May 3, 2023
December 31, 2022
Another year comes to a conclusion and time, once again, to reflect on the last twelve months. On the surface 2022 has been a quiet year […]
August 30, 2022
Greenland Odyssey part 3. MFU and pull up your big girl pants.What had happened to me? Had I gone soft over the last two years? Where was my strength, my determination? Why was I so frustrated and angry.
August 30, 2022
Global Odyssey Greenland part 2.
What now; a good cry for starters.
August 29, 2022
Part 1 of the Global Odyssey Greenland 100k. Greenland is not an easy or straightforward country. We learned time is fluid, plans have to be flexible and patience is a necessity.
December 31, 2021
Review of 2021, another year defined by Covid, but a year of solid and consistent running maintaining sanity and fitness
June 10, 2019
The head torch is out. A slight edge of panic sets in. Part 2 of the Global Odyssey Patagonia 100
June 9, 2019
I never thought I would hear myself saying this: Patagonia trumps Antarctica!
What an epic, spectacular, awesome and inspiring experience the South American stage of the Global Odyssey 100 was.
March 10, 2019
Nature finally let me pass, allowed safe passage and I completed the African stage of my Global Odyssey 100k challenge. It was my day. I rocked it.
December 31, 2018
2018 has been the epitomised the odyssey. It has been a year of challenges both physical and mental; and there have been successes and failures. It would not be an odyssey if it was easy, and it would not be an odyssey if I didn’t learn along the way.
December 16, 2018
Recently watching a documentary about an Everest ascent that did not go to plan I was struck by the cost of hubris. The climber’s desire and determination to be the first to summit in that season, and significantly, to be last off the summit that day despite rapidly deteriorating weather conditions was an act of sheer hubris and lack of respect for nature that almost cost him his life.
November 1, 2018
I must be honest and say that this blog entry is tinged with disappointment and frustration at my second failure to complete the African stage of the Global Odyssey, but I am entirely comfortable with my decision to abandon forty-five kilometres into the 100k Ultra Mirage el Djerid event.
September 19, 2018
An epic run with a Mongolian mud spa treatment thrown in for free.
Where do I start? This stage of the Global Odyssey 100 was the perfect example of what the Global Odyssey is about: remote, extreme, challenging, wild, beautiful and awe inspiring. One hundred kilometres over foothills, through gorges, over desert plains in rain and sunshine with temperatures ranging from fifteen to thirty-one degrees, from dawn to night.
May 28, 2018
The Namibian Odyssey 100k was certainly an adventure and a journey of discovery; just not the one I had expected. How wrong did it go? Spectacularly wrong. They say, that if you are going to fail; fail with style, get eaten by a leopard or something of that ilk. Failing because you are bit pooped simply lacks panache. I can give Cyrano de Bergerac a run for his money when it comes to panache.
April 2, 2018
‘If you're seeing things running through your head Who you gonna call?’ Sandbaggers!
There I was dreaming about those remote, extreme, beautiful, exquisitely painful 100ks that you have set yourself the challenge of doing for the Global Odyssey 100. Antarctica, no problem: done. Europe, no problem: done. Africa; wait a minute, there are not that many one-day 100k events on the African continent and the ones I found just did not seem to whet my appetite. There was something missing, a certain ‘je ne sais quoi’. Do I settle?
November 28, 2017
Raid Des Bogomiles: Do I get the prize for the most amusing race name? You have to admit that coming from a country where the word ‘boggin’ is common parlance and where you frequently run through miles of bog it has a certain amusement value.
Did the Grand Raid Des Bogomiles, (one of three races held within the Grand Raid Des Cathars), provide miles of bog? No, but there was an ascent up vertical mud slide which left me fairly boggin.
March 7, 2017
From Namibia (see previous blog post) back to Frankfurt, then on to Beijing (the coldest and most unfriendly airport I have ever set foot in) and a final short hop to Ulaanbataar: departing Namibia on Sunday night and arriving in Ulaanbataar on Tuesday, yes, Tuesday afternoon, losing 7 hours on the way.
March 1, 2017
Our adventure started on a wet January morning as we flew from Glasgow to Frankfurt where we hooked up with David Scott (Sandbaggers) the organiser and the rest of the group before the overnight flight to Windhoek the capital of Namibia.