I’m sat watching the Departure board at Gatwick Airport as I write this. I am on my way to Malmö (via Copenhagen) for a what promises to be a truly excellent week of discussion about running research; a prospect that has not been dampened by my 4:30am alarm for the first train from Surbiton to Gatwick.
This week I will be taking part in a PhD course entitled ‘Enacting the urban landscape: running as an everyday practice‘ organised by Mattias Qviström at Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences. The first day (Wednesday) will be a PhD workshop for students from all over Europe who are studying running as an everyday practice, during which we will be having discussions about methods and how to research running.
Thursday will see us attend an International Conference on Running & Landscape that features a stellar cast of academics doing a range of fascinating work into running. These include Alan Latham, Hayden Lorimer, Kai Syng Tan, Tim Edensor and Mattias. I am particularly looking forward to hearing about the work two architecture MRes students from Wageningen have been doing their thesis into how to design a runnable city. I’ve been emailing them for a little while so should be good to hear how their project is coming along.
Finally, on Friday we will be taking a field trip around Malmö and the surrounding area to look at the history of landscape planning for running in Sweden, and current facilities for the practice.
All in all it looks like a wonderful few days, a great chance to hear and discuss running research, catch up with friends, make some news ones, and perhaps, just perhaps, get some running done. I’ve long wanted to visit Sweden, so I am very much looking forward to it.
I’ll report back next week!
Jographies 