After Willie Gibson’s warning about the connection between Interviews and broken legs, I’m not at all sure I wish to go ahead with this. So I refuse to be Interviewed. It’s even more embarrassing than This is Your Life.

Being brought up on the West Lancashire plain, the billiard table between Wigan and Southport, the mountains were to the east, near Wigan. Parbold Hill and Ashurst Beacon, 150 metres high. The interest - it was a good courting spot.

After the north face of Ashurst Beacon, the Lake District was the first mountainous place I saw, at the age of about 15. I think the first big one was Helvellyn via Striding Edge. Not a bad introduction, looking back. When I was at Calder Hall in the late 50’s, getting experience as a nuclear power station commissioner, the Lake District was the spare time occupation. The west side has some superb mountains.

I guess I was hooked early on but serious mountaineering, as opposed to mere hill walking, started in Scotland. Until we moved to Largs I knew nothing of Scotland. I continued the hill walking type of exploration in the Renfrew Hills. Real mountaineering – exposure for the fun of it, find an interesting, scrambly route - started in the Highlands a bit later. To pursue the metaphor to it’s disgusting conclusion, the barb really became inextricably embedded then and its been festering ever since.

Running was something I did on the rugby field or was dragooned into for the School Sports Day. Maybe a cross country (3 miles?) as a bit of training for rugby. It’s very sad to think that it didn’t occur to me to continue running for the sheer enjoyment. My concept of running then was that to be legitimate it had to be done on the track and if you weren’t Olympic standard, don’t bother.

Kentmere. (Said in a hushed and trembling voice, with wild-eyed glances all around) The day in 1972-ish when half a dozen of us innocents nearly perished after Keith Burns’ suggestion that we try it. Vivid memories:- wearing plastic Adidas cross country shoes; being left for dead on the first climb; emerging into "the weather" at the big wall; the endless traverse along the terrifying, steep snowfield with one slip bringing certain death; being totally alone on Kentmere and just guessing the direction back; the knee-deep bog half way down; the wonderful feeling of having survived at the end; (I’ll never sin again, God, honest).

Well, that’s largely true, apart from a few, snatched days in the Apennines local to Rome. The big opportunities in the Dolomites were missed. My excuses are that the job was very pressurised – on occasions I would take the family off for a holiday and have to dash back for some crisis. It was very important at the time. First British export order for a nuclear power station, in competition with an American Plant not far away etc etc. And the kids were very young – three under fives.

Everyone smoked in my young day. Just watch a film of the period – or are they period films? In Italy I must have been about 15 stone and smoked Nazionales. The food and wine are wonderful. Everyone should spend a long time in Italy

In those days, the idea of re-entering a nuclear reactor once it had operated at any reasonable power was totally crazy. However, a problem arose at Oldbury which only manifested itself during power raising. After a lot of Deep Thought we realised we had to go in to solve the problem. It was very strange. The interior didn’t look any different from all the times we had been in there during the commissioning and yet we knew it could be lethal to stay too long. I am authorised to say that my running re-started soon afterwards and ever since I have been the superman you all know and hate to be beaten by. It may have been the world’s first genetic engineering. There could have been other effects, too. Nita and I didn’t have any more children after that .

Not that I have been aware of. Scared, yes. Terrified, yes. Lost, alone and panicking, yes. Expecting to walk over a cliff in white-outs, yes. But no actual incidents, where only a hairs-breadth . . . . . . . .

0600 rise and decide where to go. 0605 change mind 33.3 times and be in an agony of indecision. 0930 arrive at the start of a route eventually chosen on a random basis. (This used to be with large, heavy pack and boots. Nowadays it is in Walshes with minimalist body cover, in a little pack or a bum-bag, depending on the weather). Set off alone or with special friends. Spend 3, 4, 5, 6 or any number of hours skimming, gazelle-like, over rough country with dry feet. This can also be done in the foulest, wet and horrible conditions, it doesn’t make a scrap of difference to the enjoyment. Hurtle to the top of the steepest climbs, beating everyone, farting on the way to make their day. Stop whenever the spirit moves for food or to wonder at the view. Suffer badly over the last few miles to impress on the brain that this has been an excellent day. Recover quickly, have a hot shower, don warm, dry clothes. Consume vast quantities of excellent food and drink. Feel thoroughly smug at having had a great day out.

I am not competitive at all. (And don’t snigger behind your hand like that). There’s an article in the Newsletters somewhere when I tried to analyse why and to provoke others into talking about their competitive urges. Mark James has an interesting word about it in his Millennium Book article. He talks about keeping it under control, which appeals to me. Whenever I enter a race, the satisfaction is in the wanting to do it and finishing. One lovely enjoyment is beating anyone much younger than myself! It would be great to beat X, Y or Z but I know it’s unrealistic, so why spoil a good run worrying about it? The older I get, the greater the feeling of privilege and satisfaction in just being able to, and wanting to, get out there and do it. Sometimes I get competitive on a long day out with others but that’s only so I don’t fall too far behind and become a drag.

Most of my running is pavement-pounding in Darlington. The ideal would be to get into the Dales or North York Moors each weekend for a biggy but that only happens a couple of times a month. It seems wrong somehow to use a car to go for a run. At present the incentive is to wind up the fitness a bit for Torridon and Iceland – and maybe another KIMM, if I get an invitation this year. 40 miles a week at the moment, with the aim of 50 a week plus 2 or 3 hours in the hills if the knees and ankles will stand up to it.

There have been so many. A lot are associated with the dreaded list ticking, I’m afraid. The big Ben Avon round, Roisbheinn Ridge in winter, Beinn Leoid last year, Stac Polly one late evening, Dave Peck’s Glen Affric rounds, The Saddle and South Glen Shiel, sledge hauling on Glas Maol before I went to Iceland. I can’t pick a best.

I thought at one stage the Carnethy campaign was over the top. It seemed so simple – either pay your £11 and race or don’t race. Then I began to realise the hidden agenda was much more important. Is hill running part of general (track) athletics or not? Is Scottish hill running to be part of a Scottish umbrella organisation or in a UK one (the FRA). The astonishing thing was when the simmering dissatisfaction with SAF among all the athletic clubs was uncovered. At the end of the day I was cheering the club on. I now see that the democratic principle must be upheld. That’s why the effort is worth it. The athletes must dictate what happens, not the remote executives.

In principle, yes. Watching how National Parks have worked in England, I’m convinced a National Park say in the AONBs is essential. (Trivia question – which was the first National Park in England?). The alternatives are fights between pressure groups, Landowners and The Ramblers Association or whatever. That must be the wrong way to balance the needs of the people who live in these special areas with the use of them by the likes of us. Scotland has yet to experience the sort of pressures between farming and the many aspects of leisure which are endemic in England. But it will come.

I’d better learn who Percy Unna is and what he has to say before I attempt to answer that one. Initial reaction – the time has passed when anywhere on Earth is free from human management or intervention. For intervention read destruction of what was there for the millennia before Homo Sapiens was invented. This includes even the remotest conceivable places – they are all polluted in some way. The question is in which direction should management go? I don’t think fencing large areas off and leaving them is a practical policy.

Yes. Watch your backs. There’s always someone who wants to make off with the best goodies. And they’re crafty bastards.

I thought I knew a bit about Neolithic remains in Scotland but I didn’t know that. Fermat said that there aren’t any more solutions to the Pythagoras type relation if the power 2 becomes any bigger integer. It’s possible to stumble over the simpler solutions. The clever thing is to recognise they are examples of a much wider, infinite series. I suppose it’s possible that Neolithic man recognised that but, without seeing the equation on a rock, its difficult to say.

Julian Barbour’s ‘The End of Time’ and Kaufmann’s ‘Universe’. Barbour because Brian Cunningham recommended it. We had long and deep philosophical discussions on the ferry trip to and from Newcastle/Bergen a couple of years ago and we zeroed in on Time as being a serious problem. If you have a few hours it’s like this . . . . . . . . . z z z z z z. Universe because it’s a very good, readable, amazing and almost unbelievable description of what goes on in it. I have to confess I haven’t understood a word of Barbour thus far and I’m half way through. I have just finished "The Whole Shebang" by Timothy Ferris, which I recommend to everyone.

I think all the Club Officers and Committee should be ladies, with the possible adoption of a couple of token males to make the tea and sandwiches. The girls have shown us (males) the way in the racing scene. I’m convinced they would have a new approach to running Carnethy, of which the stunted male mind can’t even conceive. I may even attend my first AGM this year to propose a few names.