Final Preparations

I am really bad at waiting, I need to start this! 

I can feel the strength returning to my legs as I am now taking it very easy. But I have been for a couple of short runs and every click and slight pain I am now worried about. What will it be like after 300 miles? Training hard stops me worrying about everything, now I am not training hard but tapering I am getting stressed by small things!

Jane is doing a brilliant job of sorting out all the logistics. There is a huge amount of preparation needed for something like this with 40 people helping me on the fells another 10 or so at support points. Making sure everyone gets to the right place at the right time with everything they need is an amazing difficult job. Then there is sorting out my needs making sure I have the correct food and drink for each section and that there is a fast transition.

Amazingly the weather looks perfect for the week, dry with light winds but not too hot. Together with the support team lined up (thanks everyone), the hard training I have been doing I stand a good chance of doing this. I just hope my body holds together.

Putting it down in writing makes it clearer but my main goal is doing all the Wainwrights. It will be great to spend 7 days on the fells with my mates. The secondary goal is beating Joss Naylor’s time of 7 days 1 hour.  Everyone who knows me will realise I will be pushing it hard but there are so many unknowns over this distance I have no idea how long it will take me. 

I seem to have been doing a lot of media stuff recently. Lots of magazines, Border TV (something coming out soon) and filming with Al Lee for the Brit Rock film tour (http://www.berghaus.com/community/?p=12833). It is not something I particularly enjoy. In fact the amount of media interest sometimes scares me. But it all helps in raising money for my two MS charities (Samson Centre - http://www.justgiving.com/Steve-Birkinshaw and the MS Society - http://www.justgiving.com/Steve-Birkinshaw1). It also helps with the sponsorship side of things. Thanks Berghaus for your amazing support and also thanks to Torq, Open Tracking, Harvey Maps, King Kong climbing Walls, Great Langdale Bunkhouse and others I have probably forgotten. Huge thanks also must go to my wife Emma who does a great job of encouraging me and looking after me and the children and so ends up with very little time enjoying being out on the fells.

As I go round I will have a tracker with me, which should update every 3 minutes: http://steveb.opentracking.co.uk/

There will be updates to this blog and regular tweets from @SJBirkinshaw