On The Late Shift

On the bike, at long last. Although I nearly didn't bother when I saw the rain but it eased off, eventually stopped and the ride turned out rather pleasant in the end. I didn’t even notice my dodgy knee as I was cycling but it’s a bit stiff now as I sit at work.

Had a few problems with a woman in a pointlessly large vehicle. She pulled out in front of me, then when she realised her error slammed on her brakes and therefore rather than just causing me to brake heavily actually blocked my path. So I had the swerve around the back of her car, at which point she started to reverse back into the side street from where she’d come. Crazy. Unless of course her aim was to actually try to kill me.

In the evening L runs. Unfortunately I need her running partners for dog training. She says I’m welcome to them. It’s a double session tonight, a session each. Doggo’s on the late shift, so perhaps he'll sleep tonight. Any more of his random barking at 2am and he'll be getting a muzzle. Even MD seems to have got bored with it now and doesn’t even bother getting out of bed to see what the old git’s barking at, let along bother joining in.

L suggests I forgo my post training takeaway that I very occasionally go for when we don’t finish until late and it’ll be around a 10:30 finish tonight. She’s says to think carefully about those ulcers before I turn down her offer of home cooked food in which she is very adept at cramming in vegetables. Hmmm perhaps, she has a point.

(Wednesday 12th January)

There's Always Something

It’s the delayed Edwinstowe Christmas 10k this morning with no doubt the expected red t-shirt to be presented at the finish. My preparation hasn’t been great and that’s the understatement of the year, even if 2011 is only nine days old. I’ve not done enough training due to the weather, the fact I’ve developed a sore throat and because my bike has been in for a service. My diet has been crap, causing a mouth full of ulcers, ulcers which have made fuelling up for this race difficult. Then to cap it all a restless night due to the dogs having a restless night. The fault, I think, of a couple of foxes screeching loudly intermittently through the earlier part of the night. I don’t wish to begrudge Mr Fox bringing home a young vixen after a night out on Wollaton Park but could he at least keep it to himself.

But anyway, back to the race. As I was, sort of, ill, I took it steady with full body cover so as to not get cold. Embarrassingly steady as it turned out, doing a 4:45 for the first km was positively upsetting. Things improved slightly from there onwards but not by much and to be honest I couldn’t have gone much faster even if I’d wanted to.

So basically I power walk (without the power) around the course, which is still a little icy. There were still a few piles of snow around. So I can see why it was cancelled back in December and even today they had to reroute it away from the Major Oak where it was sheet ice in places. The fact it’s still quite cold is good as it made the course firm underfoot, otherwise it could have been really muddy.

So a time of 47 something, which I would have assumed would have put me near the back but oddly doesn’t. L rubs it in by bragging about her time, which was eight minutes quicker than last time she ran this race two years ago. I blame her personal trainer, although she’s still behind me.

Home for the hot bath that I’m more than ready for, so too the wine we hit later.

On the positive side, the exercise seems to have blown the worst of the illness out of my body. So that’s good. Instead I now have a really painful knee. There’s always something.

(Sunday 9th January)