Non-specific training....

So this weekend I headed to the Dales with Adam's sister Claire and we took in two of the Yorkshire 3 peaks, Pen-y-Ghent and Ingleborough. Actually due to some quite heavy mountain fog we skipped the summit of Ingleborough but having slogged up the 'Lord of the Rings' type stone ladder scramble that gets you to the plateau before the summit we felt we could count it! I had a fantastic weekend and feel very 'soul-revived' which makes returning to computer-based work seem even more of a slog. Enduroman recommends long weekends hiking as a great endurance base activity without the impact associated with long-distance running and I could certainly feel the benefits. Apart from some tight calves though I felt great come Monday and ready for my mini-taper prior to the Channel relay. Our tide starts on Wednesday and I will pack my bag tonight and prepare everything I might need so I can make the last minute dash to Dover as soon as the call comes!

Some fantastic sposnorship opportunities have come my way this week. Firstly the wonderful Sue Losson offered me shower washes, body lotions and sunscreen from the fantastic company, Green People. I hate putting chemicals on my skin and the intense training programming with multiple showers, lots of chlorine and cycling wind burn can often result in dry skin. So the fabulous products they produce which are free of nasty chemicals will be a great treat and soothing to my skin. I am especially impressed with how they manage to produce an effective high factor sunscreen without the addition of chemicals that so many commerical products contain. Their website is an www.greenpeople.co.uk, go and see for yourself!

Secondly, Warrick Kernes at Action Cameras has offered me a helmet camera to record the cycling leg of the race. This will be a great addition and I hope to use it, not just for the race, but also to capture some of the many hours of training so people can see how intensive the preparation for a challenge like this becomes. I hope to add the videos produced to the blog in the future - if a technophobe like myself can work out how to do that! For anyone else who wants to capture their own training or perhaps an epic race themselves and record their own viewpoint you can get further info at www.actioncameras.co.uk.

A big thank you to both Sue and Warrick for their support!