My usual running track (here in torrential February rain and strong winds), Filey Beach - ten km of sandy bay, stretching from the end of my road to the start of the chalk at Speeton. Hard to imagine life without it, running or otherwise.
One year, 500 kilometres, and a truly humbling
£4,697 /
$6,385 for Turtle Doves later, and it's all over - my
#Couch2500k for the
#YearOfTheDove challenge is done! A few weeks early (I managed to nail it in less than eleven months) and way beyond my fundraising target (I was hoping for two grand), and after a beach run late last night, it's a wrap.
Anagach Woods, Highland. A particularly memorable evening in Caledonian Pine forest: a misty, beautiful session that got even better when I randomly bumped into my friend Simon, also running - which turned into an 8k trail run, setting the world to rights in the mud after dark.
If you donated and encouraged me along the way - and a
lot of you did - know that I massively appreciated every penny's worth of your goodwill, and every penny helped propel me towards the finish line.
Saltburn-by-the-Sea, September - early a.m run with a killer hangover after my mum's 75th celebrations. I can still feel the throbbing temples
Traditionally, my commitment to such things is, well, erratic at best, and there were many occasions - often involving cold, wet weather, strong winds, tiredness and lethargy - when I
really didn't feel like it, and could easily have put the kettle on/cracked a beer and kicked back on the couch instead. But it was the motivation of why I was doing it (see below), and most potently, the generosity of the lovely folk who coughed up for the cause via my
Just Giving page, that kept me in the game throughout.
Eyemouth, autumn - Snow Buntings and Twite joined me for this one
Even in the worst of conditions (external or internal), all it took to get me off off my lazy arse was a look at the latest roll call of donations; it's amazing what guilt can do, and it did all the right things at all the right times. I'm still genuinely overwhelmed with the support; there are so many good people out there, and it's given me much cause to remember that, with a comforting regularity.
Full-on, shirt-off, growling psycho mode for this 10k to Speeton Sands and back, around midnight one night back in December. It wasn't pretty, but it ate up some kilometres towards my target and improved my mood greatly, so who cares?
So why did I do it? It's been a privilege and pleasure to be involved in
Champions Of The Flyway - the international conservation campaign which fundraises for and spotlights projects to save migratory birds, especially from illegal hunting - for some years now. COTF '21-'22 -
The Year Of The Dove - brings together not one but four recipient Birdlife partners (Malta, Greece, Turkey and Cyprus) in a multi-pronged campaign, involving campaigning and lobbying decision makers, exposing and spotlighting the Turtle Dove's plight across the flyway, and raising vital funds for a variety of co-ordinated projects on the ground.
On the south bank of the river Humber at Killingholme. A regular location for my bird surveys, involving full estuary counts every two hours - so if and when possible, I fitted in a 5 or 6k between counts. Effectively a private running track, even better on calm, mild days, like this one in November.
100% of the money goes straight to helping fund those projects, from community engagement, to lobbying, satellite tagging, direct action, research and much more - vital funds that make all the difference for small, cash-strapped NGOs desperately and passionately trying to turn the tide in their respective backyards. You can read more about the cause, and past campaigns,
here.
Killingholme again, looking downriver - always swirling clouds of shorebirds to enjoy while plodding up and down between industrial sites.
So how was the running? Brilliant, crappy, inspiring, laborious, joyous, grim, wet, dry, cold, warm, sleety, sunny, rainy, windy, muddy, fun, hard, really hard, easy, challenging ..... take your pick. But overall - pretty great, if I'm honest. As an out-of-shape (almost) 50 year-old with foot osteoarthritis, asthma and zero previous, it was never going to be pretty, but a combination of the cause, the support, and the selfish benefits of improved mental and physical health comfortably overshadowed any hard luck stories.
Filey seafront - frozen beard sleet, crunchingly audible even above the podcast in my earbuds
And, not to be fatalistic, but for whatever reasons it may be that I'm not able to run as much as I am right now in the future, and so there's also been a real enjoy-it-while-you-can aspect to the challenge. The beach here at Filey is a wonderful place to do the vast majority of my running, and while it can be pretty exposed (and the wet sand is more of a challenge than roads or similar), it's such a blessing to have almost ten kilometres of beach right on my doorstep. I've run on the beach in hot sunshine, snow, sleet, thunderstorms, bright, full moonlight and thick fog; I've run straight into the sea afterwards on many occasions, and had ice in my beard on others.
Shetland, October - a run memorable not only for being cold, wet and very windy, but also hilly. Ouch.
While unfortunately confined to these islands over the period due to the plague, I've been lucky to enjoy plenty of travelling around the UK during my challenge year, which means I've run in many other places, too; on the beach at Saltburn, in driving rain on Shetland, along the Humber at Killingholme, at Spurn and Kilnsea, on the clifftop at Eyemouth, in the Caledonian pine forest of Anagach, and on the skunk-infused streets of urban Bristol.
Two weeks guiding at Spurn in late autumn meant dragging my sorry arse out for runs after long days in the field with clients. Here outside the Crown and Anchor after a memorable run that incorporated laps around the Warren and Kilnsea wetlands, and three owl species (Little, Barn and Short-eared) at the latter.
So now it's done, thanks again to all those who chipped in and supported me, it really means the world.
