Maintenence

Well, I had a pretty poor weekend of exercise... very, very good everything else (captains dinner at Llandaff rowing club, an obvious highlight).

Did a little bike maintenance, basically cleaned it a bit (still gotta finish the job around the gears), adjusted the saddle and put on Sian's light fitting (rechargeable unit - nice and bright (safer) front light).

The one bit of 'exercise' involved 20mins in the tank rowing and 20mins on an ergo - rowing machine.

It seemed that I did not disgrace myself on the ergo as it seems I may be invited to row in an eight this weekend coming!! Mary the 'uber' novice coach suggested that some of our techniques weren't as bad as she had suspected and that she would be happy to include some of us in an eights session. I am both pleased and worried at the same time... pleased that someone else likes my rowing (I have had very good feedback already - thank you Sian ;o) ), but at the same time a little worried at the increased expectation. I will endeavour to relax and enjoy it!!

The worst part of the weekend was no run :o( again, bad Andrew, but I did take the dog for a good hour long walk on Saturday. Though worse still I didn't have the chance to row all weekend, and more especially didn't get out in the double with Sian... which I absolutely loved doing the weekend before.

Another week, another time zone... clocks changing has lead to a couple of good sleep nights but will lead to rides home in the pitch black, d'oh!!

Biking blitz

Ah, the bike, the simple elegant alternative to standing on a train platform for an hour on a Monday morning waiting for a hot, sweaty, crowded train... this morning reminded me why it is that the bicycle is the most flexible and straight-forward to get me to work in a good mood, and with all of the other benefits (cost, time, exercise).

I am going to try and ride throughout the winter, an incentive being a spanking new bike as a treat for my birthday if I manage this feat... albeit the worst of the weather may be yet to come in February!! hahaha

Filled out my rowing club application form last night, will cost a couple of hundred quid, but like the bike it is a massive investment in my future fitness :o) More about rowing to come I'm sure... hoping to run tomorrow, or Wednesday for sure!!

Contemplation

I am beginning to contemplate the name of my blog... I might have to call it simply a training blog, as I can see my exercise time dividing between running and rowing. I had a very good session on the water today in the double scull with Sian (my lovely fiancee), I really, really enjoyed it and was taken by the smooth feel of a relaxed row. It felt quite like a zoned out run, there were times when my far from perfect technique felt grooved and sweet. I'd like to build on that through the coming weeks.

I will not stop setting running targets, and trying to better myself in that area. I guess what I am now centred on is simply developing my enjoyment of fitness as far as I can. Probably the original driver for change in the first place :o)

All is good, and I am going to try to develop a routine / plan that will fit into my working / resting week nicely and propel me forward with all my targets and goals.... watch this space (and maybe the blog title, hehehe!!).

Tooled up!!

Aside from the new map measuring program [for the URL see last post] I have also gotten my little mitts on an mp3 player for training / cycling to work... I am not sure of the make otherwise I would share the info (it is 128MB). I reckon I can get 1hr 20mins of music, or 6+ hrs of podcasts... I am not sure which will be more useful in the long run. I may well hold a list of music on the computer and a bunch of podcasts and load up different batches for different purposes. Will work out my motivational music set list and let you know what ends up on it. iTunes [apple] will no doubt be the base station for building the lists, it has a 'new' podcast functionality.

Found a pic of the player on the web...

Have to get myself tooled up because the Abersytwyth run entry forms arrived at my in box, I didn't put my entry in for London due to marriage plans coinciding - despite the chances being slim of getting in Murphy's Law suggests it would be the one time I would get in because of the clash... Decided not to play chicken with the Law ;o)

Return to trainer - route planning software found

After my brief flirtation with the sport of rowing, and hrm, sculling I have to start running again... if only to break in the new trainers that took ages to arrive [still rowing, but have devised cunning training plan, more later].

The big news with running is the arrival of a computer package that will calculate run distances from map image files (as long as you know the scale of the map), it looks absolutely fabulous. Sian found it and has bought it, you get five maps free on download.... oops, the name of the new package is..... AccuRoute V2 - from http://homepages.tesco.net/~criticalpath/accuroute/
Highly recommend it!!

The training plan for the winter is simply this.... rowing (sculling) twice a week, and running twice a week - long run and double sculling on the weekend, shorter run and single sculling in the week. Aside from the 'training' I will endeavour to cycle to work all through the winter... I would 'do' gym work but I am still 'under' the physio and will wait and see (they have recommended that I go to a shoulder class every wednesday morning, maybe starting this week.

Will let you know how I get on of course ;o)

On a break !!!

It seems that I have found myself on a running break, between work, rowing, and other things I haven't been running. I missed the Cardiff full and half marathon, through lack of training and my shoulder injury (from falling off my bike months ago).

There will be a new plan... and new goals to come ;o)