The state of running

I started the running-research journey as a naive undergrad, exploring how running afforded runners a deeper connection to the natural environment they often ran in, through and on. I loved it, and results were positive and exciting. Research highlighted some of the ways in which running connected bodies to environment, owing to its multi-sensory and immersive character.

Before going ahead with this research, I had read running free by Richard Askwith. A thought-provoking book that surfaced an academic curiosity with running. Askwith detailed his own personal journey with running and how a return to a ‘purity’ of activity, through barefoot, technology-less runs reignited a passion for the sport. He had turned to what he termed ‘free running’ ? after growing frustrated with the failure of shoes, watches, online platforms and coaching technology in helping him improve, and stay injury free.

During this journey Askwith uncovered a growing trend within the running world: its commercialisation and neoliberalisation. I returned to this dimension in my Masters research, attempting to expand, explore and critique this idea. The Masters research used ultra-marathons as a lens through which to explore the relationship between economy, western society and (natural) environments. Research used the Cape Wrath Ultra-marathon (CWU) as a case study from which runners’ motivations and expectations, as well as event legacies and experiences, were contextualised amidst a growing commercialisation of running and commodification of nature-based experiences. The CWU is an 8-day expedition race that starts in Fort William and takes participants to the most north-westerly point of Scotland, finishing at Cape Wrath. The route covers over 450km. It attracts participants from Australasia, North America, South Africa and across Europe, as well as the UK. It costs around £1800 to enter. This year’s race sold out in 3 minutes.

I understood the event as a form of global adventure-tourism. Theoretically, tourist events are facilitated through the commodification of ethnic and environmental difference, as tourists are invited to safely consume organised encounters with an environmental and/or cultural other. Such consumptive practices commodify place and direct tourists’ actions towards phenomena with hedonistic or transformative potential. The CWU can be understood as a branch of adventure tourism that relies on a narrative deeply woven into society and the psyche of modernity that, through ideology and the glorification of an adventurous mentality, has seen it become a popularised form of adventure tourism. Carefully marketed images of fit bodies and aesthetic landscapes bestow identity labels and signify cultural capital and social status. Ultra-marathons offer a new form of adventure travel that ties together fitness, adventure and health.

Running, as a popular mass hobby, emerged in the 1960’s in the USA, primarily because of government concerns with widespread sedentarism amongst the ever-expanding urban middle class and a concern for the declining health of the working population, especially surrounding heart attacks and obesity levels. Both ‘health conditions’ are now seen as ‘treatable’ by buying some trainers and going running. Higher living standards, urbanism, and the rise of white-collar employment led to a sustained rise in heart disease cases across America in the 1950s/60s. These changes were exacerbated by the reducing physical effort required in most jobs and the increasingly indoor nature of working life. Running offered a cheap and simple ‘fix’ to public health issues and over the next 50 years running as leisure activity, and health policy, would rise dramatically. Large road-running events, such as marathons emerged from the jogging boom, attracting thousands of participants, springing up all over America and subsequently western Europe. Crucially, the practice of running allowed government individualise responsibility for health. The marked rise in runners paralleled the implementation of neoliberal economic policy throughout the 1970’s. Running subsequently became commodified through expensive shoe technologies; fitness watches; technical training programmes; specialist clothing and more recently fitness tracking apps; websites; and increasingly expensive race events.

Since the early 2000’s ultra-marathons have overtaken the marathon as the primary event of running. The majority of ‘ultras’ take place off-road on trails, with many recreational athletes fed up with ‘pounding the pavement’ and seeking new, more multi-sensory experiences. The ‘post-marathon age’ represents a desire to ‘look for more’ as road races feel unfulfilling in comparison to ultra-marathons, which offer a uniquely enjoyable but arduous challenge.

German ultrarunning website DUV has plotted a 1000% increase, globally, in the number of ultra-marathon races now on offer. In the UK, the sport has fed a strong desire to reconnect to, and encounter, natural environments. At the turn of the millennia there were only 595 ultra-marathon finishers in the UK. By 2017, this number had grown to 18,611. Ultra-marathons are an increasingly popular, celebrated and intensely mediated form of cultural tourism that emerge from a new experiential economy presenting experiential consumerism as a form of self-help, and physical exercise as an aspirational device. An industry of self-improvement, communicated by speakers, books, podcasts, and expensive self-help technologies (e.g., fitness watches, exercise apps, training plans, GPS trackers) all converge in products or experiences for self-improvement. Running has become a material and discursive extension of the neoliberal presumption that biological improvement can be acquired through self-optimisation, via the marketplace.

Healthiness has become a desired and prescribed state, one which is more an ideological position than a biological condition. Health is used as a lens through which a variety of other values – discipline, civic responsibility, family and stability – are articulated. Globalised markets have arisen out of this health discourse as fitness technologies and consumer goods become inculcated into the culture of long-distance running and self-help. However health is mobilised, it is assumed to be an unambiguous and universal good, and is especially appealing to corporations, who see economic value in employing healthy productive bodies. Running has become a medium through which businesses and corporations can increase profit through having productive, self-governing and resilient bodies in the workforce.

Developing from the commodification of movement, research configured bodies as becoming increasingly tied to corporate ideals and projects of self-transformation. Such projects are actualised through testing the body’s limits and encountering topographic otherness. Understandings of the ultra-marathon as the ultimate endurance race for those aspiring for an ideal neoliberal body, that which is healthy, civically minded, autonomous and resilient, evidence the changing culture of distance running.

I love running and it is a sport/activity that has given me a lot throughout my life. It was out of this appreciation that a curious concern grew… there is, undeniably, an issue with the current state of running. It sadly has succumbed to globalised, neoliberal capitalism. The fact that there are so many now exercising and running in a variety of stimulating environments is undoubtedly a positive. However, running races are becoming increasingly expensive and the expansion of technology and apparel is excluding a lot of people. Running is marketed as expensive, complicated and requiring of significant investment. If we are to keep or return running to its core principle of accessibility, we must decouple this simple form of movement, an act of placing one foot in front of the other, from individualised pursuits of status and health. We should support the local, the small, the un-commercialised, the parkruns, the act, the freedom and above all else the simplicity. *Any* pair of trainers will do and some shorts (maybe not just now!) and a t-shirt (optional sports-bra) is all you need. Honestly. Running can be one of the most inclusive leisure pursuits, lets keep growing the participation and route finding, not the capitol-value, of going for a run.

(if you would like to read the full 15,000 words, do let me know!)

Lockdown running

This piece has been created thanks to an array of varied contributions from friends all over the world. Responses were received from experienced runners and those who had used part of this year to try out a new hobby. The structure is deliberately random, aiming to replicate the lack of structure many of us have experienced during 2020. I hope there are bits and pieces you can relate to, whatever activity provided a solace during the pandemic. I hope you enjoy…

Running during lockdown:

A love affair with my local acre;

an old flame reignited,

during extended lunch hour flings.

Running makes me feel invincible and happy in my body,

it’s the best way to move through any space.

The only freedom

An escape

One which grounds.

An unchanging constant during strange times,

giving comfort to us,

as we are forced to re-evaluate

life

Liberating,

as the weeks ticked by, comfort and normalcy emerged.

Un-replicated by anything else,

mirrored only by memory

when everything else in the world still feels so weird

But this movement became a way to expand a suddenly shrinking world

A grounding release

A cathartic re-centring

An act of regeneration that has heightened awareness of nature and flowers

And things.

Just wandering round more wild areas

When lockdown was at its strictest,

a reason was found,

to get out and be on my own.

Although my motivation was a little broken

The shrunken confinement briefly and joyously

Expanded

Quiet

Neither bad nor good

An act now full of clarity yet devoid of companionship

We run because we can,

for to run with others, is to is to truly feel

To fully be

Beautiful

Liberated

Refreshed

Offering rhythm amidst a blurry stretch of life

A consistent escape

That gives time for healing and rest

Lifesaving

But, lonely.




A poem by Ben Murphy ( and many, many contributors)

All but one line is from a someone other than myself. I received contributions from over 30 people, ranging from single words, to sentences and entire paragraphs. This poem represents a collection of experiences and thoughts on the activity of running in 2020, during a global pandemic and societal ‘lockdowns’

Thank you for reading. I wish you all the best for 2021.

Happy running!

Earth

A stride, a bounce, a skip.

A bump

A bounce

We glide and trundle, flowing with the grooves and folds of the landscape

The earth beneath us bending, unfolding and merging

Suddenly, horizons are no longer visible, a change in angle as strides become steps

‘Tops’ become the focus

Ascending, we become one with the incline.

The gaze narrows and blurs. Thoughts emerge from us, and return to us

Up and over.

We glimpse the view but then

Down,

Down into the roots of the earth. A different kind of step.

A quick step, no longer laboured and irregular.

But a fast two-step, a beat to the groove of breath.

Down and under,

Then over

Back on top of rock, grass and root.

 

Traces

We wander but we follow.

We follow lines,

markings,

indents,

traces of prior movement.

We trace trails, remnants of hooves, footpaths, lines, markings

And topographic grooves, all created by the humble foot.

Where did they come from, how did they begin?

Was the ground too boggy, did a rogue dash across the grass create a new trace-line? Are we following the original follower, or a scent, a sound or a stride?

Where do they begin?

Where do they end?

Regulated by cartography. What constitutes a footpath? What gives a path an official designation. The width, depth, fold, usage or potential?

Or

Prominence.

Over grassy hills, parklands, heather clad moors, rocky mountains, muddy mounds and football fields.

We trace traces. Historical but contemporarily reworked.

A static inscription on the landscape yet they move, flow and undulate. A line often created out of a barrier to movement, enabling more movement.

Created by imagination and an urge to explore but now a symbol of safety and reassurance.

Traces

 

 

Beinn Resipol Hill race

Beinn Resipol. A 845m Corbet that sits on the Ardnamurchan peninsula. The race costs £8 to enter and only has route signage on the first half – the ascent. The mountain itself is a rather nice one! The second half route is entirely up to yourself, you can choose which grassy-heathery sections you throw yourself down.

The way up was wet, boggy, very narrow in places and truly absorbing. I loved that you had to concentrate 100% on where you were putting your feet and the narrowness of the path relaxed my mindset, knowing I could only go as fast as the person in front. After coming out of a forested section that beautifully ran parallel to a stream, the summit towered ahead as the flag began to move in. A steep and even muddier ascent to its top flanks preceded a short scramble to crest the peak and turn to head back to the Caravan park.

Race start!

Claggy summit

Views on the way down of Loch Sunart

After an initial technical and slippy decent off the summit, we began bombing down the hill side of Beinn Resipol, limbs flying everywhere, middle aged men falling on their arses, waist deep in mud, getting up and grinning a giggle. This is what it felt like to be truly alive. To be stripped bare and to just have fun, immersed in the environment. Nothing else mattered, you didn’t (and couldn’t) switch your attention. No egos, no technology, no outside intervention or route markings, just a rapid descent of survival and childlike madness over the slippery rock and grassy tussocks that make up the side of the Resipol Mountain. A real hidden-gem low key race and a fantastic feel to it, the Beinn Resipol hill race was about as ‘Scottish’ as it gets with regards to the weather, terrain, route and friendly-low key feel of the day ensure a well spent 8 quid. Unique.

Photos: Beinn Resipol HR facebook page

Glenshee 9 race review/reflection

A very late reflection on my first Long classic hill races. I had signed up to these for a few reasons. Mainly as a new challenge: a totally different type of race to anything I had experienced before. Consequently this also meant a focus in training on my biggest weakness – leg strength and hill endurance as well as descent technique. At the time of signing up, I was just returning from serious illness and a non-existent month of training. A focus on hills, trails and long distance afforded a total move away from the quantified training I had been following in the run up to the road racing season.

The Glenshee 9 race also allowed me to experience a stunning new part of Scotland in an incredibly immersive way! (and offered a quick way of bagging 9 munros!!)

The race felt very low key, with a friendly registration and excitedly nervous atmosphere at the ski centre. After a warm up and kit check we were off. I was a bit disappointed that it felt like most of the field were happy to follow the leaders after making a very big attempt to get the nav and map ingrained in my head, but up we all went…

I felt great on the first climb up to Creag Leacach which followed a narrow ‘path’ and onto open moorland. It was an anticlimax in reaching the munro summit, a simple cairn tap and on we went. The next few tops involved some shorter ascents and steep downhills over the Heather laden Deeside hills. Pacing felt good and began to move up after losing places on the technical descents.

Coming off Tolmount was a fast descent to a beallach before a water refill and long slog up to Carn an Tuirc Here’s where the muscular fatigue began! A welcome relief at the top of munro 6 (little did I know that the next hour and a half would be even more of a long slog)  (The top of Tolmount. Photo: Russ Valentine)

The descent down to the road was probably my worst section as I really struggled on the rocky technical steeper descent. Once off that I began to make up time and places that had been lost just after Carn an Tuirc.

At the road I made a bad mistake in not taking any water as I only had 400ml for the remaining 3 munros and I didn’t realise how sweaty/dehydrated I was…

A long 30min slog up to Carn Aosda on steep heathery hill sides. 7 done! I was chuffed but the next two were embarrassingly slow progress as I became dehydrated and bonked hard. Mentally I collapsed as I struggled to Carn a’Gheoidh (hill of the goose), only saved by a stream and finally doubling back to Cairnwell. Really annoying as this was perhaps the most runnable section.

A short steep finish back down to the ski centre ensured a delapidated Ben upon crossing the line and I began to take in the previous 4hrs, in awe of these awesome mountains and all the finishers. I had no expectations of my performance but was annoyed at both my time and position, feeling as though at least 10-15mins was lost and a good 10 positions, unnecessarily.

But, a phenomenal day out and fantastic race was all I cared about. Really enjoyable experience and highly recommended race with great food provided at the cafe post race!

Hill running or trail running

It was during a recent running race that I questioned the distinction between trail and hill race. Some called it a hill race, others tagged it as a trail run. Inevitably the race went up a hill, involved a series of off-road ascents and descents and was attended by a variety of runners, ages, sexes and experience/fitness levels.

The thing with distinguishing between these two branches of ‘running’ is that it is more about what they are not than what they are. The natural environment plays a crucial role; generally people are doing it for the experiential joy, as the natural landscape that envelops routes of trail & hill races is integral to the feelings associated with trails and hills. Crucially the surface is not a road or track, they fundamentally reject this quantified aspect of the sport. At their heart they represent a rejection of road running and the commercialisation of our sport (even though both contain races that are big, commercialised and more in line with road races).

The very joy or thrill of trail running is encapsulated by the ascent, the uphills and the downhills. It is in these moments that feelings are most affected by the terrain and topography. Both trail and hill running share two critical common elements. Something they involve: undulations, hills, ascents. And something they don’t involve: manicured ‘man-made’ surfaces. We don’t always realise it but the surface has a huge impact on our emotions and feelings as the proprioceptive receivers in our bodies are signalled by the terrain that we are moving within somewhere more natural and ‘green’. It may not always be the most picturesque of places but if there is dirt, rocks, branches, roots, grass etc then we know, consciously or not, where we are and what experiences are being generated.

Its interesting that in any advertisement or review of either a hill race or a trail race, people usually mention ‘the view’ and its attractive features in making the race or run more enjoyable and enticing. But  because you are running you have little time to pause and admire this ‘view’ so the aspect that is often billed as the most appealing for runners and main draw of either branch of running (the ‘view’) is actually a very small part of what gives people a more holistic, multi-sensory and enjoyable experience.

For me, both are all about the thrill, the bodily engagement with the environment and the activation off all the senses and proprioceptors within your body. That is what makes them what they are. That is what makes them of interest.

The differences

Distinguishing between the two has little practical importance but the differentiation offers interesting caveats about what they are and the draw of either of them.

For sure, trail running is more of American thing, and Hill running is more Scottish (in England its called Fell running). As with many things national differences will occur. For here in Scotland the main aspect is that hill running is supposedly more raw: often no set route, no race package and a more ‘pure’ experience for those with higher experience levels (physically, I’d argue hill running is harder…) whilst trail running is perhaps more an entry level or ‘less hardcore’ pursuit than running off the beaten paths in the Scottish hills. However, there are many trail races where the terrain can be just as challenging.

Perhaps a key difference talked about is the route; hill races often have no set route and ‘a day in the hills’ rarely follows a designated path on the map whilst trail races often have marked routes, following well marked, set paths (hence its potential to be more beginner friendly). But there is often cross overs and what is classed as a path is vague and open to interpretation.

One thing I have noticed from reading a lot on the subjects and being a part of both communities is the gendered side of the two. Engagements with hill running and their spoken narratives often come from a male voice, talking about his heroics of conquering the tough rough terrain that serves as a justification for the outing and generally, (speaking from personal observations), hill races are far more popular amongst men than women in comparison to trail races. This gendered aspect is fascinating but I believe is too large a topic to tackle here

Trail running and hill running have many similarities and some differences but both are based around the fundamental notion of having enjoyment in a natural environment, away from the quantified road running scene. Both are individually defined (and that’s ok).

Oh, lets not even mention ‘sky running’….

Trees

There are perhaps only two things in the world that have the power to a) combat climate change b) reduce stress, anxiety and depression c) cure cancers d) look great and e) act as shelters. Trees also act as natural air conditioners through evaporation and

Trees absorb and block sound reducing noise pollution in many places. The colour green is calming and relieves eye strain.

Trees produce oxygen, intercept airborne particulates, and reduce smog, enhancing a community’s respiratory health

 

The following paragraphs are from my undergrad dissertation and explore how movement (in this case running) amongst trees affects your mental state…

The surrounding trees or forests that several of my research go-along interviews took place in often provided feelings of happiness, shelter and security for runners. A special connection to trees was apparent with several participants, – ‘I like how you’re open but also in the trees, you feel quite connected but also enclosed yet free’. Trees facilitated more internal reflection when running. It felt far more natural and easier to be more attuned to my own haptic feelings, bodily movements and inner thoughts compared to more opened areas where increased light and distanced views allowed for more happy feelings emanating from the visual enjoyment. In some ways, it can feel as though trees have a special affective power. Trees have always been and will remain key aspects to places and our connection to the world’s environments. Places must be understood as a series of embodied relationships with the world. Their affective meanings and the embodied feelings generated from our engagement with them are constituted through people’s movements– they are never finished but are constantly being performed. For me these feelings were embodied best along a section of trail in the woods above Crieff; weaving in and out I became connected and more aware as I performed, ‘dancing’ with the trail’s trees, lightness fading but flowing.

In Robert Macfarlane’s critically acclaimed book, The Wild Places, woods become ‘places of correspondence, of call and answer’ for many of us . They contain unique memories, and unique forms of thought and just as other natural or wild places can, they ‘kindle new ways of being or cognition in people, can urge their minds differently’ (99-100). Trees have an undeniable but secret affective nature, as they transform our regular notions of time, drastically impacting our experiences when moving amongst them.

The darker light protruded by forests can illicit new orders of connection – sonic, olfactory and tacit. Our sensorium is transformed,  you become more aware of the landscape as a medley of affects, a mingling of geology, memory and movement – life. Environments exist as ‘presences, inferred, less substantial more powerful. You inhabit a new topology’ (Macfarlane 2017, 193). When you are in a forest, you could in many ways be in any forest in the world: time and space are transformed. Woodland areas had an ability to transcend the locational place of the moment. A magical, enchanting feeling was experienced with trees when running within or alongside, and they became akin to a physical signifier of positive experiences. Trees affected us through an embodied connection: as ‘the trees are really close to you; it sounds really silly but it’s like a wee security blanket. It’s just you and the trail and the trees around you pushing you up the hill’.  Sense of place isn’t fixed by physical characteristics but instead by what Buttimer & Seamon (1988) term ‘environmental synergy’ – human and material parts unintentionally foster a connection with their own spatial rhythm and character. People, time and place can become joined in an organic whole, as place becomes a dynamic entity with an identity as distinct as the individual people and environmental elements that comprise it (Buttimer and Seamon: 1988).

 

 

The most important relationship between environment and people is not being in it but it being in you; landscapes can imagine and reimagine themselves through the awareness of the perceivers (Ingold: 2012). As environments open out so do we, fostering a phenomenological connection to our environments. Our bodies become entwined with the trees, the hills and the terrain of a trail.  Distanced views or perspectives are not necessarily limited to vision, they can, argues Tim Ingold (2012), extend to tactile and auditory perceptions. When running, people become part of the landscape; a mind-body connection with their surrounding environment takes precedence as you move with and through the environment. Environmental engagement is exacerbated through the touch of the terrain, the movement of the body, the feel of the plants as well as the visual impact of the landscape and the presence of trees.

 

 

References

Buttimer, A., and Seamon, D. (1980). The Human Experience of Space and Place. London. Croom Helm.

Ingold, T. (2012). Imagining landscapes: past, present and future, Farnham. Ashgate.

Macfarlane, R. (2017). The Wild Places. London. Granta.

(Non referenced quotes from interviews)

We like hills

“Oh come on, get to the top and the view will be amazing!”

This is usually how it goes; the tough, physically draining movement of running uphill justified by the gazing view that awaits you at the summit. The enjoyment or pleasure only reached once we can crest the hill and outwardly appreciate the landscape.

However what I found through the ‘go-along interviews was a real pull of the landscape when ascending. It wasn’t the non-embodied gaze that afforded positivity or connection but the gradient that immersed the runner in(to) the landscape.

There is something magical about hills. Their affective capacities and embodied climbs engulf the runner ‘through the experiences of descending and climbing and their different muscular entailments, the contours of the landscape are not so much measured as felt – they are directly incorporated into our bodily experience’ (Ingold: 2000: 203).

Uphill sections of trail runs are perceived as the hardest, most exerting moments, however on nearly all the climbs I experienced with my interviewees, few negative comments were made; amidst the shortness of breath often hid a smile and immense feelings of satisfaction.

Experimental narrative of ascension in my dissertation. Photo’s cant do the immersion justice though.

Pain and discomfort of uphill running is negated; the body and landscape become mutual as kinaesthetic sensations are stimulated. Because practice frees us from representation, movement becomes our primary form of consciousness, so our participation in the landscape brings with it a very different sense of place from one which is disembodied or contemplative (I.e. the outward gaze). Through the production of rhythms, the re-embodiment of the visual and the intense muscular feelings of a kinaesthetic burn, hills become part of you.

The internal-external relationship of hills shifted my awareness; internally I naturally focused on the present. My legs and senses became more attuned; the surface became an extension of my movement rather than a passive surface.

The gradient of the uphill tunnels our thoughts, as thoughts become narrowed, a sensory focus on the immediate, the touch and feel of the hill:

‘to become so absorbed by effort, there can come a point where it all becomes effortless… the gradient is ever present but proves no real impediment to passage, paradoxically even becoming an energizing force, propelling the body upwards’ (Lorrimer: 2012: 258).

Hills afford ‘a truly terrestrial kind of attachment’ (Lorrimer: 2012:255), reinvigorating the mind and the body to become an embodied dimension of the landscape. Several of the runners involved in this study, including myself, noted how the uphill sections offered positivity, I noted how there was ‘something about running hills and trails that relaxes and puts mind at ease, calms you down and allows you to be more open.

Uphill climbs engage more of the lower body muscles such as the quadriceps, glutes and calves as well as significantly altering stride patterns and posture resulting in a sensory-kinaesthetic overload of uphill running. In Wylies’ (2002) ‘Ascending Glastonbury Tor’ paper, he notes how subjectivity produced and performed via practices of ascension and elevation moves towards a new understanding of visible landscapes in terms of sensuous practices. New engagements with these embodied, multisensorial relationships offer avenues for ways of better understanding environmental connections, reinforcing conceptions of landscape relations beyond simply visual and aesthetic.

Hills affect and are affected by our movement. Through the kinaesthetic sense and the pull of the terrain, our bodies become immersed. This connection helps foster a more acute bodily awareness and heightens all of our senses.

This exploration still doesn’t make running up-hill any easier though!!

 

References

Ingold, T. (2000).The perception of the environment: essays on livelihood, dwelling and skill. London. Routledge.

Lorimer, H.(2012). Surfaces and slopes: remembering the world under foot.In: Jones, O.and Garde-Hansen, J.(eds.) Geography and Memory: Explorations in Identity, Place and Becoming.London. Palgrave, 83-86.

Wylie, J.W. (2002). An essay on ascending Glastonbury Tor. Geoforum. 33(4): 441-454.

 

A year of running-research: Some reflections

Off-road running.

Immersive, multi-sensory, thrilling, aliveness, embodiment, tough, technical, engaged, relaxing, adventurous or even, ‘natural’. But 12 words doesn’t quite do the activity its full justice…

A single word simply cannot capture the true essence of how it feels and what it means to go for a run off the road and on some variable more natural terrain. I struggled to capture and represent this phenomena in a 12,000 word dissertation. It was a week before my dissertation deadline and I was 3000 words over the limit but I felt connected to what I had written. It felt cruel to ‘cut’ the “waffle” and the material I had collected through a lot of enjoyable research around the activity.

Some ‘findings’

Place is important. In an ever moving world, places are changing, getting reformed and re-interpreted.

Place attachment wasn’t fixed but was instead an affective collection of connections to experiences and environmental features, co-produced and experienced through movement. In several of my research runs I noted how I felt incredibly connected to other people, despite being totally on my own, I felt as though the landscape intertwined with my own memories of trail runs to connect me to others and their thoughts or experiences

While on a trail run, one is always somewhere but this somewhere is always on the way to somewhere else; places move with the body. Human existence is not totally place bound but is instead constituted through place binding as existence unfolds not in specific places but along paths. Each mover (in this case a runner) along a path lays a trail where many movers meet and these paths or trails become entwined as the life and experience of each becomes bound up with the other.

Moving through places, the body’s senses become attuned to particularities, interacting with the mind and muscles to connect the body to the physical world in an affective place-binding journey.

Being out in the open often contrasted with the presence of trees for many runners. The surrounding trees or forests that several go-alongs took place in often provided feelings of happiness, shelter and security for runners. A special connection to trees was apparent with several participants. Trail runners connect to place through physical markers affected by experiential, performative and embodied feelings that become part of our runs.

If anything my research project allowed me to explore my own understandings and performances whilst out on the run. It afforded an ability to recognise the meaningful engagements that can be formed through activities often perceived as mundane leisurely practices. I feel more connected to the environments I run in and appreciate why so many others loving the sport and cite it as an escapism through outdoor relaxation. I understand too that its hard, a level of physical fitness is required to get out there and fully experience what nature can offer. But I guess thats part of the satisfaction, part of the thrill, that in a way you’ve earned this enjoyment.

Home. Security. Attachment. Immersion.

A screenshot from dissertation; a creative chapter on ‘immersion’

Performative movement in the natural environment can foster increased sensory, haptic and meaningful connections to the physical entities, memories and meanings of landscapes travelled through by trail running. My research has shed some light on how trail running affords a natural sensibility. One which can foster genuine connections to the natural environment and bring about a renewed sense of belonging for runners.

Landscape engagements can allow for understandings of our world’s meanings which are altogether less cognitive, more embodied and sensed. Movement can afford immersion. A genuine connective immersion that brings us closer to the natural world. Of course, this is possible through other forms of movement than trail running. But I hope my dissertation has demonstrated the possibilities outdoor performance or activity can offer for reawakening our senses and becoming more connected to the living world around us whilst offering an interesting, engaging avenue for enlivening cultural geographers to the world out there.

 

(All photos are my own)