I’ve always been up for challenging myself, seeing how much my body can do. Started off by small things like climbing 60 boulders in 60 minutes, to riding a certain distance on my bike. Then when the fell running developed from completed the Wainwrights, I became more interested in established challenges and routes.

Since living in the Lakes, and in particular the last 2 years I’ve broadened my horizons from the climbing and ticked off a lot of challenges, large and small. I’m going to list the best ones I’ve done; some you may have heard of already.

In 2022, the first silly challenge was one I made for myself, whilst following an established ultra fell running route. 22 Wainwrights on my 22nd birthday! It was 65km, 4500m elevation and it took me 12 hours and 20 minutes to finish. Next was the Welsh 3000’s, every mountain in Snowdonia above 3000ft. 47km with 3660m elevation. 2 days later I completed the Yorkshire 3 Peaks in 4 hours, another 30 something kilometres covered.

I was feeling quite fit at this point! The George Fisher Tea Round also got ticked off the list, 45.6km 3,200m covered in 8 hours 15 mins. That’s every fell from the George Fisher Café window in Keswick. A great day which took me on some new paths for once, a rare deal for me!

That was the running done for the year so turned my attention to the bikes. I entered my first enduro mountain bike race in Scotland, very physical day of riding through lots of mud, flat out and just a great experience to try something new. Road bikes next, completed the Fred Whitton challenge. This tackles the steep mountain passes of “The Struggle” on Kirkstone, Honister, Newlands, Whinlatter, Hardknott and Wrynose, as well as every hill in between. 172km, 3500m in 8 hours 20 mins became my biggest and most physical ride to date!

But just 1 month later, my sights were set on the Coast to Coast or C2C route. Starting in the Workington and finishing in South Shields, pretty cool to just ride my bike all day from one side of England to the other! I rounded the ride up to 200km which made it my new furthest distance on my bike, not even a flat tyre either! Bonus.

2023 came round and I had bigger ambitions than last year. Started off with an 8-stage downhill MTB race, which I hadn’t practiced on so rode it all completely blind. Bit mental but the rush of adrenaline and fast thinking and decision making made it very exciting. 35km in the baking heat and 1300m, hard work!

I completed my first proper climbing challenge. All the 36 Stanage VS starred routes from the 1989 guide. Bonkers day with Kristina, sub 12 hours, just. 538m of single pitch climbing and 76* in total, as well as navigating the routes from Stanage Popular End to Stanage Far North. Kristina took 11 epic leads and I did the remaining 25. It was a big day and I reckon the most amount of climbing I have ever done in a day!

Ticked off my first half marathon race, around the local area, Newlands Valley and Derwentwater in the September, absolutely chucked it down but was great for running in! 21.2km in 1 hr 44 mins. Really pleased with this one because I hadn’t been running much this year, and genuinely hadn’t ran more than 5km on the road before so there was lots of pb’s! Great experience, maybe I’ll try and train for a marathon one day!

I regularly swim in the mornings, anywhere from 500m to 2000m, so I thought I’d try something new again, a swimming challenge. The Frog Graham was the perfect one and definitely the hardest thing I’ve ever done so far. It involves swimming across 4 lakes, Bassenthwaite, Crummock, Buttermere and Derwentwater whilst summiting 18 Wainwright’s along the way. 14 hours 20 mins total, 62.26km covered and 4758m of vertical ascent and descent. I think I was the 150th person to have completed it, I wasn’t even fussed about the time just to stand on the steps of the Moot Hall again all that time later was a great feeling.

That was training for my triathlon I’d entered, 1 month later, I was on a mission! The Helvellyn Triathlon isn’t your standard race. It has a 1 mile swim in chilly Ullswater, in to a 40 mile road bike ride around the Helvellyn mountain range, with a climb up “The Struggle” in the last 5 miles and then straight in to a run up and down Helvellyn from Glenridding via Swirral Edge! 4 hours 49 minutes and 64th place, I was chuffed. My first triathlon was so much fun, combined 3 things I love doing. Perfect.

The final one of the 2023 year was the Hadrian’s Cycleway/Route 72 on the road bike. Worst chafe of my life made it hard to finish, gritted my teeth and reach South Shields, 12 hours later after setting off from Cumbria’s Sellafield station. 254km in one effort, definitely a crazy endurance challenge which has sparked plans for completing Land’s End to John O’Groats at some point in the future. 1913km?!

Bigger things were to come for 2024!