Wrapping Up 2010

All in all its been an eventful year but I'll be glad to see the back of it. I lost my favourite uncle in October and my mother in November, the first a credit to the care and attention of the health service for keeping him going for forty years after a major heart attack, the second a tragic, and all too familiar, tale of indifference and lack of care from the same health service.

This blog has been a bit quiet lately, largely because I've been resting my knee, in the hope that it will repair itself, since completing the OMM at the end of October. I'm not sure the rest is working as my knee has been making its presence felt in the last couple of days. We'll find out in January when I start training again.

The OMM was another of those "why the hell am I doing this again" experiences that are great in hindsight. Dave and I had upgraded to the A class this year, just when the planners decided that as the hills of Dartmoor aren't so big they'd up the distances. We must have done 32 miles on the first day and 20 on the second. Day one was tussocks, bogs and gorse with reasonable weather (cool and dryish) while the second was a day of more tussocks and bogs with a few swollen rivers thrown in all topped off with driving rain and hill fog. I'd invested in a new Terra Nova Laser Competition tent which is a nice one man tent but is very cosy for two. Even so I must have slept for the best part of ten hours. All in all a good weekend.

So, looking forward to next year, apart from a possible participation in the High Peak Marathon (40 odd miles of night time peat bogs)in March I'm going to stick to more runnable trails. I've entered the Grindleford Gallop again (go to go for that 3 hour time) and I've just gone and entered the Lakeland 100!

So watch this space.

Events for this Year

As you may know if you follow this blog I'm not a massive race junky. I generally just like to run but it's good to enter the odd event as an excuse to run somewhere new or interesting. Last year for example I only did three events, the Ridgeway Run, the 3 Peaks Race and the OMM (Day 1 and day 2). However, this year I've already entered 2 (Grindleford Gallop (21 miles) and the 3 Peaks (24 miles, again)) and am eyeing up at least a couple more already, the Swiss Alpine K78 Ultramarathon (50 miles) in July and the Ridgeway Challenge (85 miles)in August.

I might get in a few others (Saunders LMM, OMM, etc) and maybe the Zermatt Marathon as well. That should keep me busy.

Healing Heels

Not one for the squeamish. The day after getting back from Wales (see previous posts) I had to go over to Liverpool to view a flat my daughter Vicky was looking at for her new job. This meant me wandering around for a few hours after work. On the train back to Manchester my heels were teeth gittingly painful. I had to wait ages for a train in Manchester and was dying to take off my shoes to releive the pain but daren't as I knew I'd not get them back on again. By the time I got back to my room in Whaley Bridge it was nearly midnight and my heels were swollen. I could hardly walk and was nearly in tears. Back in the B&B I performed minor surgery on my heels cutting away the loose and dead skin. This was the result:




Needless to say I couldn't get my shoes on the next day.

As for the black toenails, they came off a couple of days later.

Ridgeway No Way

Pictures borrowed from the excellent 'TheRacePhotographer'.

Just as I thought I was making a breakthrough I come down to earth with a bump. Expecting to knock a few minutes off my Ridgeway Run time on Sunday I went and added 3 minutes to it instead. I just had no strength on the hills and stopped on two of them (at the bottom of the first one to be honest), used both drink stations as an excuse to stop and even went behind bush for a pee as an excuse. I was so close to packing in trying and just jogging back. Felt a bit better in the second half and even pulled a dozen places back but it was too late by then. Ironically I had no problem with the knee or the calf muscles or anything else for that matter. I just felt crap.

Official image in the post.

The stats are 9.6 miles hilly off-roader, 1h 15m, 95th out of 473 finishers. (See course here) Still upper quartile but not an enjoyable run. Only just beginning to feel normal over two days later. Having a rest this week. I might go out on Thursday night.

Not sure what the explanation is other than I might have overdone it last week with four hard runs over four nights. I felt sluggish on Thursday night (having felt great up to then (see previous post)) but I thought it was because I was with the fast lads in the GV Striders. Also need to look at my diet as I'm living on Marks and Spencer's sandwiches and pasta dishes during the week living away from home as I am.



The weather was fine. Looked like it would stay cloudy with a cool breeze so I togged up in black only to have the sun come out as soon as I walked out of the door. Where's a nice green and white vest when you need one? One runner was togged up in long tights, long sleeved top, hat and scarf (he's at the back of the middle picture). I'd have died wearing that lot. I ran the mile or so to the start and felt ok. The late start (11:00) wouldn't have helped either.

Finisher's tea-shirts were OK this year. Black with and orange design on the front.

I guess I'll have to put that one down to experience. Got the OMM in a couple of weeks.

Knees and Oils

Six weeks in and the knee is not fully fit still. This is doubly frustrating as I'm 'between contracts' at the moment and could have really got some decent runs in. However, this morning I wnet on the treadmill to test out the knee. I could still feel it (a bit of pressure under the kneecap and the odd twinge at what I think is each end of the anterior cruciate ligament (ACL). This is on the outer edge of the tibia and inner edge of the femur.) but managed to complete a mile at 5 mph then 7.5 mph. It seems to have loosened things up a bit and certainly hasn't appeared to have done any damage. Hopefully have another go tomorrow.

Anyway, whilst I've been laid up I'm been persuing my attempts to learn how to paint. I'm now onto my sixth painting and have just set up a blog to share the results and my experiences. Take a look at Slapping Oil on Canvas



The next stage is to become official painter to the FRA and OMM!

OMM 2008 - Look Mam, I'm on t'tele

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/7691403.stm

The news reports might have been a complete load of codswallop, but at least I got on the tele so Rosie knew I was OK.

OMM 2008 - Wet, Windy and Blown Up by the Media

Just a temporary post to vent my spleen a bit. I'll do a full job when I get back to sunny Brussels.

Did Class B course (shortened version of the bad weather route) with my mate Dave S. The weather was extreme, violent and savage but was it dangerous? Only if you took completely avoidable risks. Clearly the fact that there were no serious casualties shows that people used their common sense and experience and survived (dare I say, enjoyed) the day. Look, I'm still smiling.

The biggest risk came after we were told that the event had been cancelled. Expecting to be back at the car that evening we dropped our guard and let our dry kit get wet only to be told we then couldn't get back to our cars. I spent an extremely uncomfortable night in a soggy field in my tent but it was hardly dangerous (there was a farm house 20 yards away!)

More later.....