Life is an ultramarathon

... just run 50 of them! And in one year that is, otherwise I wouldn't call that a challenge, really.

That's pretty much what Hardmoors creator Jon Steele has on his plate for 2012. No one asked him to do it, he decided it himself, Mens sana in corpore sano (a sane mind in a sound body). Well, at least the sound body part.

So the idea is to run an ultramarathon pretty much every week-end, either as an actual ultramarathon race, a shorter race topped up after the finish line, or a training run, as long as it's longer than 27 miles (43.5km). And to season the whole idea, that will include three 100 miles races and four 50 miles ones.

You can follow his progress on his new blog: jsteeles50in52.blogspot.com. Good luck Jon!

Ultra running year

David Walliams has started this morning his attempt to swim the length of the Thames in seven days. Apparently colder than expected, he's eventually decided to use a wetsuit. I cannot blame him really...

As they advertise it, "WARNING DO NOT TRY THIS YOURSELF. The tidal Thames is incredibly dangerous and many people have drowned in its waters which have powerful tides and unpredictable currents". So up to Richmond is fine then :) Lewis Gordon Pugh, who has actually done the full length from the source (starting by running) to South-end-on-Sea, said the biggest danger was coming from objects immersed just under the surface. For Charlie Wittmack, it was probably more a bacterial threat, as he became violently ill during his attempt.

Ultra swim

A "Station de Trail" (trail resort) has been opened in the Chartreuse French mountain range. Alike a ski resort, it features a range of marked trail routes for different abilities and an information desk where an experienced trail runner provides personalised advice. The aim being obviously to boost local economy by attracting runners (and there families) in the region during the summer, mid-season and snowless winters.

Whilst this is generally a good idea, it is also one step further towards the integration of trail running into a well-formatted sport. Let's hope it doesn't go too far.

Ultra trail resort

I was a bit surprised to find the following answer in this image on the BBC website :) Nothing to do with my current position.

Ultra photo reuse...

Once upon a time, in a far far away countryside tavern, two lads bragging about their respective achievements couldn't settle what they thought was the meaning of life. In order to resolve this dispute, they decided to make a pact. A pact that they might have signed with their blood if they had been a bit more stupid (or drunk) but there's a limit to everything. It took a while to fulfil the pact requirements, but both were eager and none bailed out. Crowds had to wait even longer to get access to the achievement evidences, but that day has come my dear friends.


Doug on the pink finish line of the Marathon 06 (Nice - Cannes).




Your author at 3,500 feet (but not for long).

Note that you'll need a browser supporting the video HTML 5 element to watch the videos. The streams are encoded in Ogg Theora (Firefox, Chrome, Opera, ...) and H.264 (Chrome, Safari, ...). If you're still using Internet Explorer, it might be time to change :) . Also note that there is no sound. Please let me know whether it plays or not on your system.

Ultra duel

Tomo started a new ultrarunning forum: UK Ultramarathon Running Community. Might be worth having a try, as there wasn't such a thing as a British non race-linked ultrarunning-specific forum so far.

Ultra forum.

... on the New Scientist website ! Follow the link at the middle of the article to see me running on a treadmill. You may not want to, though.

Ultra famous ... or not !