Wednesday 20 October 2010

Whatever happened to that Drunken Euphoria fella who used to blog?

I think he got injured...
Is he still?
Possibly, I heard he tried cycling and that injured him as well.
Unlucky..... anything else
Oh and I'm sure I heard he'd put on weight and now has Tesco home deliver him huge bags of tortilla chips which he gorges on washed down with sugary fizzy drinks.
Really!!
But I also heard somebody thought they saw him running at night, dressed in black, muttering and with a pronounced limp, probably drunk and running into things.
Oh I heard that too... and scrounging from bins?
Thats right.
Hope thats not true? shame.... he seemed alright really.
Maybe he's retired and found a good woman to settle down with?
That would be nice, but would that stop him running?
ehhhhh..... doubt it.
Lets hope he's getting back in training for another marvellous adventure.
Yeh.... Maybe the Coast to Coast and do you think he'd do the Lakeland 100 again?
Oh yes, and I'd bet he'd get round a lot faster next time too.
I'll be there, I'd better get training so I can beat him!

Friday 8 October 2010

C2C - planning so far

I've mentioned it somewhere on here, possibly numerous times, but I plan to run the Coast to Coast next year. Following the challenging 190m Wainwright route of course - following from reading several excellent accounts in blog-land and hearing from former completors. The planning is underway and there's quite a lot to work out. First things first, my co-runner and I have commited to 5 days, so much so that we've started booking accomodation at appropriate intervals. We reckon this will be a challenging but not uncomfortable schedule, especially as the hilliest bits are at the start in the Lake Distict. Not to suggest that the Yorkshire Dales and, my oft bleak - more often stunning nemesis, the North York Moors are easy. So now we plan around the schedule.

Never being a fan of complication I'm toying with the idea of carrying the bare minimum of gear rather than using a sherpa company and only getting support on route in the form of places to eat and sleep. After doing the 180m section cycle of transpennine trail with a 10L pack. Which I had stuffed with bottle of energy drink, powdered energy drink I needed for second day, clean thin clothes for the evening and train journey back after second day, snack food to supplement food I'd buy on route, protective gear (waterproof, gloves, hat), navigation stuff and - the thankfully unused - spare innertube. Only thing I carried not in this bag was a small bumbag with puncture repair kit and phone and 2nd waterbottle on bike.

We've called the idea, "doing it caveman". Ok, thats a slight exaggeration, were not going to subsist off the land, catching rabbits, eating berries and grass. But, if we can confirm there are places on route to lunch substantially, then I plan to carry the minimum of food. Sure, this is 3 days longer than the TPT cycle, but I'll be using a 20L pack, and only plan on carrying extra's from that trip to the tune of a change of running gear, more food, more maps and numerous sachets of powdered energy drinks. Oh and I definately won't be needing an innertube!

Saturday 2 October 2010

Cardiovascular Purgatory

I felt pretty good to be out there completing that transpennine cycle. It was an interesting self-suffiency and lone endurance experiance. All part of the rich tapestry of what a well endurance-honed indivdual can do. However the achilles problem I mentioned has brought me back down to earth with a bump.

It took me a bout a week before I could manage any kind of endurance training after this. I tried a run midweek but the achilles was too sore and I bailed out after about 600metres. I passed my leisure time semi-constructively by upping the variety of my core, upper and lower body strength work. Things looked up when I managed a very flat soft trail run on the Saturday of about 2.2m. No massvie reaction from a hopefully recovering achilles or the stress fractured leg. I repeated this distance two days later and then four days later whithout major complaints. Then bizarrely after two days rest on the Friday the area of the stress fracture seemed to be feeling sore again?!

So I opted for a cycle today as the achilles was now the lesser of two evils and I fancied a longer and tougher cardio session, due to feeling - probably paranoically - I'd be starting to lose fitness with the limited distance running. So off, out I went, pretty nice day compared to some of late, for a nice trip into the wolds. Bouncing up and down hills between sea-level and a not-quite dizzying 550ft above - but on a bike at speed even a shallow climb feels harder work than the equivelent when running.

It was enjoyable and all going pretty well, but the achilles got more and more sore throughout. Towards 1hr45 out I was glad to be nearly back as it was now close to as bad as two weeks before. So a good hard session - which I then followed with some strength work in front of the Ryder Cup ("Go Europe!") - but at what cost?

That rules out cycling of any great distance and perhaps running also after the reaction from my tame return in the last week. Unfortunately my run of good training and eventing has made me impatient and I sorely miss the things I was able to do just two months ago. If this goes on I may have to do a deal with the devil and join a gym. I guess I've got to be patient and accept that I'm not the first person this has happened to, or by far the worst effected. But as the title suggests; I'm frustrated!