High June

High Noon is one of the most iconic Westerns ever made, a true cinematic masterpiece from the golden era of Hollywood. Starring Gary Cooper and a young Grace Kelly, the film is the story of a small-town marshal, played by Cooper, and his inability to gather a posse of men to help him fight off a gang of bad guys coming into town on the noon train to exact terrible revenge on him. The growing isolation he feels as his friends and colleagues desert him to face the showdown alone is captured perfectly, and the film was quite rightly a huge hit with audiences, and quickly became a classic of the genre. The idea of a gang of bad men arriving on the noon train rather than riding into town on their horses may seem a little odd for a classic Western at first, but there was a very good reason for that, which we'll come back to in a moment...

Gary Cooper was always a shoe-in for playing the good guy in a classic western: raised on a ranch in Montana, with a supreme court justice for a father who had a strong moral compass, it made the screen legend a natural choice for a role such as that of Marshal Kane in High Noon. It's a classic piece of cinema worthy of its fame, but there are also a couple of significant back stories to the production that makes it in hindsight even more memorable, and a genuinely  important piece of cinematic history for more reasons than you may initially think.

The screenwriter for High Noon was Carl Foreman, perhaps more famous for writing Bridge On The River Kwai, which was to come later, but in 1952, his career was very much on the line thanks to drama of a different sort in the form of the odious scourge of McCarthyism. Foreman, as a former member of the Communist Party, had appeared before McCarthy's House Committee on Un-American Activities the previous year and been labelled as 'uncooperative' due to his refusal to name other Communists known to him. As a result, he was blacklisted by all of the Hollywood movie makers, with High Noon being his last film before he fled the U.S. to England where he continued to work under an alias. But even High Noon nearly didn't happen for him. He was actually struck off the production team after shooting had started, but Gary Cooper stood up for him and, according to his daughter, said that if Foreman was off the picture, then so was he. The bosses and producers therefore relented, allowing the movie to continue, crediting Foreman as the screenwriter, but removing him from the production credits.

That Cooper would take such a stand was remarkably brave and completely in keeping (as it happens) with his role in the film as Marshal Kane. The film actually appears to be an allegory of Foreman's experience at the hands of McCarthy, which brings me back to that noon train and the approaching deadline of inevitability together with the increasing isolation as friends desert to leave you facing the music alone. The movie in this way perfectly mimics what Foreman and so many others must have faced as their time in front of the House Committee approached and then consumed them.

That we now appear, some sixty years on from the days of McCarthy, to be in another era of witch-hunts and inquisitions truly bothers me, and I can only hope that enough brave souls such as Gary Cooper stand up to this sort of menace and give some hope to humanity.

Another, less desperate form of high noon for us runners is, of course, the race day deadline. With the Sydney half marathon now behind me, it's time to look to the next race goal, and it's a big one for me, being the Sydney full-distance marathon sixteen weeks hence. That, of course, means that this is week #1 of a standard sixteen-week marathon training schedule, and so training has commenced in earnest once again, only this time with greater emphasis on endurance and made more difficult still by the twelve weeks of winter through which I must train, today being the very first official day of the season of dread for those who cavort about in singlets and shorts in the name of athleticism. It's a cruel form of lunacy, and not one I've ever really successfully mastered through the dark, coldest months of the year as it is here on the remote, lower parts of the southern side of the globe.

Still, the enthusiasm is strong with this one just now, so I'll continue plodding on down Optimist's Row and see how we go. It's a long way, however, and I'll need plenty of motivation cattle prodding to see it through.

The ever-expanding background of world terrorism makes writing about running seem quite facile and irrelevant, but this is a running diary, of sorts, and I can hardly write about my running without at least mentioning the background of world events which impacts my efforts, even at a remove of half the globe.

I'd worked a night shift, and returned home and had just fallen asleep at about the time of the most recent attack. I awoke some hours later to find a message on my phone from #1 son Chris in London saying he and his wife Tash, whilst out on the town that evening, were safe. Eh? What's all this then? I quickly check the news which reveals the latest round of horror on the streets. Increasingly it seems we have to tick off areas we know and have been in that have been subject to the horror of terrorism. The Borough Markets is an area we have visited more than once during our times in London, and loved. In my case it has also the connection of being the area where my mother was born and lived in her youth; just around the corner, as it happens, from where the attack took place. With a son and daughter-in-law now living in London, these events cut deeper than some others, and it was with a sense of continuing disbelief that we followed the events on the news services.

As evidenced by the resolve of Londoners and Britons in general, I felt compelled to still live my life as normally as possible, whilst still acknowledging the turmoil and paying respect to those injured and killed. With that in mind, I was determined to complete my scheduled long run.

In fact, a strange dream just prior to waking had also strengthened my resolve to run today, though it was a somewhat bizarre semi-lucid affair involving Jimmy Carter as an octogenarian (he's 92 as I write this). My dream involved a fitness campaign in the U.S. when Jimmy was 80 years old, which showed the ex-president jogging along a country road. He stops and speaks to the camera, saying 'I'm 80 years old and can run non-stop for 80 minutes. Get active and you too can live a long and fulfilling life' before smiling and running off again. I don't know if Carter was still running in his 80s or not, but I think I know the genesis of this dream which involves two recent conversations I've had and which were perhaps the catalyst for the nocturnal subconscious creativity.

The first was a discussion with a work colleague in which I mentioned that in the recent Sydney half marathon I had finished just outside the top half of the overall field, but a long way down in my age division (55-59), meaning the race clearly had a lot of very good, older runners. I had said how I've long declared that I want to still be running in my 80s, and if the race results indicated anything, it was that the 80+ age categories will become very, very interesting by the time I get there (still a long way off, I hasten to add).

The other conversation was with my mate Steve, in which we had agreed that for average blokes such as ourselves, the best legacy we can leave in this world is to simply lead by example and hope we can encourage others to improve their lot in life by getting on with it and not treating it as if it was never going to end.

It was this, I suppose, that led to the Jimmy Carter dream, although I'm unsure why it was Carter that had the lead role, other than perhaps the fact that he took up running later in life and perhaps tried to simply set a goal that others might like to follow. I'm not really sure; dreams are often weird things, but it did at least have me leaping (figuratively) out of bed determined to complete my long run today. Then I read the news of the attacks in London and this only deepened my resolve to get on with it and complete my run.

I do, though it may seem odd from this side of the planet, feel a deep empathy with London's resilience to such attacks. This has a lot to do with my mother who suffered terribly through the London Blitz of World War 2. Bad enough as the Blitz was, she was also a member of the Women's Royal Navy Reserve and was often stationed on bridges across the Thames at night, her job being to spot falling bombs that landed in the river and failed to explode. Of this role she never spoke, and we only learned years after her death from my father what her job had actually been. To stand on an exposed bridge at night as the Luftwaffe rained down thousands of bombs on the city of your birth, given the specific task of spotting and mapping bombs that failed to explode must have been a truly terrifying ordeal. She was a true Cockney however, born literally within earshot of 'Bow Bells', the bells of St Mary-le-Bow church at Cheapside just one mile away from her home nearby to Borough Station. Whether it was this that gave her stoicism, courage and a fatalistic pragmatism in the face of overwhelming odds I'm not sure, but I like to think at least a little of its positive qualities rubbed off on me, though I've of course not been tested to anything like the degree she and so many others have been.

But yes, I believe I do understand something of the resolve of Londoners, and perhaps this helped me power through my long run this afternoon. Whilst it will have had no impact on the terrorists or the wider world of terrorism, I like to think it helps me to deal with the current state of the world, and perhaps, by extension, help others, too. It certainly can't hurt.

So, 23 kilometres were completed at a decent pace, and in defiance of crazy, mixed up and sadly violent world affairs. In fact, the run went so well that I'm prepared to say after my previous tough hill climbing tempo run and today's long 'un that I've leapt to a new level of fitness. That this should happen in the first week of my four month campaign is greatly encouraging.

Of the actual events in London last night I've little to say that hasn't been better said by others. All I can do is run on with ever greater resolve to lead my life in a way the terrorists are attempting to diminish. Well, to hell with them. I'm running on, regardless. If my mother can stand on a bridge at night for nights on end as bombs fall relentlessly around her, threatening to snuff out her life at any moment, then the very least I can do is keep on running. It's not much, but it's something, and if the goal of terrorists is to disrupt our everyday life, then to carry on is victory.

Wet? You bet it's wet.

As we approach the shortest day of the year, the weather has turned cold, wet and windy. Together with long hours of darkness this has caused much darkening and deepening of the melancholic clouds that surround the MLCMM abode. After several days of rain, I'd had enough, but a break in the weather this morning meant it was finally time to head outdoors and breathe in some real, unfettered air. A week ago I'd done the same, but as a walk with mates from work. Now I wanted to run off-road and clear my head a little of this wintry fuggishness.

Work being done nearby to me on the Great North Walk, a 250km track that runs from Sydney to Newcastle, has greatly improved access, and I was keen to try a couple of new routes, especially one heading north, heading away from the Lane Cove National Park, but largely followng the Lane Cove River until it hits several townships several kilometres away.

With my normally trusty sidekick Garmin Forerunner 405 GPS currently out of action and awaiting repair, I ran naked for once, relying on track markers and my memorisation of the map the night before to guide me through to my destination. As a precaution, I took my phone with me, but only used it once to confirm that I was, in fact, where I thought I was.

I had risen at 7 and was out the door a mere fifteen minutes later to find the world largely hidden by mist. The only real problem this caused was to constantly fog up my glasses, but after a half hour or so the fog had burned off and all was well again.

My usual approach to the Lane Cove National Park has been along the (very) busy Ryde Road, but in recent times I've discovered a back way to the Park which requires only the very briefest of trots alongside the six-lane behemoth, otherwise being mainly quiet back streets and a short section of bush track. Once in the park proper, civilisation quickly vanishes, and despite being, in real terms, very close to subrubia and main roads, all of it is mercifully hidden from sight and sound, instead replaced with lush eucalypt rainforest and the omnipresent, and to me, quintessential sound of Australian rainforest, that being of bellbirds and whipbirds. Have a listen here, it's completely magical. Despite the cold and wet, running through this sort of bush is wondrous, and I intend to do very much more of it, especially now that better access has been opened up and the tracks proeprly signposted and maintained. I say 'maintained', but they are still rough bush tracks, not conducive to your average Sunday stroll, as evidenced by the fact that I only encountered four other people, walking as a group, in the whole two hours I was out there.

Several days of rain made the run a damp one, of course, but of mud there was thankfully very little. Creek crossings, on the other hand, were a nuisance, and there were four that were impassable other than by wading through the sods. This of course resulted in utterly wet feet, but I seemed to escape unscathed, with cold, wet feet, yes, but none of the feared blisters that usually result from such drenchings.

I was toying with the idea of making this outing a return, out and back journey, but the track was more technical and slower going than I expected, so at the end I opted for a return leg home by bus and train, rather than go through all those creeks again. With a couple of rain-free days the water should recede sufficiently for a return outing to be hopefully feasible.

In short, it was a magnificent outing of about 2h45m. I will have to invest in some decent trail shoes however, as my old ones are too old, with virtually no tread. Instead I ran in my oldest pair of normal runners, which held up rather well, but were not so comfortable on the rockier ground.

And so, clear of head, and comfortable of leg, I look forward to the next off-road session, soon.

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I wanted to write something about the tragic Grenfell Tower fire, but to be honest, it's just too depressing. So instead, I'll focus on the antidote to depression and frustration, which is, of course, running. Recent days have been relatively dry, so it was time again to go off-road and hit the trails. It was also time to be sensible about the time of day I ran those trails, and so after a decent night's sleep and something of a lie-in plus a leisurely breakfast, I headed out the door at a very civilised 10:00 a.m.

The plan was to scout out the southern end of Lane Cove National Park and the area beyond, down to a junction at Epping Road. If successful, this would then mean I had a known 30 or 31km running route from the ferry terminal at Woolwich, on the northern side of Sydney Harbour, right through to Pennant Hills. This is predominantly bush track, with a small amount of quiet suburban street running, and one that I'm rather keen to attempt in the near future. Being able to run that sort of distance in quiet, secluded eucalypt rainforest whilst never being more than a few dozens of metres from civilisation in the form of a city of five million people is an amazing thing, and I intend to make use of it.

Today's run would be rather less than the 30 or so kilometre outing I have planned, but it was still a good 20+ kilometres - without a functioning GPS it was a little hard to be sure. I suppose I could install an app on my phone to measure it, but I'm actually quite enjoying running without all the bells and whistles, so for the moment I'm letting it be.

The day was cool and with the threat of rain, and whilst there was evidence of recent rain on the ground at various places, I managed to complete my run without being rained on at all. Overall, this was a run that went very well, and another great brain soother and a welcome change from the treadmill and the busy suburban streets of my 'hood. I'm still questioning whether these off-road sessions are the best form of training for the marathon and the Point To Pinnacle, as it seems to me to all be rather too much stop-start as I have to slow to a walk-and-stumble routine on the all-too-frequent steeper and more slippery sections. On the plus side however, I certainly feel stronger in the legs, so the voice of reason suggests it must be doing me some good. The use of a greater range of muscles on the uneven surfaces must be a useful thing, too.

At one stage on this run I stumbled across an orienteering club outing, with lots of earnest-looking, map-holding athletes clambering around the hills looking for orienteering control points. On my return leg I ran through part of their course again, only this time an event photographer took a long sequence of photos of me, even though clearly I wasn't part of the club. On a whim however, later I emailed the club organiser on the off-chance I could get hold of the photos, as I'm pretty sure I don't have a single picture of myself running off-road*. We'll see what transpires.

I returned home three hours after starting out, and later, by using Google Earth calculated that I had covered about 22 kilometres. That is fairly slow I suppose, but it is a pretty rough old track in places, with long sections of it being completely un-runnable, unless you have particular death-wish, or at least a penchant for rolled ankles and bloodied knees. To be honest the pace or lack of it doesn't bother me at all. It's just good to be out there and covering some very tough and very beautiful terrain. As an antidote to the daily news of terrorism, Trump and tower fires, it's hard to beat, and keeping it simple and tech-free seems to be appropriate.

Now to see where I go from here. My training plan is all rather messed up just now, but these trail runs are useful, even if I'm not quite sure in what way.

 

After a dastardly week of little sleep and being generally under the weather, yet another night of little sleep finally resolved itself about 5 a.m. last night with a determination to bloody well get up and go for a run, regardless of how little sleep I'd had. Only trouble was, it was dark ... very dark. That's the problem with this time of year: you have to wait until so, so very late for the sun to come up. And so it was that I didn't get out the door until 06:40, when there was enough light at least to get me to the start of my bush track run, some 3.5 kilometres from home, and from where full daylight was a necessity, lest I be taken by the nocturnal bunyips trip over a rock or tree root in the pre-dawn murky gloom.  

Today I ventured even further afield than previously, exploring new paths and byways which lead to unexplored parts of the far northern end of the Lane Cove National Park. I'm slowly getting to know these paths; the ones to avoid (creeks, bogs, bloody steep hills etc.) and the parts to seek out (kinder, gentler running with views and so forth), and with the weather being rather clement for the moment, I've been kicking myself for not making the effort in recent days. I did rather make up for it somewhat this morning, however, with a long out-and-back effort of a little over 24 kilometres. Not all of it was run, I hasten to add, but it was a tough outing, as made evident by my falling into a deep sleep for over an hour almost immediately on my return.

I still struggle with the thought that this running, whilst very exhilarating, isn't quite what I need heading into a road marathon, now just 12 weeks away. Well, I say "just" 12 weeks, but of course, that should be plenty of time if I just pull my finger out and get on with consistent, planned training. So this week it's back to the treadmill for some proper endurance training runs. Which isn't to say that off-road running doesn't have a key part to play; it's just that I'm not sure where it fits in and how... oh what the heck, I'm clearly over-thinking all this. Let's just get out there and log a few hundred more kilometres and let it all sort itself out, as I'm sure it will.

At least we're now over the shortest day of the year. And whilst, yes, of course, we still have two more solid months of winter ahead, the hours of sunlight are now irrevocably getting longer, and that does wonders for the lifting of my mood and the cessation of winter blues.

But I really must hit the treadmill again with regularity and purpose.

Here goes...