I don't like Wednesdays

For anyone of faint disposition, look away because I'm going to swear.

Actually, on second thoughts, maybe less is more and I'll swear in the way instead of out the way.

I have two reasons for my pissedoffness. The main one is that my Garmin GPS watch is refusing to talk to the computer which means I can't download anything from the watch.

You would surmise quite correctly that this is hardly stuff of earth-stopping proportion but in my marathon-centric world it's a real hassle. However, I'll get it sorted out one way or the other. The last thing I want to have to do though is send the bloody watch back because if I did, it would be the fourth new one from the same retailer.

Secondly, I had another uncomfortable run this afternoon. Six miles in the west end of Glasgow and my legs were like lead. Hopefully it's just an after-effect of 19 miles on Sunday, the wee bug and no running yesterday.

Odd that that's happened on two successive Wednesdays.

Still, what the hell am I whining about? Today I told the Leonard Cheshire Foundation that I'd run Loch Ness to raise money for them. I'd been thinking about it since they approached me last week.

I was very impressed by the amount of homework they'd done on me, even pointing out that they have premises in Aberdeen, my home city.

I've set up a page on Just Giving.com which has already raised £75 so that's fantastic!

Nice to hear from Claire in Bath (hi again!!!) tonight, who said she was determined to beat my Mull PB.

As I said to her, how ironic that she, the total athlete she was when we worked in Birmingham and I was an emaciated, 40-a-day Marlboro red, Guinness-swilling maniac, was now pursuing MY half-marathon time.

Somehow I really don't think she'll have any problem overhauling it.

Btw, for anyone wondering when the next article will be on the BBC News website - next Monday. I'd planned to do it after the Glasgow half.

After that I'm hoping to do it weekly until the big day then a final one.

Tuesday blues

No running today and I feel guilty about it.

Fiona started feeling crap during Monday - achey, hot, cold - and went to bed as soon as she came in from work.

That kind of bug thing really doesn't affect me or so I thought. I could feel myself becoming heavier as the evening went on until eventually my joints were aching.

I hoped it might have been a side-effect of Sunday's run but at 2am I discovered it wasn't. I felt like shit.

I think the worst has passed but I still feel very lifeless so I decided reluctantly to give the eight miles a miss tonight. I know it makes sense and with the Glasgow half on Sunday I really don't need to thrash myself this week.

I should be able to get six in during the day tomorrow before collecting Sophie.

She's still on the phone

She's still on the phone
Originally uploaded by C Ray Dancer.

A truly superb image from Jim Moore on flickr, taken at the Edinburgh Fringe.

This is the second picture he's posted of this lady on the phone box.

The first was captioned: "On the phone". It needed no more telling.

Look at the bloke in the background. His face is a picture.

More uncharted territory

Today's herculean effort (only kidding, it wasn't that bad) was 19 miles.

I didn't feel as knackered at the end of it as I did after last Sunday's 17 miles, doubtless because I didn't run a 10K race yesterday and today I took two gels, one at 8.25 miles and the other 13.5, along with jelly babies and the lemon and lime carb drink I swore I wouldn't take again.

Alec next door was quizzical when Fiona hosed me down in the back garden. Ahem, enough said.

There's a massive feeling of contentment and achievement after something like that - enough to head for the cold cider and Stella.

So, five weeks today and counting. Well, I'm counting anyway.

40 miles

40 miles
Originally uploaded by Sparks57.

Hit a landmark this weekend by exceeding 40 miles in one week.

This is me, soaked by heavy rain, marking the occasion with a home-made sign quickly knocked up by my able assistant.

I'm not sure what my maximum mileage will be before the Loch Ness Marathon.

Take it as it comes.

Florida

Been meaning to put this on my blog but just got round to creating an account on YouTube to do it.

Seeing the video again brings it all back.

Here's to next year!

Love of my life...

Image000.jpg
Originally uploaded by Sparks57.

That Friday feeling

What a difference a day makes. Last night's sojourn with running shoes on was a five or six mile outing.

Compared to Wednesday night which was uncomfortable and painful, last night was a positive delight.

There was a great turnout at training, probably something in the region of 35 people, including a colleague of Fiona's who was venturing out with the club for the first time.

Three of us headed round the Bird Sanctuary route, which is about 5.25 miles. We took a wrong turning though and ended up doing 5.95. Not to worry though because it was a really nice run at about 9mi pace.

Less fortunately, Sophie fell off a trampoline and landed badly which needed a trip to Yorkhill and an x-ray. She's in a sling and doubtless loving the attention.

See those trampolines? Bloody death traps.

Today's a day off from running. We're heading out tonight to a 40th birthday party in Moodiesburn and I'm driving (by choice).

No swearing please, we're Scottish

Today was a blur of meetings. Meetings about this, meetings about that. Mostly they're a necessary part of life in the BBC but sometimes you really feel like you want to go out and actually create something tangible right there and then instead of talking about it!

There are so many things bubbling under at the moment which WILL come to pass at some point in the future that it can be a tough act to juggle all the balls.

But these are the challenges... and they're why we get out of bed in the morning!

Sophie and I watched a bit of the Bellshill juniors' match this evening. Wow! We even saw two goals. Can't say I was overjoyed at the language being used by the players and the coaches though. It expanded Sophie's vocab somewhat.

The Bellshill number nine gave the linesman (sorry, but assistant referee is just too modern for me) a mouthful of abuse when a decision went against him. This puzzled Sophie, who couldn't quite figure out the reason for his anger. From the mouths of babes.

Look - see how long it too before I mentioned the "r" word? That must be a record.

Five miles tonight and they were probably the most uncomfortable and painful five miles for a while.

My legs were weary and my shins hurt. You can see the route I did, taken from my Garmin Forerunner 305 (just in case you were interested).

Hmmmm...

I had a very odd run tonight. I set out with the club to do an easy eight miles but when my GPS watch was telling me I had done about four miles, my legs were telling me I'd done less than that. I also knew fine well it was less than that because of where we'd reached on the trail to Chatelherault.

I wondered if I'd managed to reset the units to kms instead of miles. Nope. Then I realised it must have been something to do with having given it to a colleague yesterday to measure out a run she's been doing on the south side of Glasgow.

Somehow the watch added on 1.35 miles or so before I'd even started my run.

Anyway, that threw me because I couldn't work out how many "extra" miles I'd need to do to make up my distance so I gave it my best shot and came to within 0.03 of my target so that wasn't too bad.

Upshot - a total of 8.03 miles. I'm swapping round the schedule a bit this week to take account of the long runs.

I bought a second pair of Mizuno Wave Inspire 2's in Run-4-It today so I can alternate them with the first pair.

Police helicopter

Police helicopter
Originally uploaded by Sparks57.

Not sure what was going on last night behind Love Drive but the Strathclyde Police helicopter was buzzing around for about 20 minutes, flying in circles over the recycling station.

It was all going on while I was cutting the grass - on a Monday night!!!

No running yesterday, a day off, much appreciated by my legs.

Who are we?

Bute Highland Games
Originally uploaded by Sparks57.

Meant to include this on Saturday's entry.

It's a great pic of lots of club members before the Rothesay 10K.

The long run

After a lot of swithering and dithering about whether or not to do my scheduled 17 miles as planned on Sunday or hold off until today, I decided to go for the former.

My concern was overdoing it after the Rothesay 10K but I reckoned if I did the long run at miles of 10mi or more (is it "more" or "less" when you're referring to pace), I'd be okay.

After loads of agonising about the guilt I felt from running taking up such a large chunk of the day, I set off at 3pm in drizzling rain.

I went from the house, through Motherwell, round Ravenscraig, back through Motherwell, into Bellshill, past the Matt Busby, round the houses there, past the Shell garage, through the dirt track nearly to the Hilton, back over the North Road (bored yet?), round the grassy loop, up to the rail head, back to our estate, round the loop twice and finally - home!!!

The last mile or so was a bit of a slog because it had been hot. I took an SIS gel at 8.5 miles which helped see me through but I'm at the end of the road with the lemon and lime carb drink. Too claggy and doesn't slake the thirst.

I must have downed a litre of water in less than five minutes when I finished then Sophie turned the hose on my legs, which seems to have done the trick!

The rest of the day was spent chilling with ice cold cider and watching the telly.

Bute Highland Games

Bute Highland Games
Originally uploaded by Sparks57.

We had a great day out today at the Bute Highland Games. Yes, I'd said beforehand that I wasn't sure if I was going to run but to be honest, once I saw everyone and had the number in my hand, I couldn't not do it.

It's "our" island remember so I had to take part in a race on it.

So, I did it in a time of 47.13, which is faster than I'd set out to do. My first reaction was "too fast", bearing in mind I've got 17 miles to do tomorrow but I've thought more about it.

That kind of time would have been very fast indeed (at one point unthinkable) for me less than a year ago but maybe I'm fixating too much on the time and not enough on how I felt.

Never once did I feel like I was pushing really really hard so that's probably another reflection of how much my fitness has improved over the last couple of months at least and probably going back longer.

I did think about stepping up the pace over the last couple of miles but some commonsense did kick in and I decided just to stay with miles of about 7.40 or so.

We had a wee swim in the leisure pool in Rothesay, then a couple of drinks in the Black Bull before heading back on the ferry and home to an Alhambra fish supper and a couple of bottles of Stella.

A grand day out!

More pics here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/motherwellac/ on flickr.com

Plotting...?

Plotting...?
Originally uploaded by equso.

Superb picture from flickr.

Is everything shit?

In the big smoke today. I was in two minds about whether or not to travel, given all the hassle over security but I wanted to speak to a few people about the head of news job and I had other stuff to do so on balance I decided to go.

I allowed an extra half an hour at Glasgow Airport, only to find that security was empty when I went through. The flight was bang on time leaving and arriving at Heathrow - only to arrive at the pier to find there was no-one available to operate it.

So having gone that far, the only hold-up was connecting the plane to the gate and we sat on board for about 10 minutes. Hey-ho.

Not so good coming back (I'm writing this at Heathrow). No hold-ups coming through security but some bollocks from BA about crew rotations causing delays. What's that about?

It gave me a bit of time to have a look at some books in WH Smith and I was tickled by the one pictured. It really appeals to my sense of humour.

Maybe I really am a grumpy old man at the age of 41?

I haven't bought it though - if I do, I'll go for the three-book deal but wait and see what Fiona might like.

Running? Still not sure about Rothesay. I feel like I'm coming down with a cold. I certainly have a sore throat so see what tomorrow brings.

Park plod

Did a four-mile run round Strathclyde Park tonight and threw in a wee bit of fartlek for good measure (a wee bit mind, nothing too arduous).

It pissed down earlier but the rain stayed off for most of the time.

Funny, but when I finished, I had a real gloom about me. Not sure whether it's a reaction to all the running this week but I feel really heavy.

I'm going to leave a decision on whether or not I do the Rothesay 10k until Saturday morning. We're still going but I may just sit it out and take soak it all up. Sunday's 17 miler is looming and the important thing right now is LNM training, not a 10k.

Aside from running (yes, there is life away from it), I was at the Scottish Parliament today doing a presentation for public relations staff. It went well, I think. I certainly enjoyed it.

Back on the trail

Eight miles tonight. My legs felt weary for the first four or so especially going up the hill into Chatelherault but they eased off around five and I quite enjoyed the rest.

There was some aching from my left shin but I guess that's to be expected. I kept repeating: "Mind over matter, mind over matter" because I'm growing more convinced about the psychosomatic side of this aggravation.

I'm expecting it to hurt, therefore it does hurt.

I particularly liked the line from one of the people who emailed me after reading my latest training instalment on the BBC news website: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/4793945.stm.

At the end of his email, he wrote: "Eye of the tiger Mark, eye of the tiger."

Soft words, strongly spoken, as the Caffrey's advert used to go.

Flickr

I've been playing around with the look of my blog and using Flickr to upload pics directly rather than using the Blogger software.

It saves a bit of time but I'm not convinced about a couple of aspects of it and the way it presents the pictures.

Trial and error I guess!

My full Flickr address is http://www.flickr.com/photos/sparkie/

Who's a happy boy then?

We've just come back from two superb days on the island of Mull, where I did the half-marathon.

What do I have to smile about? Clocking a time of 1.41.51, which knocked 14 minutes off my previous hm best. It was a totally great day, from the scenic route to the gallons of Guinness afterwards in the Salen Hotel then dinner in the Mediterrana restaurant nearby.

The owners, John and Selena Coyle (no relations) are top, top people. Selena, who's Italian, ran the race pushing her son Sam in a buggy and managed it in 1.50.00. Now that's bravery for you.

Amazingly, the winner, Robert Gilroy, was still on the lash at 3.30am on Sunday morning with the son of the race organiser, Babs Whyte. He came in on 1.11.00. That's not even funny.

We stayed overnight and this morning the sun split the sky. It's Fiona's birthday today and we had a table booked at Dhakin, the south Indian restaurant in the Merchant City, so we took the 1pm ferry back to Oban and watched porpoises jumping in the Sound of Mull en route.

I promise you - it's at times like those that Scotland is a joy to live in.

Home to find a pile of slabs in the front garden which means the paving will be done in the back garden tomorrow. It should be great when it's finished.

Sophie's in Wittering all week on the final leg of her summer odyssey. Then we're all back on a boat on Saturday morning and heading over the watter to Rothesay for the 10k there. Should be fun.

I'm still here - honest!

It's been pretty hectic since coming back from Florida and returning to work. Three things are going on, pretty much on parallel tracks.

First, the focus of my job has changed from working on the day-to-day output and is much more now looking at how we move interactivity from the "margins" of BBC Scotland's news and current affairs offering to the heart of our services.

Secondly there's the question of the vacancy created by Blair's departure from the post of head of news and current affairs. The deadline for applications was extended this week. By the end of last week, after talking to a range of people, I'd decided to apply... so some interesting days ahead to say the least.

Thirdly, the marathon training continues apace. Tomorrow is the Mull half marathon which should give me the best indication yet of how I've progressed through the eight weeks of training so far. I'm looking for a time around 1.45.00 and if I managed that I'd be delighted. I'll be writing a review for Runner's World magazine so I'm looking forward to that as well. I tried all week to find time to do another article for the BBC news website but there just weren't enough hours in the day. Next week, I promise!

Monday is Fiona's birthday so we're staying overnight on Mull. Her mum and brother are going too - moral support is never unwelcome!

Sophie's now on the final leg of her multi-journey school holidays, down in Wittering. She's coming back by herself as an unaccompanied adult which I don't doubt will make her feel even older than her years. Again.

People to go, places to see.

Florida pics

They're here.

It's been a bit weird this week so far. I should have been jet-lagged but I haven't felt like my body clock is upside down. So far at least.

Not so good for Fiona. She's struggled through three days of a chronic cold and of course has continued to go to work. No surprise there then.

I'm back in the running groove - Monday (four miles), Tuesday (hills - 4.6 miles), Wednesday (seven miles). Tonight, six miles. And on it goes.

There's been a wee bit of pain in both shins but nothing to get too upset about. Maybe the new Mizunos are helping out.