A lofty subject.

"La fatica in montagna per me e poseia",

"Exertion in the mountains is poetry for me"
Marco Pantani.

Some people are mountain people. These are the effortless types, the sherpas who know the Himalaya like the back of their hand, great athletes like Kilian Jornet and Marco Pantani and the great chroniclers like Wainwright and Bonnington. These people share an innate connection to the high places of the world, an unbreakable almost inevitable bond of their body and mind to these places. You only have to watch a Youtube clip of Pantani ascending the Alpe D'Huez in the 1998 Tour to see that he and the mountain are not two distinct objects, Pantani's mind and body descends into chaos in order to scale heights of spiritual being that we can't imagine. No man on a bike can climb that hard without being embroiled in some quest to discover something fundamental about themselves, their character and their essence; I'm sure of that. Yet as this plays out to the onlooker and thereby in nature, Pantani is engaged in a performance with the Alpe, he is the epitome of poetry in motion, tapping away on the pedals as the mountain appears to yield before him. The same goes for Kilian Jornet, he seems to effortlessly glide over the terrain, eating the miles up. He doesn't work against the mountain, he is engaging in a dance with it; imprinting his soul upon it with every step. There are countless other mountain people who I am in awe of, Alex Honnold, Billy Bland, Joss Naylor, even Rob Hall whose death in the Everest climbing disaster gripped my attention from such a young age. Their achievements and attitudes instill the idea that they are not merely completing these amazing feats in the mountains, it is almost like they complete these feats with the mountains. In these moments; Pantani climbing to victory, Kilian ascending Aconcagua in record time, Alex Honnold free-soloing El Cap, they are synonymous with the mountain; the mountain is an extension of them and they are an extension of the mountain. They were born to be in the mountains, they are intrinsically linked to the spirit of the mountains; they animate the inanimate.

I love the mountains, I feel at home in the hills and high places. I don't quite remember the first time I actually recognised my enjoyment of them. I think the holy trinity of holidaying the Lakes as a kid, being allowed to watch 'Vertical Limit' and being taken climbing to Standedge when I was 6 or 7 are probably the root causes. I probably attribute 'Vertical Limit' with the most responsibility, I was gripped from the start- the life and death nature of choices, the scenery, the desperation and the camaraderie. As an impressionable young kid, I don't think there is any more of an awesome start to a film than people climbing in Monument Valley suspended hundreds of feet in the air when disaster strikes, all these new concepts in one action packed bundle. I don't watch the film anymore, I've probably not seen it since I was 12. I fear that it will ruin an awesome childhood memory through bad script writing or cinematography, but it really made its mark on my young brain. It just snowballed from there I guess.

 I remember staying at my dads and spending time reading about the Himalayas, Sunday afternoons spent making 'mountain top trumps' and drawing pictures of climbers going up big mountains in the Himalayas and then later the Andes, especially once I'd learned about Machu Piccu. I got the 'Horrible Geographies' series, I poured through it all but my favourite edition was by far 'Freaky Peaks'- learning about Mallory and Irvine, the tallest peaks on each continent, glaciation. Looking at the 1998 DK World Atlas, spending hours going through all the countries and finding the highest peak in each country, tracing the Pacific Ring of Fire, learning about tectonics and how British mountains used to be so much higher. Watching Touching the Void, seeing the Everest documentary at the IMAX, going to Oldham climbing wall the odd time. My teacher in Year 5 was a member of the Mountain Rescue so that gave me ample opportunity to ask countless questions, she'd climbed Mt McKinley- so I started learning more about North American mountains. Excuse the pun but I guess in hindsight these were the things that peaked my interest. In later life I remember discovering the Tour De France; stage 19 in 2008, Carlos Sastre launched a lone attack on the Alpe' to deprive Cadel Evans of the Yellow Jersey.....I was hooked, I've not missed a stage since that day, I've gone through the folklore of cycling immersing myself and feeling connected with the riders of the 60s and 70s- Simpson, Mercyx- real mountain men who left all that they had on the mountains of Europe, performing for themselves and the millions of people for whom their performances captured something inherently inspiring and human; the test of man with and against nature.

Discovering Fell-Running through Saddleworth Runners Club was my first foray into the outdoors under my own steam. I have to say, that was it for me, I realised I'd found my thing. I started to get academic about that too, reading about the Bob Graham round, memorising record times and race routes, reading into the history and spending far too much time on the fell running forums. I started regularly going up to the lakes doing things I'd never imagined I could do....11 hour runs through the night, supporting Bob Graham legs, mountain marathons. I found that I was put off the junior scene which was much more linked to 'athletics' and athletic prowess, whereas the senior scene and ultra-distance events (before they became a gimmick) were about experiencing the mountains, pitting yourself against nature. There are no coaches screaming at you during a fell race, just your quads, calves and lungs begging you to stop whilst your mind has to scream at them to keep going- it's masochistically brutal and so simple. I loved the scene, travelling to these amazing places with kindred spirits. Thankfully my parents have always been really cool so they let me do my thing, it would be Snowdonia one week, the Lakes the next, then a midweek race in the Peaks, maybe go and support friends doing the Old County Tops. I didn't necessarily race, I spent a lot of time watching races I wasn't old enough to compete in.

Nowadays I believe in running hard, I find hurting myself on a run to be cathartic. Hurting yourself on a road run is easy, you settle into a rhythm; 150 strides per minute is my average. The hills are less predictable, its natural, immeasurable- they make the rules. If it's snowing, windy, clag is down, the ground is soft underfoot, these all massively effect the experience that you're about to have. I've had some worrying experiences on days out; twisted ankles, almost getting hypothermic on the Welsh 1000m Peaks Race and dehydraton. If you take the rough then sometimes the mountains yield moments akin to religious revelation; sunset over Hall's Fell, clag clearing on the descent of Alphin, sun rise over Fairfield and many other special moments I hold dear. There's something beautiful about such a lack of control in an otherwise finely tuned world based around human need and desire. If I want a takeaway, a film, a video game experience they are all readily accessible, but that clag clearing was a finite moment, it's been and gone and will never be recaptured....now that's something really special eh.

I believe anyone who goes into the mountains (round here it's hills but the spirit is the same....it's a high place where the weather is usually awful, the terrain rugged, the views awesome and risk of death, if stupid, very high) imparts a part of their being into that terrain. When I run around the edges, or up Alphin or on the track up to Chew, I give a bit of myself to that place. I feel it when I run in these places, a self-assuredness, a knowledge that there is some element of oneness between me and the places I hold dear. There is something magical about a 20 metre patch of scree that the 16 year old version of myself used to seek out on every run because it made me imagine I was Billy Bland tearing it up on the Corridor Route on the way to setting the Borrowdale record. Or running up Wimberry pretending I was chasing Rob Jebb up the path to Great Gable in the 2009 Wasdale race wth memories stirred from seeing the pictures in the Autumn Fellrunner that so brilliantly captured my imagination. There is no doubt when I run in the Chew that I am no longer an outsider, a stranger to the valley, I feel like I have worm my heart on my sleeve, ran hard and earned some degree of unity with it. I enamoured myself with every little bit, leaving no stone unturned, exploring every path, nook and cranny, and as such I opened myself up completely to it.  

I don't think I'm like a Kilian Jornet or a Marco Pantani....not in accomplishments (I have two Strava KoM though, lets see Kilian take my 'Alphin ascent and descent') but maybe in my connection with the mountains. They are essential features of the greater story of the relationship between man and mountains, like The Busby Babes are an essential part of the Manchester United story. Any account of the history of mountain accomplishments must necessarily include what they did, they have defined what it is to exist in the mountains, they transcend any notion of mere human activity, a Duncan Edwards or George Best. I'm Bebe or an Obertan......a footnote, an irrelevance to all but myself in the grand scheme of things, a story which is complex and potentially the things I have done are interesting but they are not groundbreaking, they just are. The mountains are in unison with Jornet and Pantani whereas my relationship with the mountains is more symbiotic, more straddled with superlative and hyperbole on my side. I consider my running in the hills to be running hard not because of physical exertion but because I feel we aren't on a perfectly similar wavelength spiritually, I've worked hard but it's not innate. My dance up the hill is a struggle, like a Jackson Pollock painting, chaotic and not at one with the canvas upon which I paint, Pantani is like Cezanne, perfect brushstrokes that match the grain of the canvas so perfectly it's as if it was always there. I don't envy Kilian or Marco, the things they've seen or the things they've done because they've missed out on my experiences, the places I've been. They've never seen the Chew at sunset, felt the scree of Ashway Gap beneath their feet, drank from the streams above the valley- I'd wish these experiences on everyone, they're profound and deeply spiritual to me.....maybe their story is more important than mine in the grand scheme of things but it's no less beautiful or pure.