Feb
22
The wistful fell runner - a cheerleaders view on the Carnethy 5, 2009
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As we all know, winters are not what they used to be. Even the uplands rising beyond the Forth valley in Central Scotland rarely see any snow worth mentioning these days and in recent years, the scheduling of an ever expanding calendar of organized outdoor events have inched further into traditionally less clement months without much need for worry about the risk of cancellation.
But this year’s snowstorms and freeze ups have provided a sharp reminder of our northern latitude and for all those participating in the Carnethy 5 hill race over the Pentland range south of Edinburgh, on the second weekend in February, it was the white stuff that was most likely to define the memories.
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Most of the route was white, though becoming as it eventually did, after the battering of a thousand traction-craving boots more a mucky line of brown porridge than anything pure and driven, as it rose, fell and twisted over the terrain.
I had traveled into the competition zone as mere cheerleader and documentarian for two friends who were taking part, having previously noted the harsh weather and declined the opportunity to participate myself. Given the sombre majesty of this winter’s day, with large sections of two reservoirs below the route still sheeted with thin bluish ice and the sequence of snowy tops running away into the mottled distance of Lanarkshire, I rather wished I had signed up after all, and was at that moment pinning a number to my windproof smock and limbering up for the off from some draughty marquee at the start point.
As it was, I cycled along the icy reservoirs to the Howe, a lonely house marking the furthest point of vehicular access and just main below the route’s final summit. Competitors would shortly be running, or stumbling, along this narrow section of glen before veering sharp right and upwards, following the shreds of tickertape wrapped round gateposts, tied to exposed bits of heather or staked into the ground, and marking the last climb up onto Carnethy hill.
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Today the Howe was a rather bleak spot. Race officials sat hunched in a landrover, Red Cross men glowed fluoresecent yellow from inside their white van and further along the flat bank of the burn, a solitary figure manned a tripod, with a large lens angled expectantly towards the hillside, soon to be dotted with descending hill runners careering headlong with reckless expertise. I later learned this was the outdoor film unit for BBC Scotland’s “The Adventure Show”. It was a compact team indeed.
I plodded up the track leading to Carnethy, indented at this point only with a handful of footprints and prepared to catch some pictures of the weary line as it beat its way upwards through soft snow for the fifth and final out of five times that afternoon.
Even as I gazed admiringly across the undulating route, from Scald Law and south west along the ridge to the tops of East and West Kip, the race leaders came into view just a few metres away. These two figures, comfortably ahead of the field, presented an impressive picture of outdoor winter endeavour as they moved steadily upwards across the snowy tussocks and on towards Carnethy summit.
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Looking down the short gulley from where the frontrunners had emerged, an unbroken line of multi-coloured figures snaked on backwards through the dirty snow and round the shoulder of the hill. Like refugees they came, in a variety of moods and bodyshapes; some animated and good-humoured but a great many just silently bent and enduring the task in hand. This was, after all, a 6-mile trek covering a total ascent of 2500 feet and in especially awkward underfoot conditions.
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For all that, the field was 500 strong and a striking testament both to the growing popularity of such elemental challenges, and the breadth of their appeal. The winner Rob Jebb crossed the line in 53 minutes, but some 100 minutes later, a sixty something also successfully completed the course and in so doing brought the 2009 event to a close.
And in truth, from behind my thermal layers, with a banana and an ipod safely stowed in in my knapsack should the need for sustainance or audio entertainment become urgent, I was a little jealous. Nature, I have always found, is best enjoyed live, unplugged, and even a little uncomfortable.
A Cheerleader’s View - The Carnethy 5, 2009 from jon Pullman on Vimeo.
Feb
11
Government goes all E-Queasy, again.
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In his rather flippantly titled article “Equasy” David Nutt, new chairman of The Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs, refers to “equine addition syndrome” and it’s responsibility for 100 deaths every year.
Professor Nutt, may be making a valid statistical point about the relative dangers of consuming ecstasy and horse riding, but his comments can only distract from the more serious issues of what is always a febrile and deeply polarising debate.
In this case, after a considerable amount of research and discussion from a thirty strong, and politically independent group of experts, the ACMD are recommending the downgrading of Ecstasy from class A, home of Heroin and Crack Cocaine, to class B, where it would join Cannabis, Amphetamines and Barbiturates.
On Monday, Jacqui Smith, the Home Secretary, led the all too predictable outpouring of clamorous censure at Nutt’s remarks, directing nothing less than a schoolmasterly scalding at the academic from the safety of the House of Commons, where she was guaranteed the warm glow of overwhelming support, and rendering the veto of the Council’s sage advice nothing more than a formality.
Defenders of the status quo refuse to acknowledge the obvious parallels with, say, speed limit offences, where punishment for contravention increases to reflect rising hazard. Indeed there is no other comparable political subject where reasoned thinking is so non-negotiably traded for the imperative of popular perception.
Above all, the government consistently falls backs to the “mixed messages” argument, somehow deciding that young adults, though trusted enough to vote, cannot distinguish between different categories of drugs. And it is, after all, only the categorisation of Ecstasy which is the matter in question here.
When it comes to the patronisation of “young and vulnerable” drug users, the voices of authority seem to want it both ways. In a recent radio interview, Ian Johnston, President of the Police Superintendent’s Association for England and Wales referred to the lack of sophistication of clubbers as a reason to avoid any downgrading of ecstasy, without considering that the very same naivety might lead to all Class As being regarded as equal. That I would suggest is a far greater danger.
In essence, evidence-based policy appears to be meaningless in such politically-charged territory as the misuse of drugs (the illegal ones at least) and with the latest dismissal of its findings, now begs the question of the ACMD’s very existence.
Feb
5
If there is but one thing in the post 9/11 world used to justify not just the piecemeal erosion of British civil liberties but the relentless dilution of its moral integrity, it is that piece of string of indeterminate length called “national security”.
First, a capitulation to the sneaky sheikhs of misogynistic, human-rights-free zone, Saudi Arabia over investigations into arms sale corruption with Bae Systems, and now, worse still, an unconditional surrender to the US over the revelation of torture evidence. In both cases, the threatened sanction for defiance being a suspension of supposedly vital intelligence cooperation.
Of course, any government’s prime duty is to protect the interests of the nation which it serves. In terms of the provision of jobs, this principle is under some scrutiny in the UK currently, with the contract tender scandal in Lincolnshire, the subsequent debate over European employment law and its ultimate impact on the welfare of indiginous workers, especially at a time of depress…err recession.
National security, however, is an altogether easier political matter to package up and sell. So much so, in fact, that people are assumed to be acquiescent in any executive decision making that claims to safeguard it. At the same time, the notion that truth and justice might carry some weight in the counter argument does not seem to be considered at all. Yet even Barack Obama himself, in his inaugural presidential address, mentioned the importance of not sacrificing ideals for security.
And from a US perspective why be so sensitive in any case. It’s a dog eat dog world after all. Alpha nations vie with each other for geopolitical advantage and control, and when the crunch comes, human rights, even moral decency, goes out of the window. Do the US authorities, whose remit, like that of all aggressors, be they totalitarian or imperial, includes recourse to state-sponsored cruelty really believe that a legal record of such will so inflame their enemies or so compromise the goodwill of their friends and allies that they must resort to such crude and manipulative forms of “diplomacy” to prevent its exposure?
Meanwhile, in it’s enforced assistance with America’s efforts to avoid political embarrassment, the UK government is left to invoke the same old theme. National security is that which cannot be contradicted, questioned or denied, but surely even a declared rationale behind how it is evaluated or a proper definition about what constitutes a threat (as long as this doesn’t weaken national security of course) would be something.
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