2006 - January

[Bierzo Baggie]

Well done! I've spent the last 10 years in search of the early morning run. It rarely lasts for more than a week. I even bought a head torch to get out onto the hills before sunrise. Guess what?...it remains unused. I'll try to follow your example at some point this year but until then my "training" will remain as erratic and unplanned as ever....

Have to admit though that running early is the most sensible option for hundreds of different reasons, but you must feel well-knackered by the end of the day...

[Tim]

Lovely bit of writing today Andy, I really enjoyed it. It's pieces like that that make me realise just how rubbish my writing is.

Did my bit for early morning rising (if not quite so early morning running) by getting up at 5:30, leaving the house at 6:30 and driving up to Milngavie (the start of the WHW) via Troon to pick up a few club mates.

It was SO worth the effort. The gods couldn't have smiled on us more broadly. Cold, crisp, sunny. Just perfect. Even better, a total of 20 runners had massed to join in the first WHW training run up to Drymen and back (25 miles total) and the company couldn't have been better. We even had a few women. As ever, we stopped in Drymen for tea & buns at a local shop/cafe where they give you that most un-british of things, free refills of your coffee!

All in all, a brilliant day. Running at it's best.

[Mid Life Crisis Marathon Man]

Gosh Andy, first you go off the booze, then you re-discover morning runs... next you'll be turning vegetarian and putting wheatgrass in your fruit juice

Never mind five hours - you'll be breaking four hours at this rate of healthy living. What hope is there for us mere mortals?

[El Gordo]

I'm nearly there already, MLCM. I am a meat-eater, but I don't eat meat. Or very little. And I'd try wheatgrass if I knew what the hell it was and where to get it. I've become horribly healthy in the last couple of weeks. Barely a mouthful of processed food has passed my lips, and not a drop of alcohol.

I'm hoping Sweder and SP will be able to knock some sense into me in Almeria.

[Seafront Plodder]

I'm hoping Sweder and SP will be able to knock some sense out of me in Almeria.

I'm sure we'll give it a damn good go.

[Antonio247]

I´m glad you´re on a healthier lifestyle, Andy. It will be very good for you.

Anyway, I hope you will make an exception in Almería and you will be able to have some churros, paella, pasta, tapas, etc. If you don´t want to drink any alcohol, which I hardly ever do, you can have some alcohol-free beer, water, orange juice or soft drinks.


Greetings from Almería

Antonio

[El Gordo]

I might pass on the churros, Antonio, as I think I'm finding quite easy to go without sweet things. The paella, pasta and tapas sound good, and can be pretty healthy in their own right of course.

Thanks for the suggestion about the alcohol-free beer and soft drinks. I'll, er, I'll have a think about this. Trouble is, I'll be under a certain amount of social pressure to drink alcohol, and even though I probably won't enjoy it much, it might be easier just to go along with the crowd rather than make a fuss.

[Sweder]

Pressue?
Not from this good ol' boy . . . aside from a couple of isolated 'lapses' I've been alchohol free since January 1. Actually, this could be SP's worst nightmare . . . imagine going to Spain and nobody drank . . .










. . . . yeah, right . . . .

[El Gordo]

Hmm. You're supposed to read between the lines....

[Mid Life Crisis Marathon Man]

You guys are worrying me. Please stop it! And don't you ever let the Hash House Harriers hear about this!

[Sweder]

It's like sucking sweetened snot out of a plastic hankie.

Ha! How right you are.
I've tried a few (gels, not . . . you know), and the Squeezy Pineapple flavour seem more tolerable than most. Some of the Sunday crowd have graduated to some powder or other; mixed with water this can be sipped occasionally throughout a run, providing a steady fuel flow.
None of that nasty hankie-sucking.

[marathondan]

Andy, I experimented with a few foods during my FLM training last year. All of the following can be accommodated in a bum bag, or of course hidden in a hedge etc if you are doing laps:

- Bananas - good for medium runs, but tend to liquefy after an hour or so of vigorous shaking. Also not compact; you wouldn't want to carry more than a couple. Obviously well-known for isotonic properties as well.

- Crackers (recommend Hovis or digestive, not cream) - again, after an hour or so you will just find a bum bag full of crumbs, but good for medium runs. Obviously you need a bit of water with them. The savoury ones also give you a salt hit.

- Figs - my personal favourite. Compact, resilient, the only downside being chewiness. I think I used to do two 2-3 per 2.5 mile lap, and my diary says that for my 15 miler I got through about half a pound. Again, water required. Alternative is raisins, but more fiddly.

For race day I did revert to gels because there was no way I wanted to race with a bum bag. What's a little extra unpleasantness when you're running a marathon?

My diary also yielded this article, which was helpful: http://www.nyrrc.org/nyrrc/mar01/training/septip.html

Impressive weight loss by the way, well done.

Finally, the RSS feed still isn't updating regularly. The last entry is from before Christmas. I'll revert to browsing you manually for the time being.

[El Gordo]

Thanks for the tips, Dan, I'll try a few of them. Apparently bananas are more beneficial for runners the more liquid they get (I suppose because they become easier to digest), so it's a matter of getting the timing just right.

Re the RSS feed, I can offer only grovelling apologies. I did send you a 'private message' recently to do some advance grovelling -- don't know if you received it. Leave it with me, I'll update today.

[Tim]

This won't help with the getting arrested Andy but will stop your bananas turning to mush on your long runs.

http://www.banana2go.co.uk/

[Sweder]

Good grief, I cannot imagine turning up for a race with one of those strapped around my middle. Looks like something out of A Clockwork Orange - or should that be Banana . . .

[stillwaddler]

I know what you mean by running to get away.

Incidentally, your boss wouldn't like to take mine with him would he?

[Sweder]

You beat me to it, SW.
Except in my case, I am the boss.
My staff would love to see me carted off

_________________
David 'Sweder' Brent

[Mid Life Crisis Marathon Man]

You beat me to it, SW.
Except in my case, I am the boss.
My staff would love to see me carted off

_________________
David 'Sweder' Brent

Now you can confuse a stupid person doing things like that. What happened to Mr.A.Head? Are you a dual-personality?

Con 'MLC Man' Fused.

[later] Don't worry - I just googled it. I understand now. It might be because I don't watch TV, other than the cricket and football and tennis and... [/later]

[Sweder]

Dual? No, no - we're all quite happy here inside this other person's body . . .


. . . CLINK! (Spound of penny dropping).
Just realised David Brent may mean rock all to you MLCMan.
There's a very popular show here called The Office, about possibly the most anal boss in Christendom boring his staff to tears with 'initiatives', sparky ideas to pep up sales, boosting morale etc.
In short he was hated. But not by the telly watching public - they showered the show with awards.
There's a spin-off in the States and that's going well too.

[Mid Life Crisis Marathon Man]

I don't have schizophrenia.

And nor do I.