Quote Originally Posted by Witton Park View Post
and just to wind IainR up

I'm not sure that the FRA would say they are there to "promote" fell running in each of the Home Countries. They are there to oversee it - the custodians of it perhaps - but shy away from promotion.

"A running guide should be ML qualified" - I would say it depends on the context and the terrain - not all fell running takes place in Snowdonia. Also, Qualifications are over hyped - I'd quite happily spend some time in the Lakes with Joss and I doubt he has a certificate and I'm sure there's plenty of Clayton Runners who are competent to guide on Pendle Hill.
I would suggest that a Running Guide should have appropriate experience for the terrain in which they are guiding.
I'd certainly agree that experience is key to leading groups and certainly there are many club runners out there who are capable of leading club runs however if you are talking about a guide as a prossesional(ie taking money for the service) then they really ought to be qualified to do that. "guide" as per Iains post is a proffessional qualification. An ML is the least I would look at, trained and assessed with experience to make safe decissions enough. a running qualification just adds to that.


Quote Originally Posted by IainR View Post
In this sense Mountain running is running in the mountains.. its for UKhillwalking.. for hill walkers..

Yeah you can differentiate fell running and mountain running but for the target audience there, they don't care about that difference.. I wasn't calling you numpty by the way, just I knew you'd get the 'we own the sport' lot coming on being semantic and just knocking away.. which I expected and enjoy.. :-)

I actually wanted to put a link earlier.. its been there a good week..

Re the guiding.. There are a few guides around. Steve Fallon up in Scotland does some I think, us in North Wales, then one in North Yorkshire (Jellylegs?), he posts on here, then people like IanDP will do some i think, then there are others. But a guide who actually claims part qualification.. yet lists experience, backed out of one race due to adverse weather conditions.. yet they are wanting clients to pay them to guide them through such weather.. its why experience may be enough, but it is fraught with dangers and you have to think about how the target audience can judge that experience..

Sadly it will take deaths in fell running and such like until we see the sport calm down a bit.. People can call it alarmist but the outdoor sports went through huge upheavels following Lime Bay and other disasters..

Also be careful with some of the 'run with x' weekends.. I won't name them, but I know of one weekend when the elite runner wasn't actually there.. so book through the person the directly..

If someone wants guiding, basically think what they want, look at the guides profile and see what they can offer. We mainly do intro and intermediate weekends for groups, but do some personal one on one guiding, which is normally 3-4 hr runs. But sometimes its just 1 hr a day, 5 days a week. for someone's holiday. A guy on holiday with the family, limited time and wants a blast on good routes.. others want run scrambles, other 3000ers work.. the dream jobs are always race routes.. take someone around a route talking them around the race.. being paid to do what you love doing..

Its interesting we also get walkers wanting to hire us and they'll almost brag on the hill that they have international runners as guides, it goes right back to the history of fell running. i.e. Guides races..

One of the top climbing guides calls it 'removing the pain'.. so that's what you try to do as a guide.. in todays society the relatively cash rich time are common, so we meet people with limited time and provide good runs in good scenery..

contacting local running clubs can sometimes provide some of that in other areas.
I'm running a Nav course for runners (full i'm afraid) next week to raise funds for the MR and will have 2 ML's and a couple of top Orienteers helping out.

I'm also looking at a similar scheme for the peak with another ML and top runner(he's a coach as well) I'm hoping to expand that to guided runs in scotland.

I regularly take walkers and runners round the PPP these tend to be corperate clients from the south coast. I agree that the PPP hardly needs a "guide" but there are many out there who just want to have a day out with the out having to think about the route/safety. same goes for the Nat PPP.

I'll not mention any more as I don't want to be seen to be advertising on here.