THE GOOD BUCK

Well. As the fictional Chinese curse has it, “may you live in interesting times”. The times are certainly getting interesting. Mother Russia has had enough. The media are all “Boo hiss, evil Putin” , but there’s a bit more to it than that. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/feb/28/nato-expansion-war-russia-ukraine Mr Putin has had enough of the American puppet regimes being used as weapons platforms on his borders. And he’s sick of nazis. So far, so good. But as with all wars, it the civvies who suffer. As usual I have been taking a contrary view to that which the media want me to believe. As you can see. I was shouting into the void on Twitter, trying to work out what was annoying me so much about the Ukraine hysteria. “Invasion is bad. War is bad. Agreed. I think it’s the fact we can invade a sovereign nation and slaughter a million of it’s citizens (Iraq). And Palestine lives this. So is it Russia doing it that’s bad, or doing it to white people?” “And the media hypocrisy. We saw Wikileaks. We know the casual atrocities we were routinely committing. Whilst our media was saying “…Our brave boys”. Now it’s “Mother takes a stranger’s child to the border. I cried” The gall.” But don’t worry. Bozo was on the case. Our foreign secretary started gobbing off prompting Putin to raise the nuclear defence level. The papers, in no way feeding hysteria, helpfully published a housing price guide. Warrington gets cleanly vaporised, which is a relief. I can’t make out how many hit the M6 through Birmingham, but frankly it’s not enough. (Garmin being my satnav watch, how I record all my run data.) The Tories were all supportive of the Ukranian people, right up until they wanted to flee the warzone to come here. Then they went full loony. Bozo stamped on that one, thankfully. No point in winning votes if you’re vaporised, I suppose. The fascist thing was them pushing through the policing bill while everyone was distracted with the war. Now police have the power to purge the gypsies, harass black people (stop and search, which massively targets black people) and jail for peaceful protest. As someone just tweeted: “Did you know the punishment for peaceful protest in Russia is 7 years in prison? I’m sure glad I live in a Western democracy like Britain where the punishment for peaceful protest is only 10 years in prison.” Closer to home, the Brits were taking it calmly. And I nearly got called up. Some weren’t convinced the architects of the million civvie slaughter in Iraq were the most moral authority against Putin. Before all that we had some weather. And Royalty I got some sage motivational message from an app that records my run data I was window shopping bikes again. I was very tempted by this, as it was (relatively, for a Harley) cheap. I was very, very tempted. My obsessing was reaching critical levels but then I stumbled upon some statistics. It […]

I’ve been suffering a bit with plague weakness-like feelings. Insatiable hunger, a craving for fats and sugar, weakness, with added chesty and sore throat for good measure. Yesterday was grim. I took a lateral flow test in the afternoon to rule out the actual plague, I felt so battered by it. I’d got to the stage where I’d resigned myself to it being post viral fatigue, which would be triggered by every hard run. I was still going to try to carry on with the plan and just endure the weakness, and ignore the hunger. I was entertaining doubts that my body would work. I can endure a lot, but if my legs won’t run when I’m weak, then it’s over. Abandon my sub 3, and possibly all exercise. I was gutted. I had my tea and some aspirin to try to take the edge off, then it just ebbed away. I went from worrying it was over to … nothing. I was just normal. A bit hungry because I am on a diet, but it was normal hunger. I really don’t understand. Last week I’d got down to 10st 10¼lbs on my diet. Due to the gnawing hunger of the condition (and/or my innate gluttony) I’d gone back up to 10.12 during the week. I got a grip and tried to endure the hunger. This morning (my official weigh day) I was amazed to have actually dropped a pound overall for the week! 10st 9¼lbs! Brilliant. Single figures left to lose. I was feeling a little off colour when I got up, but that is possibly me finding something because I was looking so hard. It was raining, blowing a gale, and freezing, but the weather forecast said it was like that all day so I just cracked on with my 12 mile run. Last week I failed to take 10 seconds per mile off my long/ fast run. I wanted 7.40 m/m but had to settle for 7.54. This week I wanted to take another 10 seconds off, so 7.30. I did it! Even in to the teeth of the wind I held the pace. This is doubly brilliant for me as yesterday I thought I was going to have to quit. I’m well happy with that. And I’m still feeling normal. On the 30th of January I booked us a little flat in Newport for 3 days in October so I could do my marathon, then we could have a few days ambling around. Possibly with Wendy pushing me in a bathchair. I went online and booked it through a booking site. The landlord wanted the money up front. Not a problem, I paid the £232.50 and thought no more of it. Then I got an email off the site saying the flat was now going to be closed for renovation or something. OK. Cancel my booking, book another place. Where’s my refund? I looked on the site, it said payment/ refund is between you and the […]

Week I Bit of a fail week. After the great progress of the last few weeks it’s disappointing, but I’m taking the positives from it. I’ve been feeling throaty, chesty and weak in patches again. Not ideal for running. Wendy’s had the same. I got an early o’clock start on Wednesday at work, felt weak and useless all day, and ended up not going for my run when I got home. The day after I felt weak again, but I did the 5 miles recovery run, and I was having to fight to keep my times slow enough. I was comfortably in the 8.10s. That was encouraging. Today I was feeling it again, (weak, chesty, throat) but I was due a 17 mile fast run so I forced myself out the door. For the first 4 miles I didn’t even know if I had it in me to go the distance. After that I knew I was going to make it, but I just couldn’t hold the 7.40 I was after. Finished with a 7.54 average. Two weeks ago I’d have been delighted with that. The top of my foot is sore again, but I think it’s manageable. And I’ve still got full, painless, mobility in my hoof. This week I started looking for fast trainers, but because I have 6½ feet, need wide fit, and am a bit wary of none-ASICS brands (for fit and comfort) I am limited. In one review it suggested getting two pairs of the same model of trainer. Break one pair in for 50 miles, then use the other pair for training, save the new-ish pair for the actual race. That way your race pair is in perfect condition and is exactly the same as the model you’ve in which you’ve done all your training. I can’t fault the logic. I’ve ordered two pairs. I was feeling a bit guilty as they are so bloody dear, so I tracked down the purchase date of my current trainers. For some reason I thought I’d just started wearing them for this return to running, (mid-December ’21) turns out it was June ’20! They say you should replace trainers every 500- 600 miles as they get worn down and don’t offer the same comfort and protection. I worked out my distance since June ’20. With today’s run it’s 963 miles. Oops. At least it’s not an extravagance getting new ones. It shows how often and debilitating the plague weakness was, I did 204 of those miles in the last 5 weeks. Next week is my first recovery week. Two 8 miles (one with sprints) a 5, a 4 and my long run is a 12. That will be nice. It’s all been harder and harder. It’s good the plan has a week to let your body absorb the punishment. I want to hold 7.30 for the 12. Week 2: Rollercoaster. I’ve been having bad patches of the weakness/ chesty/ sore throat. Luckily it’s been a recovery week […]

I’ve not been blogging apart from to note my running. Thought I’d catch up in general. Wendy has just brought it up, about my boat. I’ve not been to the club in ages as it’s the middle of winter and freezing. My last outing was when I turned turtle and found my mast embedded in the lake bed and was contemplating possibly dying trying to swim to shore. I’ll not lie, that has taken a bit of the shine off. Then Wendy has said it took her mate years to learn how to sail. Huh. I thought the few lessons would suffice with a bit of practice. I’ve not given up on it yet. When it warms up I want to get back to it. I’ll see how I get on. The other thing that’s not about running is my cheapo ‘phone. I like the long battery, but it is just too cheapo. I’ve had to change my home screen picture because the screen can’t do black convincingly, and the camera is awful. I mean seriously bad. I can’t be doing with that. I’ve been trying to buy a second hand one on Gumtree. Luckily in my searching I came across a few adverts saying it was the fake ‘phone. Huh? I googled a video on Youtube and they are the spit. They arrive in sealed boxes, with all the Samsung branding, and fake barcodes and such. The guy opened the box, the ‘phone looks exactly the same, open the home screen all the same settings inside. It is a brilliant copy. Then you try to use the 4 cameras and only one of them works, and it’s terrible. You go to other features that are in the ‘phones menu, like on the real one, and they just aren’t there. The genuine, top of the range model, with 100x zoom camera and all the bells and whistles, sells for over £1000! Over a grand! Incredible. Which is why I was looking at second hand. I asked the people selling the four cheapest (still £400 or so) if all the cameras worked, as I’d want to test them. (The cast iron fake-detecting test.) No reply. The adverts are still up, so they’ve not sold them, so they must be fakes. How gutted would you be to spend £400 -£500 for a worthless bit of crap? So glad I watched the video. You would never know to look at them, and you see the perfect replica box, you just wouldn’t suspect. In the end I’ve plumped for a lesser spec, but brand new, ‘phone, off Amazon. It’s the same price bracket, £419, but it’s got good reviews and I know I’m not just throwing money away on a scam. Wendy said I should just get the model we had, an earlier Samsung, but still with a great camera. As they are quite old (in ‘phone terms) now, they don’t make them anymore, and a reconditioned one was £350! Which I thought was […]

I might as well stick all my boring running posts into dedicated blogs. These are only of interest to me, and will be a good record of my attempt. My New Years’ Resolution is to run a marathon in under 3 hours. I started off from two months of no running, resting a foot injury. I saw the physio on the 13th of December, he said it was a trapped/ injured nerve in my left knee (probably from slamming into that van sideways on my motorbike, 2 years ago). He gave me some stretches to free it up and told me to crack on. I was highly sceptical, after 2 years of done-in foot and intermittent training, that a stretch was going to sort it, but what do I know? It seemed to free it right up. The top of my foot still gets sore, but I’ve got full mobility. 2 days after seeing the physio I was back running. And my foot held up. I spent two weeks gradually building a base then thought “what the hell?” and started on the Advanced Marathoning training plan. It turns out, as usual I was being ridiculously optimistic in my self belief. I unquestioningly thought I’d pick up at the peak of where I left off, being able to run a 3.30 marathon. Ha! So no. I’d built up to 8 mile, zone 2 (very slow) runs before I started the plan. My first “general aerobic” (pushing a little bit, but slower than other runs) which I arbitrarily set at 8.30 m/m, was 4 days into the first week. It was a 9 mile run. It nearly killed me. That pace, for those miles, took everything I had. The medium long run at the end of the first week was 12 miles at target marathon pace plus 10 – 20%. For a sub 3 (6.50 m/m) that is 7.31 – 8.12. I wasn’t even sure I’d be able to do the distance, that was upping my miles from the previous week by 50%. And a lot faster. I just couldn’t hold it at the end, it was too far and too fast, too soon, but I averaged at 8.15 m/m. It was a start and I was close enough to work in the parameters of the plan and wait for my fitness to catch up. 4 days later I accidentally ran 10 miles at 7.53m/m. Caught up. Game on. I think that was part of the problem for my medium long run a few days later. I’d run the 10 miles general aerobic thinking it was target pace+, so had nothing left for the longer run. I wanted sub 8 but did 13.1 miles at 8.07m/m. Not what I wanted but within the 8.12 outer limit. I was getting discouraged as all my runs were flat out and killing me and I wasn’t anywhere near the 6.50 m/m mark. Then I realised the plan is to get you there. If you could […]