Keir's first 10k

This morning Keir took part in the Huddersfield 10k road race.  He decided last summer that he would do this as part of His Duke of Edinbugh (silver) Award.

For the last six months he has been very dedicated and ran three times a week in addition to his usual PE and games at school.  He also went swimming regularly on Sunday mornings.

His result for the hilly 10k race surprised me and Fay.  I even think he surprised himself.  At 15 years of age he was the youngest runner in the race and he finished 264th out of 429 with a time of 54:51.

Very pleased with him for obviously putting in lots of effort in training and not shirking in the recent bad weather ... in fact I'M RATHER PROUD OF HIM.

need some different weather now

Not much about me to talk about at the moment ... more snow fell last night and this morning I had the pleasure of a 10 mile run through a deep blanket of the white stuff.  It was foggy too.

I know it's good for leg strength, and just getting out there is good for mental strength, but it's getting a bit boring now.  Can we have some different weather please.

a friendly bunch

Thanks for all the kind words from everyone following my last post.  Even those from the opposition ...

My son (Keir) was well impressed by those.  He said: "I don't think sprinters would congratulate other sprinters from other countries on their selection for the World Championships."

I couldn't possibly comment other than to say that the world of ultra running is a very friendly place to be.   I'm pleased I live there.

Also ... I've added the James Jarvis video (Onwards) to this page.

There's a book edited by Kevin Beck called 'Run Strong' which I'm finding very useful at the moment.  Lots of stuff about all aspects of running training.  Much of the information can easily be adapted to ultra running.  More details here.

Chris is happy ...

Last night I received a phone call from Norman Wilson (chairman of selectors, UK Athletics) to confirm that I have been selected to represent my country in this year's World 24 hr Championships.

It seems that all the hard work over the past couple of years has finally paid off.  And I feel good.

Full details of the event can be found on the race website.  Looking around that website it appears that there are plans for live web coverage - should be good.

I have to say a big 'thank you' to Adam Smith at Fitnessfootwear.com and Steve Raven at ASSIST Creative Resources Ltd and Alan Young at Dion Networks for helping and sponsoring me.

If you would like to help/sponsor me too please email chris.carver@btopenworld.com

weather

It's still very cold over here in Yorkshire.  This morning's run felt, at times, as though I was running on an ice rink.  Over the nine miles my stopwatch showed that I ran about 15 seconds per mile quicker than my target pace - I expected AT LEAST 15 seconds per mile slower than my target pace.

Happy with that.

Lots of ice about this morning although, for some strange reason, the major roads are far worse than the minor roads.  We have had a couple of snow showers too - there's one right now which seems quite heavy.  I don't expect the snow to remain on the ground very long though.

Although the past few weeks have been very cold we haven't had much snow compared to mid December to mid January when we had loads of the stuff.  It seems that Washington DC is getting all the white stuff at the moment.  See Dan Rose's blog of 6 February for some wonderful photos.

I must admit that I'm getting a bit fed up with all this coldness now.  The temperature's been below average all year - often by 5 or more degrees.

Why are we Brits so obsessed with the weather ?

some thoughts ... and coffee !!!

I didn't really want to explain what I thought the differences were between Britain's selection policy and that of Australia because I think it would be better if I kept out of the politics surrounding these things.

However, since Anth asks, my thoughts - in brief - are:

1. in last September's Commonwealth Championships the Australian men finished first, second and seventh.  UK men were third, fourth and fifth
2. in general the Australian men seem to be running far greater distances than the UK men and do much better in championship events
3. things are slightly different for the Australian women who seem to be of a similar standard to British women
4. therefore it seems strange to me that the Australian athletics authorities have a lower qualifying standard than UK Athletics
5. and to pay your own travel and kit expenses for representing your country seems insane to me ...

Writing about these things reminds me that the UK selectors met two days ago to choose the team for the World 24 hr Championships in Brive.  I wonder what their decision was.

For me, last week was an easy training week.

Day 1 - 50 mins cycling and stretching
Day 2 - 5 miles at 10k pace, strength training and stretching
Day 3 - rest
Day 4 - 23 miles, 50 mins cycling and stretching
Day 5 - strength training and stretching
Day 6 - hill reps (x 16), 50 mins cycling and stretching
Day 7 - 7 miles fartlek, strength training and stretching

During that week I was drinking a wonderful coffee from the Sanani region of Yemen.  Chocolately, spicy, winelike, almost dark roast ... fantastic.

selection criteria for another country

Australia have recently published their selection criteria for the upcoming World 24 hr Challenge.

I imagine it's a bit different to what most runners are used to ... but it makes interesting reading all the same.  See it here.

race coverage

Well done to all those involved in William Sichel's website for providing first class coverage of the Espoo indoor 24 hour race.

I thoroughly enjoyed reading about the race as events unfolded and, from a personal point of view, I was most interested to see how Paul Hart would fare.

I did feel a bit sad for him not reaching his target of 236 km after such a promising debut last October ... I am also a bit glad though as the selectors meet next weekend to choose the team to represent UK at the World 24 hr Championships in May and Paul's performance is definitely better for me.

At the moment I feel that I've about a 50% chance of being selected.  Still training hard though and I'm probably fitter now than I was this time last year.

an enjoyable evening yesterday, a rant today

Enjoyed a lovely evening yesterday at Korks in Otley with a chance to catch up with those Otley AC members I don't see often enough - Janice, Eric, Malcolm, Huw, Phil Robinson, Bridget and loads of others.

It was good to see the trophies awarded to those runners not normally associated with athletic prowess ... and the introduction of awards for new club records is a good idea I think.

One thing though ... why do some people refer to me as a 'heavy metal fan' ?  I know my music collection has some stuff that most people would categorise as 'heavy metal':

Aerosmith, Alice Cooper, Black Sabbath, Iron Maiden, Marilyn Manson, Metallica, Motorhead, Saxon, Twisted Sister, Van Halen, Velvet Revolver

But there is also lots of stuff that no-one would claim to be 'heavy metal':

Barclay James Harvest, The Beatles, Blackmore's Night, Blondie, The Blues Brothers, The Doors, Ian Dury, Eagles, ELP, Gnarles Barkley, Jethro Tull, Journey, Kaiser Chiefs, Manic Street Preachers, Marillion, Bob Marley, Maroon 5, Robert Palmer, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Rolling Stones, Rush, Scissor Sisters, Seasick Steve, Patti Smith, Squeeze, Stray Cats, The Zutons, ZZ Top

And then there's the third group, that in which some people might define as 'heavy metal':

AC/DC, The Answer, Chris Cornell, Deep Purple, Def Leppard, Evanescence, Extreme, Foo Fighters, Ian Gillan, Heart, Linkin Park, Meat Loaf, My Chemical Romance, Nazareth, Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Rainbow, Soul Asylum, Stereophonics, The Sweet, UFO, Uriah Heep, Whitesnake

Over on the left hand side, and down a bit, you'll find a list of what music I'm listening too most commonly at the moment and of the ten albums listed I would say that five belong in the second group and five in the third group. The strange one (and one of my favourites) is the Whitesnake album Starkers In Tokyo ... some people would say that Whitesnake are a heavy metal band and yet this live album is simply one singer and one acoustic guitar (no drums and no loud electric guitars).  It is therefore impossible to say that this is a 'heavy metal album'.  It is very good though.

OK ... rant over.

PS ... when it was decided last November that Otley AC should enter a team in the Pennine Bridleway Relay I immediately sent an email to the team captain offering my services.   I haven't heard anything since but the event is tomorrow and I know we have a team entered.  I presume we had more than enough people to fill a team ...

news update

Still very cold outside.  Not running today but yesterday I still needed a hat and three pairs of gloves!!!!  There hasn't been any snow for a week or so now but the average temperature on my training runs has still been around zero Celsius (32 Fahrenheit).

Mike Blamires recently picked up on the item from my last post about the Melbourne to Sydney race of 1985.  His recent post compares the nutrition strategy of Yiannis Kouros in that race to my nutrition strategy during the Run To London.  Mike does know a bit about that as he was one of my helpers last May - he ran with me for 25 miles or so beginning at about 4.30am on the Sunday morning.  One thing he later said will always stay with me:  "I never thought I'd see a man run 200km in 24 hours and yet look so fresh."

Thanks Mike ... without your help I couldn't have raised well over £2000.

A few days into the future now and on Friday there's the Annual Presentation Evening of my club - Otley AC. The Runner Of The Year competition was won by Tom Hannah and the Handicap competition by Billy Rayner. I didn't finish in the top three in either of those competitions but I do think that the rules of the Runner Of The Year competition make it very difficult, if not impossible, for an ultra distance runner to win.

Although I doubt I'll be collecting any trophies this year it's still an enjoyable evening with lots of food, drink and memories of 2009 with the good company of over 50 members of Otley AC.   Unfortunately Fay will be absent this year, for the first time, she has another important meeting to attend instead.

Speaking of Fay ... she fell badly at lunchtime today and came home with torn trousers, a cut and badly bruised knee and a swollen hand.

On a final note all the best to William Sichel who's taking part in the Espoo indoor 24hr race in Helsinki at the weekend. He's using it as part of his build up to the 1000 mile race in Athens in March. I believe Paul Hart is also running in Helsinki.