Mon 1 Nov 2004

Don't Forget to vote for Member of the Month
.

This poster appears in the men's changing room at the hotel gym.

Hmmm. You couldn't make it up.

Tues 2 Nov - Wed 3 Nov 2004

Tuesday Lunchtime:

An ominous day. Two days. I'm going to merge them, because I don't know where one will finish and the other start. I hope there'll be a run or two in here too, not to mention a football match, so hang on in there.

A message on the Runners World forum the other day asked plaintively whether people weren't fed up with all the attention that the US presidential election was getting. "What's it got to do with us?" they asked.

Rather a lot, of course, is the answer.

Arguably, we've seen more of the campaign than the average American. We get the straight (if it can be called straight) hustings stuff. But we also get a ton of meta-analysis that examines the state of American society and its media. It truly is "the greatest democracy money can buy", as a wise man once said.

People keep asking me who I think will win. It's an interesting question because it's not really about Bush v Kerry. It's about Bush. It's about whether the electorate endorses the Bush world-view or rejects the Bush world-view. Kerry may or may not turn out to be a great president, but his purpose in this election is reduced to that of a code-word for Bush rejection. It's a bit like an arranged marriage, according to an Indian guy I spoke to recently. "You marry first", he said, "And hope you can fall in love later on".

This is the first US or UK election since this website began, so I'd better explain that I enjoy them. A lot. Enough to book a day off work the next day so that I can stay up half the night. The appeal is sort of gladiatorial. Sport, but deadly serious. Serious enough to change the world, and by extension, the lives of the people in that world. It's a long time since we had a US or UK election as unpredictable as this one, so the sporting element is even more exciting, and more deadly, than usual.

Between now and then, there's the small matter of QPR v Millwall to attend to. It's going to be a long night.

Midnight:

Just back from a pulsating Loftus Road where we were lucky to grab a 1-1 draw against a... robust Millwall side, thanks to a last minute equaliser from the age-defying Paul Furlong. (Pics from tonight's game courtesy of www.qprnet.com).

I'd earlier thought I might manage a first for me - a midnight run. I fancied the idea of a new perspective. But I was too hungry to put off eating any longer, so instead I'll try a longer jaunt tomorrow.

Election news is surprisingly positive at the moment. There are strong murmurs about a Kerry win, though this is based on little more than anecdotal reports of a high turn-out. Ladbrokes have just made Kerry 1/3 favourite and Bush 9/4. First time in the entire campaign that Kerry has been favourite.

.... but going the other way again. I've had Ł50 on Bush at 7/4 as a minor insurance. Not the sort of bet I want to win.

Time to sleep, fearing the worst.

Wednesday morning:

That's it then. We wake to a world even less safe than it was yesterday. At least yesterday we had hope. Now we have none.

At times like this, I tend to retreat. No point in agonising over the impending disaster. It'll happen. Life will limp on.

This is where running is so useful. It has a great ability to wipe the slate clean, even if the tabula rasa is illusory. Let's get running. Life will be better afterwards.

Wednesday evening:

Oh well, what can you do?

You can run, that's what. I got out at about four this afternoon, and headed out along the canal - my first plod down here for weeks. How good it felt. It was still light - just. I watched as the sun slowly sank behind the lake running alongside this stretch of the Kennet & Avon Canal. Very peaceful, and just what I needed.

I didn't have a lot of sleep last night, and thought this would weigh heavily on any running I did today. But it didn't. I ended up knocking out nearly 6½ miles at a reasonable lick, and felt almost purged of my earlier despondency.

Much of the run was spent pondering the nature of the American people. I read recently that about 50% of American adults regard Darwinism as "just a theory on a par with Creationism". If people are that badly educated, or inward looking, or mentally ill, or f***ing stupid, I suppose Bush's re-election seems more comprehensible. A damn shame for all those decent Americans I correspond with, and like a lot.

The one good thing I can think of about another four long years with this Bush creature is that he'll at least provide us with plenty more laughs. We are rightly scared of the man's staggering idiocy and deceitfulness, but it does have its lighter moments.

In fact, let's face it, the man's a scream really.

Thurs 4 November 2004

I've been reading Runners World magazine, and reflecting on how mad people are.

I'm ambivalent towards this magazine. I confess that I devour it, though part of its compelling appeal is that it reminds me that not everyone is like me. Running makes me happy, but others are surprisingly full of anxiety and resentment. One letter-writer bemoans that "the reality of healthy self-propulsion" (I think he means running) through the countryside is being spoiled by the "all-pervading smell of industrial perfume overpowering the sweet autumnal smells". He's referring to deodorants.

And I'm always shocked by the amount of harrassment that runners say they get from pedestrians and car drivers. I can recall only a couple of minor incidents. A schoolkid threw an egg sandwich at me once. (Or was it chicken? Or cheese? I remember observing that it was a missile with an unusually high protein content.) And another time, someone shouted "Oy, you're too fat to run". I'd actually imagined someone shouting this at some point, and had an answer ready: "That's like saying you're too hungry to eat". It takes a bit of pondering, a tactic that paid off on this occasion.

I'd forgotten about this latter incident until a recent visit to Charlotte Dutch's running blog, when she mentioned some kids giggling at her race-walking technique. It's a terrible confession but... well, race-walking does tend to be one of the comic highlights of the Olympics, doesn't it? A 13 year old kid would have to be a bit weird not to have shouted something, let's be honest.

I've created disappointingly few waves of outrage in my local community. Perhaps people mistake my running style for someone just out for a leisurely stroll, and think nothing more of it.

Back to Runners World magazine. One perplexing item in this month's issue was a piece about tapering. This is what it says about a final preparatory session for a half marathon:

Run one mile at 10K race pace and recover with four minutes of jogging. Then run 1200m at 10K race pace with a three minute recovery jog. Follow with 800m at 10K pace and another three minute recovery jog. Finish with 2 x 400m, running each 400m about eight to ten seconds faster than you ran all the other laps. Jog one lap to recover between.

I really don't know how people go about following this sort of advice. Do they write it on their arm? Copy it into a notebook and keep it in their back pocket? How else would you remember such convoluted instructions?

Sometimes it's good to be a slowbie. Life is less complicated.

Fri 5 November 2004

Guy Fawkes Night. A slightly surreal war-zone run this evening, surrounded by explosions and flashes and sudden illuminations. Not very fast but no shortage of entertainment.

Sun 7 November 2004

An eventful couple of days.

Yesterday began with a quick run along the canal. As usual, I turned off at the second road crossing and ran the half mile or so up to the main road back to the village. This tiny lane up to the A4 takes me past the hamlet of Ufton Nervet and over an unmanned level crossing. I've plodded along this sleepy cut-through a hundred times. I don't think I've ever seen a car or even a person on the lane.

How could I have guessed that this track, this level crossing and this ramshackle collection of farmhouses, would become international news just a few hours later?

The afternoon was spent at West Ham, watching us lose 2-1. An entertaining game at a ground I don't think I've visited since the 1970s. In those days it was an atmospheric, claustrophobic cauldron of a place with all four stands butted up against the narrow pitch. Now it's just another expansive stadium with stands reaching to the heavens and a home support that could barely raise a whimper of enthusiasm until they regained the lead shortly before the end. With the likes of West Ham starting to become a sterile brand, and a visit to Upton Park being marketed as just another pricey "Experience" to add to the tick-list, it's time to worry. Those Tower of London ravens must be packing their bags as we speak.

More heartening on this dismal day was the drive through London. It's a long time since I traversed the capital like this. I used to do it all the time. When I shared a house in Balham with a French guy, Olivier, we would often go off in the early hours of the morning to search for smoked salmon bagels in Whitechapel or Spitalfields. The drive across town at night was always astonishing. Hard to say why. Perhaps you have to know, understand, love, London, as I do, to appreciate just how different a place it is after midnight. It's a shame the Americans have hijacked and devalued the word "awesome". Very few things in this world truly deserve the label, but London, and particularly London at night, when you're young and sassy, really is awesome. The drive today reminded me of those times.

And then Saturday night happened. At first I thought it was fireworks. As we approached our village, we saw the sky illuminated by blue flashing lights. The line stretched across the fields to Ufton Nervet and beyond. Dozens of fire engines, ambulances and police cars. Then we heard that the London to Plymouth Inter-City had crashed at the level crossing. It was surreal to think that where I'd earlier trotted across the railway line, people were now lying, dead and seriously injured.

This morning's canal run was a sombre affair. I knew I'd not get near the crossing so I carried along the towpath as far as I could. As expected, the path had been blocked by the police, and the usual early morning runners and dog walkers were being diverted along one of the muddy paths through the fields on the other side of the river. The mud got wetter and deeper, and in the end I had to stop and turn back. It was only now that I caught a glimpse of the train through the wood, cork-screwed along the track in the light early morning mist like something out of a disaster movie. And a new village had appeared overnight in the scrubby field next to the level crossing. Tents, caravans mobile cranes and other heavy plant now filled the space.

It was a terrible scene, and I didn't linger.

For the record, I managed nearly seven miles, but this doesn't seem too important just now.

pictures © BBC

Thurs 11 November 2004

I've committed adultery.

That's how it feels, anyway.

I've deserted Hal for Bob.

I blame it on my illness. I'm almost never ill. So I find it sort of interesting when I am. It's only a bad head cold, but enough to keep me away from work for a couple of days. No running of course. So I've been using some of my time to read Bob Glover's Competitive Runner's Handbook. I've been aware of this book for at least three years, but the very title was too off-putting to even pluck from the shelf for a book shop browse. But some correspondence on a running forum recently persuaded me that its bark might be worse than its bite, so I bought a copy. And it's good.

I've been reading the stuff about marathon training with particular interest. I plan to do one in the spring, and have decided my usual training regime needs a splash of Tabasco. Glover's plans appeal to me for two reasons. One is that they are 16 weeks rather than Hal Higdon's 18. Last time I did a Hal plan, I felt that 18 was a little long for someone with a reasonable training base. It stretches into the distance just a bit too far. 16 is only 2 weeks less but I'm hoping it will make a psychological difference.

The basic structure of the two is the same: rest days on Monday and Friday, lengthening weekend run. But the second positive difference for me is that Glover's plans have longer midweek runs and a kinder weekend schedule. The long runs escalate slightly quicker, but the second weekend run is always just a 3 miler, while Higdon's plans (apart from the Novice schedule which has just one weekend run) tend to have a second weekend run of 5, 6, 7, 8 miles. This is just too much for me.

So I'm going to give Bob a chance.

************

It's Remembrance Day. There was a touching thread on a football website today, where people were posting poems and messages and stuff. (It also taught me that one Evelyn Lintott, apparently the first QPR player to play for England, died on the Somme in 1916). One guy, who I'm fairly sure is a runner from something he once said about marathoning, posted a Charles Sorley poem that I'd not seen before. (Sorley died in the trenches in 1915, aged 20). I thought it combined running and the troubled times in which he lived rather well. Here it is.

The Song of the Ungirt Runners

We swing ungirded hips,
And lightened are our eyes,
The rain is on our lips,
We do not run for prize.
We know not whom we trust
Nor whitherward we fare,
But we run because we must
Through the great wide air.

The waters of the seas
Are troubled as by storm.
The tempest strips the trees
And does not leave them warm.
Does the tearing tempest pause?
Do the tree-tops ask it why?
So we run without a cause
'Neath the big bare sky.

The rain is on our lips,
We do not run for prize.
But the storm the water whips
And the wave howls to the skies.
The winds arise and strike it
And scatter it like sand,
And we run because we like it
Through the broad bright land.

Sun 14 November 2004

Running slow teaches you how to run slow.

I read this in the Glover book recently. He may not be great with adverbs, but some of his sentences are like cattle-prods. The sentiment was in my head as I set off on my standard 'round the block' run yesterday morning. So I tried to run quickly. And by my modest standards, I did. It wouldn't sound speedy to most runners, but apart from races, this was the fastest pace I've run for more than 16 months.

More good news on the weight front too, which is probably related to the quicker pace. Six weeks into the new regime, and I'm averaging a loss of just over 1½ pounds a week. Not a dramatic plunge, and that's how I want it. Just steady decrements, amounting to ten pounds. The only changes I've made have been to cut out alcohol and chocolate.

Yet more joy to come in the afternoon, as my team defeats the league leaders in a hard-fought match at Loftus Road.

Not a bad day's work.

This morning I woke up and decided I couldn't be bothered running. Then I got up, pulled back the curtains, saw the brilliant sunshine - and knew I had to get out there. As I left the house I saw a fox dart across the garden. First one I've seen this close to the house.

It was cold. The first properly cold day of the season. The usual 3½ miles. I'd normally head off down the canal for a slightly longer run but I wasn't sure if the path would have reopened after last week's train disaster. So I kept away.

I'd already resolved not to try for another fast one. The after-effects of yesterday's extra speed were lingering in my legs. More important, I was out running just 5 minutes after getting out of bed, and with cold muscles, straining too hard is a gilt-edged invitation to injury. So I just jogged round the lanes and through the deer park in the sunshine, grinning at everyone I met.

As I turned the final corner and headed for home I found myself running past the church and the annual Remembrance Sunday parade. Ironically, I'd forgotten. Rather self-consciously, I did something a bit old-fashioned. I took my cap off as I went past the line of old soldiers and their families, receiving a few grateful nods in response.

I'd been startled by it all. One minute I was bowling along, carefree, enjoying the sense of liberation you get from one of those beautiful, sunlit wintry mornings. The next, I was tugged back into sombre line. I felt almost guilty for a moment. But then the Charles Sorley verse came back to me, and felt somehow exonerated. We run because we like it, Through the broad bright land.

He wouldn't have minded.

Thurs 18 November 2004

Some good emails this week, including one from a disgruntled Chelsea fan called Rufus who wrote to me from an internet café in Santiago, Chile, to protest about something I wrote about his club on the Runners World website. All I said was that they were corrupting the entire sport, and that there was no honour in buying the Premiership and the Champions League with stolen roubles. Fairly uncontroversial, I'd have thought.

I've also had a couple of mails which have got me thinking about my race schedule. I don't recall saying much about it here, so I'll mention that I've entered two races within six days of each other just after Christmas - Cliveden on December 27th and the Hyde Park 10K on New Years Day.

Cliveden's a pig in a poke. I can't find a definitive description of what it's supposed to be, or even how long it is. Either 5.3 miles or 6 miles. Cross country or trail. Murderous or enjoyable. A hangover is variously essential or deeply unhelpful. I do know that it takes place at Cliveden, the house near Maidenhead once owned by the Astors, and venue of celebrated house-parties in the twenties and thirties. And I do know that it involves running up and down a large steep hill not once, not twice, but three times. I was going to add: "The mud is legendary", but I can't believe that mud can ever be described as legendary.

I don't really do mud, and don't have many hills under my belt, whatever the scales may say, so something will have to give. I even bought a pair of Gel Guts, the curiously named off-road shoes from Asics that were well reviewed when they came out last year. I've been meaning to buy a pair for a while, and when I found some reduced by Ł20 (to Ł29) last week, well, I could restrain myself no longer.

Talking of shoes, I heard today that the always-cheap New Balance factory shop were offering an extra 20% off this week, so I've dived in there and bought another pair of 854s and a pair of the new 856s. Along with the as-yet unused pair I bought in last year's sale, I now have four pairs of unworn shoes. Caramba.

The other race is the opposite of Cliveden. Very much a known quantity. I did it in 2003. In a way, a rather dull race, being a circuit of some of Hyde Park's inner paths, repeated three times. But I like its symbolism. A race on New Year's Day says something about your intentions for the year ahead. Buggers up your New Year's Eve though.

End of January comes the Almeria Half Marathon. Then in March we have the Reading and Silverstone Halfs on successive weekends. Then April, with some kind of marathon somewhere. Padua is still the likely one.

For training purposes I've assumed I'll be doing a marathon at the end of April. This means my 16-week Bob Glover training plan kicks in, neatly, in the first week of the year. The Hyde Park 10K, if I get there, will be the final weekend before proper training starts. I call it "proper training" because the four weeks before that need to have at least 20 miles in each if I'm not to get off on the wrong foot with Coach Bob.

This week hasn't been great so far. I managed 3½ leisurely miles on Sunday,followed by a scheduled rest day. On Tuesday I found myself plodding four miles in Dartford once more. This really is among the bleakest sort of urban landscape available to mankind. Not bleak in the sense of derelict or dilapidated. Just the opposite. It's modern. But it's anodyne. Sterile. It's a concrete pillow, smothering your appetite for life. For a while it drains you of all hope. Down the long dual carriageway, past the Asda depot, BurgerKing and McDonald's. Oh god, I can't go on.

I couldn't face it yesterday or today.

Tues 23 November 2004

I complained last month that the light at the end of the Dartford tunnel kept flickering enticingly, without ever really appearing. Well, it's now burning bright. Barring yet another last minute stay of liberation, it looks like my time here will finally be winding up this week. I've done me porridge, and I'm going home.

So this week, I'm playing my joker. There was always a strong possibility that the week would be a bit of a write-off in any case, for all sorts of reasons, but if it's my last week, who needs a further excuse?

But if you do, here are a few. Thursday's the birthday of a colleague who announced a while ago that it was time we had a good old knees-up. And last weekend marked 50 days of abstemiousness, which is even longer than Jesus managed in the desert. He went without a good bevy for only 40 days and 40 nights, apparently. Surely I can celebrate beating his record?

The other reason is that next week represents my last few days of freedom before my training starts. Not my marathon training proper, but the month of 20 mile weeks that New Coach Bob has specified. So I have 16 weeks of real training, preceded by a month of gentler groundwork, preceded by a week of tuning in, turning on and, er, calf stretches, preceded by a week of beer-guzzling and pizza-chomping.

This week's the week of beer-guzzling and pizza-chomping.

I'm back in the Dartford Hilton for, I'm told, the very last time. Sitting here in my usual salmon sofa, laptop on knees, but this time at least, with the chance to enjoy a glass of Waitrosian Montepulciano d'Abruzzo. Never a bad choice if you want to get mildly drunk for less than a fiver. That's what it says on the bottle anyway. I think. It's in Italian, so I can't be certain. Others may translate it more literally. Something about dark grapes ripening in the shimmering heat.

Rather optimistically, I packed my trainers and 3 sets of running clothes this week. Plus _colin, my GPS 'gadge'. I even have New Coach Bob's book sitting on the table in front of me. I try not to notice it, but how can you ignore a missile aimed at your heart like that?

Looks like the week will be a write-off - first one in months.

Aw, stuff happens.

I'll be fine until the alarm clock detonates at 7 a.m.

Sun 28 November 2004

This is it - my last night of nutritional abandon for another while. I've not made the most of it. No alcohol, no cream cakes. I've OD-ed on naughtiness this week, and done no running. I just don't have the energy to get drunk one last time. Pitiful really.

Middle-class, middle-aged depravity isn't a patch on the twenty-something version, it has to be said. I was mournfully tackling this very important issue over a few post-match pints and large gins with one of my QPR buddies in a Hades-black, raucous Shepherds Bush boozer just yesterday. Instead of scrapping and screwing and snorting, the worst we can do now is spend longer in the pub than we promised our wives, and avoid our running shoes for a few days. Woooo-ooooo. What's the world coming to?

It's been an interesting week, but I'm seriously wondering if running isn't the new debauchery. I've spent much of my life living in fear of becoming a goody-goody, but I may have to reassess the tell-tale signs just to stay sane, Perhaps taking part in a race is the new lost weekend. MY MARATHON HELL. A four mile run through the empty, post-dawn streets tantamount to doing a half bottle of Smirnoff before breakfast. It's the new fuck-ya bastards rebellion. Getting drunk? Way too accessible. Too conformist these days. We need wicked and anti-social. We need shock, and maybe running is it. Try telling someone at work that you've decided to stop drinking for a while because you're training for a marathon, and it's like you've come clean about your crack addiction.

I'm not alone in this revolution. Even Tracy Emin, whose work I anarchically delight in enjoying, was on Desert Island Discs today, confessing to eating nutritiously and going to the gym.

Crikey. The game's up.

[Distant sigh] Pass me those muddy, toe-blood-bloody trainers.

Mon 29 November 2004

6:15, and it was going to be painful. I confess, I did hesitate.

Hold on, isn't Monday usually a rest day?

Mmm. Funny how often I try this one out on myself. No matter that I'd not run in two weeks, had nothing but rest for a fortnight, been drunk most nights for a week. It's always the first thought when I wake on the appointed back-to-work Monday. Hang on. Hang on, I implore. Monday's always a rest day. And for a moment or two I'm almost taken in.

The more it happens, the easier it becomes to dismiss the appeal. Annoying really. There have been times when I've taken a while to work through the arguments, knowing that this would reduce the chances of getting out there. Can't do that now.

So I just got up and did it. Bastards.

And it wasn't too bad.

Just 3 miles. It wasn't fast and it didn't feel very nice, but I managed this modest distance without stopping at least, which is some shred of comfort.

And that's it. I'm now back in training mode. The plan is to have a pretty gentle week - a few round-the-block plods to start feeling fitter again, and then next week to embark on New Coach Bob's stipulated four weeks of 20 miles each. The last week of these will contain my two post-Christmas races at Cliveden and Hyde Park, and then - bang - it's into the new year with the 16 week marathon training.

Race number for Cliveden received on Saturday, so that's that. At the bottom of the instructions it says: WARNING: This really is a tough race.

The message is worrying, but it's that bloody bold type that's so chilling.

-----------

I just ran this file through a spell-checker as I sometimes smugly do. Homesite, my HTML weapon of choice, doesn't have a match for Montepulciano, but suggests "contemplation" instead. I like the idea that these two words might be interchangeable. I like that idea very much.

Tues 30 November 2004

This wasn't a run in the countryside, it was a flickering, grainy film - a monochrome glimpse of some other runner's nightmare.

Hmmm. November is the cruellest month.

Where did autumn go, boys? Lasted a couple of weeks, then we got distracted, led astray. Before we knew it, stepped off the cliff into winter. Something must be done, I say.

Working from home today, I had the luxury of not having to surface till 8, and not having to run till it got properly light. Yet it never got properly light. It got to 2pm, and I gave up waiting. Night would start to close in again if I didn't get out. Not cold, but one of those dismal days that wait around by the back door, ready to smother you as you step outside. The day was so dense that even my GPS sputtered, struggling to find a satellite through the matted clouds.

I set off, but trying to move was like... like dragging a rusty iron bedframe through a shallow, fetid swamp in Southern Louisiana. You know the sort of thing. God, it was horrible.

At least the pub up the back lane is no longer shuttered. Yesterday, it seems, it reopened, though by the time I'm able to sample its exotic fruits, sometime next year, when spring is back, I suspect it will have been once more abandoned.

This was a run to forget. Why?

I've forgotten.

Let's leave it like that.

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