Yeehaa... Every Day's a Sunday...

... Well for the next three and a half weeks anyway!

I'm off to Nicaragua tomorrow for the 100k, checked the local weather it's in the mid 80's at the moment so will be a shock to the system. I'm also missing the Round Rotherham 50... but I'm trying not to think about that.

I've had a stinker of a cold all week so haven't managed much running apart from a 20 miler on the roads last night and a 10 miler in the hills tonight so I'm feeling a bit under-trained! But this one is more for the adventure than the competitive side of things so I'm not going worry too much.

So... I'm off, if you don't hear from me I'm probably jogging up a volcano somewhere... (not Arthurs Seat).

Bog Eating, Cross-Dressing and Christiano Ronaldo

I'm finding it increasingly difficult to call my running training anymore. It's becoming more like maintaining fitness or maybe even surviving! The 24 hour has hit me hard, I could probably have done with an extra weeks rest but too late now there's a 100k to do in less than 4 weeks time!


So, I rested for 8 days after Tooting then got in an easy 40 mile/7000' week (hills again yeehaa!) with no long run. Followed that with a 67 mile 9500' week including a 3 mile time trial (18 mins, exactly the same as the one 3 weeks prior to 24hr!), Tinto Hill race (39:02, 35th) and a 21 mile long run. Then last week ended up at 44 miles 7800' only managing to run on 4 days for one reason or another.

There have been some adventures though.

Tinto was the usual fast and furious, lung bursting quad bursting affair only this year I decided to throw in some bog eating too with a spectacular bog dive on the descent.






Then, this weekend was the Vasque Ultra Series awards in the Lakes. So, Lucy and I headed down to Ambleside for the fun event at the Lakes Runner shop. It was a 90 minute score event in which there was also a prize for the best wig! So running through the town centre complete with my long blond wig was worth it in the end as I picked up the prestigous award for my Dave Lee Roth/Bon Jovi look! Then after meeting all the Kryptons we headed off to the "barn" we had hired for the weekend with an hours tour of Kendal and quite a few dead end streets beforehand (it's amazing the difference one letter of a postcode can make to a sat-nav!!). A freezing/boiling shower, some wine, a toast to all things Krypton then it was off to Wilfs to party! It was a really enjoyable night swapping race tales and discussing next years plans with people I don't normally have time or am too knackered to talk to after races, oh and a few beers were also consumed.



Dancing Krypton style


Next morning the good weather had held out so Andy (our new Krypton recruit!), Lucy and I decided to do the Kentmere Horseshoe route. It took the first climb to get myself in gear but after that the running was excellent, really getting into the descents and stopping occasionally to admire the fantastic views. It was one of those days when it was a privilege to be up there enjoying it. I also got to wear my new shoes unfortunately that is the only colour they come in so I felt like the Christiano Ronaldo of the fells until I could give them a good dook in the nearest bog to cut out the glare.

Always remember the camera... great excuse to stop on the climb and get your breath back!

Maggs Howe camping barn with the Kentmere Horseshoe behind.

Vasque Ultra-running Series Races 2009

You heard it here first! The race series for 2009 is a cracker!


Short


1/3/9 Wye Ultra


22/3 Wuthering Hike


5/8 Dark & White Peak (tbc)


?/9 Pumlumon


Medium


18/4?? Calderdale


16/5??Marlborough


5/7 Osmotherly Pheonix


20/9 High Peak 40


Long


25/4 Highland Fling


9/5 Fellsman


1/8 Lakeland 100 & 50 milers


3/10 Long Mynd

Fuego Y Agua Newspaper Article

Here's a great article on the FYA ( click to enlarge).

Hills, Trails and Typhoid

What a cracker of a weekend it's been! A world away from the stormy weather of the OMM weekend previous.

On Saturday Oscar came up and we headed off for an easy run over Benarty Hill and out to the Lomonds. They've just finished a new path around Loch Leven which means it's possible to run this route without going onto the road. Much better since most drivers would take the opportunity to try and run you into the ditch and on the way back with a load of miles in the legs it used to get a bit hairy. What a difference now! We climbed Benarty and down into Vane Farm nature place (I'm not sure we should run through here, but there was people running here before they turned it into a twitchers place, that's my theory) then along the new path for about 4 miles before coming into Scotlandwell and climbing Bishops Hill. The views were great at the top, you could see loads of snow covered tops in the distance. I sat for a few minutes just enjoying the silence and the views while Oscar disappeared down the hill a bit mumbling something about needing a dump!
We took a slightly different route back making it a bit shorter but a bit rougher going through knee deep heather for a bit. All in all it was about 17.5 miles and 3500 feet which I was happy to have survived only two weeks after the 24 hour.

That made it about 40 miles and 6000 feet for the week, so I'm pretty much back into the regular training routine again and just need to up the miles for a couple of weeks before going to Nicaragua for the 100k.

There was a bit of a spanner thrown in the works yesterday though. I was due at the doctors for some pre- trip vaccinations so cycled the couple of miles to the surgery not realising I was late. When I got there the crabbit nurse wasn't too keen to give me my jags since I was a whopping 5 mins late! Standing there with my (remaining) hair sticking up, red face and windswept look I decided just to stand in silence and hope she would think I was another mental person and best not to mess... it worked! She told me to hurry along to the chemist next door, pick up the bag of diseases and get my butt into her room asap. So now 24 hours or so after having tropical diseases ( hep A + E I kept calling it... and she thought I was a mental person??!) injected into me I'm feeling a bit out of sorts. My arms feel like lead and after an easy 7 miler tonight my legs feel like they've done an OMM in the rain!




Back to hard training....

If I can't get over this wee dose of typhoid and hep A+E soon then the bigger mileage week I've got planned isn't going to happen.