Bierzo Baggie Wrote:This diary will probably resemble my "training"...erratic,meandering and sometimes non-existent. In any case, it's an honour to be able to write on the only Anglo-Hispanic running forum on the net. How's that for a first post?
Hey, its almost a year since I started my training diary. And since then every single run has been religiously registered complete with running time (must get round to measuring the distances one day). If Id shown the same discipline in training as I have done in writing up all this tosh then Id probably have broken a world record or two.
Time for only a brief dash this morning. Frosty winter landscape encapsulated in a shroud of mist. The route is a familiar one. Out via the gypsy way, alongside the railway track for a couple of kms, across the unmanned level crossing with the memorial to the fallen tractor driver and back along the other side.
24 minutes.
I’d hung my boots up at 33. Decided that football was a young man’s game and that running was the future. Theoretically I should be at my running prime in my mid-thirties whereas the fate of a 30-something footballer tends to lie amongst an array of orthopaedic supports and shouts of “mark the old fellow” from opponents who weren’t even born when you started your glorious career in the Bloxwich Combination League or wherever.
Anyway, it all began with a phone call a couple of weeks ago from the turbid world of Spanish Sunday league football (except that the games are usually played on a Saturday). It was Mingoya junior, an ex-teammate from a highly successful pub side I’d played with a few years ago. He has formed a new team with his dad and they are at present languishing two places from the bottom of the flat end of the Spanish league pyramid. Relegation is impossible as there is nowhere left to go. In fact Mingoya senior was a decent semi-pro in his youth and still retains a nice touch. Mingoya junior must be getting on 30 these days. Oh, and they’re short of players.
Mentioned to Rosana that I intended to join the father-son combo and kick-start my playing career again. Once she had recovered from 5 minutes hysterical laughter she questioned the wisdom of my decision. Well, she didn’t actually say “I question the wisdom of your decision” but it was along those lines. As she correctly pointed out my unfulfilled dream had always been to play up front with Cyrille Regis and I clearly wanted to live out my childhood fantasies. Shouldn’t parenthood have matured me? The ageing Mingoya senior was merely a substitute for big Cyrille and I would inevitably make a fool of myself or get injured. I tried to explain that Albion’s present day centre forward is Kevin Campbell who is as old as me. So is Alan Shearer. And then there’s an authentic English institution called Teddy Sheringham who is possibly older than the legendary Mingoya senior himself (although like Ethiopian steeplechasers the true age of these people will always remain one of life’s great mysteries). Rosana laughed again and asked how a grown man could possibly be named after a cuddly toy .
So, I signed on for my new team and found myself in the dug-out for Saturday’s home game. Except there is no dug-out, but rather a soft bed of grass where I took advantage of the pleasantly warm rays of afternoon sunshine and tried to get a first half suntan. Almost immediately I recognized what I missed about football and why running in contrast is such a hard, solitary pastime (and perhaps why I felt inclined to write about the latter and not the former). Be it the Bierzo “friends of football” league or “the Devon and Exeter”, there’s the same banter, the same characters, the same ridiculous situations and the same innate immaturity of men getting out of the house for a couple of hours to act like boys. Running gives plenty of time for the mind to wander, for reflection or introspection even. In football there’s never a dull moment. Love it!
I was one of two subs. A third turned up just before half time complaining of a fairly heavy family lunch. My team wore yellow shirts with the name of our metal factory sponsors “Aluminium Dos” emblazoned across the front in bold letters. And we’re quite an international bunch as it turns out with two Brits, a Frenchman and a couple of Cape Verdeans in the ranks. But don’t be fooled by appearances. We’re still crap.
My moment of glory came in the second half when I came on as sub, ran around like a headless chicken for half an hour and got one of their centre halves booked but little else. We lost 5-2.
Still managed to get out for a Sunday morning run. Ran past the village pitch of Toral de Merayo where I’m due to play with the aluminium boys later on this season. Glorious sunshine. Cold. Icy in the shade. One solitary heron flapped its wings and took flight across the river. I feel that this particular training diary is coming to an end….
Running time 44 minutes.
One running year. Runs; 108. That’s probably about 1000 kms or 666.6 recurring miles. A little less than some years, a little more than others. Sounds like a lot….to a non-runner, but as you’ll all know here it’s somewhat on the short side for any half serious marathon preparation. Celebrated my tenth year of regular running by this little act of self indulgence, a training diary on the net in the eminent company of some excellent writing runners (or are they running writers?) and in doing so followed the footsteps of the likes of Samuel Pepys, Nick Hornby, Adrian Mole, Sweder and Andy…. And now the running cycle which has taken me through icy cold winter and baking hot summer, sweet smells of spring and golden taints of autumn has at last swung its full course. I run the risk of repeating myself. And in any case I prefer circular routes to linear ones.
My running diary will revert back to its original, more humble format. Brief notes will once again be scribbled down in my own primitive shorthand in scruffy exercise books and stored away in a shoebox to be occasionally used for personal reference. And funnily enough I’ve learnt a lot more about writing here than running. One appeal of running for me is that it’s so, sort of….minimalist. The less excess baggage the better. A T-shirt, a pair o’ pumps and the open road (or trail or path). Nothing complicated. I’d spend money on a pair of decent trainers (look after those knees) but you can forget all your gadgets, GPS, MP3, HRM, gels and whatever. It can be as simple as you want it to be. Relaxation. Switch off. Zen. The idea of running as therapy has come up a few times on the forum in the last 12 months and I must say that I’d never thought about it before, at least not directly (relaxation is a form of therapy as well). Although I’d once thought of running as being a bit like yoga (it’s not, it’s much more knackering!) And what I have found fascinating is how such an imminently uncreative process as running can stimulate a creative activity such as writing. Both are irrational pursuits. And from the irrational come innumerable acts of senseless beauty (err, more magic mushrooms anybody?) And my reasons for running are ambiguous and difficult to explain. It’s far from being simply “another leisure activity”. More, an inescapable part of my routine that keeps the blood pumping around my body. It’s something that makes me feel alive. Still prefer the footie though….
Went to a funeral on Tuesday. It was for Eduardo “lord of the paths,” one of the characters from El Bierzo who I’ve mentioned a few times in these diaries. Always expected that he’d go out in a blaze of glory scaling some Himalayan peak in a snowstorm but as it were it was the cancer that finished him off. I didn’t even know he’d been ill. The last time I saw him was back in September on Monte Pajariel. He probably knew by then although you’d never have guessed on seeing him, striding along, squeezing out the precious time that remained by doing what he enjoyed most. The funeral was in the basilica of Ponferrada although Eduardo’s church was the mountain and the walls of ice were his gothic cathedrals. The annual Montes Aquilianos event (first Saturday in June) was his brainchild and I resolved to do the 66km route this year in homage to the “lord of the paths”.
The season ahead? Who knows? Hope to do a few more races this time around but it’ll probably be very much the same as last year; running around in circles .
I'll miss your succint yet infinitely descriptive style, BB. I feel I've been across that bloody rickety old bridge a few times myself. Sorry to hear about the LotP. Happy running.
The harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph
Had hoped to finish February with a photo of the first almond blossom of spring. No such luck. The bleak mid-winter still reigns supreme.
Havent packed in the running. Im getting out about twice a week and Sunday mornings run was the first time over an hour and a half since last July. Took the camera and these were the results.
Good luck with the warmer weather ahead BB. Down here, the experts tell us we are looking forward to a particularly cold winter following a relatively cool summer. We even had some snow in the mountains this month - in February!
Nice photos too. I like the bridge especially. Anything that old down here would be a major tourist attraction.
Maybe you should exhibit some of your jokes, MLCM...
Great pics, BB. There's something surreal about seeing vines covered in snow. I must look up Bierzo and find out exactly where it is. Looks well worth a visit sometime.
Incidentally, I haven't made a direct response to your threat about not keeping up your training diary. As long as you're writing about something, that's fine. I need this regular fix of Spain, whatever you're telling us about.
El Gordo
Great things are done when men and mountains meet.
Kids off school today (carnival Tuesday, great invention these Mickey Mouse holidays). Up at dawn to tackle the big one on my old mountain bike, the Morredero pass, a place to d .25km from my doorstep. Ever upwards. Theres enough snow up there to start an avalanche.
In the 10 years Ive lived here Ive never seen it so white. Laden with snow the mountains take on a whole new personality. Jagged outcrops are suddenly softened into smooth creamy curves. La montaña, exquisite, feminine and perfumed with a scent of adventure. Danger even.
Morning glory, heres the story, in pictures. Loads of them.
Got to within 2 or 3 kms of my destination. Couldn't face any more climbing so instead tried to descend to the village of Peñalba along a track I'd run up at the beginning of January. In normal conditions this would have allowed me to follow a circular route back to Ponferrada. Not a chance today. The snow came up to my saddle! Ended up whizzing back down the way I'd just come.
Frolicking back to February....
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