Its Almost Marathon Time

Well its been a bit quiet the past week. I went out for a couple of little hour long runs but nothing major and I also got out on the bike for a 68km ride down the valley just to mix training up a bit and to let my knees rest from pounding the trails.

Running to Flegere from Planpraz on Sunday Lunch

Mont Blancs a big old Mountain , view is from Passy 34km down valley from Cham. Great bike ride.

I was also in Lyon on Monday evening to watch The Stone Roses do a gig at an amazing old Roman amphitheatre , an after been allowed in to watch the sound check in the afternoon the rest of the day and evening were spent celebrating what was an incredible wee trip and the end of any sort of alcohol drinking until after the CCC on August 31st! That’s a long way away but has to be done.

So the Marathon is on Sunday and I am feeling fine for it. I have rested for the past 6 odd days so I should be ready to go come 7am Sunday. The forecast is looking awful with heavy rain and a thunderstorm passing over. To be honest I was quite happy to hear that as the recent temperature has been a roasting 33 and I was not looking forward to running in that. I am happy with rain.

I am still unsure on whether to give the Marathon a right good go and try get a good time or just cruise it and use it as training towards the CCC. I think it may be quite good to be able to finish it and feel not too bad. The Marathon finishes at Planpraz which is 1000m directly above my house so my plan is to run over the line and then just keep going and run down the 1000m to my house. All seems a good idea at the moment but that may all change.

Back to Work...Well kind of

It was back to work on Friday and all was good. I could get used to this 4 day week thing. On lunch breaks I managed to do a bit of downhill training on Saturday getting the lift up to 2317m and running back down to 1035m in 37 mins. On Sunday I went up the Midi for a bit of altitude fitness , and squeezed in a little 4 pitch Vdiff/Severe up at Flegere with Dorian on Monday then on Monday evening after work I went out for a sprint up to the Chalet Floria behind my house and felt amazing on that. I don’t normally go out and try to sustain a fast pace but felt good from the off that night so thought I might as well go for it and it was great. I was up to the chalet and back home in 45 mins.

Monday Lunch

So after a very short time back at work it was day off time. The weather turned for the worse overnight so the rock climbing plans on Tuesday changed to running. I walked the 100 metres from my house to get the lift up to Planpraz. From there I ran along the high trail to Flegere then down to the Sentier Des Gardes Trail and back to the house. Now the Sentier trail is only good for two things. Its great for working on fast footwork and for breaking your ankles, due to the dangerous amount of metal spikes that stick out the ground for a large section on it. You cannot switch off whilst running along this. It all went good. Was out for 2hrs.

The death trail

I'm sure some of you will have noticed in the photos that I have compression calf supports on. Right OK I totally admit I am always moaning about this compression stuff. Yes I wear Skins and Salomon Exo tops but I don't believe that they make any real difference with my performance or recovery( I do reckon the full length skins recovery tights will do a good job but I don't own any. Well not yet) I wear them because they are super comfortable and after testing loads of gear I think these work best for me. I have always said calf compression is a gimmick so thought I would try them out. Dorian lent me his. I have to admit that I reckon I will use them for the CCC , they did seem to make a difference but only on the uphills and with 6000m to contend with in August them I will take any bit of help I can get. I wont go into the science behind compression kit but there is a ton of stuff on the web about it if you care to look into it more. I am concerned however that running look is now ultra euro , no more tank tops and short shorts for me but with the Cham marathon just round the corner and the 100km CCC this summer , running in the most comfortable gear I can get is a must.

My Suunto running watch actually decided to work for a change(their Mountain watches are great however this M5 fitness one has been utter rubbish) so I stuck on the heart rate monitor which I don’t normally and was quite happy at going for 2hrs on an average HR of 148 and a peak of 180. My resting rate is usually around the 41 mark.

About to start the descent , the Dru poking out the clouds

From Mid station out towards the signal. You can just pick out the trail on the right

Today was spent sitting staring out my window until the rain finally cleared and the sun came out so I nipped down to the midi lift and went up to the mid station at 2317m and ran along the trail to the Signal point then downhill all way back to Cham. Again felt strong so tomorrow will be a rest day from running and with a decent forecast I reckon its going to be rock climbing in the Aiguille Rouges.

Finally Some Climbing

Today I went up the Midi with Dorian and Graham to do a quick lap of the Arete Des Cosmiques before lunch. Its been snowing a lot up high recently and to be honest when we got up and started the walk to the route we kind of wished we had had our skis. The snow was super deep and powdery. A couple of lucky ones did take skis up and got some amazing turns.

Check that fresh pow!

Anyway we plodded over to the route and it luckily was not busy so we made good time on it , we were not going for a speed record on it but we moved fine over it at a good pace , stopping for a laugh now and then. The route varies loads depending on snow conditions but its never very hard , a couple of abseils(sometimes only 1) and the odd little step and there is also one little steep crux wall with a couple of moves of about UK Vdiff/Severe , after the crux wall comes the best part , you move over onto the North side and climb an awesome chimney to the top , today it was in brilliant Scottish winter condition but sadly its super short and doesn’t last nearly as long as you hope for. After the chimney its up some ladders onto the viewing platform of the Midi station to have your pictures taken with all the amazed Japanese tourists. We were Midi and back to Midi in 2hrs 30mins. For the record my current fastest is 43 mins , hopefully this will be beaten this season. 

At start of route

Me just getting up to the last chimney

So back in Cham at 12pm we headed off for lunch then met back up at 1.30pm to finally go rock climbing. We went a short drive out of Chamonix and walked in for about 35 mins to the Chezery Slabs. Its was super quiet and I climbed with Dorian and Graham brought along Lorne. I took the first lead on a 5c Slab(French Grade 5c is meant to be roughly UK VS/HVS. I don’t reckon this was anywhere near an HVS pitch but I did make a meal of it , I didn’t fall and didnt feel I was going to but I wasn’t that comfortable on it( also my feet were killing me in my rock shoes) and took a while but got up it , I hate slab climbing , I just don’t trust anything about it!

Dorian cruising up the Slab

After that Dorian cruised up the slab and then managed to get to lead the best pitch , an awesome section of about Severe , quite steep but great holds. Then I took over another quite easy section with probably a little bit of Severe at the start and then easy Vdiff. It was then decided to abseil from there as the climbing above was still wet from the past few days pouring rain.

Dorian on the Awesome 3rd Pitch / Lorne above belaying Graham who was on the next

Ace belay spot

Well the abseil was funny. We were all just using the same ropes to get down so Graham went off first (not descending the way we came up) and took ages then finally Lorne then Dorian then me. When I got over the little overhang of rock all I seen were the 3 of them anchored to different places and quite far apart! I had a good old laugh and made my way to Dorian who had picked the best line. It ended up that Graham didn’t have enough rope to make it to the next anchor so just clipped to a bolt then Lorne came down and had to find a bolt and then Dorian found a new anchor so I went to him. Me and Dorian then clipped into the same point (quite an awkward stance) and started pulling the ropes down to us as we knew that from where we were we could make it down to the ground and Lorne and Graham could get to the rope as well so all good. Well surprise surprise the rope got stuck whilst pulling it down , it was quite funny and myself and Dorian made the most of the hilarity as we were both clipped the same anchor attempting to free the rope (it was a pretty bomber chain and bolts we were clipped to Mum!). Just when all looked lost we (well actually I with a genius bit of rope swinging) eventually managed to free the jammed knot and then it was a simple task of rigging the new abseil and down we go.

Fun Times

Abseiling down to rescue Lorne and Graham

An excellent day. Only in Cham can you swing an Ice Axe in the morning at 3800m then come down to a roasting hot valley and go and do some great little mutlipitch rock routes.
Its back to work tomorrow and I reckon back to running on lunchbreaks.

Training and Laughs Continue...

So the Birthday meal turned into way too many Birthday shots meaning Thursday was a complete right off.

I agreed to going a run with Dorian on Friday. I still wasn’t feeling particularly great on Friday morning but decided to go anyway. We drove up to Switzerland (passing a recently written off Ferrari 360) to a small village called Trient and left the car there to then follow part of the Ultra Trail of Mont Blanc back to Chamonix , 33km / 1500m of up and 2000m down.

It was a pretty horrible day weather wise but I felt good on pretty much all of it , I slowed a little at around the 22k mark but then devoured a Mars Bar , Double Decker and a Gel in about 3 minutes and after that felt strong again. Only one minor niggle and that was a small amount of pain in my left shin , it got worse that evening but it seems to have gone now. I think we were about 4hrs 40mins and we had a few stops for photos , to refill with water and to check the map as trails go all over the place here.

Pouring

And it didnt stop - Brilliant 800m Descent to Vallorcine

It was a great day and a good easy pace and was good to get a little bit of distance in legs before the Marathon later this month. I will do it again soon when less hungover.

On Saturday myself and Ally wanted a bit of a laugh so we decided to go up the Aiguille Du Midi armed with a disposable BBQ , a sledge and some flippers(no idea why). We got the 9am lift and just as we got out the ice cave at top we were greeted by absolutely tons of folk who were taking part in some Arcteryx weekend. There were groups everywhere doing courses ranging from safe glacier travel to pretty hard climbs, us sledging didnt go down too well with some guides!

Ally armed with sledge and flippers on a rammed midi arete

Ready to go

We got a few strange looks as we headed down the arête with some rather strange gear our packs. After Ally did some pretty hilarious sledging(many videos to post soon) we got the BBQ going over at the bottom of the Cosmiques Arete and pretty much spent the entire day eating , having a wee drink and doing more sledging. It was the busiest I had ever seen the glacier and our plans to just solo back up the Cosmiques were changed as by 3pm there were still guides coming back down to the start saying the queue at the abseils was 4 hours! We decided to do the boring slog back up the normal way. Now this walk is horrible and without doubt the worst slog in the Massif , its not that long but with the scorching heat and at at 3600m up to 3840m its pretty brutal stuff. Surprisingly I felt strong on it and didn’t need to stop all the way and just plodded on up only stopping near the cave to crack out a beer! An awesome hilarious day and great for acclimatisation even if we didn’t climb at all we were sitting around up there all day soaking in the views.

BBQ at 3650m

Ice Axe is always useful

I went a little ride on the bike this morning up to the Col Des Montets and back. Not been on the bike much recently but all went well and it was a rather rapid return back down the Col to Cham. I’m not that great on a bike at distance , I mean I can pedal along 50+ miles but I am by no means good at it , its kind of like a vice versa with my running. I’m not an amazingly fast runner but can cover a fair few miles whereas on my bike I much prefer and I am much better at short flat out rides than long distance ones.
Weather not looking great this week and I start back work on Friday. Here’s hoping for sunshine or at least dry weather to finally get the rock shoes on!

Its Not Always Sunny In The Alps

Tuesday was a rather hectic day , I woke up and went out on the road bike for the first since last September. I just went out for about an hour and felt pretty good on it , I didn't bother destroying myself just yet on any of the big climbs around so just did a little circuit around Cham.

After that I got the lift up the Aiguille Du Midi (3842m) for some more acclimatisation time , I walked down the Midi arête and just sat for a couple of hours enjoying the view , usually the walk back up the arête is a nightmare but my legs were really strong going back up and breathing was fine so this sitting around up high must be working for me. Will begin the climbing up there pretty soon.

Sitting at 3695m

Midi arete at moment is ace for doing lots of laps up and down , its only really narrow at one point but its super quiet.

I got down late afternoon and nipped home to stick on my running gear , I then got the lift back up but only to the halfway station at 2317m so that I could do a bit of downhill training. Again it was roasting but I made it down the 1250m in 37 mins which was pretty decent.

2317m , time to run down.

A very full on day but worth it.

I got up today and the sunshine had been replaced with pouring rain. I couldn't waste a day so the running stuff went back on and out into the rain I went , I planned on only something short but ended up feeling good so managed an ace little lap up to the small village of Lavancher and back to the house taking me 1hr 46mins I again didn't feel any problems during or after. Today's top tip! If you end up going out a run and 30 mins in you either don't feel great or just cant be bothered then there is no point going on , just go home. On the other hand if you end up feeling good then just keep going

Miserable weather - Endless trails.

Birthday meal tonight and most likely some drinks so it may be a lazy day tomorrow although I still need to get back on the rock asap.

A Wee Update

With the weather forecast for Sunday not great we scraped our plans for climbing over the weekend so I decided to get out the trail shoes again and on Saturday ran up and back down from the Plan Aiguille. Climbing from Cham at 1035m up to 2317m on great forest trails. I forgot my watch so don’t have a clue how long I took on the climb. Once at the top I met my work colleague Dorian who had got the lift up on lunch and was about to start running down the way I had come up so I told him my plan to run down another trail so he decided to follow. All in all it went well , it was actually rather sunny and was extremely warm , I’m going to have to get used to this heat soon. I think I was up and down in in around 2hrs 45mins which I am happy with considering I had done the Bellachat run the day before.

I awoke to some rather sore thighs on Sunday so decided it would be a rest day and since it was pouring down I went with Ally and did the usual Cham thing on a rainy day and wandered the gear shops.

It was still raining this morning (Monday) but legs were better so got the kit on again and went out for a jog. Well.....it didn’t go well , my lungs , legs etc were all great but I just couldn’t find any kind of energy and kept having to stop with my body shaking , very very strange. I managed to go for only 40 mins before returning home. I’m not sure what was wrong but I hadn’t drank much after getting up so I have a feeling I was just super dehydrated. So after a disappointing morning with nobody else off to go for a wee climb I got the lift up to the top of the Aiguille Du Midi (3842m) to start getting a bit acclimatised for the coming climbing season as I am notoriously bad at getting acclimatised so I am going to try and get it sorted this season.

In fact I am currently sat there now typing this blog and staring over to the Grande Jorassses. Uch its not too bad a place to enjoy a coffee.

Oh and one last thing , stay tuned for a very special announcement when I will reveal more about a new project where myself and the famous Ally Swinton will be giving it our all when attempting to scale Mont Blanc without fixed ropes or oxygen to get to the summit with the World Famous Chocolate Golden Coin!

Cham Time

I arrived back in Chamonix on Wednesday late afternoon after the usual long drive from Scotland. I was pretty tired but made it out for a few pints to catch up with friends and see what plans we all had for this coming summer.

I had stuff to do on Thursday like sort my flat out, buy food and go get my summer lift pass so I just chilled out and waited until Friday before the running shoes went back on.

It is great being back and not having to get up early to go and drive to the mountains , I lay in until around 10am then got up and ready and wasn’t out my door until 12.30pm , the bonus is that a run 50 metres on a road and then im on the trails , I went a run up to the refuge Bellachat and just came back down the same way. Its great for working on uphill and downhill strength as I climb from my house at 1070m all the way up to the refuge at 2152m.

It was not easy. I’m not sure what it was , it cant have been the altitude as its not really that high , it was mighty hot though and by the time I got to the Refuge I was pouring sweat. I was doing ok on the down until about the last 200 metres when my legs got very heavy.

Finally at the Refuge

The Trail back down

I’m not too worried about this , I have done a lot of training in Scotland lately and I must admit I didn’t expect to be feeling that worn out but I have been travelling since Monday and not really had any decent sleeps so I’m putting that to blame. I was door to door in 2hrs 20 mins which still isn’t bad considering the climbing I was doing and I did sit down for a chill at the top for about 10 mins but im sure I will get that time down over the season.

Not a bad view up to Mont Blanc

I was also testing out my new running pack , the Salomon Advanced Skin Slab 12 , Its a strange design and I wasn’t sure of it at first as its kind of like a vest and it has no shoulder strap adjustments , it does come in different sizes though. Well first run with it and I am sold on it , its amazing. Its super snug on the back , doesn’t move around at all, I never once on the whole run had to re adjust anything , it just fits perfect on the back. It also has handy little pockets for gels , a camera and the life saving Mars Bar. Yes its a touch pricey at 170 Euro but its a seriously good pack for distance running and although very compact it carries all the mandatory kit you need when running Ultras over here.

The New Pack. Apologise for the poor quality pic

And another of the pack for any of you interested

I don’t start back at work until 15^th June then next up is the Marathon on the 25^th.

The forecast is good this weekend and my mate Ally is off so I think the running shoes are going away and its up to the real mountains for some climbing.