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Record attempts
What's the hurry?
What is the appeal to try and get a record fast attempt on a mountain route, be it a classic horseshoe or popular challenge trail?
The satisfaction of working through a project (and hopefully ultimately achieving it) as well as developing an intimacy with the route is immense. However getting a record is no easy feat. It takes hard work, adaptability and perseverance.
There is alot that can and does go wrong, and sometimes months or years are spent working towards the goal.
Countless hours are spent reccying the best lines, training hard to be fit enough and refining the logistics. On top of all this, you need to be able to understand the weather and the conditions so that you know when to make a judgement and just go for it.
Having a great network of supportive, inspiring and talented people to help you along the way is also invaluable, and Snowdonia attracts some amazing people that have helped immensely with goals achieved and goals planned! Collaborating with runners, climbers, mountain guides and photographers helps motivate and drive the success of these projects.
So if you ever wonder why records are pursued and ponder that the record setter has missed smelling the roses, just remember there are alot of hours and people that go into making it go as fast as you can! The record setter is usually the person who knows that route better than anyone else and has seen it in all it's guises.
It is that intimacy that lives with them.
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Run-scrambles and enchainments
Where running and climbing meet
An enchainment denotes climbing two or more routes in one outing. The idea of linking climbs has been around for years, popularly done as a way of training for a more difficult objective. But some enchainments are a prize in their own right and provide a rewarding day out, done all the faster if the link-ups can be achieved as a run - moving fast and light.
In collaboration with reknowned mountain guide Libby Peter, and climber and runner, Ali Thomas, we joined an exciting project in 2011 to create a new classic challenge, Copa Cerrig:
- five scrambles or climbs on five 1000m summits covering a distance of 25km.
The success of this event has inspired us to tackle a few more projects in 2012.
Run-climbs may require carrying of ropes and gear - depending on your experience, level of competency and difficulty of climb - and are only suitable for the very experienced. However run-scrambles are a lovely option for those with less technical ability in climbing but perhaps good competency on technical ground.
Run-scrambling is a great training exercise for the runner. The process of a fast approach, coupled with the more full-body workout undertaken in the scramble, can help avoid over-use injuries if multi-day mountain runs are planned. Being able to handle the sort of terrain encountered on scrambling routes is also important if you are targeting some of the challenges like the Welsh 3000ers or the Snowdon Horseshoe.
On these routes you'll need to be able to tackle Grade1 scrambles on very exposed terrain, so you need to know if you have a head for heights!
If you have a problem with exposure we work through managing this sort of terrain in our fell running training weekends or get us to design a bespoke training camp for you and your running mates to deal primarily with scrambling.
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Run-swims
Run up to a high level lake and go for a swim
There is something addictive about immersing yourself into painfully cold water in a remote mountain location and enjoying the vulnerability that comes with it. No matter what troubles you've had, you've forgotten them all after a wild swim.
In the summer of 2010 I started wild swimming with my mate Jenny on my rest days from running. Jenny is not a runner but it was a great way to get out and experience something new, and lovely to be included in Jenny's impressive personal challenge to swim all the lakes in Snowdonia - no easy feat given there are around 240 of them!
I must admit, there were some swims where I was just a little more than apprehensive:
- the fear of the stinging tight-chested shock of very cold water and how it would affect my asthma;
- how long could I last before I became unable to function due to hypothermia;
- how to get safe post-swim when emerging already dangerously cold in remote high level mountain areas;
- the sudden onset of deep-water heebeegeebees;
- learning the reeds that won't entangle you and the mud that won't trap you;
- and a random fear of water monsters....
The combination of all those experiences and working through the fear is what makes it so satisfying when you can finally head off on the spur of the moment and just do a swim on your own...
But why do it solo?
Well as much as I'd love to join Jenny on all her swims my running training takes priority and I can only join her on certain days. In the mean-time, Jenny has been tallying up an impressive number of swims. So now to catch up I am trying to bagg the ones I've missed out on as run-swims!
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