Alex James (the young - or old - folk here probably never heard of Blur but he played bass for them, drank huge amounts of alcohol, and then bought a farm in the Cotswolds to make cheese and write usually interesting but occasionally annoyingly twee and patronising columns in the Independent, mostly) is so close to understanding fell running that someone needs to get him some Walshes and an FRA sub...
Exhibit A:
"I got a pair of spikes, for running, completely different from clunky trainers. More like ballet shoes, they are supple and slender. They’d make quite nice slippers if you took the spikes out, and they come with a little key so that you can do just that. I’m not given to getting over excited about footwear normally but these clogs are a source of delight of similar proportions to my first pair of football boots or first aeroplane: things of beauty, totems of freedom.
I’m surprised you don’t often see spikes in the shops. I suppose we must all subconsciously cling to pavement, to tarmac. There’s evidently not much demand for cross-country running shoes as mine were quite hard to come by. In fact it took me so long to land a pair that when they finally arrived in the post I was quite happy to just look at them and showthem to people for a week or two, so colourful and glamorous they were. I knew as soon as I took them for a spin in the mud they would never be quite the same.
My goodness. When at last I did, I reckon I ran about 15 to 20 per cent faster. I flew right through puddles I’d normally tiptoe around, went bounding up hillsides feeling completely weightless. In a way it was better than flying an aeroplane. I felt I could go anywhere. I raced on and on. Normally a part of my rounds take me along a stretch of road that links two hamlets along the prow of a hill but running on tarmac in spikes is like trying to run in flippers. They forced me off the beaten track through dreamlike successions of silent unknown fields and pathways.
Warm sunshine on my face, ice still lingering in shady corners, along streams and over ancient ridges and furrows, I ran. Fleeting English meadows in the first throes of Spring. There is nothing so beautiful."
Exhibit B:
"All the rain has made "the going" quite exciting. Fields are difficult to cross at this time of year, lots of mud, sticks to the shoes like lead, but one of my favourite woodland paths has become a fast-flowing stream. Best fun I've had all week, silently running down that stream."
Exhibit C:
"I inadvertently discovered a new adrenaline sport a couple of weeks back: probably the oldest one of all – running through the woods at night. I've been basking in the long evenings, especially enjoying the calm of twilight but I mistimed it, set out on my rounds too late and got completely caught out, plunging headlong into darkness with, it has to be said, a certain amount of glee. I knew it was going to be a close-run thing when I set out so I had a head torch on but it was nothing at all like I expected.
The darkness came suddenly. It was still dusky on top of the hill but as black as black by the time I was in amongst the trees at the bottom of the valley just a couple of minutes later. My ears were sharpened. There were new noises: caterwauling and cooing, hooting and barking.
A neighbour had said to me just a couple of days before that he found those woods creepy. "What!" I said. "The woods? Creepy?? Pschaw." I do know the woods really well and feel at home there but they are another world at night.
His words echoed and rang between my ears as I fled full tilt down what I hoped were the right tracks. It was as scary as anything I can ever recall from flying in a helicopter gunship in a war zone to being caught out in bad weather at sea. The fear was all completely irrational. Those woods are no more dangerous at night than in the daytime and I'd been there just the day before picnicking among the bluebells but that didn't matter.
Irrational fears are the scariest ones of all. I was hanging on to that thought when a startled pheasant clucking and flapping in a panic stopped my heart.
By the time I was out of the woods the moon was rising huge and orange. The fields were benign and peaceful. I could see the glow of light of the farmhouse on the prow of the hill and it looked so warm and cosy and I was safe and I couldn't wait to do it all again."
Basically he's found out what most people on here already know, but by himself and doesn't yet seem to realise that it isn't odd, or mad, or special.... good on him for it.
B
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