France: six wings, four tents, two cars, one weekend.

Paragliding… Robin and I first tried it under the confident guidance of Alex Ledger of Sky School back in 2011. A small hill in Dorset, perfectly formed, funnels a bubble of air smoothly up and around it creating a perfect paragliding spot in miniature. We jumped off the top, and floated to the bottom a hundred feet below. No drama, and seriously exciting… Like driving a car at twenty miles an hour for the first time.

Then in March this year Jack Marrian pushed Robin and later, me, off a mountain in Val D’Isere. Over a thousand feet from launch to landing, this was a different game. No wind made for a gentle descent to a snowdrift landing near the tracks I’d been running on all week. It was something else, the resort spread out like a model village below, cable cars climbing up past the descending glider and neon skiers zipping down narrow runs. It had to happen again. Fast.

Jack banded a bunch of us together, six in total, and we arranged the dates. We’d fly in May to Geneva, pick a valley and a flight school and get some proper training in. With two experienced friends, Ioan and Al, Jack would go off flying the gnarly stuff while us fledglings took lessons. Robin and I joined Tom and Tree (Katrina) and, with a strong recommendation from a British local pilot Dennis Trott, booked a course with La Centre Ecole Parapente du Mont Blanc at the foot of the highest mountain in Europe.

We soon realised this was going to be an encompassing course. Jean-Marc Benezech has ten years of flying behind him and knows the risks of floating hundreds of metres over hard ground on nothing but silk and string. A magic carpet has more substance. We were told in the nicest, firmest terms that we weren’t there to fly. Just to learn. If we weren’t ready to fly, forget it.

Two days of theory, ground handling and control techniques followed. It was tough: running hard down the training slope battling the glider above you, packing it up, climbing the hill, setting off again. By day two we were old hands.

Day three, our last of the weekend and our first day of flight. We were prepared, we were keen, we were up and out of our tents in no time, fueled by a huge meal at le Snackshack the night before and Jack’s stories of their thermal-powered soaring high above our nursery slopes. It was on!

Or it wasn’t. Thick fog shrouded the valley side and the high launch site at Plaine Joux was buried in a mass of cloud. Our nerves relaxed, we deflated, and waited.

Three long hours later and it began to lift, an hour after that Robin took off, closely followed by me, then Tree, then Tom. We were in the air one at a time, guided by Jean-Marc at the launch and his friend Manu at the landing. With careful instructions they talked us through eight hundred vertical metres, and many kilometres of flight. It was fantastic: a panorama of mountains and gliders, a three dimensional world, a petrified first-time pilot with a huge smile sinking slowly earthwards. That first flight was exhausting. With no knowledge of normality in the air the smallest shiver from the glider fires adrenaline straight through you. It was fantastic.

We had time for one more each that day, and we relaxed into it, flying higher, faster and farther than before. It’s fair to say we’re all hooked, and we’ll be back. The Alps, Dorset, further afield. For now though… Merci Jean-Marc!

Oh, and CLICK HERE for Tree launching from Plaine Joux on her first flight!

This is a classic Cambridgeshire lane – gentle gradient through arable – perfect for a 40k Sunday evening ride, even in the rain!

Packing for a weekend of racing is getting easier, but not much. There are a bunch of things – compass, sharpie, bike – which are always needed and hard to forget. After squeezing the cacophony of necessary gear into my venerable Sak-A-O (holdall) I’m usually hopeful that nothing’s forgotten, but sometimes have that nagging feeling.

This weekend was one of those, but luckily it’s nothing major… only my bike helmet. Damn!

Last weekend was pretty close to ideal. After a late night faffing with gear and bikes on Friday it was an early start on the Saturday to pack the car and set off from Cambridge for the Peaks with Russ. Squeezed into the tiny Lupo, with two mountain bikes and a pile of all sorts, we buzzed north on empty roads chatting about adventures and Antarctica. By midday, after checking in with the owner of a camping field outside Alstonefield, we were on our bikes and off to find some fast riding and explore the area.

The next morning we would be racing against each other in the Haglofs Open 5, a 5 hour adventure race organised by Open Adventure. Based out of Alstonefield it would take us all over the area, so getting the lie of the land was pretty essential. In the bright spring sunshine a few hours on a mountain bike was little hardship anyway!

We couldn’t say we went fast, but it was good riding and a few hours later we were back at the camping field to switch to trainers and set off running. The running was fantastic. Good trails. Great scenery and enough interesting terrain to keep anyone engaged. The geology of the South Peaks is limestone, so over the years the river have carved great clefts, caves and gullies through otherwise quintessentially English country-side. Some rivers just done appear to flow anymore, leaving dry beds behind on the surface while the main body of water moonlights underground!

Arriving back at the camping field in the early evening Russ popped up his mountain marathon tent and I set up my tiny Vango Apex, both dwarfed by the gigantic canvas palaces elsewhere in the field. Katie was staying at a campsite just down the road supervising a DofE Silver expedition so I went and met them in a pub while Russ bedded down and watched the thermometer fall.

Frost greeted us first thing next morning, as we’d known it would. Around 4am I awoke chilled to the bone, grumbled my way into my down jacket, and tried to get back to sleep using a water bottle as a pillow… with little success. Bof.

Suddenly though there was no time to worry about frost. With only a couple of hours till race start and a million time-sapping things to organise the morning slipped quickly into sharp focus. Five minutes later (seemingly) and the starting deadline was approaching. With map marked, kit ready and head screwed on roughly the right way round I stood next to my bike in transition wondering whether to start on foot or on wheels. There didn’t seem to be much in it on the course, but starting the wrong way could ruin any plan!

I made the call with a minute to go before the deadline and set off on foot. The course was well laid, and 16km later I was back at transition with a decent sweep of points in the bag and only one or two small nav errors on my route.

Switch to bike and out onto some of the fastest riding I’ve ever had in a race. Everything was bone dry so the bike flew. I changed my plan early for a more conservative route, cutting in across the race area instead of taking the long circumference. In hindsight I could have stayed out, but it was safer to have some space on the clock in case my nav, or anything else, slowed me down. Fortunately all went to plan and I scooted in with a leisurely 7 minutes to spare after 5 hours of racing, with 515 points on the board (of 600).

Turns out this was enough to put me in 8th for the race, lifting me to 8th in the series after racing 3 of the 5 races, putting Tri-Adventure in the top ten. Very happy, and there were strong results from the rest of the Tri-Adventure squad and from Russ, who beat me into 4th place in the male solo class for Camracers with a really strong run!

Definitely coming back next year… and certainly with more certainty than Russ and I getting back to Cambridge on Sunday night… as we missed our motor-way junction and tootled on towards London!

The photos in this post were taken from Open Adventure’s facebook album, with thanks to the photographer James Kirby.

Here’s a link to my first ever video blog… Last week I was in Val D’Isere, staying in a chalet in Le Joseray, slightly away from the main town up a south-trending valley. Behind the chalet and into the mountains beyond ran a prepared snow path (they criss-cross the resort): bashed, compact snow very similar to the skiing pistes. I decided to follow this as far as I could and, after passing a fantastic frozen waterfall, reached the Refuge at Les Fonds des Fours. Sadly that was as far as the path stretched, but the run was brilliant and a welcome change from skiing. The only slight hiccough in my non-crampon plan… descending was a lot trickier than I’d imagined!

Three days in Val D’Isere, with bashed pistes, fast skiing, hot sun, and my quads are burning. Skiing on powder is naturally slower, but more aggressive. On the hard, clean pistes we’ve got this week there’s less chance to stop, more chance to ski fast and keep skiing. It’s exhausting and brilliant.

Bashed pistes make for good skiing in a fine weather week, and are far better than the cut-up moguls that form on un-bashed pistes without fresh snow. It’s tempting to go too fast though, and we’ve had to hunt for the runs with some sort of texture.

With marathon-training friends Claire and Jack, and climber Rich, out here too, it’s awesome to get out running and bouldering in the evenings between apres and dinner. There’s some good snow-paths around the resort and a small traversing wall. Just shattering at altitude.

The nights are getting later though, and with busy days this might turn into an endurance holiday!

This time last year Sam Dell, Jon Moorley and I did the Evans Sportive, starting and finishing at Sandown Park. Sam dropped us about half way round the 70 mile course, leaving Jon and I to gorge at the food stations and catch flying Boost bars on fast descents. It was a good, long day in the saddle… So we thought we’d do it again this year.

With a 5 hour adventure race (the North Downs Open 5, race report to follow) on the Sunday, I was half hoping the boys would choose one of the shorter rides. Jon hadn’t been on a bike since July (his last Ironman) so I suspect he felt the same, but Sam was having none of our cheese-eating! So we set off on the longest course available early on Saturday morning, riding into drizzle that built steadily into rain, and sped down and through the Surrey Hills. Jon decided on discretion over valour, taking the gentleman’s exit onto the (60 mile) medium route after about 3 hours. Sam and I pressed on. I soon found myself cycling alone, Sam and his pneumatic legs a hazy memory on the horizon ahead of me. So I span the pedals onwards along twisting, overhung forest tracks, between fields scythed by black bitumen and past the most beautiful houses outside of London. When the pink way-markers turned me back North towards Sandown Park I was looking forward to the last two big hills of the route: Whitedown and Westcott, but admittedly the end of 7 hours and 100 miles in the saddle looked pretty attractive too!

I joined the boys back at Sandown for the final half hour of the Triathlon Show there and caught up with Johnny Mayne on the Tri-Adventure stall too. Mixing the sportive with the show is ideal, I’m insufficiently retail-savvy to cope with a full day of shopping, even if it’s gorgeous bikes and super-expensive gear. Next year? Most likely!

My Dad’s taken a berth on the phenomenal schooner Windrose for the RORC Caribbean 600 race this week. He’s out there with my uncle and other friends tearing around islands in a close fight with the other schooner in the race, Adela. For a man who’s grown up sailing small offshore racers around the Channel it’s got to be an awesome experience! Here’s the latest from the RORC:

The RORC Caribbean 600 has two magnificent schooners racing: Greg Perkins, skipper of Adela and Windrose of Amsterdam, skippered by Alex Howard have barely been apart since the start of the race. Hugh Agnew, Adela’s navigator, called in by satellite phone as the two Spirit of Tradition yachts rounded Tintamarre. Adela was on a tight reach, all 300 tons of her doing 13 knots:

“I don’t think there has been more than two miles between us since we began. It has been a fascinating encounter and one that is all about boat on boat tactics,” said Hugh. “We had a heroic tacking duel through the Anguilla Strait. The leg down to Guadeloupe looks like a tight reach in building breeze, classic conditions for these awesome yachts. We have just cracked off after rounding Tintamarre. We have an enormous amount of sail up and we have opened up a ¾ mile lead but no doubt Windrose will catch us up and we will have another bout of energy sapping sail manoeuvre on the south side of Guadeloupe in the early hours, I have to say this is a truly epic race.”

Very very very very very very very very very jealous.

Katie dropped me off in Ditton Green this morning to run back into Cambridge along Devil’s Dyke and the River Cam. Estimating the distance on the map it looked like 16miles or so on tracks and paths, which should take me just over 2 hours.

I packed the basics – phone, money, keys – and then added a bunch of “useful” bits and bobs to get the weight up to about 5kg. Finally a cereal bar, banana and a litre of squash. Even though I would be running over lunchtime that would normally be enough on a good breakfast… I hate running hungry!

The route shows how straight the Devil’s Dyke is. One of the UK’s largest Anglo-Saxon earthworks, it was built to separate the warring Viking and Anglo-Saxon populations. It’s a 10metre high barrier of earth with a deep ditch on the south side: formidable to attack from the side, but perfect to run along. Undulating, cutting through woods and fens, it’s the highest feature for miles around in the flat fenlands.

After an hour and a half at a steady 5.30minutes a kilometre including stops it was pretty clear I’d underestimated the distance to run. With about 20kilometres left I had a couple of hours to go, but I’d already eaten the cereal bar and the banana was calling!

I crashed about an hour from Cambridge. Luckily on a cool day in February I had plenty of squash left so a quick stretch/stop and a big drink and I set off again, but the lack of energy was crippling. My pace slowed to over 6minutes a kilometre, dragging the average for the run up to 5.50minutes per kilometre or so. I wasn’t tired, and everything was moving properly with no niggles, but I was absolutely starving!

Lesson learned (again)… always take spare food. Gorgeous day for a long jog on an ancient monument though!

Here are my splits from the Street O in Highbury last April… Highbury

And here’s yesterday evening’s Brockley O… Brockley

The difference is pretty marked, lower heart rate and longer stationary in the Highbury O implies I was navigating far more slowly. Yesterday evening was faster on foot, and on the map. Good news, but a long way to go yet!