Edging towards Morocco

8 days on, and things have progressed reasonably positively on the injury front. I've had 4 sessions with physios, a Pilates class and a one-to-one session and a visit to a Chiropractor since the injury which, on the one hand makes me feel optimistic about my recovery, and on the other hand makes me feel like my body is falling apart needing so many people and interventions to hold it together. Without wanting to dwell on the negatives too much (or tempt fate), it does seem that things are moving in the right direction.

I've lost most of the pain in my calf muscle apart from when really pushing off on it or stretching it extensively. I can walk pretty normally now which bodes well. Having rested it and iced it for a good few days I've been advised to push it along a bit so I've started doing a bit more targeted exercise on it.

I had thought I'd left the stupidly early mornings behind, but on Thursday morning I dug out the headtorch and met with Rich at 6.30am just up the road. This session had a number of aims.

First I wanted to see how my leg was getting along. It seemed fine and coped well with a 4 mile outing, albeit with no pack weight and not too fast.

Secondly to get some photos of us in our shiny new sponsored kit which we'd just received back from Sue at Heatherhill Farm Embroidery in Bamford  in the Peak District. Possibly a little of the "all the gear, no idea", but I'm happy with the desert look at this stage.

I'm the tall one (not stood on a rock) on the right.

And finally to meet with a reporter from BBC Radio Sheffield in order to record an interview with us ahead of our live appearance on the breakfast show with Toby Foster next Tuesday. This nearly pushed me to my limit on the leg front as she wanted to record it whilst we ran. I gingerly trotted along and luckily I don't think that running was Kat's thing as she didn't appear keen to push the pace.

Kat from BBC Radio Sheffield wasn't used to being up so early - she didn't even have time to dry her hair!

So having suffered no ill-effects from that little jaunt, and benefitting from another physio session with Derek French today, I set off for a brisk march of 7 miles this afternoon. I'd been feeling as though my back problems were being compounded by protecting my injured leg however once out and up to speed all seemed to settle down and I started to really enjoy the outing. I think that I've been getting a bit stir crazy being unable to do anything and having enforced rest. Whatever, I faced the demons of where my injury took place on the aptly named Limb Valley towards the end of the hike and finished off the 7 miles in 1 hour 36 mins and feeling much much better about my prospects for the race itself.

Despite the look, I'm actually feeling better about my recovery at this point

Aside from the BBC coverage, I've also been in touch with both the Sheffield Telegraph and Sheffield Star to try to secure some more coverage for our charity fundraising and for our kit sponsors Otto's and the Mediterranean restaurants in Sheffield. I'm hopeful or articles in both next week.

Our fund raising has now reached over 90% of our £5,000 target, and today stands at  £4,657 and hopefully with a final push we should hit the target before we go.

The final bits of kit preparation are coming along well, although I'm struggling to bring my overall pack weight down below 10.5kg before adding water. That's a fair bit heavier than I was aiming for, despite cutting off almost 100g from my rucsac and seemingly trimming the rest of it down as far as I think I can. I may change my views a bit after practicing with it in the Sheffield Hallam University heat chamber from tomorrow, and probably even more once I get to the desert and experiencing the conditions, and seeing what others have packed.