the what and the why

I’m sat here currently dosed up on anti-inflammatory pills, every now and again forgetting that I’ve sprained my ankle, only to stand up and be sharply reminded of said fact.

This weekend Matt and I headed up to the Lakes, as any regular readers will be well aware, to compete in the Saunders Lakeland Mountain Marathon. Well, I say ‘compete’, but really our main aim was to have a good time, find out what Mountain Marathons are all about and of course, to finish. I guess two out of three ain’t bad!

To cut a long story short, I must offer my humble apologies to all those generous enough to donate as unfortunately we didn’t actually finish. I managed to roll my ankle very early on on Saturday (in fact, before we’d even reached the first of out seven checkpoints). Of course, anyone with any real sense would probably have turned around and bailed there and then. Predictably though, I chose the stubborn and mildly farcical option of using a short length of duct tape to strap up the afflicted ankle and after taking a large dose of painkillers decided to carry on. Some six hours later we made it into the remote camp after having successfully hit all of our checkpoints. Mind you I could barely walk by that point, and I was cursing my old shoes that were slightly too big, the many bogs we’d trogged through, the wet patch on my arse where I’d slipped over in the mud, the horrifically steep bracken covered slope that constituted the final main descent (the race organizers were clearly sadists), the old sunburn I’d had that was blistering badly, and the new sunburn I’d acquired on my legs, as well as the pains in my ankle and knee.

All in all I hated most of it. The pain, the navigational cock-ups meaning we managed to add a few additional km onto our route, the heat and the sheer torture of it all. Every now and again though, I’d managed to catch glimpses of magic through my pained haze.

Matt was loving the midges at basecamp

I’ve never been a big fan of the Lake District. Too many people, too many tourists and people with no real appreciation of our mountain environment. This event granted me a slightly different view though – a view of areas well off the beaten track, still with lots of people, but people all out there for the same mad reasons as we were – we’re all at home in the hills. The weather was incredible, visibility beyond comprehension, with clear cloudless skies. Running along the tops was at once hell in knee deep bog, and heaven in the brief glances at what surrounded us. Even through the pain I'd look up and shout at Matt to look behind us, to just stop and see why we were there. More than once the vista took our breath away (which in fairness wasn’t too helpful seeing as the whole running thing is quite breathing intensive).

On Sunday morning we awoke to another incredible day, but it was with a deal of sadness and despondency that I made the decision not to run. My ankle had swollen up badly overnight, and my previously injured knee that had spent all of Saturday compensating for my ankle, had kept me awake by stiffening up and shooting pains up and down my leg every time I’d moved. We managed to grab a lift back to the start/finish, laid in the sun for a while and then set about finishing up and heading home.

As I sit here, occasionally swearing as I manage to bang my ankle against the table leg, the fact that I didn’t finish the race niggles at me. There was no way I could have continued, but it still grates. That’ll be my competitive side showing through I guess. The Rab Mountain Marathon is going to be in North Wales in September this year, so it looks like I may well have to have another go…

don’t you just hate it when…

http://www.charitygiving.co.uk/laurenrichardson

I hate asking people for money, I really do. Probably stems from the way I was brought up – part of a very poor family but with a whole lot of pride. Sure, we couldn’t afford any of the things other families could, like holidays abroad, fancy clothes or a big TV, but we did have pride – we were not charity cases and asking for money was very much frowned upon. Even as a teenager, if I wanted something, I had to find my own way to pay for it – asking mum or dad for money just wasn’t cool. Hence my getting into the world of engineering at the age of 16…but I digress.

Basically, this is a plea for help. Not for myself though - yes I’m critically skint, having lost most things I owned back in January’s house fire and now also having lost virtually all hope of any reasonable kind of insurance payout. We’ll just have to survive without a sofa or any chairs for a while longer (or until I find some more work!). This isn’t a plea for help for myself (cries of ‘but how can you afford to fly aerobatics if you’re struggling so much’ aren’t what I need right now – the answer to that question is actually really devastatingly simple: I can’t and my dreams are slowly dying as a result. But none of this is relevant and I’m not after sympathy). I don’t beg for money for myself, not for any reason, it’s just not my style.

I am however willing to beg for help on behalf of an organisation that has come to mean more to me than I’m likely to be able to express with any deal of eloquence.

Mountain Rescue Teams within the UK are groups of like-minded people, all willing and eager to give of themselves in order to help others. Now, whilst it may sound completely self-less, I can assure you it isn’t. The next time you meet a team member, ask them why they do it – there will be a whole plethora of reasons. Speaking for myself though, I choose to be a part of a team of people with whom I feel safe, that I trust and that I enjoy working and playing with. Life as a team member is a life of training and working, fighting energy reserves and pushing yourself to achieve things that feel worthwhile. In short it’s great.

Training for me has been eye-opening in many ways, getting to know so many different people with such varied skill sets – we have master navigators, climbers and rope work specialists, doctors, paramedics, police officers, dog handlers, carpenters, plumbers, outdoor instructors, teachers, athletes, engineers, IT workers…I could go on – each and every walk of life has elements that transfer across through people’s personalities into Search and Rescue work, and each and every person knows and does different things that we can all learn from at times. A team is a huge resource of skills and enthusiasm, and a truly fantastic environment to train and learn in.

Since joining I have learned to navigate properly, I’ve learned how to assemble and use a stretcher on a vertical crag face, I’ve learned how to take care of an injured casualty, how to search for someone missing from home, and how to remain positive in the face of extreme tiredness and adversity. For me joining a Mountain Rescue team was an entirely selfish thing to do – I thought I’d be able to get a whole lot out of it and become a more capable mountaineer, and I have!

We are volunteers. We fund-raise in order to remain operational. We pay to be a part of our own team.

We have a laugh and enjoy ourselves. We learn from each other and become better people for it. We do this as a hobby.

We go out in the middle of the night searching for people missing from home, people despondent and people lost on the hills. We recover the bodies of those who lose their lives in difficult places and situations. We head out in the middle of the working day to come to the aid of climbers and mountain bikers who fall and lay bleeding in need of help. We work with the RAF and the Air Ambulance to get people to help when they need it – and when things are too bad for the helicopters to do their work, we will be there to carry you. We are where the buck stops, and we love it.

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So any of you reading this, I apologise for you being on the receiving end of ‘yet another link begging for sponsorship for yet another ‘good cause’. I realise that money is tight for everyone and that there are a million and one different charities all begging for cash and vying to be deemed worthy of a donation. However I don’t apologise for asking – please help keep my team operating this year, help us to remain there for you 24 hours a day, 365 days a year whether you’re a climber, walker, biker or just someone living in our area.

Support us by supporting me as I’m stupid enough to be running this year in the Saunders Lakeland Mountain Marathon next weekend – I’m not fit, I’m not a fell runner, but I am keen, stupid and willing to give everything I can for the North East Wales Search and Rescue team – both operationally and through participating in these mad events.

Donation link here (I will love you forever if you give a few quid!): http://www.charitygiving.co.uk/laurenrichardson

what it’s all about

Helping people. That really is what it’s all about.

No-one has a ‘right to rescue’, and yet that’s what we do. It’s what we train for, week in, week out. It’s what we groan about when the texts come through, but once we’re out we just work. We go, we fight our own bodies heading onwards, moving upwards, moving, carrying, fighting the temperature and the terrain, finding ourselves exactly where we should be, where we’ve trained to be.

We laugh at each other, poking fun at one another over fitness, pack size, loads carried, complaints made, clothing worn, food eaten. We are a team. This is what we do.

Last night’s callout was the typical type of long-winded tough search that we as a team are so used to – acres of woodland, marsh, thick foliage and fallen trees. Hours of searching, focussing and hoping we’ll find something before dark. Of course darkness still comes, and out come the torches – each team member lit by headlamp and powerful hand held search torches, illuminating the same terrain, still tramping through the sort of woodland you only ever hear about in fantasy stories – woods and wasteground full of thick flesh ripping brambles, deep, stinking, boot sucking marsh, branches impaling us from the big knurled trees towering overhead – trees that are home to the night birds that startle and scream as we move beneath them, in turn startling us, granting us a new audible clarity of the pace of our own hearts.

Long hours spent in the field, constantly observing, shouting out for those for whom we are looking. Sounds occasionally fill the air – shouts for the missing person, radio chatter between callsigns I can never remember, banter and insults being thrown between comrades and the all important voices of concern calling out to make sure we’re all still together and won’t end up also hunting for one of our own.

Tonight’s callout was in stark contrast to that of the night before – a climber had fallen and was in need of rescue. A known quantity, someone needing to be helped. We are a team, this is what we do.

Hauling ourselves up the hillsides, helmets on as we traverse beneath loose crags and terraced scree slopes, carrying everything we need to care for and evacuate our casualty. You never hear a complaint when people are working – the banter stops, everyone does exactly what needs to be done. When it really matters we are seamless, we come together like clockwork. The casualty is laughing as we work around her, making sure everything is done right and that everyone is safe.

Smoke flares are lit and the helicopter circles then comes in. We all cower beneath the crags, a few members shielding the casualty as the downdraft sweeps over us, all of the equipment neatly piled out of the way. Eyes glance occasionally upwards through the hurricane as the big yellow beast hovers over us, the winchman heading down to begin the evacuation.

After a while they’re gone and everything is suddenly quiet. There is no helicopter, there is no casualty, it is just us. Still focussed we gather the equipment, each item silently taken up, and together we walk back to our normal lives.

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Last night’s search: http://www.newswales.co.uk/?section=Community&F=1&id=21531

Pictures from tonight’s rescue: http://www.flickr.com/photos/gerald-davison/sets/72157626977583662/

 

We are volunteers. We receive no funding – everything it costs to keep our Rescue Team out on the hill, in the towns and on the moors, comes to us through our own efforts at fundraising. It isn’t easy. Our hardest days are often those days we spend out manning stalls, shaking buckets, talking to people and just trying to raise the awareness of the public that so often need us.

I spend my time with the team out on the hill on the ‘frontline’, working and battling to do what we do, the work that we train for, but I also work behind the scenes along with a good many of our members, simply helping to keep the team running every day. My role is minimal, I’m not going to pretend otherwise – I spend my time coordinating and working with, designing, testing, repairing and maintaining all things radio and communication related, because it’s what I’m paid to know and to do in my professional life. Our radios are critical to allowing us to work and communicate efficiently, safely and securely. My role just helps keep the lines of communication working for us as a live Rescue unit, and yet it involves many hours of work in the ‘downtime’ – and my hours are far, far less than those of the Team Leaders’, the Secretary, the Training and the Equipment Officer to name but a few. None of this is paid and yet it still costs.

I hate fundraising. I’d far rather be out on the hill for 12 hours than to spend 2 hours on the street with a bucket begging people for loose change – so I’m taking a slightly different approach. This year I’m hurting myself!

In October I will be running the Snowdonia Marathon in aid of NEWSAR, but in the meantime my major efforts are focussed on the Saunders Lakeland Mountain Marathon, which is taking place on the first weekend of July. I will be running this with a very good friend of mine, Matt Knight, despite neither of us being fell runners.

We are both training hard, spending hours sweating, swearing and occasionally bleeding as we try to become fit enough to run our race. We’re also both spending wads of our own money on entry fees and equipment to allow us to compete (although our soul aim is simply not to finish last!).

This race for me is a personal challenge, but also a means to raise awareness and funds for the team with which I serve – please help us out and give a couple of quid via the link below and on the side of the page here – it really does all help.

http://www.charitygiving.co.uk/laurenrichardson

the new year

My blogging of late has been horribly lax, and my simple explanation as to why, is simply that I’ve had nothing to say, nothing I’ve wanted to share. I’ve been ill for what seems like weeks now, in fact ever since my ascent of Maesglasau Falls with Dave I’ve suffered a whole series of setbacks – first the bout of food poisoning that left me totally empty in more ways than one, then what I have termed the ‘uber cold’ (it wasn’t the ‘flu, but it did leave me feeling as weak and lethargic as my last bout of real ‘flu did), and now some inexplicable round of serious infection in my lip and gums.

So basically, thus far, 2011 hasn’t really been my year. I feel drained, horrendously unfit and pretty disappointed in myself. Plans had been forged to enable this winter season to be incredible – I spent most of the summer training my fitness, my strength and psychological levels were good, and then work came and after that the seemingly never-ending period of illness. It all feels like such a waste.

So, now I’m sat here, dosed up on antibiotics, still in a fair amount of pain (stupid gum infection), slightly depressed about how things have been going, but also feeling positive that I’m going to turn it all round.

Plans for more Winter forays are being made, partners are being sought out, training is starting to be done to get me back into a fit enough state to survive the Ben Nevis walk-in. Of course my trip to Rjukan in March is still enough of a way off that I may yet still be capable of climbing that WI6 I’m lusting over, so all is not yet lost!

I’m also working harder with my Mountain Rescue stuff – this weekend should yield some hilarity with my Helicopter and winch training scheduled for tomorrow at RAF Valley (I can’t wait!!), and next weekend is the ‘Casualty Care’ course, for which I have been struggling to study but mostly failing because I find the text book such hard work – I just hope I can retain enough from the course to pass the exam in February!

If all that weren’t enough, I’ve set up a couple of pages to raise some money for NEWSAR (North East Wales Search and Rescue) through two events I’m now signed up for:

Sponsor me (and Matt) in the Saunders Lakeland Mountain Marathon (my first ever MM) here: http://www.charitygiving.co.uk/laurenrichardson

Or, if you’re more of a road runner, sponsor me (and Matt again) to run the Snowdonia Marathon (my first road marathon) in October, here: http://www.charitygiving.co.uk/laurenrichardson2011

Both of these events will be serious tests of my resolve and my motivations, as I’m going to be putting in some real training efforts for both of them. The Snowdonia Marathon in particular scares me. I’ve never run that kind of distance before, and I’m out of running shape at the moment, but I’m determined not to embarrass myself and as such will also be participating in a few shorted distance races in the lead up (one of them will hopefully be the Lake Vyrnwy half-marathon, if I can ever manage to book a place, and I’m also now toying with possibly entering the ‘Race the Train’ event in Tywyn in August…should be an interesting year!)

Tips and encouragement will all be much appreciated, and I will be keeping the blog updated through the year with progress on how our training is going for each event. I’ll also be pointing out the links more and more as the time draws closer.

running out

Running.

I've contemplated doing some serious distances but I just find it all too tedious. Went for a run this morning  - did 7.1miles (11.4km) in 1hr12mins or so, which is pretty slow really (but my circuit laps are incredibly hilly- I used to be much much faster when I was running on flatter surfaces, and I guess I still would be). It’s the first time I've pushed that kind of distance in a while and boy did I feel it towards the end.

Have you ever had a weird sensation of cold when running? Like you've just crossed that barrier of having used all your readily available calories and your metabolism doesn't seem to know what to do, so you feel cold and almost shivery, even though you're running just as hard as you were before? This morning was the third time I've felt like that, it's almost like an extreme fatigue where mentally you just can't imagine being able to finish the route - you've given everything and now you're running out, but you keep going anyway, one step at a time, you grit your teeth and keep going, swallowing the pain and the nausea until eventually you're done - and you hadn't even realised...

I’m not sure if I’m really cut out to be a runner, it’s just not my ‘thing’. Part of me wishes that I could suck it up, train and go run a marathon (a friend of mine got me thinking about this – he’s been a real inspiration to keep me going of late so thank you Anders), it seems like one of those things that you should do at least once in your life and what’s more, it would make my Dad proud. So maybe I should – I’d love to see the look on his face as he stood at the finish line waiting for me. He used to run and compete alot, he ran marathons – running WAS his ‘thing’. I’m sure he is proud of me, and of all the things I’ve achieved so far, but it doesn’t stop me wanting to make him smile and feel that warm glow inside, the one you get when someone you love does something amazing and you feel good to be a part of their small circle. So yeah, a marathon…I’m going to have to think on that one…

So anyway, this week is [hopefully] going to be a turning point for me – I’ve decided that because I still don’t have to go to work, and the main reason I left the world of the employed was so that I could train harder, get fit and become a better climber (well that and so that I wouldn’t end up killing my bosses), I am actually going to get my act together and start training properly. Too little effort, too much time spent reading, watching DVDs, cooking, eating cake, and just generally being lazy of late has not been helping me in my quest – so this week that all changes. I just need to resist the calling of the scones…