Three people stand on an isolated patch of Mediterranean beach, staring at the hundreds of flamingos preening themselves at the water’s edge. Behind them lie miles of mottled, lunar landscape. Over there in the far, far distance a sharp eye could just make out a line of cranes, marking the start of one of Europe’s largest and most anarchic construction sites. Armies of foreigners, Germans mainly, seem to want to buy retirement homes here in Roquetas, and the skeletons of a thousand concrete mausoleums mark out the final resting place of their sunlit dreams. Se vende, se vende. Nothing exists yet, but it’s all se vende. It’s funny how things only half-built can look almost identical to … …
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Taxing Run 1 Tax Return 0. Only 3.4 miles this time, but the pace was 9:58 – fast for me, but still comfortable. Things are looking good for the Almeria Half on Sunday. Readers of the forum will know that there are 6 of our small but beautifully formed community running in Spain in a couple of days time. The hand of history weighs heavily on our quads. Training has gone well. Except I’ve not been training for the half at all, but for the Hamburg Marathon in April. Almeria is part of that larger training – but it’s gone well in any case. I’ve run on 10 out of the past 12 days, and most of those have … …
The Gospel According To Bob Glover? How strictly should training plans be adhered to? How bad should I feel about missing a run or falling a few miles short over the week? To find some answers, I decided to ask someone who is currently training for his 4th marathon. Myself. Don’t feel too bad about missing a midweek run, I opined, though it depends why you’re missing it. “Can’t be bothered” or “It’s too cold out there” are pitiful justifications, and will not be accepted. I went on: Don’t make the mistake I made when training for my first one in 2002, when I would feel terrible about running 4½ miles when the schedule had said 5. At my level, … …
Coldest day of the year by some distance, and a rest day – but it seemed a shame to stay clear away from it. I had to go and have a taste of the pain. Only 3½ miles, and slow, but strangely important. If I’m to do better than I have in my previous marathons, I need to work harder than I did in preparing for them. Part of me finds that sentiment nauseatingly goody-goody. But squinting at it in another way, it seems to show not starey-eyed, clean-shaven, Hitler Youth tendencies, but a nod towards the more palatable ascetic Buddhist perspective. The one that says that you achieve equilibrium only through suffering. Sigh. I must still be an … …
Three juddering, frozen recovery miles, early on a Sunday morning, while the church bells rung out across the village.… …
Mid-afternoon. The world was getting colder, wetter, darker. And the football was about to start. So I did what I had to do – put on my running stuff and ventured out along the canal for a twelve mile slog. The first of those miles was as long and as miserable a mile as I ever ran. I couldn’t see myself making it to the third. But I persisted, and as always, gradually, the real world began to drop away and I entered that other place. The Feelgood Club. Open to all, but entered by so few. Hardly any rules, and so cheap to join. Such amazing benefits and perks. Yet the hoi polloi stay without, whispering in groups. How … …
Back to the local road running group tonight for a vigorous 5 miles through the suburban capillaries of Tilehurst. This was one of the best runs I’ve had in a long time. It did what I wanted it to do – forced me to run a bit faster than I was accustomed to, and just a bit faster than I was comfortable with. For a short while at least, I felt like a better runner.… …
Four runs, a new job, and no chocolate cake. It’s been an interesting week. And it’s one of those ironies that the more interesting and eventful life is, the less time there seems to be to digest the lessons fully and to regurgitate the wisdom. But perhaps there’s still just time to leave a blogoscopic scratch on the week’s surface before it vanishes completely. Thursday 13th: No run, but a voluble and bibulous evening to mark the end of my bondage to those who would send me to orifices malodoreuses like Leeds and Dartford. Well, perhaps Leeds has things going for it, but Dartford? But most things were forgiven during a delightfully fractious, argumentative session, lubricated by the fruits of … …
Dense, succulently moist, cloyingly rich and sticky. Chocolate cake. Laced with Cognac. I need to fix it in my memory, because that’s where it must remain confined, at least until after the Hamburg Marathon on April 24. Last night I opened the fridge, hoping to find a tomato or half a stick of celery to snack on – and there it was. A slab the size of half a house-brick. As mentioned yesterday, it was originally somewhat larger than this, but my hunger and greed has… eroded it over the past few days. Guzzle and chomp and slurp and lick. It was mutually-assured-destruction. We finished each other off. I bring it up again today… [no, that would be far too … …
This has become a bad week, and like a lot of bad weeks, it’s sprung up out of nothing, quite unexpectedly. It’s true that I popped out for an unscheduled 3.3 mile recovery run last night, but after returning, showering and getting changed, I popped out again, this time for an unscheduled couple of hours in the pub, followed by a frenzy of calorific feeding at midnight, and a very late night, leading to fatigue today which has removed the prospect of getting out this evening for my planned 4 miler. Instead I’ve polished off what was, on Sunday, a gigantic slab of chocolate cake. It is no more. Result? Tiredness, bloatedness, disappointment with myself. Bah. Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and … …