Fit to Walk Keswick to Barrow?

Keswick to Barrow

The Keswick to Barrow Walk is an annual event that will be held for the 41st time this year. It’s quite simple; you walk (or run, if you’re that way inclined) from Keswick to Barrow-in-Furness, with a set route which gives a distance of 40 miles, passing through a number of checkpoints along the way.

The entire walk bar a couple of hundred yards is along roads (so no need to sweat about the erosion that would occur with 1500 walkers tramping along Cumbrian footpaths in a single day).

Two years ago, I supported a team and promised that I would take part in 2006 – a promise that I made before I saw the state of most people as they passed through the 34 mile checkpoint.

Despite starting the event last year with the completely wrong mindset that I wouldn’t get past the 34 mile point, I managed to finished the entire course two hours faster than the target I had set (in twenty seconds shy of 11 hours).

Having seen the results of people thinking that they can go and walk 40 miles in a day without doing any prior preparation, there is no way that I would take part in this event without building up my speed and stamina over the preceding months.

Okay, so it’s still February (just), and the walk is still two and a half months away, but I’m already getting concerned that I’m not going to get enough training in to make a success of this year’s walk.

A bit of re-jigging is going to be needed over the next couple of months to free up our Sundays (oh I almost envy those people who week after week tell me that they have no plans for their weekends; how do I always manage to book mine up for three months ahead?).