Tales of Trails, Mountains and Rocky Roads

It's been several weeks now since I competed in the 24-hour World Championships, and looking back, it still feels a little surreal that I was there on the world stage, representing Canada along with some other amazing athletes. The whole experience was incredible, from our arrival in France where we got chatting to athletes from other countries whilst waiting to clear immigration, to the flag parade and opening ceremony, the mealtimes at the pavillion, the Team Canada meetings, wandering around Albi and the French saying how much they loved Canada, to the actual race itself, where world and national records were broken, PRs set, and a whole range of emotions surfaced, not just for myself but for many others that were out on the course too. Whilst the memories are still there, some of the detail has already faded with the passing of time over the past few weeks, but I still wanted to capture things as best I could in this post so that when I read it again in years to come, I can rel...

 I started running when I was 10 years old, and I've been a runner ever since. Not surprisingly, that means I've done a lot of races, and I mean A LOT. These races have ranged in distance from just the 100m sprint right the way up to 200 miles, but I've never been very good at sprinting and I found that I excelled over the longer distances, usually the longer the better. It's only the past 15 years or so where I've really become an ultra trail runner - prior to that, I always considered myself a road runner, and I used to compete regularly in 10km, half marathons, and of course the marathon. I felt confident doing those distances, I wasn't afraid of the "hurt", and I knew exactly how to pace them.  As a road runner, there is always this thing about chasing PBs - or PRs if you're from North America - and every time I toed the line, it was always about going as fast as possible on the day. I spent a good couple of years chasing times - that sub 40 mi...

What can I say about 2025, except that it's passed by so quickly, and it doesn't seem like two minutes since we were last celebrating Christmas and New year! All in all, it's been a good year and I feel like I've achieved lots, although there are a few things that I wish we could have done more of. From a running perspective, I've had a good year - a couple of podium finishes both overall and in my age group, although in all fairness, I've tried to enjoy racing this year rather than putting pressure on myself and trying to race flat out, or to meet the expectations of others. A win at the Frozen Ass 50k, second place at Hill of a Race and Blackfoot Ultra 50k, then another win at Survivorfest 24-hour track race made me realise that I've still got it when my training goes well and my mind's in the right place, but then I'm not too bothered about the wins so much these days. I then did a couple of trail mountain ultras - Sinister 7 50k and Canadian Deat...

Back in the days of the COVID pandemic, a race popped up on my radar that was just an hour's drive from home. It was a 55km trail race in November, and it would mimic some of the traits that are more commonly associated with The Barkley Marathon. This new race was Bar-ka-koo -  5 laps of 11km, run in alternate directions, where one had to collect and carry a log on every lap as proof you'd been to each of the checkpoints. With a 10-hour cut off, it was either a very generous time limit even with the snow, or it was going to be one heck of a tough course. It turned out to be the latter, and with just 4 solo finishers that year and no teams finishing, it began to gain a reputation for being a darn hard race. I was one of the finishers that year in 9 hours and 4 minutes - whether it was the deep snow and bitter cold weather that year that made it a hard slog, or whether it was the brutal course that had my body aching for a week afterwards I don't know, but I knew one day I...