The Road to Snowdonia

 Maybe with everything going on over the last year it's pretty obvious as to why there is little to talk about. That's mainly why I thought I would write this blog post. Like many runners I have struggled for motivation going forward with seemingly every event I enter being cancelled and the virtual events not really doing it for me. Last year I entered relatively last minute into the Ultra Trail Snowdonia 50k which was inevitably cancelled. This year it has become my so called 'A Race' I know for a runner like myself the 50k 3500m+/- course will take everything just to finish but I have a desire to not only complete this time but to try and be a bit more competitive this time. I'm planning to try and train far more specifically and scout the entire course properly before hand.


I was fortunate that I am already quite familiar with most of the course having climbed all the main summits on separate occasions last summer (Moel Siabod, Glyder Fawr and Carnedd Llewelyn. Hopefully lockdown permitting I will be able to train on steeper and more continuous terrain in the peak district on the weekends. However with the race being at the beginning of June I am hopeful along with many others that training an racing will be more back to normal by then. For now though I am starting the build phase slowly increasing both my mileage and distance climbed each week.


The Ultra Trail Snowdonia is branded as the UK's answer to an alpine scale ultra-marathon. There are 3 distances none of which easy and this year the event was added to the Ultra Trail World Tour as an event that gives UTMB points and running stones which make qualification and entry more likely. 


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