SORRY FOR THIS VERY ROUGH DRAFT!  PICTURES TO FOLLOW. Total 6th March 2012 = 16,172km for 377 road days 33km today

MANY THANKS TO KEVIN FLOOD,LARRY DOHERTY, PAUL JOYCE AND KEVIN MOORE FOR MAKING THE NEXT WEEK OR SO COMFORTABLE FOR ME! THANKS LADS YOUR SUPPORT IS VERY MUCH APPRECIATED

Two nice days running took me from Pasto to the Ecuador border. The first day was 44km and as always the traffic was hectic. That night I stayed in a nice resort called Los Toboganes having bargained a few dollars off after flashing my business card. The next day 38km took me right up to the border. On the way I noticed more and more people wearing ponchos, more the traditional garb of Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia. I feel I am making progress now. Having touched the border I returned to Alex´s house in Pasto.

MY GREAT FRIEND ALEX IN PASTO. LUBIA WAS PHOTO SHY!

 Colombia has now been run so it´s time to prepare for Ecuador. I will carry my circa 16kg bag over the border in a couple of days.

COLOMBIA HAS BEEN RUN! nOW FOR ECUADOR!

I will then mail it to Richard in Guayaquil, which is about two thirds my way thru Ecuador, not quite at the Peru border but near enough. My bag contains running shoes, running clothes, socks, and such luxuries as vitamin tablets which I count out for the next country. Also conditioner cream for my feet which I treat every night. I also have a heavy duty sleeping bag and other equipment that I change out for the forth coming challenges. Alex and his wife Lubia, a Russian free-lance journalist couldn’t have been nicer or more helpful. Lubia is expecting their first child, a girl in April. They are so easy-going it´s incredible… Though the baby is due in April they are talking about coming out to meet me on the road in Peru around that time! Lubia has been living here two years now. She met Alex at the carnival in Pasto. So I returned to the border and carried over my support bag. I will return to the border tomorrow and start running Ecuador. I took a mini bus to Tulcan and checked into a hotel. Within an hour I had hailed a taxi to the Servientrega cargo office. Here I use this company as they are very reliable, fast and cheap. I boxed the bag, labelled it, paid $15 for the delivery to my next contact Richard Evans an American living in Guayanquil and was then celebrating my great system with a chicken and chips and ice cream lunch, all done and dusted within an hour!

I HAD A NICE CHAT WITH THIS MAN. I LOVE TO STOP AND TALK TO PEOPLE

Back at the hotel I turned on my laptop. There was a serious attempt on one of my 48 hour records, the treadmill record of 405km/251 miles. Six runners were racing each other in a 2 day treadmill race in a small French town of Evreux. It was set up specifically to attempt to break the record. I would be telling a lie if I said I had no interest! I woke up several times during the night to check the hourly updates, in fact I got very little sleep as the lead changed and a tough French athlete came within 10km of breaking the record. His name is Christian Fatton. If anyone is interested in reading his report , here it is HERE

Over the years many people have asked me questions about these races/attemps, so perhaps it´s time to add a few comments to the blog.

I had sent a message of good luck to all the athletes, saying all records are meant to be broken, including mine. I would be telling another lie if I said I wasn’t delighted to still be the holder. Even though I have been stereotyped by this treadmill lark and the media love it always talking about the boredom! What boredom could there possibly be if you are prepared and chasing a world record, especially with a realistic chance of breaking it! I say, Happy Days! Running  a treadmill attempt is very much a personal experience which few athletes have experienced and most would not even consider. I know of several athletes that could break my mark and when I spoke to them about it they just laughed it off, beaten in the mind! I have worked very, very hard on my mind strength and have always considered myself to be just an average athlete but with exceptional mind strength, which is one of my few tallents!

The media and many other people also get confused by the treadmill stuff as it is almost always indoors and my indoor 48 hour record (426km/265 miles), which was set on a 250 metre indoor track in Brno,the Czech Rep almost 5 years ago. That is my main pride and joy as it was set in competition against  58 other runners. Indoor 24, 48 and 6 day races started in the 1800´s and in those days were huge occasions where smoky arenas were crowded by people betting on runners like they now bet on horses. There was huge prize money for the winners then! So that´s why it´s so important to me, it´s an honour to have surpassed the distances of many great athletes that went before me. There have been hundreds of such races including 2 day splits in six day races since those olden days. Nowadays they are less frequent. More info on those athletes of bygone years  HERE   This treadmill competition was fun.

I was shattered the next day and just ran 30km from the place I stopped at the border a couple of days ago to a very small village called Julio Andrade. That was a very routine day, yes a routine 20km climb at the start! On the way I stopped at a house for water. An old lady, prob in her late eighties told me it was only 15 minutes on foot to Julio. I guess she is a faster walker than I am a runner as I arrived almost an hour later!

Next day was a long day, 62km long. As I mentioned before, I am not interested in speed anymore, I take my time, probably got no option with almost 16,000km in the legs, much of my speed is gone. These days it takes me all day to do what I used to do all night, run a marathon!

The roads are a bit better now, and I still got about a 1 metre shoulder. Except for the odd landmine in the shoulder.

Not so many trucks today, I felt safer, on I ran into the night. Stopped at the fire station for water, no water, I ask you! That was in Ambqui and luckily across the road was a place called the ” Oasis Hosteria.” It was a nice resort, with cabins, swimming pools and the works. Once again I flashed the card when I was asked for 20 dollars, ( Ecuador along with El Salvador and Panama uses the American dollar) The nice man on reception made a phone call and though he was reading my card to his boss about the worlds run he still said cyclist! I give these cards out and even when people read them they still ask what country am I from, I tell them its on the card, same for my name and please read again I am running not cycling. The boss said I could have the cabin for 12 dollars! The next couple of days I ran hard but the mountains sapped my energy. Some days I felt strong and other days I was short of breath which never happened to me in the Colorado Rockies where I crossed 6 passes all well over 3,000 metres. I rarely get an altitude reading here but think it´s around 1,600 metres. Not much I know but there is a lot more climbing still to do! I love the mountains,that´s why I moved to Colorado and lived there for almost 8 years. Mountains are in my blood.

Actually here in the Andes sometimes I feel like I am in the Rockies again as the climbs are mostly long gradual efforts. Some of the mountains I have climbed in New England in the States could be argued to be tougher as they are steeper climbs, as could some of the mountains in Co. Wicklow,Ireland especially Sally Gap.

 The traffic here is as busy as in Colombia but not so many motorcycles or bicycles, which is a relief to me as often they came up behind me in the hard shoulder in Colombia.

The indigenous tribes in northern Ecuador are generically called Quichuas (Language: Quichua) but are actually a whole series of tribes. If you observe carefully, the dress, especially the women, are similar but do vary as far as colors, types of hats, etc from town to town and tribe to tribe. In fact a lot of the towns are named after their local tribe – Otovalos, Canaris, Cayambis and Quitus, etc.

In fact, the same styles of tribes go down well into Peru, except there they are called Quechuas (Language: Kechua). That’s as far as the Sierras (Andes) there are whole other sets of tribes on the coastal plains (Huancavilca and others) and the Oriente (Amazon Rain forest – too many to even try to mention). They say there are about 2.5 million indigenous people in Ecuador, and the largest tribe is about 50,000. I am getting excited as I am getting closer and closer to the Equator, or Mitel del Mundo, center of the earth as it is know here.

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