“If we don’t change direction soon, we’ll end up where we’re going.” I’ve no idea who Irwin Corey is, but his warning was in my mind as I embarked on another toughie this evening with the running club. Only 42 minutes, but the 4 and a bit miles we covered were one long, dramatic splosh through thunder and lightning, and a torrent of warm rain.… READ MORE.... …
Month: June 2005
It hurts your backside the first few times you try it, but the pleasure eventually comes if you persist with it. Cycling. Today was supposed to be a rest day but I thought a spot of two-wheeled cross training might be a good way of squeezing those faggots through my intestines. For the benefit of American readers, I should explain that a faggot in Britain is different from an American one.… READ MORE.... …
I’ve bent over backwards to try and improve my stretching techniques, but I still don’t feel as supple as I’d like at this stage of a marathon training schedule. I keep looking at the figures in my spreadsheet, trying to make sense of the apparent fact that I’ve managed a perfectly respectable 29 miles this week, yet still feel unfit, undertrained and, like Marx’s proletarian hero, in a state of perpetual struggle.… READ MORE.... …
Not much to report beyond a distended, clammy 4 miler this evening that I struggled to finish without a walk break. What’s preventing me from feeling on top of my running at the moment? Is it the weather? Or my current corpulence? Dehydration? Lack of motivation? No, it’s not really any of these things, though none of those first three help the situation.… READ MORE.... …
Midsummer Night. After that pretty dismal showing at the weekend, I’ve now managed 3 runs in 24 hours. It’s not an attempt to catch up – that’s not a strategy that seems to work. I just need to find some fitness again after a slothful few weeks. I’m finding it hard to shift the excess weight, and to feel really good about my running again.… READ MORE.... …
Forgive me Father, for I have sinned. I didn’t go for my long run today. Actually, my dad didn’t mind, and didn’t even seem that interested in my confessional when I called to wish him a happy Father’s Day. Phew, what a scorcher. I rarely believe anything that Texans say, but I should have taken the advice of those guys from Austin we sat next to at the pasta dinner in Chicago, the evening before the marathon in 2002.… READ MORE.... …
Self-control in the face of temptation, particularly in the realm of confectionery, isn’t a claim I ever thought I could make. Now I’m not so sure. After this evening, I’ve gone up in my estimation. Just as some races are planned, even entered and paid for, a long time in advance, but never actually done, others just ambush you. Lying in wait for me this evening, hiding among the trees in the Outlook Centre in Bracknell Forest, was the Forest Five.… READ MORE.... …
Out at 6:30 this morning for the same run as yesterday evening. This time, the 4 miles were executed without any stops, and I felt twice as strong. It’s heartening to know that lack of fitness can be attacked so effectively, so quickly. Hurrah for the jury who acquitted Michael Jackson. In the eyes of the mediocre mob, Jackson’s real crime seems to be eccentricity.… READ MORE.... …
OK, it’s back to business. The seven weeks since Hamburg have been profoundly unhealthy. In that time I’ve run only 10 times. I’ve stuffed myself with empty calories and fat, and sunk into the sort of lethargy that only a marathon can provoke. It’s a familiar experience. The (perhaps surprising) consolation is that I never feel a sense of sacrifice or gloom about buckling under again.… READ MORE.... …
Life throws a great handful of stuff at you. Some fragments stick, some bounce off and land on someone else; most hit you and end up just blowin’ in the wind. One bit that stuck to me, years ago, was one my sisters telling me about a teacher of hers who adored Jane Austen. At that time, she’d taught Austen for more than two decades to hundreds of girls, yet there was one book that she hadn’t read, and didn’t plan on reading till she retired from teaching.… READ MORE.... …
Week 1 of my 18 week marathon training for Loch Ness hasn’t been a staggering success. Tuesday’s plodding 5 miler in Guildford was to be a painful-but-necessary sort of inaugural dam-busting run. Flowing from that evening would be the purer athletic juices, as it. as it were. And I’m sure it was of beneficial, but I’ve not been able to build on it.… READ MORE.... …