Gherkins do Sahara

Here's the man who got me into all this. Sark Kenny has been running with me for a while and we signed up for this package tour of southern Morocco together two years ago. The two of us are one half of our UK summer racing team The Gherkins.

It's great what you see when you're out running

Salvation Army founder's grave...





...and the latest iPod model in shop window.

Pack 'O Juice

This is how I am training now - filling my Raidlight up with orange juice cartons. It takes it up to about 10kg, what I expect it to be for the race.

Must write to Tesco asking for sponsorship...

An Intro After an Outro

After my first entry I thought I would introduce my new blog with my second. I really felt a blog was necessary since I have experienced such great interest and support for what I doing in March in the Sahara.

PURPOSE: Initially to inform about my involvement in Marathon des Sables MdS 2007.

METHOD: Ramblings and photos.

RESULT: Hopefully interest, updating sponsors and generating more traffic to my donations page: Pls see link on right.

I have raised over £1,500 in two weeks for Workaid and have a target of £5,000. Let's keep it going!

Thames Path Ultra

Saturday Feb 17. 8:45am
King's Meadow, Reading

About 130 nutters gather, along with me and my trusty photographer Bruno, to run 50miles along the Thames Path. Race Director Rory waves us off at 9am.

9hrs 32 mins later I reach the finish on the steps of the Holiday Inn in Shepperton with stiff thighs but generally OK. There were four Checkpoints (CP) and time/position was recorded at each CP. My placing at CP1 was 19th and I finished in 43rd place. That gives you some idea of my performance - not a tactically astute race. I dropped places at each CP. A lesson as always to start slow and then go slower, an old piece of ultra-runner advice. After my silly start (first 20 miles in under 3hrs) I had to resort to walking for bits till the end. My pace for long training days and races is fairly consistently just over 5mph and today I set off at almost 7mph. The event was partly intended as a warm-up for MdS competitors and there were many of us, all very noticeable since we all seem to have the same kit especially RaidLight running packs. The longest day on MdS (Day 4) in the Sahara is 54 miles but with different conditions!

Winning time today was 6hrs 18mins by some guy who arrived from Belgium. Amazing. That's over 50 miles of mud, wading across flooded fields and pathfinding. Despite my slowing in the middle I finished strong with a friendly South African guy called Gareth from Isle of Man and Garry, another MdS runner. We had a great chat as we went along for the last 10 miles keeping our spirits up and pace consistent. One of the main threads was telling the others about our toughest events so far. "This one", I say! It's easy to drop off and lose motivation and it always helps to hook up with someone else and talk drivel.