Black and white

It was hosing it down on Saturday, and with a houseful of in-laws, I felt it wise and politic not to go for a ride in the horizontal rain. It was one of those days when it rained ALL day. Every single time we considered the weather, the reality was precipitative. So the only form of exercise we took on Saturday was a surprise – and great fun – hour of ten-pin bowling, in which @agentkiss overcame her cough and reigned supreme.

Sunday was a very different kind of day altogether. No rain, occasional sun and blue sky, big rolling clouds, but still a winter chilth. I rode and rode, past the Universities, down to Brighton Pier, on to Hove Lawns, in spitting distance of Shoreham. And then home. 34K, up hill, down dale, and a pretty fine way to spend a couple of hours. Mistake NOT to wear socks in my barefoot shoes. Brrr.

The afternoon was more sportif – ironing in front of El North West Classico with the Master and one of his classmates. And with @agentkiss struggling to shake off her cough, the Master and I went to ASK for supper and, missing mum as we were, had one of those wonderful father-son meals out at which we never stopped jabbering and we had a tender and wistful conversation about my father and how much the Master would love to have met him. Priceless.

This morning when I rose, it was cold in the house. A tiny, tiny sprinkling of snow – presaging a lot more? – lay on the cars and was falling from the skies. My first ride in the “snow” for aeons, and this time I resolved to wear socks. 9K to warm myself up and kick myself off for another challenging week. Tomorrow morning after another ride, it’s back to the sports physio to see how my feet have been faring from no running and nightly exercises and ice baths.

Chilth

The meeja – and particularly the Daily Express; always the Express, and the Mail – are getting very excited about the Arctic freeze that’s about to sweep over Britain. Apparently.

“Wasn’t there supposed to be loads of snow before Christmas?” asked the Master last night. “It just rained. Are you sure there’s going to be snow this weekend?”

I’m not sure, no.

But I am sure that the unseasonable warmth of last weekend and the start of this week – particularly at the ungodly hours I need to go riding my bike if I’m to fit it in before work – have now given way to full on chilth. To the extent that I’m even regretting have not opted for the fleecier running/biking gloves last autumn.

Perfunctory and satisfactory 10K this morning. Looking forward to stretching my wings, legs and lungs over the weekend and pulling a longer distance.

Dark. Muddy. Endurance

How we laughed when Clive James showed us in the 1980s what those wacky, otherworldly Japanese contestants were prepared to put up with on Endurance. Now we subject all manor of minor mediocrity to far worse feats on IACGMOOH. (Sidebar: I have a particular penchant for TV show acronyms, particularly utterly meaningless ones. Perhaps my favourite is HIGNFY.)

This morning’s bike ride was a cross between Endurance and a Kafkaesque cauchemar.

First it was wet. I hadn’t noticed it raining in the night, but my first clue was Fat Tony squeezing himself through the catflap and dripping on the floor. By the size of the puddles I routinely rode through, it must have been raining ALL night.

Second – therefore – it was muddy. So I added my Muddy Fox, orange and black jacket to my Ron Hill meggings and flourescent yellow zippy top. Off road, I routinely lost traction with wheels spinning in deep rivulets. My Muddy Fox truly lived up to its name, the whole back of it spattered with mud splashes by the time I’d put in 35 tough minutes.

Third it was dark. I found it hard to keep my track across the White Windmill field, hard to be sure if that was a puddle or a pothole as I sped along. Even in Kingston, the village with one street light, it wasn’t always clear what was road and what was pavement.

But despite all this, and despite the continuous drizzle, this was a very enjoyable ride – not least in retrospect and the retelling.

Foot update: heels OK, left one sorer than right, both sorer first thing in the morning. Bruised metatarsals sore, particularly towards the end of the day. Ice bath, rolling massage and stretching therapy being intensively followed.

Sporty, sportif

Par un beau jour d’été, M. Vandestin était assis dans sa chaise préferée pour regarder le rugby.

Something like that. Quelque chose comme ca.

Some lessons stay with you after more than 30 years, as if they were yesterday; some ways of learning stick like the stickiest of sticky glue (“Join up for Sticky Glue”, we used to chant in the playground of Long Crendon County Combined).

Fast forward to French composition at Aylesbury Grammar. The aggressively moustachioed Mr Horsfall, teaching us how to write interesting prose compositions for our French O and then AO levels, based on six-cell cartoon strips. I can remember “Par un beau jour d’été” as being a prize opener. When the car drove over the tin tacks, les pneus devenaient toujours dégonflés. And when the weather changed – as it inevitably did, particularly if M. Vandestin had decided to put the top down on his convertible – he would inevitably be trompé jusqu’aux os. Serves him right. Flash git.

But my most favourite of lessons from that period – better than Ralph Saunders’ or Nigel Wright’s mangled accents – was the nice (stet) distinction that French has between sporty (can’t remember the word for that) and sportif. If you’re sportif, you never stretch a muscle in exercise, but you’re an armchair, touchline fan who knows far more about the game than any of its practitioners, even if you’ve never played it yourself. Or it’s at least 30 years since you did, and all the rules – surtout pour le rugby – have completely changed.

Today is a sporty/sportif day. With the Master sleeping off the last remnants of Christmas and New Year, I headed out on my bike for the second time this weekend. A half marathon yesterday, looping through Ringmer, Glynde, Kingston and home past the White Windmill. Today’s would be necessarily shorter, with @agentkiss headed North on a mercy day trip shortly after breakfast. So I took the delightful A27 to the University, looped behind the Falmer sports complex and home. It’s thrillingly more downhill on the way back, to the extent that I took 20 minutes on the inbound leg vs 30 on the outbound. I added in a downhill loop to the Dump before heading for home past the Pan.

I’m very much enjoying my biking life, while my running life is in limbo. I’m being assiduous with my post-ride stretching, massaging my calves and ice-bathing my feet. I’ve got another sports physio session in eight days, and though I’m not confident I’ll be given the all clear to run again, I have found another form of exercise to keep my fitness up and the pounds at relative bay. I’m particularly not confident because I appear to have a fresh, minor (?) insult in my right foot, perhaps a bruising of the metatarsals, caused by my Orthoheel orthotics pushing my foot too hard against the top of my brogues. Sometimes you just can’t win.

And why sporty, sportif? Because after yesterday’s 22K, we watched the first half of the Seagulls outpecking the Magpies for the second time in two years and the second half of the Rooks pulling back to salvage a point against Hampton & Richmond. The Life of Pi was sandwiched in the middle. And following this morning’s 16K, I’m going to be on the touchline/sofa for the rest of today. The Master has a “squad” game vs the other team in his club at the same age group, Oranges vs Blacks, and then it’s a couple of hours of potential banana skins, watching Mansfield vs the Master’s favourites, Liverpool. COYR.

Maintaining fitness

So on the second day of 2013, a year to the day since I’d given up caffeine – and at the time all carbs and booze too – I went to see my sports physio to get the low down on my sore heels.

No plantar fasciitis in the right foot at all, just the remnants of a slight tendon strain on the right hand side. Mild plantar fasciitis in the left heel – as I’d suspected. But what wasn’t expected was the tangled web of knots in both ankles and calves, and something that only rang the faintest of bells with me – DOMS, delayed onset muscle strain. Running tightens calf muscles, and at least SOME compensatory stretching out afterwards is desirable if I’m not to employ a personal sports physio to pop round after every run and put my legs right. After reading various articles online, blogs and sundry pieces in running magazines, I’d come to the only partially-informed conclusion that I didn’t need to stretch before or after running, and so I hadn’t.

Bad move. Tightened muscles in the calves had knotted. That knotting shortens the muscles, the muscles pull on the tendons, the tendons on the plantar fascia, Bob’s your uncle, Fanny’s your aunt. Darn it. I was put on an intense programme of stretching, self-massage with my massage stick (that sounds all kinds of wrong), rolling a new gizmo like a miniature dog toy – a ball with protruding spikes – under my feet, and nightly ice baths. Two weeks of that, and then back to my physio to see if I can start gently running again. He hadn’t given up all hope of my making Brighton. We’ll see about that …

So in place of running, I’ve got back on my bike. 18K on New Year’s Day, 12 on the second, and 11 this morning. Today’s ride was my first under cover of the night. Having fitted bike lights – and mudguards! – that had sat in the garage for 18 months, I recalled how famously poor bike lights are at lighting the road. So I wore my head torch too actually to light the way.

It was unseasonably warm – and dry – this morning, and that made my 35+ minutes quite a joy, pedalling hard around the streets and hinterland of South Lewes. I’m doubtful that I’ll recover quickly enough to run in either half marathon I’m down for, but I have found a new modus exercisandi to substitute for running until such time as my feet get better, and one that allows me to maintain at least some of my fitness in the meantime. Lewes is hilly, after all.

Out with the old

It being the last day of the year, those good people at WordPress this morning sent me a stats-lover’s e-mail summary, headlined “Your 2012 in blogging”. “Our stats helper monkeys have been busy putting together a personalized report detailing how your blog did in 2012,” they enthused, capping off a light-hearted opener with a superfluous exclamation point.

Dozens of posts (120), thousands of views, and the busiest day of the year had the most obscure title of the year, too; “Eschatology”. Readers in 77 countries, dominated by the UK, the US and the Netherlands. If anyone’s remotely interested – and how meta that would be; blog readers wanting to read stats about a blog they read – let me know and I’ll post WordPress’ report on my year in blogging as, well, another blog post. All a bit too solipsistic and navel-gazing, IMHO, if, that is, this blog has room to grow in either camp.

A look at Runkeeper, which has been tracking my progress since I fell out of love with Nike+ in June, shows a total of 97 runs for the half year covering 679km and burning nigh-on 64,000 calories.

And where am I now, having first run on Valentine’s Day 2011?

A couple of weeks ago, I put in my applications to run the Brighton and Hastings half marathons in February and March. After a few weeks in which my heels were grumbling, first thing and then a number of hours post-running, I had a week or so off following a feverish couple of days and a hard hacking, phlegmy cough. A couple of days after Christmas – a Christmas dominated by running presents (shoes, meggings, top, iPhone sleeve holder – the works), @agentkiss and I went out for one of our relatively rare (but very enjoyable) runs together. An away run just outside Newmarket.

All seemed fine. Until the afternoon after when, having been stuck on the car park that is the M11 for another hour or so, we got out at a service station for some R&R. I found it very difficult to put weight on my left heel. Lots of ibuprofen and Google searching later, and it looks like I’m ending the year with the same condition I started it with. Plantar fricking fasciitis, albeit this time in the left heel rather than the right arch.

First thing I did: book an appointment with my sports physio, swearing off running until he’s given me the once-over. Because of holidays and early year bookings, the earliest he can see me is 10 January.

Second thing I did (after regularly popping ibuprofen to ease the swelling): relocate my Orthoheel orthotics, ice pack and golf ball – in my shoe drawer, the freezer and the Master’s Drawer of Spherical Objects respectively – and begin a more rigorous personal programme of RICE and foot massage.

Third thing I did: email the organisers of the Brighton and Hastings halves and see if I could get a refund/lose the commitment to charity fund-raising and postpone everything until 2014. Jury’s still on annual leave on that one.

Fourth thing I did: determine not to be too despondent if it turns out I do have PF again. Much as running has helped transform my life, this is a condition I know I can conquer. And while I may be weeks or months from getting back to the joys of running, and certainly getting back to previous levels of running fitness, I’m not going to stop exercising or stop using the great presents @agentkiss kitted me out with at Christmas. Maybe as comparatively soon as 2 January, I’m going to get out on my bike again and munch up more kilometres in less time on the roads of Sussex. You don’t put in 97 training sessions, burn as many as 64K kCal and blog 120 times for nought. The worm has turned and, though his feet may not be playing ball, it’s not turning back that quickly or easily.

Fifth thing I did: decide to work out – beyond faulty physiognomy; legs of different lengths and an outward-turned right leg – what I need to do to modify my gait, style and running regimen so that PF does not become a regular log jam in my running career. My knees and hips have benefited from many years of not exercising, and the ailments that stop many runners of my age don’t apply to me.

My new year’s resolution? Take an evidenced-based approach to finding a completely sustainable way of running.

Happy New Year.

Woodditton, and a right pain in the heels

A cough that came on a week before Christmas had – with the exception of an abortive run on 23.12, when my chest had still been too tight – kept me off the roads for a week. Staying with my in-laws outside Newmarket, having packed my new Ron Hill meggings and fluorescent yellow top plus my Christmas Vivobarefoot trail shoes, it seemed like too good an opportunity to miss an Away Run with @agentkiss.

We’ve run here together before, and took a route we’ve taken before, too. Just under 5K in the rain, looping in and out of the village of Woodditton, where my in-laws live. The new gear felt great, and it was an interesting sensation to run in the icy rain in ski-tight Lycra. My body and legs from the knees down were fine and warm enough. Where I really felt the cold was on my thighs, as if the material was keeping hold of the rain to superchill me. Be that as it may (and it was), I very much approved of the new gear.

Feet grumbled a bit, chest rumbled a bit, but all in all we had a good run together, and it was good to get back into the saddle. I think I might stretch things a it further in the coming days, assuming that everything holds together well and the caught doesn’t stage a comeback. We’ll see …

– – –

7am update the morning after … I can hardly walk. Extreme heel pain. Looking for an emergency session with my sports physio, now I’m but 50 days from the Brighton half.

Bonfire boy takes another tumble

There are many reasons why this splendid print and sentiment from the Tom Paine Press are close to my heart and belief set.

Lewes – Centre of the Cosmos

The most recent and topical of these, of course, is Lewes Bonfire. Before doing anything else at the start of a new year, if the fifth doesn’t fall on a Saturday or Sunday (when we march on a Saturday), I score out the fifth and sixth of November from my schedule as unshakable holidays. Less movable than Christmas, birthdays or summer holidays, this fiery fiesta of wontbedruveness is struck from the diary as my first act of the year.

Yesterday was a pretty perfect Bonfire for our family of buccaneers,  marching as part of the recently-reborn and thriving Southover Bonfire Society. Costumes renewed over the past couple of months, badges added including the all-important permit de marcher from badge night. we marched our little socks (and new boots) off. One of those clear evenings, chill enough to feel it on the fingers, but not once you get a decent flaming torch in your hands.

Lewes is a news magnet, and while writing this blogpost I discovered – c/o a Words with Friends friend – that my visog is disgracing the news.sky.com/strangenews gallery of Lewes Bonfire. Archived below, in case you stumble across this post long after Sky have taken down these frankly excellent images.

Original caption read: “A man with a flaming torch who is dressed in period apparel.”

Knowing I’d be up late and marching into today, yesterday I didn’t run. But today, as a day off to recover from Bonfire, I did. With the Master safely off for a classmate’s birthday at a nearby animal sanctuary – being chased by geese, we heard later – I donned my running gear for the first time since Friday and headed out of town on alternating steep hills and flat. 3K out of town, running athwart a busy A27, I turned on my heels and headed back into town, up past the prison and down into the thrumming heart of things.

Most of where I ran today, I’d marched last night. But as I passed Caffé Nero, revelling in the memories of the revelry and reveries of the glorious fifth, my left foot went into a pothole and I started to tumble. “Oh no, not again!” I cried silently to myself, recalling the tumble on the rainy Avenue a few weeks back. But it wasn’t wet, it wasn’t slippery. It was just a pothole … a very familiar pothole into which, when the Master was but three months old I pushed the front wheel of his buggy in a torrential rainstorm and his pushchair did a 180, onto its (and his) face. The very first day @agentkiss went back to work, the very first day I was in solo charge. And when she came back from her morning’s work, we were nowhere to be found, in fact in hospital having checks for any neurological incidents. None forthcoming, of course, but I remembered all of this as I took this latest tumble …

… and this time, there was no way my phone wasn’t going to get a bumping and a scraping. It looks less like Tim Cook’s pride and joy on its reverse South East corner, more as if a greedy smartphoneivore has tried to take a decent chomp out of it. And succeeded.

Bloodied of elbow (which had just healed), bruised of knee, I quickly picked myself up, dusted myself down, and headed on my way again.

Grrr. iPhone holder for the sleeve top of the Christmas list (pocket til then). Attempts to claim accidental damage expected to prove futile on home insurance …

Rest

After my 15K run to Brighton and 10K walk the evening after, my ankle became a little grindy. I ignored it to start with, but a week or so on, I determined to rest it and RICE it to prevent turning a minor niggle into a major problem. I actually listened to my body – and to the advice of others, most notably @sweder, for which much thanks. Hence my silence for the past week or so.

At a time of intense activity in all domains, I’d been concerned my head might explode without the release of running. In fact, as the prospect of a return to the streets and fields gets closer, it’s the promise and lure of the head-cleansing loveliness that’s to follow that’s sustaining me through. The grinding is easing and the niggly pain receding, so with a following wind, I don’t think I’m more than a few days away from hitting the road again.

I cannot wait. Though of course I will.

South West, Six

We braved the traffic and left Lewes for Exeter at a quarter to eight on the Friday evening of the double “Brenda” Bank Holiday weekend. In fact, it wasn’t brave at all as it turned out. We were all tucked up and gently snoozing before midnight. So much for recapturing the moonlit flits to Devon of my youth, when we dozed under duvets in the back of the car, en route to Great Uncle Bill’s house in Bigbury on Sea.

Despite the long drive, at the end of the long day, and the end of the longest week I can remember, both @agentkiss and I were awake before seven. At half seven we were considering running together, and by eight we had hit the streets of Exeter together.

Now this was our first run together since last May – that’s May 2011 (see Breaking Down …), an experience I was keen not to repeat. As we walked out of my mum’s drive, @agentkiss said :”You lead, babe, I’ll follow.” Now remember I’m not used to running anything other than alone, so I approached this joint run – with my lovely, forgiving wife – with some trepidation. I set off at a pace – modest, but a bit faster than usual, spurred on, as in London two weeks back, by the urban thrum.

After half a km, I was about 200m up. I assumed she was holding back so as not to breathe down my neck and put me off my stride. As I got off the road and turned onto the Exeter Quays and along the banks of the Exe, the kinks of the road meant I couldn’t see her any longer.Then I thought – idiotically – was she patronising me, allowing me to push ahead to give me a false sense of progress.

Down I ran, over the lock, chez Ben Bradshaw, MP (very nearly almost), and after just over 3km, I turned for home. Past 50+ swans – what the Master later deemed to be a convention – and past the most enormous and sensibly-protected swan’s nest. Never seen one of them before.

On and on (like this blog entry?) over a satisfying cluster of bouncy bridges reaching resonant frequency, tracing out the other side of the Exe, and then retracing my steps to Alphington.

My colleague @JRAMAGE1973 advised me the other day to really push myself on the last 1k, in preference to running longer each run. I followed that advice today and put in my fastest 1k of the day, uphill to boot, as I raced home. I arrived a full 2.5m before @agentkiss, who greeted me with a cheery “You’ve come on!”

Apparently I was being quite pacey, but she’d also lost sight of me and didn’t see where I’d gone and had to double back on herself on more than one occasion. She couldn’t see where I’d gone in our own private Fulham, in Devon – South-West-Six. Ok, 6.25km.

Day off tomorrow. More river running – probably in the bank holiday rain – on Monday.