Open Letter to Keith: Your First Trail Race

Hey Keith, so great to hear you’ve signed up for your first trail race. I thought I’d share some experiences from my first race so that you can avoid the mistakes I made. Last August, I took part in the “Utsukushigahara Trail Run & Walk”, a 70km trail race in Nagano. A few months earlier, I ran the Kakegawa Marathon and unnecessarily injured myself to the point where I only […]

2014 Training Progress Update #1

I’ve been trying hard this year to avoid posting boasting about my training on social media, instead leaving my workouts where they belong, on RunKeeper and Strava. But please let me indulge myself a little on my blog. 🙂 Three big races I have some big goals this year and am doing some big runs to prepare for them. The three big races I’ve set my sights on are: 1. […]

WAA MDS Ultrabag Review

I recently got a 20L WAA MDS Ultrabag. This is the official backpack for the Marathon de Sables, a 6-day, 250km foot race through the Sahara desert. I have no plans to do that race, but do intend to go on some multi-day adventures here in Japan. So far, I have used the bag for a 52km trail run and an 86km road run. I’ll assume that you’ve already researched […]