Obviously, the most important first thing to buy for an idea like plodding around the SWCP is a new GPS (when you’ve already got 3… or 4 if you include the watch!)
I got a Garmin GPSMap 66i which has inReach support (Iridium satellite messaging). It’s never a good idea to try new kit out on “race day”, so. I bunged on a month subscription and set it up to ping location updates every 10 minutes during a 20 mile run.
Seems to work OK. Mind you, at £35/month and a £35 yearly “activation” fee I should bloody well hope so. Still… pretty damn cool to have my location bounce off actual SPACE and get caught by the internet to show up on my wife’s phone!
The run was good – it was to the coast path, rather than on it, but still lovely (and hilly) terrain for the second half. Haven’t done 20 miles for a long time so I kept it slow, and it topped out a 61 mile week (which is my longest for a long time too). Good start to getting a bit fitter for this event.
Coincidentally, I bumped in to my cousin while running – he did the SWCP in 21 days spread over a few months in 2019, and we had a little chat about it. We’ve got plans to meet up so I can pick his brains, but he was very positive about it and excitied about helping out, which is nice!
I took a pack with cold weather gear, first aid kit, rain jacket etc – all of which was completely unnecessary but I wanted the weight. I also had the new GPS, phone, 1 litre of water and some energy bars – about 3.5kg all in I think.
Not much more to say without waffling (more). So until next time…