Past achievements and future objectives Part 1

I thought the start of the new year would be a good time to set myself some targets, while at the same time it seems a good moment to review how far I've come. I started out running at the same time as I got interested in mountaineering, the running was intended as a means to improve my fitness so I could cope better with spells at altitude but after a couple of months the running took over. This entry will review my past peaks and running milestones, while tomorrow I'll list some future objectives.

October 2007: Climbed my first mountain, Mt Snowdon 1038m on the Watkin Path, its a fairly straightforward walk but has the biggest change in altitude of all the routes up the mountain.

November 2007: The walk up Snowdon was intended as training for the following climbs in Ecuador.

• Illiniza Norte 5024m Summited - To date this is the highest mountain I've summited on. I don't remember much about it, apart from some very nice views and that the refuge we slept in was extremely basic.
• Chimborazo 6267m Failed - This was the main objective of the trip, the peak is the furthest point from the centre of the earth, but we came up short. Setting out in the middle of the night from a refuge at 5000m we made it up to about 6000m when we decided to turn back. I could hardly breathe at all while my colleague could no longer feel his fingers from the cold. We enjoyed great views coming down, and arriving to 6000m is no mean feat, but ultimately we were disappointed.
• Cotopaxi 5897m Failed - Cotopaxi used to be considered the highest active volcano in the world, until peaks further south in the Andes were found to be active volcanos. My friend had already summited on Cotopaxi so I played the lottery of signing up to go up with a guide in a pair without knowing the other person, it was a lottery I lost. I was paired with a 40years+ German guy, my first worry on the mountain was after dinner at the refuge when I saw him pop outside at 4800m to smoke a cigarette, the air is thin up there, smoking isn't going to help matters. However, the moment when I saw my chances of summitting pretty much disappear was at 2am, all set to head out into heavy snow I saw my German friend wearing a pair of jeans, a bog standard pair of jeans. Added to that he didn't have any gaitors. The guide questioned his attire, he said he didn't have anything else, the guide said...."oh, let's go". We set out and unsurprisingly the guy got soaking wet and after about 3 hours we turned back as he was showing signs of suffering from hypothermia. Admittedly the weather was bad, and there would have been no guarantees had I not been paired up with someone so underprepared, but it was incredibly frustrating to see my chances of summitting blown before I even got started.

March 2008: Reading Half Marathon

After returning from Ecuador somewhat disappointed I got straight into training for my first half marathon. Things started slowly, but I quickly improved, I finished my first 10k race in 47 minutes, then just a month later I ran the 21.1km of Reading at about the same pace, ending with a chip time of 1:36:56. I ran another 10k three weeks later in 41:30, at the time I was really confident that the progression would continue.

April 2008: Bracknell Half Marathon

Eager to make further progress I signed up to do my second half marathon just seven weeks after Reading, and I knocked over four minutes off my time in Reading, finishing in 1:32:44. From that point the rate of progress has been considerably slower, in the 20 months up to now I've managed to improve my PB by just a minute.

July 2008: Three Peaks Challenge

The three peaks challenge involves climbing the highest peaks in Scotland (Ben Nevis 1344m), England (Scafell Pike 978m) and Wales (Snowdon 1038m) all within the space of 24 hours. The mountains are all fairly comfortable walks on their own, but the fatigue from doing all three, put together with a lack of sleep made it a difficult undertaking, but we managed to finish with about half an hour to spare. The great thing about the challenge that by getting sponsored I managed to raise over £500 for WaterAid.

November 2008: Elda Half Marathon

After moving to Spain in the summer of 2008 I planned to continue training as I had been before I left the UK, however in the first few months I had real difficulty finding the time and as a result I was completely underprepared when I ran my third half and my first in Spain. I finished in 1:49:13 and for the first time in a race had to resort to walking for some parts of the course.

I'll have to take a break here, I'll continue with 2009's successes and disappointments tomorrow.