Ten weeks ago, I boldly instructed my spreadsheet that this was it. "Starting over". A week later, I tried again, and this time actually put in a good week of easing-back activity: just one leisurely 3½ mile run-walk, but supplemented with a couple of good bike rides, a trip to the gym, and 1½ hours of gardening. A total of five and a half fairly sweaty hours. Good start. But that was it. The following week, I resuccumbed to the usual summer disease — beer and cricket and sunlit idleness — and I’ve pretty much stayed there ever since. The trouble is, this indolent lifestyle is not quite so pleasant as it seems. Ot at least, it’s subject to the … …
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It’s said that a man’s shoes will tell you all you need to know about their occupier. I believe that a solitary breakfast sausage is likewise a motif for an entire hotel and its position in the accommodation universe. Even retreating from such grandiose extrapolation, let’s agree that a sausage is the yardstick by which you judge a breakfast, or “the breakfast”, as they say here in Ireland. Must say, I like the inclusion of the definite article. The “the” hints at the sacramental status this morning ritual merits. In the Shannon Court Hotel, the sausages were mean looking. Thin and greasy and, like other items on this plate, looking like they’d arrived from the ‘credit-crunch-buster’ economy range at the … …
Hellifield Gala Fell Race – Saturday 2nd Aug A contemplative start on the first ascent. [url]http://www.photos-dsb.co.uk/hellifield%2009/content/Hellifield_Fell_Race_2009_118_2_large.html[/url] The damage is done. [url]http://www.photos-dsb.co.uk/hellifield%2009/content/Hellifield_Fell_Race_2009_173_2_large.html[/url] Another valuable learning experience. Mainly concerning the fact that fell shoes need to be a really snug fit to deal with the fast and uneven descents. It serves me right for trying out new kit in a race. But descending is also a real skill that will take some time to get half-descent at. And 3.5 miles turns out to be alot longer than it sounds when the first half is up a big hill. Obvious when you say it like that. Not so obvious when everybody is charging to the end of the first field. And Junior GM … …
Last week’s scheduled relaunch nearly went to plan. I’d put all the posters up, invited the spectators, got the creaking fuselage in place, drew my map of the stars, lit the blue touchpaper… and phut!. Nothing happened. I didn’t get off the ground. Too many beer invitations, a BBQ, a dinner out, and the new village takeaway pizza place to put through its paces. The health moonshot was doomed from the start. This week has a couple of sizeable lumps of space debris to dodge, or at least to buffet without diverting my course too much. The first is Thursday’s invitation to the pub, to watch the final bit of the first day of the Lords’ Ashes test. From … …
It seems like more than nine weeks ago that I was lining up in Hopkinton, pointing my innocent knees in the direction of a distant Boston. In a way, it is more than that, because to try measuring the gap using time alone is misleading and simplistic. I shouldn’t be surprised. I warned myself against it enough times — the danger of allowing the momentum to drain away too quickly. It’s happened after every previous marathon, though this time, of course, I vowed that it would be different. Predictably, it wasn’t. The bald story is that since Boston I’ve piled on around 20 pounds, jogged a total of 5.47 miles (the last 3.47 of these being six weeks ago), and … …
Note: This entry was created over several weeks. The great bulk was written while in the USA, but I wasn’t happy with it, so I left it to congeal on my local drive. On May 17, I padded it out, and have retained the perspective of this date for the post, even though I have tried to soften its sharper edges since then. And I will almost certainly tinker with it some more. In particular, I have a lot of photographs and pieces of video from the race, and from our subsequent travels, that I need to do something with. Seventeen days in the USA after the Boston marathon was always going to be risky. I try to avoid clichés … …
Mid-Atlantic, heading west, I should be throbbing with excitement and dread about Monday’s marathon, and with relief and joy at the thought of three weeks off work, and all the pleasures in store. Below the surface somewhere, I probably am. But just for the moment, I continue to be shocked and saddened and confused by yesterday’s news, conveyed by Ash (Sweder), that Chris Moyle died on Wednesday night. It’s outrageous; wrong; inexplicable. I last saw Chris in Almeria, just over a year ago, though we’d been in touch as recently as October, when we exchanged emails. By that time, his illness (he had been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer not long before) seemed to be in remission, and I allowed myself … …
I need to keep this brief. I have a 3 week trip to the US to plan, and am running out of time to bag the perfect Vegas deal and research car hire and book the Boston pre-race pasta meal and find out how long it takes to drive from San Diego to Tijuana and whether the Alcatraz trip goes on a Sunday, and deal with a thousand other miscellaneous impulses, 900 of which will stay on the cutting room floor. Less exotic was today’s journey round someone else’s daily grind. The venue for the Maidenhead Easter 10 is a sort of business park where we troop up and down the corporate tarmac for a few miles, with a spell … …
Late on a Wednesday, like most nights, I’d normally be knee-deep in the BBC. Well OK, the corporation’s output would be reaching a higher intellectual water-mark than that, but let’s not get too literal. Tonight however, I must stay away from Five Live, partly because I can’t bear the egregiously phlegmy tones of that Lovejoy bloke at the best of times; but tonight he will be insufferable. In the packed pub this evening, you could have heard a pin drop each time the team he promotes scored in the Anfield Big Cup QF. What a thoroughly despicable bunch those Chelsea people are. When they went 3-1 up, the pub almost emptied in silence, which was some comfort. But even this … …
20 miles today. An awkward tick in a big box. I managed to make most of the errors that I like to warn novice marathoners against: going out too fast, doing too much the day before, not getting enough sleep. Maybe it was good to be reminded of these mistakes again now — just in time to ensure I avoid them on marathon day in 14 days. I did this race once before, 7 years ago, just prior to my first marathon in April 2002. Here’s my race report from back then: Mon 25 March 2002 And so, the fabled three-week taper begins. Abandon Hope All Ye Who Enter Here. The encouraging daily emails I get from the Hal Higdon … …