And you thought a marathon was hard?

...then try the Trailwalker Challenge - 100 Km through terrain within 30 hours. Teams of 4 people set out hiking or running the distance through the South Downs national park from 6 a.m. in the morning on a rainy weekend in late July.

As a joint fundraiser between Oxfam and the Gurkha Welfare Trust, the event attracts over 1600 participants. Unbelievably, the first teams of Gurkha soldiers arrived at the finish line a little over 10 hours after starting! With stops at the 9-odd checkpoints and feeding stations, that makes for an average pace of 10Km/hour through hilly terrain - a feat in human endurance almost too hard to imagine.

Most teams struggle through the course at a slower pace and hike rather than run. To complete the challenge, 30 hours are the maximum time allowed. There were emotional scenes throughout the night and the following morning as tired and exhausted trailwalkers arrived at the Brighton Racecourse finish line. And I must add - I was pretty exhausted too...

TIME Lightbox feature on oil development

Following US president Trump's executive orders effectively reviving the Dakota Access and Keystone XL pipeline projects, TIME Magazine started working on a Lightbox feature looking at the effects of oil production related to them. The essay titled "A Crude Awakening-A Visual Exploration of the Pipeline Controversy" appears here and includes work by nine photographers who have shot stories on oil development.

My image of a Grizzly bear crossing an access road near a tarsands mine in northern Alberta is featured in the section on deforestation. Enjoy the read!

Better late than never...

It's been in the works for almost a year. It took tweaking and re-tweaking, configuring and updating, and I am sure nobody wants to know the boring details behind it all, but it's finally here and live: my new website!

The only thing that hasn't changed is the URL, it is still hosted at jirirezac.com, and so is this blog. Everything else (apart from the images) is new, based on the Photoshelter adaptive template.

As always, I am keen to hear feedback, comments and criticism, if you have the time...

Home away from Home

It's a strange feeling when your home of many sea voyages, expeditions and adventures suddenly turns up on your doorstep. Usually, when I join the Greenpeace ship Esperanza, it involves dragging multiple bags and cases through multiple airports before arriving somewhere at the other side of the world. This time, it was a 1-hour ride on the tube to Tower Hill.

So the Esperanza arrived in London, moored just next to Tower Bridge, and I had an opportunity to catch up with friends and crew members. She was in town for a week, and I must say I have missed the old girl - my favourite ship in the Greenpeace fleet, she has been home for months at a time, on every ocean, on more trips than I care to remember over the past 10 years. Nice to have had her so close to my chosen home, London. Here's a few pictures to go with the occasion.

Portfolio Candidates

It's over two years since I have added anything to the portfolio - so understandably, during that time, I think I have accumulated a few keepers. They were mostly shot on a range of assignments, from cover shoots to expeditions and neatly fall into the four categories 'Creative', 'People', 'Industry' and 'Places. Here is a gallery of the new additions, soon to be published on my redesigned website - watch this space.