic of worms head from the top of Rhosilli downs ... stunning and a few more of the beacons from last Sunday ...
I'm starting to concentrate more around fundraising again ... its progressed over the past month, but there's not long to go now, around 88 days so I need to get my backside in gear. At the risk of repeating myself yet again if there are any businesses who'd like to sponsor me in return for having their logo / name on an item of running kit etc, then please get in touch at tircoeds@googlemail.com .. I'd love to hear from you.
Also, if you'd like to donate then you'll find the link here .... Click me to donate please !!
Yet again, congratulations for surviving til now, til next time
Fatboy !
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