Running Commentary

11:00am

I have been struggling to start my Ironman training.  Struggling to do everything - run, swim, get out on the bike.

I'm supposed to be doing a fell race today - right now even.

Last night I was at my cousin's wedding celebration.  It was a great day.  She was so clever.  She got married in New York in December but had her party last night.  As such she got to wear her dress again and share her honeymoon with all her guests.  We had lego to play with and props to wear and a polaroid camera to take selfies with and I got to dance with the most beautiful woman in the room.  I danced with my dad and a twenty-something hipster complimented my dad on his moves.  He beamed with pride.

We got home at midnight.  I don't have a hangover which is a surprise for the quantity of proseco and G&T I drank but I was tired.

So I decided not to knacker myself on a 10 mile fell race that I haven't trained for and instead, stick to a 6 mile run to persuade my legs that it's Ironman training.  It's a day early but Vicki has me motivated.  My primary goal will be to walk out of today with a sense of do it again tomorrow... or perhaps the day after.

7:40pm

What a day.

I looked at my fell shoes then my nice comfortable road shoes and opted for the latter.  I don't often run on roads so it was to be something different and I just felt like wearing something pretty and new... yeah, bite me.

I ran about 10 steps down the hill then back up, deciding to grab a wind proof to go some way to keeping the 4 degrees rain shower from freezing every hair on my body.  I was glad I did.  The "light rain" wasn't exactly heavy but sure was persistent.  

There were few cars about and I wiggled my way up to the A57 steadily, then began the long descent down to the bottom of Rivelin Valley.  I was aiming for 6 miles and didn't look at my watch till I got to the bottom, where I decided to check my distance before deciding whether to run along the top of the valley on the other side (roadie-route through Stannington) or take my usual and much beloved muddy trail along the bottom of the valley.  At 2.57miles, the bottom of the valley still tempted me in as I didn't want to massively over-distance myself with more training to be done later.

The valley was as muddy as promised and I gently resigned myself (with the odd swear word) to getting my new trainers dirty.  I enjoyed every step of the valley-path.  Especially bumping into the Rivelin Valley Volunteer Group who I waved to and thanked as I ran past.

Dog walkers chatted about muddy hounds and teenagers said hello.  I was so happy that everyone was happy - even given the shitty weather.

At the bottom of my precipice climb to the house I was still 0.7mile short of my distance so I continued along the valley trail to the fire station then turned up the hill and ran a slightly elongated route home up the hillside, through a couple of footpaths I haven't run up for ages.  I forgot where they come out - at the top of our road nonetheless - and consequently dropped down to my front door after 6.01miles of running.

My muddy shoes and both rivers running in the valley

After a good dose of sitting down and a lunch of salad and cheese and coffee, I dug the rollers out.  Phoenix was devoid of a Garmin device for tracking distance so I set off for the loft to dig out Rosie Dragon.  She had a Garmin device fitted but no block on the rear wheel so I changed that out for my turbo wheel and had to go in search of a magnet and then change the saddle for one that doesn't give me tendinitis in very uncomfortable places.

Finally, by 3:30pm we were ready to go.  

For some time I have wondered what my new found yoga strength will do for my triathlon season this year.  The gains we made last year were pleasant but having seen where cyclo-cross went this year, I am excited for this tri season.  Particularly as the additional strength should protect me from Ironman abuse so much more.  I've seen the benefits in mountain biking already and in the endurance I have for getting back to running but haven't tested the form on the time trial bike yet.

On a parallel stream, I have been thinking that I need to get my position on the bike so dialled that I am able to ride the TT bike on the aero bars on the rollers.  Once I can do that I will know I am niggle-free.  No nasty, distracting wobbles in direction or power.

I am happy to say that tonight, I nailed it.  First day of Ironman training and I pretty much rolled out 60 minutes of roller riding in aero (along with a few more choice words).  I may have damaged parts of my anatomy but they'll fix.  There's a little bit of saddle adjustment to be done but I'll get there.

So, that's me, all motivated and doing good again.  Happy that I might be able to last a ski holiday when it comes, confident that I'll enjoy myself in the pool, happy I can run again and with a cyclist core to dream of and now newly focused on delivering an Ironman training schedule performance to rival anything I've dreamt of before.  I will not be letting anything get in the way again.  

The fog appears to have very much lifted.