Hi everyone,

welcome back to Neb’s blog after quite a long spell off - we’re gonna fix that now and make a committment to monthly updates as a start. Hey I guess many of us experienced tumultuous times in 2009 but hopefully we’re on the up again - it certainly seemed so at the Ordnance Survey Outdoor Show last weekend (This is the UK’s largest outdoor show, held in Birmingham England)!

As part of the Wilderness Camp, organised by Bushcraft and Survival Magazine, the show was manic on the Staurday and Sunday, so much so that it was difficult to grab a bite to eat even!

Some of the highlights from the North Ridge stand were:

Launching the UKs first Survival Instructor certificate

(Yes there are in-house courses available, and also some bushcraft courses but not like this one!) This course will run, for people with existing outdoor experience over a full year, allowing plenty of time for consolidation plus plenty of exposure to the good old British weather - with modules in England, South Wales, Snowdonia and the Scottish Highlands we’re pretty much guaranteed to get it all!

Key to the Instructor course, will be the establishment of a new hierarchy of needs as framework to what we do, and all decision making as part of a group - obviously whilst retaining flexibility. As they say - no plan survives contact with enemy! For a civilian course it’s also going to have some interesting content on the subject of hostile environments when we may not want to be ‘rescued’ by the first people to happen along - how can we evade and if necessary protect ourselves and groups?

Another unique element to this course will be our ability to train candidates in a variety of operating environments - not only will all the usual woodland based skills and drills be covered (and some not-so-usual ones also) but we will be fully exposing candidates to the rigours of mountain survival - what does it mean, how does it feel etc.. part of this phase will be dealing with steep ground (use of ropes and improvised equipment for climbing, rapelling and other techniques) and water - river crossings, flotation methods and the like..

 We have quite a network of instructors whom we will be inviting as guests at various times throughout the course - one guy I want to introduce you to is Perry McGee, 

Perry Mcgee

 who is a highly knowledgeable survival instructor and tracking expert in his own right, as well as being son of the (late) Eddie McGee. If you don’t know who he is please Google him and keep your eyes out for The Tracking Handbook which he will be releasing soon….

Also a huge draw at the show - the announcement of our next race. This one is styled on the ‘Long Drag’ the famous SAS endurance march in the Brecon Beacons which has been written about so much…hitting the spot with a full 70 Kilometres (half distance option) the competitors will need to carry a 40lb bergen over those rolling green hills - to all those folks who said ‘that’s not very heavy’, I look forwards to receiving your entry form….take it from me, everyone who completes this event inside the 20hours will have achieved something spectacular for themselves. Of course a race like this wouldn’t be complete without those old warhorses who simply don’t know what quit means…some of our contestants will KNOW they can do it, just a bit slower these days!! Entry for this can be done at www.runnersworld.co.uk as well as www.northridgeadventure.co.uk and for serving military please deduct 50% from the Bimble price (maybe donate the balance to H4H or RBL?)

Here I am at the end of the show, still smiling after 3 days of non-stop talking! One of the best things about exhibiting here is all the people you meet - some serious about training, looking to book courses, others just wanting a casual chat as part of their show tour, and many junior one-day outdoor folks, stopping by with their folks. I lost count of the fires we let the kids spark up over the weekend but every one was accompanied by big grins and I bet there’s back gardens all over being used for camp-fire lighting over this Easter holiday!

Watch this space for updates - I’ve got gear reviews and training plans to share and look forwards to your comments and feedback, as always…

till next time…

A friend of mine has been training for a half marathon, using an extremely detailed and scientific training plan. It seems to be working as her times get faster and faster, so I asked her what it was about a training plan that she liked? “It gives me focus” she said “so all I have to do is run!”

Many people ask me for training plans for the various endurance events we run at North Ridge Adventure, whether it’s for the Sleepwalker Night Race, the Welsh 3000s, or one of the military style challenge events such as the Fan Dance or Ultimate Endurance - Long Drag, so what I thought I’d start to do is to publish some training advice on this blog to give everyone who wants it a good heads-up on the training required.

Now before all the sports scientists get to grips with what I’m going to give you, let me just say that if anyone wants a BESPOKE training plan, then contact us and we’ll get that sorted out PDQ through Cathy , our fitness advisor. She’s the one with the Sports Science degree and the wall full of trophies! Having said that though, the rest of us have more than a passing interest in fitness and performance so as long as you don’t automatically believe everything we say, and use the advice as a general indicator which may or may not be suitable for you, then we’ll be good to go!

If it seems unusual to be advising against believing everything we/I say, then let me explain…

1st - we’re not out to make any money from giving out training advice - if it encourages people to come on a course, and because they turn up fit and ready, they have a great time and tell all their friends how much fun it was….that’s what we want.

2nd - everyone is different and it is IMPOSSIBLE to give specific detailed advice without meeting the person. Let me give you an example from my old climbing club..

We were sitting around in the bar one evening, after training on the local climbing wall, and big Charles (a caver - I know its wrong but its true) was telling someone about another lad’s Everest training which included walking up and down steep hills with 2 big paving slabs on an old frame rucksac! A fairly new recruit, who was a fit guy and well into the gym, took exception to this and was explaining how wrong this training method was, and why…to which he eventually got the response “well how may f****** 8000ers have you climbed then?” The point is, if it works for someone, it works, but it might not be for you - but it could give you a good idea for adapting to your own circumstances?

On similar note, when I ran the West Highland Way, I did so with a pulled hamstring - reason being my domestic situation meant I couldn’t train in the week so what I did instead was run 15 to 25 miles off road, virtually every Saturday for 5 months! Try find that one at www.runnersworld.co.uk (and while you’re there have a look at the Sleepwalker Night Race - it’s open for entries now)

I imagine most folks will find their own happy medium, involving a sensible bit of structure and hopefully, a bit of good old grit - at the end of the day it’s as important to train your head as your body, but we’ll discuss more of that later!

Dunc