Time moving, time not moving - the return of wittering on Wednesday?

Time moving yesterday was 20 minutes running with Dr.C. last night, it was excellent and a fair bit quicker than any of my other recent sessions. It was good banter that always distracts from the distance travelled. Perhaps the most stunning part of the run was that my Garmin found a satellite in reasonable time and moreover the sun was out.

The park in the sunshine yesterday

The time I spent not moving was sitting in the park at lunchtime enjoying the spring sunshine and eating a bar of chocolate very slowly. It took me over five minutes of mindful eating to savour the treat, which is greater than 10x more time than it would have taken me to eat it a month ago. While it is not a job completed over the last week I have been reacquainting myself with good food habits and feeling much better for it. Too early to report my slump is over but the signs are looking hopeful.

On another day I would demolish these in one sitting

I hope your Wednesday is full of good news and not to much chocolate.

Swansea half-marathon 2015 - my race review

My impressions from the day -
Course: 10/10 it is a super simple one lap course, that looks like an out and back and is more or less just that. Very nearly pan flat but for a bump in the final mile.
Marshalling: 10/10 Very good.
Facilities: 9/10 Very good, it is in the middle of the city so there was plenty of options for supporters too. Could have done with a few more port-a-loo units.
Organisation: 8/10 - two words "car" & "parking"
Fellow runners: 10/10 good and smiley, pace squad were excellent.
Crowd: great support all over the course, a bit patchy but lovely and vocal
My performance:  7/10.
My time: 2:04:59 official chip time - my watch gave me two spare seconds. at 2:04:57.

My race day -

Got up for an early breakfast and walked the dog which set me up nicely and got me properly awake. Getting to the race was a nice straight forward drive from Cardiff to Swansea along the M4. The morning weather was looking good, a little cloud cover, with no sign of rain.

I had decided ahead of time to make the run about training, and so time was put onto the back-burner. This wasn't to say that I was ignoring time - far from it - I aimed to go out at a strong pace, aiming to get to half way (something like 10 km race pace) and coming back in whatever I could muster from there. Hoping all the while quietly that I might be able to hold the high pace beyond halfway.... and so it was a race of two halves...

Image of the start taken from WalesOnline - there is a review article about the race at on their news pages

Inside the start corral I stood near the 1hr 50m pace guys (from race pacing) with their fantastic back pack mounted Xempo flags, it was utter fantasy for me to able to follow them the whole way but they were on perfect target pace for my 'hot' 10 km. For the first 3 km it felt pretty good, my running form was okay (not that good, but okay) and the pace didn't feel searingly fast mechanically (though my lungs weren't entirely sure). So over that first phase it was already clear that I could not run that pace the whole way, which I of course knew and so hoped to control. Though to 8 km I kept my focus on trying to relax and stick to the pace guys. It turned out that around 7-9 km the switch came as my body began to let me know just how much more it could take of the 'hotter' pace.

So my fall off the back of the pacers was slow and sort of graceful (!) in so far as I didn't just stop and wheeze. I eased to the inside of the course and let my pace ease down from 5:15 per km to 5:30 per km, which was okay to get me through to the turn around point out in the area of Swansea bay called the Mumbles. Now, the Mumbles is lovely and I have been there a few times, but on race day other than the over head weather and air temperature I couldn't tell you much about the lovely picturesque area - I was utterly internalised working out my second half and how much I had taken out of myself in the first. In the Mumbles was a water station, I took a bottle, pressed the lap button on my Garmin and steadied myself for the hard work part of my marathon endurance test! (see the photo montage below)

After having a handful of sports beans with the drink walking along for about 100 metres I picked up my feet and took off again. Well I say "took off" I mean started to shuffle again intending to find full marathon pace for the trip back to the start / finish. In many ways I did mange my second half goal - (1) I finished, (2) my pace was pretty good (but not quite what I had hoped for), (3) I enjoyed the day more with my head up looking around me, and most of all I discovered that I could put myself to the running sword and have my body deliver after months of niggling injury and uncertainty.

I think my face tells a story in itself - left top is me at the start; middle top is me taking a halfway drink,  from there on it was all hard graft

The last mile was hard - really hard (!), I walked a short way at the bottom of the hill and then ran it home through the cheering crowds of the city centre. One big downside for me personally was that I had signed up with my non-injury target time, which meant I had a 'quick' coloured bib number and large numbers in the crowd had the look of "what's he doing back here?" on their faces. I would have happily swapped my race number and stood in a different start bin but I didn't look into it in time and so just had to put up with the "look at that prat running so slow in a fast number" sort of sentiments.

Inside the last 150 metres I put on a stupid burst of speed, partly because of the mounting feelings around my race bib and mostly because I spotted that I could sneak under 2:05. After colliding with someone in a previous race I had sworn not to be so daft, but the red mist dropped and I finished my run with a lung bursting attempt to sprint (in my head Usain Bolt, in reality of course a lumbering knackered bloke flailing his arms and legs about). Over the line the organisation and the funnel was great, returning me to my family and my wife's quizzical question of "why did the race tracker say you went through half way in such a fast time?". I spent some time explaining my mad plan!

Having the family there was great, with the enthusiasm of the kids and the flaming influence of my lovely wife. My kids had made little good luck signs that they waved at me in the start area. The signs made not just me smile silly smiles but the runners around me were smiling along with us. In the end I offered to carry two of them folded up in my back pocket to 'push' me along. Thankfully I remembered they were there when the going got hard and my plan seemed foolish - they did really push me up the only hill on the course inside the last mile.

On our way back to the car park we stopped for a Joe's Ice Cream which is a Swansea must-do in my wife's opinion (I have to say I am converted to her way of thinking). Munching our way through the delicious vanilla ice cream we spotted the only fly in what was otherwise pristine ointment - the chaos in the car park. We spent the next hour going nowhere as my legs began to seize and everyones blood pressures soared. Eventually a handful of community and full police officers came to everyones rescue by adding some common sense to the process of feeding cars out of the only exit from the Parc Tawe car park - certainly something for the organisers to tend to there.

My takeaway -

All in I was extremely happy with my effort, and even happier that my body took it well with no huge adverse reaction to a long and hard run. I feel I now have a good platform for a summer of training towards Berlin, so onwards and maybe upwards. I certainly hope to be back next year, perhaps to hunt the pacers all the way round.

Note - Swansea Half-marathon race day photography was looked after by Dirty Green Trainers Sports Photography though sadly I didn't have the kind of run where I would want a memento they did great work and were all over the course. So if you ran go take a look at what you might find.

Deeply humbled

The last couple of weeks have seen my training nose dive through the combination of a calf tear and then a huge stinking head cold, to the extent that I feel like have gone backwards fitness wise too. Initial effects of the calf tear were easing with the aid of rest and a visit to see Leon the uber physiotherapist, but then this Sunday I went and re-angered it. Happily in all this gloom I was deeply humbled, admittedly to be fair I am humbled most days by the activities of people around me. I ran with my four year old son on Sunday when I pinged my calf again. His face during the junior parkrun was a picture of delight, joy and fun as we negotiated the course to his 2km best time.

The ping happened in the first 400m as I jogged alongside the happy chappie, I didn't stop, I didn't want to stop, I wanted to stay in the moment, I wanted to not spoil his run and his fun. It was not a bad twinge / re-tear in so far as a change of running form alleviated most of the pain, and it simply grumbled a few more times as we continued. I was utterly in the moment and feeling so humble in the face of the pure delight he was exuding that there was no way I was missing it. In the end his pace towards the finish time was quite breathtaking, especially as he is only just old enough to take part and one of the youngest lads there.

The lil' dude's awesome sprint for the line, and his huge PB

Since then I have had to go back to icing and nursing my leg and trying to look for low impact training / rehab plans, but when I am feeling grumpy I try and remember that moment to put a smile back on my face. Suffice to say though I won't be parkrunning for a while - if only for the fact I fear I'll have to be fully fit to keep up with him in coming weeks :-)

Wittering on Wednesday - How to stick to a resolution

How? Well, it is simple really "Don't make a resolution at New Year's, make it when you want to".

There it is 'easy'.  To explain... well even the explanation is pretty straightforward, it seems to me that those resolutions that stick are invariably those made when it was "the right moment".

Sure a New Years resolution can work (don't let me put anyone off), but the 'stickability' comes down to factors like:-

• mental preparedness - i.e. does it simply feel like the right time for action?
• collection or body of information that will act as leverage
• belief - do you really believe in the need for the change or does the fact everyone is doing it make it 'the thing to do'? Do you have as they say in some circles 'Buy-in'
• life situation
• other external stimuli (imminent event, new job, family changes, illness, etc.)

Whenever you make a change - "Make it for yourself and make it stick. Good luck!".

Midfoot for 9km - revelations for the plodder

Monday night I ran, which in of itself is a very good thing, and I ended up running the whole 9.3km with new form. The changes away from heel striking makes logical sense to me and to be fair it has done for quite some time now. Foremost in changing is the how, and so I have just started doing it as best I can over sensible distances / times whilst reminding myself to run the 'old' way whenever is prudent. In practice this has come down to which shoes I wear on any given session.

Don't get me wrong I am not wearing zero drops one day and super-stacked motion controllers the next, no I am wearing a less stacked shoe on days when I try to run fore- to mid-foot (almost entirely mid-foot in reality). Rotating two pairs is by conventional wisdom prudent so the shoes 'recover' their shape - though a lot of people might note this may have more benefit for manufacturers than runners. My experiment is a simple one at this point but does seem to be making some differences.

Difference one is that I don't feel the crash of my heel / leg into the ground, and for a plodding jogger / runner that is a revelation. Two, I have the sense of doing something new which has reinvigorated my motivation to go running. Thirdly, I hurt in all new places, which might seem odd but for me shows I am using more of my legs.

Really what I am noticing the most is the switch from fast walking, i.e. jogging over to running. When I run I essentially speed up my walking gait to a point where my speed over the ground counts as 'running', I am still heel landing and rocking over my feet in the same style as my walk. Looking back at marathons where I have had to take walk breaks (ahem, two out of my three thus far) my run gait simply decelerates into a fast walk and then walk with very little change in foot positioning. From the little running I've done on my mid-foot it feels more like a running action, positive, with momentum, lift (my shoes scuff usually the ground a lot), and the feeling the brakes are off.

Basically I want to move like my three year old, walk = heel / flat foot, run = toes / mid-foot... and blimey can he shift gears between walking and running! I want to re-find my childhood gears and move between walk and run in a similar fashion, so that I can discover what speed over the ground I really have and fully 'run' a 10k, half-marathon, or even the full marathon??

Not exactly rocket science - Wittering on Wednesday

Eureka, I think I have hit upon a complete new and novel approach to getting this fitness thing done - eat better X move better = feel better - a simple and powerful equation to sit with the collection of other important equations from across the ages...

Image"Hand Drawing Scientist Portrait" by MR LIGHTMAN courtesy of FreeDigitalPhotos.net

...aaaah wait no!!! I have of course 'rediscovered' the mantra that near enough all health and fitness professionals will quote in one form or another. Did this revelation come from listening to these good good people? Well no, it came from me being constantly broken, feeling crap, generally getting no where, and then having one of those light bulb moments after finding myself in my fitness slump - I was not moving as much as I used to in as many ways as I used to, plus I was not eating not so well on top of that - in the end wasn't difficult maths at all... after all I am not a Rocket Scientist :-)

Image "Rocket And Earth" by jscreationzs courtesy of FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Wittering on Wednesday - Micro-blogging is ruling so far this year

So it seems so far this new calendar year I have been tweeting like a thing possessed, it has taken over any time to sit and actually blog. More happily though it is providing fabulous fuel for new posts... just as soon as I can pull away from 140 characters at a time... I have signed up with no less than three fitness programs / schemes / memes so lots to describe and do real soon.

#busytweeting #sorry #i'llbebackshortly :-)

The end of the year is nigh... already?

So another year is rapidly come to a close, and I have not been blogging or running much since the Berlin Marathon. With the festive break very nearly almost here I hope to pick things up a bit (and finish my Berlin race summary). As it happens I haven't had a great deal of 'on the move' news to report since Berlin as I have sort of been "on a break"... which sounds lovely, but actually means I've gained a few pounds and not exercised nearly enough!

With all that said I have a new plan for my 2014 challenges which kicks off next Monday on the eve before Christmas eve. Having spent too long fostering bad habits I am all set to make some new better ones. Although as I read that on average it takes 66 days to embed a new habit, I have decided to get a two week head-start on all those making resolutions (new habits) on New Years day. Should be fun and should make for blogging fodder... did I mention I'd signed up for a spring running challenge - no - ah, well maybe next post will reveal more.

Yours slightly cryptical, A :-)

The Wednesday Witter

I have had to change the title of my occasional (sometimes even regular) weekly waffle, it seems that 'Wittering on Wednesday' might be just fine but by shortening that to 'WoW' on a blog which is for the most part about exercise 'WoW' may cause some small confusion with the cross-fitters version of 'WoW' - "Workout of the Week". No confusion was intended, not that anyone finding one of my WoW posts would be in any doubt after reading two lines or so.

With all that said this Wednesday's witter seems like me to be suffering from fatigue, I have been getting on the move of late hoping to sort out an injury, and it seems the extra workload is tiring me out. I will take some time to adjust to the new routine, and this much I have learned during my blogging days - you do adapt to new routines and habits quicker than you think (once you get past the initial resistance). So for me that is the exciting prospect of early nights to help the tiredness while I adjust and settle.

I have been busier with this blog nonsense of late (as my wife pointed out), and whether this is because I'm living out my running vicariously at the moment, or a genuine deep seated need to write stuff down, I am not entirely sure. Anyway it turns out I am usually at my most prolific in August (see my swiftly constructed graphic below), so perhaps this year I am just blooming early - I blame the crazy weather.

Did I really? Well I never! - my average number of blog posts per month over the years 2006-2012

Have to say as a diary type blog the graph does confirm one of my paper diary trends that January always sets out with good intentions (!). Could be cruel and make some comment about consistency, but hey this is a blog about life and few lives are consistent (at least thats my defence) :-)

Sunny, warm, decent breeze, some Simpsons title sequence type clouds moving through - looks like a fine day for gardening and being outdoors.

For a few moments I thought this was the most viewed thing I'd written all month until I spotted two new referrer spams have taken up residence in my google stats. Thanks for your 'interest' spammers now go do something a little more worthwhile!!

Morning walks are back again

Meet the reason why I am getting a huge amount more walking done than I have been for some time...

     

... yeah, we have a new dog in the household. Another rescued former racing Greyhound, a doggie who through being not faster than her peers was thrown on the canine scrap heap. Her name thanks to our kids is Sali and she is a bundle of youthful energy with a puncheon for 'borrowing' socks and chewing small plastic objects!

It is so nice to have a dog again and not least amongst the many reasons that I'm enjoying it is that I get to talk longish brisk walks most days. I had almost begun to forget how good for me these walks are, but it only took a couple to remind me of what I had been missing. I haven't missed the occasional irresponsible dog owner or crazy cyclist then again maybe in a funny way I have missed that too. Though Sali doesn't know it she is already a part of my exercise landscape each week - I wonder if she's noticed we are going a little faster each day as my knee heals?

Cooler, overcast, moderate breeze - hoping to run again for the first time since the injury in the next couple of days.

Re- rehabilitation

So I find myself, after the disappoints of last weeks new injury sinking my Milton Keynes marathon run, at the point of rehabilitating my knee. I have plans in mind regarding the road to my major goal of finishing the Berlin marathon, but in the back of my head are those lingering doubts "will the knee respond to treatment?", "is it a bigger injury than it appears?", "will I have to change my plan to run?".

It is only to be expected and I am delivering the nervous doubts in spades at the moment - I suspect because of the sudden appearance and nature of the problem. Any injury rehabilitation, let alone training cycle, brings those unknowns and so I am now trying to rationally work through them.

Sunday morning - ice-packing my knee and cursing my luck
(taped foot is to support the knee by limiting foot roll somewhat - apparently?!?)

The immediate plan has been walking, resting, popping glucosamine sulphate pills (eases my inner hypochondriac - I have begun worrying about OA in the knee joint), getting out books and looking for a training guide, and most of all sorting out my diet.

My diet is probably key here in my humble opinion as it has not been consistent of late and in hindsight I hit the last training block a stone (6.3 kg) heavier than I did my last (first) marathon block last year. Though pure weight / mass probably isn't correlated directly with the symptoms, it is the composition of the weight that I suspect does... suffice to say that I am not exactly lean just now (but then I haven't been truly lean since the the '90s - the ravages of student life and over indulgence over time).

So at the extremely real risk of repeating myself a little, this time* I am targeting the weight and more over body composition whilst working hard (with a little help from the physiotherapist) on general strength and flexibility, before I tackle the run training block in around a months time. It is a plan, and I am a past master at making the things, but this time around my motivation is total and drive utterly clear - I will run the Berlin marathon and I will run the very best I can!

* - seriously I'm beginning to sound like someone waking up with a hangover swearing he'll ever never drink so much again only to be back at the bar the following weekend downing doubles.

Wittering on Wednesday (sort of)

So I have been busy, or have I? You might have those phases too where you seemed to have not stopped but yet reflect and wonder quite what it was you achieved... it has been like that this week. To borrow a lyric from somewhere I have been travelling without moving (apologies if that was not the intended meaning behind that phrase whomever penned it, and to my shame I don't recall who). In terms of on the move type activities, I have done nothing but eat since the large number of kilometers covered over the weekend. The eating started as post run munchies and don't seem to have relented since - it often gets that way when I am rushing around I get lazy with food choices and food control. Still having noticed it today I hope to put that back in its box.

In the wider terms of wittering it to has been a busy week with the press full of all sorts of stories everything from studies of the best forms of activity (long and steady versus high intensity training), to a new material heralded by major sports shoes maker as the next big 'boost' to running performance, to the sad stories of sporting icons heading into courtrooms.

Oddly though with all the sources of wittering fodder I have passed as my brain seems engrossed in a any 'spare' moments with a personal reading frenzy (but that I could develop a faster mode of reading overnight). I have inspiring books a plenty and for a change am applying myself to consuming them rather than doing the proud ownership thing "oh, yes those are great and they are real classics!"... "sorry, what? Have I read them all - ah, well - no, no, no not all of them no"... "how many? Hmm, well these are... well they are classics aren't they? Fancy moving into the other room?". My challenge at the moment is thus to dent my unread books collection, including all those running and fitness books that will undoubtedly tell me what I should be doing and set me on the path to a marathon PB without bumping into more injury / illness.

All I need to do is figure out just when I can find the time to tackle my unread book mountain... more hours in the day - anyone? One day soon a real slick blog post will tumble of my keyboard, for now - sorry ;-)

A tale of two podcasts

The number of podcasts that I regularly listen to has now doubled, to the princely sum of two! Yes, that is right I now listen to literally a couple of podcasts. Which two and why?

The first one I have listened to for a while now (and have mentioned before) is the Jillian Michaels podcast - not because I'm a closet north american, not because I'm a huge Biggest Loser fan, and not because I am a woman of a certain age... just because it is generally silly, but informative, and benign whilst insightful. I am sure many people have said many things about the 'show' and I am certainly not going to critique it here.

The second one I have been downloading has been a revelation - Marathon Talk - for me at the moment simply perfect listening and simply perfect content. As someone hoping to run two marathons this year it has been a brilliant find for tips and training ideas / guides. The running advice is coupled with some absolutely brilliant interviews, and since I started listening over the New Year I have heard some crackers with Kelly Sotherton (former GB heptathlete trying her first marathon after retiring from elite sport), Mike Tomlinson (event organiser and husband of the late Jane Tomlinson), Amby Burfoot (RunnersWorld guru, and lifelong runner), Prof John Brewer (sports physiologist), Brett Larner (the guy behind Japan Running News), and Kurt Fearnley (paralympic athlete) this year, and I haven't begun dipping into their archive yet.

I have taken so much from the Marathon Talk podcasts that I would recommend a listen to any runner. It is true that the podcast it is supported / funded by Adidas but it is not by any means an ad driven enterprise it comes across as genuinely about running community, and the two hosts (Messrs Martin Yelling and Tom Williams) are warm and engaging. I have yet to find time to root around the website but I have the feeling that when I do it will be similarly rewarding.  

Both of these are available through iTunes just stick something relevant in the search do-da :-)

Diary - very busy in work (not a bad thing), very busy at home (also not a bad thing), not getting many miles out on the road (not a good thing). I'm 10lbs lighter than at the end of December, and moving towards fuller training. Weather - cold, windy, and possibly bringing more snow our way.

Wittering on Wednesday - 'that guy'

Well as a sports fan I was drawn into watching the interview where a sportsman did his level best to distance himself from, well in the end from, himself. It was almost as if Lance Armstrong was trying to convince the audience that there were 'forces and pressures' that made him do things and that he was not true to his current self, but a victim of a whirlwind of circumstance that he could do nothing about. Well in a nutshell, I was not at all convinced, I was not convinced at all... you can always say 'no'.

There are so many issues surrounding the 'confession' that a debunking of it all would take hours, and from where I sit as a general sports fan it is all just deeply sad. I myself was wow'ed by the sport of road cycling during his run of Tour de France wins, I would leave work early with a very good friend to sit in his lounge wrapped in the wonder of watching 'that guy' storm up an alpine col. It was incredible to watch the drama of those races unfold, and frankly though I will still watch the Tour or other events I feel robbed of something. I watched the cancer survivor apparently defy the odds and blow the world away, it was inspiring and I feel very hollow at the final analysis.

I know that I was not alone in that sinking feeling over the last years leading into this admission, and the bereft feeling now we know the accusations were true. I bought the wristbands for the charity, when I might have spent that money on another charity, because of the feats of the man. Why else would I donate to a charity based halfway around the world (yes, I am very aware they fund global research). I am also the owner of a Nike / Livestrong running jacket that is frankly brilliantly stunning at its job, but lately has made me think twice about going for a run in it.

It is absolutely crazy to take something of this nature personally, but here I don't think I am alone in doing so either. Following heroes and icons has always been a risky enterprise.

At the moment I hope that 'that man' both from the past and present goes on to confess more fully in a more appropriate forum (law courts, some form of court of arbitration for sport clean-up commission). That there is still so much not laid out for further actions to be based upon in cycling and sports around doping is wrong, and 'that man' has not forgotten the machinery that got him around the Tour de France as 'winner' seven times.

Sadly my personal opinion is that sport should not allow Armstrong into any arena even if the total confession is given, it has been the manner and conduct of not wishing to be truly accountable for his own actions that leave me with little doubt a lifetime ban is merited. A truly humbled, repentant, sorry individual would not on balance carry on business in this way, and would likely be granted some form of sporting outlet in the future.

So there, I couldn't bite my insignificant sports fan tongue any longer. Sadly I will likely now be using the story of Lance Armstrong as a story of the bleak side of sports to my kids rather than the story of effort that many of believed not so very long ago.

Wittering on Wednesday - pre-race wobbles

Pre-race wobbles
So it is indeed race week, and grand though I try and make that sound all it really means is me and 17,999 other souls will run around the streets of Cardiff this Sunday. I am not 'in a race' - I have entered an event sure - but really I am not convinced I am racing anything other than perhaps the clock. Sure there are elite runners coming to race the Cardiff Half-marathon, but most of us are just doing it because we can and not to race the next guy or gal.

Why then do I find myself so charged the week of this thing? It is all about the culmination of a block of training, a set of efforts, to do this one distance at this one time as well as I can... and indeed that provides enough 'pressure' to quicken the nerves quite a bit.

Other Witterings
Ummm, well I don't have any... sorry, I blame the pre-race wobbles!!

Wittering on Wednesday - super brief

Due to a bout of tiredness, and I mean to the core tired, I haven't had the energy to think about wittering this week. I was in my bed just before 8pm last night and I feel like I could happily do the same again today... I am hoping it is just training fatigue after a busy weekend and that a couple of easy days will see me right.

I other news I am all set to shut down my 'Training' page and go back to popping training updates back into the day to day posts, though I have yet to decide a format (one decision at a time here! hehe!)... anyway here are the last weeks efforts...

Week beginning Mon 10th Sept 2012

Date	Cycle	Run	Stretch	Row	Ergo	Circuit	Gym
Mon	.	.	.	.	.	.	.
Tues	.	4.5mi	Y	.	.	.	.
Wed	.	.	Y	.	4 x 4min firm	.	.
Thurs	.	.	.	.	.	.	.
Fri	.	.	.	.	.	.	.
Sat	.	9.6mi	Y	.	.	.	.
Sun	.	5mi	Y	3trips		.	.

Wittering on Wednesday - including Tennis, legacy, heat, blogging and ice cream(!)

Special bit of wittering this Wednesday, Andy Murray has cracked it, in case you missed it (how could you) he won the US Open in a thrilling five set final against Novak Djokovic. The summer of shear joy for British sport just took another level step up, just when we all thought there was nowhere else it could go after Bradley Wiggins triumphed in the Tour de France, and the GB and NI team excelled during the London 2012 olympics. Phew, as a huge sports fan (aka TV sports-aholic) I am just about out of steam - I stayed up until gone 2am to hear Murray win on BBC radio.

Olympic bounce - local rowing legacy?

I ran into a former rowing colleague the other day who told me all about the apparent effect the Olympics has had on our local club, Llandaff Rowing Club. Each year an event called the "Pub and Club" is run which encourages teams of four from local workplaces, clubs and pubs to get together learn to row for a month culminating in the "Pub and Club sprint regatta". There were, I was told, queues down the stairs and out of the clubhouse door coupled with cars parked all over the place apparently during the initial sign up evening. As an event I know they will love it, it was my introduction to rowing and left me totally hooked.

Any sign of an Olympic 2012 legacy, or an inspire a generation, sports effect near you?

Bring the heat

I am trying, and I am not sure how I am doing, to mix up my running a little. Yeah I know my training log looks pretty much as it always has, but it belays a change in approach which is seeing more speed-work. For me speed-work is a relative term of course (closes mind to how fast the Olympians covered such distances), but having spent a very very long time running at and just below 10min/mile pace for greater and greater distances I have needed the change and gone looking for it. At the moment it is not especially structured with me doing one session a week (at a mid-range distance) with sprints or sustained bursts within it. Like I said I don't know how I am doing but I am certainly less 'bored' with working my way around every course at 10min per mile.

Wales Blogger awards

I have seen on other blogs mentions of the awards for Welsh bloggers (I first noticed it on the very professional http://www.girlontheriver.com/ blog via my twitter feed), unfortunately I don't read enough of them to give a real judgement about their merits but the short-list is a fun way of taking the temperature of blogs in this part of the World. Some I think will be retained as regular reads - more on those in another WoW perhaps.

Take a browse of the 'Peoples choice' nominees list if you like at http://www.walesblogawards.co.uk/peoples-choice-award/

Swansea next...

Not long now until I tackle the Swansea Bay 10k. I have to say I am looking forward not only to the course and a lovely day out by the sea with Mrs. Taffi but I am also looking forward to my Joe's Ice Cream. This is a family thing inspired by my wife's love of the ice cream that they concocted in their ice cream parlours, when we go to Swansea or the Mumbles (or anywhere vaguely close actually) we have to 'pop' in for an ice cream. Very good stuff it is too, and I am looking forward to a well earned scoop or three ;-)

Diary - sunny, shattered showers, modest breeze. I am feeling inspired by all things running at the moment, and reading loads of great blogs and magazine articles. Job interview later - which should be fun.

Wittering Wednesday

Why is it that the moment you really need to print the printer decides to go AWOL? Why is it that when you decide to go for a run it rains? Why is it that when you are all set for a training session your buddy gets injured? Sure all of these are issues, all of which I have had in the last couple of days, but the bigger question is why does it matter to what we are doing so much? I didn't need to print a draft in order to carry on working, nor did I need good weather to run or a training buddy to get down to training. I suppose some days if you let things stop you they will.

Breaking out of a "why I couldn't" pattern can seem difficult, although when you are out of it you look back you wind up pondering just what its supposed power was (those you never suffer this never quite understand). A friend succinctly summed up my post-marathon post-illness funk by enquiring "you know what to do, why do you do the opposite? If I want to train for a race I'll just do the opposite of you". I suppose at times (especially if you are in a bad place for other reasons) the "why I couldn't" seems comforting, simple and accurate, despite the fact that ultimately you'll be uncomfortable about things you didn't do, find things complicated by the things you missed (especially those base training runs), and totally inaccurate in the cold light of the powerful angle-poise lamp.

So the next time you get the "why I couldn't" or "why I can't" thoughts coming your way see them as they are, step around them and get on with things. So I am off for a long training run later on my own whatever the weather, although in the end I really did need the new cartridge for the printer regardless :-S

PS. in the end the whole of my run was in a break in the weather, I experimented with a route variation and ran a fun 8mile circuit with good form and rhythm - see what was I all in a tangle about :-)

Wittering on Wednesday - obesity

The Food Programme on BBC Radio4 this week presented the debate around changing / stemming the progression of obesity across the 'Developed' world, and I can recommend a listen...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b01ky5gx/Food_Programme_Can_Andrew_Lansley_change_your_diet/

Given what I have seen on my travels through day to day life whatever tack they take we are facing an uphill challenge. The people that I rather rudely snapped with my mobile phone camera in a local cafe were essentially a super-sized family. They sat down across from us and tucked into lunch followed by an excited round of cakes.

As a group I have a feeling these people were contributing to their own weight issues - "Oh , go have that half of the cake with me!"

To me the changes have to come from simple non-judgemental education starting in schools and spreading out through adult groups. Education about menus, meal times, food options, food flavours, essential nutrition, exercise, movement, lifestyle, not simply pushing the message of ill-health and disease as if a big scary stick will have long term benefits. The strategies that rely on companies and industry to help drive change present such a monumental conflict of interest (they need to sell product to justify their existence, shareholder dividends, company bonuses and so forth).

Sure the education approach will take time to achieve, but it could be one of the few ways that could create appropriate obesity avoiding life long habits.

Situation update: A story summed up with toys

It finally seems as though my lungs are getting to a point where I might consider training, though as I mentioned in my last post it will be a long road...

Partly because my weight increased to:

A gain of 9kg!, whoops, 6kg (I did my conversion wrong)

Mostly through eating more than just my five-a-day:

It is possible to eat too much of a good thing even if it doesn't really taste wooden

All whilst feeling bad that I would see other runners out on the road and in parks working hard, so I felt like I was stuck behind a barrier as train after train went by:

Another delay for a speeding train ;-)

Hopefully now I will be able to get all my sports toys out of their toybox and start new adventures.