Stepping up a gear

Well that's the general idea. On Monday I did my usual 4 mile run then photographed Donovan in the evening. I had a day off on Tuesday as I went out with a friend for a coffee - I can't be a complete triathlon bore. Yesterday I braved the swimming pool and did 30 lengths in just over 18 minutes. I could probably have gone faster but the pool was quite busy. At one point I was behind a man doing a strange sideways breast stroke very slowly. Every time we got to the end I thought he would let me go ahead of him, but no, he stubbornly sidewound on. In the end I got fed up and overtook him, which is probably frowned upon, especially as I then nearly had a head-on collision with someone coming the other way. My name is Mudd there.

Today I did another brick session - a 50 minute bike ride then a 33 minute run. I also had a delicious Hi 5 energy bar as I got off the bike, They really are yummy, but as I imagine they have about seven thousand calories in them, I'd better only indulge mid-training.

Did it!

The brick session that is. I had a really good bike ride, a lot of it off road, through lovely meadows. However I wasn't entirely sure where I was going so it took a little longer than I expected: I was out for an hour. I got back here, jumped off the bike, put it in the garage (my version of transition) and started running. I say running, but quite what it looked like to the outsider, I do not know. It felt like I had diving boots on. Any notion of running style went straight out the window! I only did 2.5 - 3ks and to be honest it wasn't hideously slow. It just felt peculiar.

I need to do some more swimming. I've wimped out lately as I've felt a bit chilly!

Sinusitis - aaagh

I don't know if it's pollen that's setting this off, as I don't have a cold at the moment ( I've had very few colds since I stopped going to the gym, interestingly)

The weekend was good as my bike is now fixed, and Tommo and I had an early trip to Grafham Water on Saturday. It's about 16km round with some beastly hills and there were very high winds. It was good fun though.

This week, when I get rid of my pounding head, I'm going to try 'bricking' where you do a training ride then get straight off and start running. If you see me wobbling down Owl Way like Bambi on roller skates, that's why!

Darn!

I've left this too long, and now I can't remember what I've been up to. I remember doing a 4 mile run last week and knocking a minute off my previous time, which was nice. But after that it all gets a bit hazy.

We spent the weekend with friends in Bath and had a great time. However, when we returned here on Sunday night, I was feeling a little 'liverish.' I did a half hour run on Monday morning to try and ease myself back into things. It felt tough but I didn't do too badly.

Here's a good web site by the guy who did the ambigrams in Angels and Demons by Dan Brown.

John Langdon

Silly girl

I had lunch with two friends on Friday and got sun burned. How stupid is that? It was really sore.

I didn't do any training on Friday or Saturday, but went swimming on Sunday evening. I just did my 30 lengths in just under 18 minutes, although I had to stop to faff about with goggles and nose clip a few times and I stopped the watch for that. Cheating I suppose.

On Monday we went en famille to Grafham Water for a bike ride. It was Darcey's first time on a mountain bike and she fell off twice and crashed into a gate within the first mile. Poor thing. I had a feeling it was going to be a very long afternoon, as it's 8 miles around the reservoir, but she really got the hang of it after that. We weren't going anywhere near fast enough for it to be classed as a training ride, but at least I have now been on a bike this year and proved to myself that I can still do it.

Thursday

I was exhausted this morning and was going to wimp out of my planned lunchtime swim. But Tommo said he was going to go this afternoon and I would have felt like a skiver if I hadn't gone, so off I trundled. Unfortunately Thursdays are school swimming days and arrived while lots of little girls were swarming round the changing room. I felt very self-concious donning my ultra-cool goggles, hat and noseclip. Sure enough I spotted two of them whispering about me in the mirror. I turned round and asked them if they were laughing at my goggles, in what I thought was a non-confrontational manner. They looked absolutely petrified - as you probably would if you were challenged by something that looked like a giant fly. I agreed that the goggles did look weird, but unlike the traditional sort of google, they didn't feel like they sucked my eyeballs out. That won them over and I really hope they don't have nightmares tonight about their mothers turning into enormous insects and sucking their eyes out.

Once in the pool I did the same routine I did on Tuesday with slightly shorter rests.

Back in the changing room, the next batch of little girls had arrived and was waiting for their lesson. They didn't want to go poolside they explained to their teacher in fits of giggles as there were 'naked ladies in the shower.' On reflection I suppose naked ladies are quite funny.

But naked men are funnier.

.

Today I decided it was time to do a slightly longer run and to include a rarity in these parts - a hill. I ran from here to the top of St Ives hill and back and it took me just under an hour. I haven't measured the distance, partly because I did a bit of 'off-roading' and partly because I worry that it might turn out to have been 3 miles or something.

It was a very steep hill, honest.

Have a go at this game, you internet whizz-kids