Petestack Blog

Two days (Thursday and Saturday), two runs I’d rate among the finest of their type anywhere, four famous Lairigs (Eilde, Gartain, Ghru, an Laoigh) and three fairly ordinary runners… (more…)

Last time I did Leum Uilleim (yes, the ‘Trainspotting’ hill!), I took the train from Fort William to Corrour. But today I did the ‘intégrale’ from my own door… (more…)

It’s common sense really, with long experience and the generally good judgement that comes with same not providing magic immunity from the simple facts… the proper place for discarded running shoes and tired insoles is the bin, not a rack in the porch in case they still prove ‘useful’ sometime! (more…)

It’s something most experienced runners probably develop a kind of sixth sense for… we all get (injury) niggles, but what matters and what doesn’t? Can I just keep running blithely on (today, tomorrow, next week), do I need to watch this or should I stop now? (more…)

It didn’t start as a plan to run 372 consecutive days. But salvaging just over 50% mostly ‘token’ running days from a busy final two months of 2015 seemed like pretty poor show, so I set about chasing a January ‘streak’ to make up. Then continued into the start of February for good measure before realising it was a leap year and starting to get further silly ideas… (more…)

A striking moment on this first day of 2017… I’d run up past the Grey Mare’s waterfall to the marble bench, then along to the cattle grid from where I can see the big pinnacle of the Aonach Eagach where I’d scattered part of my father’s ashes to wish him a Happy New Year. And then, just as I’d started back and was coming to the point at which that pinnacle’s lost from view, the corrie and glen my side of the pinnacles were lit up by streaming rays from the low sun behind the ridge to the south. Now perhaps it was just serendipitous timing, but still enough to stop me briefly to tell him again that I loved him. And then that magic light was gone, but you can see why folk have wanted to interpret natural phenomena as ‘signs’ since time immemorial! :-)

Make of the title what you will — an elegance I’ve admired in others but never had, a quasi-religious reference to the ‘soul-saving’ properties of a physical activity, a nonsensical attempt to compare said activity to a tune in triple time — but here are some thoughts about intangible things set down in something approaching tangible form… (more…)

Today’s (great) odd numbers are 273 and 99. That’s 273 consecutive days running, 99 to get my three-day 2015/2017 overlaps, 96 to complete the calendar leap year of 2016 and 93 for the year from my start date, so sub-100 no matter how you look at it! :-)

When you like balanced, even numbers, 248 and 124 has to be the best pair yet! :-)