Prince's Trust Sahara Desert Challenge

I came back strong and upbeat from my holidays in France. I really
loved climbing up the Mont Ventoux and doing a bit of touring around
the Luberon. I certainly came back with a strong will to do more of
that.

I found something...

Thanks to Cycling plus for advertising the Prince's Trust Sahara Desert
Challenge on their web site: 91km of Mountain biking and 43km of
running in the Atlas Mountains for a very good cause. I have enrolled
and now have to train from it :-S

I would love some advice from urc on how to minimize the risks of
injury while training. I believe I need to build up strength gradually
How do I know I am training sufficiently hard to get fitter and better?
How do I know when I am trying too much too soon?

One of my concerns right now has to do with combining running and
cycling. I know I need to run more (I am not used to running). I know
running is more demanding on knees than is cycling but I will still
need to be fit on the bike to travel uphill in the Atlas mountain (I
believe there will be a 2200m col to cross). How can I devise a
training that match the requirements of the challenge?

I have set up a weblog on to which I will attempt to recollect my daily
training regime and when time comes, the challenge itself:
http://nicsaharatraining.blogspot.com/

Of course, if you find the cause worthy and wish to sponsor me, you are
very much welcome:
http://www.justgiving.com/madfrenchman/
At least 50% of these funds will benefit The Prince's Trust, the
balance being spent on costs of the trip (travel, food, equipment...).
100% of any sum raised over £2,500 will benefit The Prince's Trust.

Thanks for your advice and support,

Nic

Nic wrote:
Of course, if you find the cause worthy and wish to sponsor me, you are
very much welcome:
http://www.justgiving.com/madfrenchman/
At least 50% of these funds will benefit The Prince's Trust, the
balance being spent on costs of the trip (travel, food, equipment...).
100% of any sum raised over £2,500 will benefit The Prince's Trust.

If we think the cause worthy, why not donate direct to the trust rather
than paying for your holiday?

...d

David Martin wrote:
Nic wrote:

Of course, if you find the cause worthy and wish to sponsor me, you are
very much welcome:
http://www.justgiving.com/madfrenchman/
At least 50% of these funds will benefit The Prince's Trust, the
balance being spent on costs of the trip (travel, food, equipment...).
100% of any sum raised over £2,500 will benefit The Prince's Trust.


If we think the cause worthy, why not donate direct to the trust rather
than paying for your holiday?

My jolly jaunt earlier this year on a tall ship was for charidee, except
that I paid the cost of the trip out of my own pocket and 100% of the
funds I coerced from various cow-orkers and friends went to the
charidee. Seems far more sensible an arrangement (setting aside all the
arguments of why charity is necessary in this daynage).

R.

That is a fair question. i don't consider that as a holiday but more as
giving my time to raise some money to the charity. I find it is an
efficient mean to raise money to the charity rather than a holiday, a
personal challenge yes, a holiday, no.

But apart from that. Yes, I agree with you!

Anyway, I would love some advice about training.

Nic

in message . com, Nic
') wrote:

Of course, if you find the cause worthy and wish to sponsor me, you are
very much welcome:
http://www.justgiving.com/madfrenchman/
At least 50% of these funds will benefit The Prince's Trust, the
balance being spent on costs of the trip (travel, food, equipment...).
100% of any sum raised over £2,500 will benefit The Prince's Trust.

Traduit: please pay for my holiday.

--
(Simon Brooke) http://www.jasmine.org.uk/~simon/
;; Sending your money to someone just because they've erected
;; a barrier of obscurity and secrets around the tools you
;; need to use your data does not help the economy or spur
;; innovation. - Waffle Iron Slashdot, June 16th, 2002

Nic Wrote:
That is a fair question. i don't consider that as a holiday but more as
giving my time to raise some money to the charity. I find it is an
efficient mean to raise money to the charity rather than a holiday, a
personal challenge yes, a holiday, no.

But apart from that. Yes, I agree with you!

Anyway, I would love some advice about training.

Nic

Side stepping all the carity stuff and getting onto training. Best
thing I ever bought when training for a marathon was a heart rate
monitor. Using this and using it PROPERLY (not as easy as it first
seesm to the uninitiated), is teh best way I know of measuring your
fitness improvement (outide of getting it measured properly).

The important thing when trainig for something like this is not to
overdo it and build things up gradually(you seem to understand that bit
:-). Basically you'll be doing some exercise 5-6 days a week, and
taining hard on 2 of those days (one for bike one for running, teh rest
of the time is your recovey time, but this does not mean sitting
arround, it means doing low level (70% heart rate max). Tyry and
learn to enjot the training it does help, but can be bloody horrible
when it's cold wet, dark an early in the morning.

You'll most likely get lots of cycling advice here, but check some of
teh running forums too (runners world is pretty good), and they'll help
you with the more specific running stuff.

Bryan


--
Bryan

i don't consider that as a holiday

But you also said above:

I really loved climbing up the Mont Ventoux... I certainly came back with a strong will to
do more of that.

So it's a personal challenge, but one which you will love and feel
personal achievement doing.

It's a tricky one - with your one, it's very clear how much of the
donations are costs, but I suppose any sponsored event other than the
very smallest will have costs. It's just that people don't realise that
of the money they've donated to a sponsored run, a portion will have
been used for the organiser's costs, the event equipment, the
advertising, etc.

When I went to Spain earlier this year (incidentally involving a lot
more climbing than you'll be doing) a lot of people asked why I wasn't
collecting for charity. But I wanted to do the ride. It was hard, and
in places was unpleasant, but it was something I /wanted/ to do.

Personally, I think the sort of trip you're doing, where your personal
costs are going to be £1250 by the sound of it, you should either
undertake to pay this yourself, or find someone willing to donate that
specifically to cover the costs. Your employer, for example. Then
anyone giving will know that they are giving to the charity, not to
fund your personal challenge.

I, and many others, would never donate where up to 50% of the donation
was towards what many people would regard as a holiday, however good we
thought the cause was.

Many thanks Bryan. Most appreciated.