A bridge too far

It looks like I won't make the full 200 miles this time around, there were just too many weddings and days missed. Since Christmas I have run on St. Stephen's Day, the 27th and the 28th. I have done 29km in those three days. Yesterday I didn't get any done because it was too dark by the time I arrived back to Blacklion from Louise's. Today I just haven't had the energy or the inclination to go out and run in the cold. Instead I have been helping out around the house doing some odd jobs and generally being useful. :)

I have managed to cover 264km and almost all of that was outside so I am happy with that. There is still one more day to go, after today and I will try to get out for at least a 10km jog to finish it all off.

I've given it a good go, and I reckon if it wasn't party season I might have made it, but that's what the challenge was and I didn't manage it. I guess this means that I'll have to do it all over again next December!

Christmas Eve

It's almost Christmas and I'm still running. I missed out on the two days over last weekend as I had to go to a wedding on Saturday and then between recovering and going to Airsoft on the Sunday for Sparky's stag, I just didn't have time. I went over 200km for the month on Monday and got three runs in yesterday. Only short ones but it all added up to 17km. That means that up to now, I am at 222km, only 100km to go!

I drove back to Cavan this morning and I'm going to go for a run around the football pitch now to see how many laps I can get in before I get bored of running around in circles. It'll be a nicer surface to run on than the concrete and tarmac that I've done the rest of my runs on.

Almost a week now

I've been continuing with the running, I ran on Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Monday. I missed out on Sunday because I was helping out with the running of a cyclocross race in Raheny.

I did my first double run yesterday, ran into work in the morning and then ran home from Louise's in the evening to give a grand total of 18km. I'm now up near 150km which is slightly below where I wanted to be at the half way point. But how and ever, I'll keep doing a bit. Going to go for a run after work today before I go to the Cub Scouts meeting. That will probably be a 10-12 km run in miserable weather. It's gone from cold and dry to wet and dank today.

I'm still feeling good, no major injuries yet (touch wood). I've realised that I need to spend more time stretching as I'm very inflexible and this has led to some pain in my right foot. I had this happen before and stretching my calf and foot cleared it right up.

Running and cinema

Yesterday I was all messed up, I didnt know what to do or how to do it. I was meeting Louise to go to the cinema at 8 o'clock but I didn't get home until after 6 and I still had my run to do. So I did the only easy thing, I ran from home in to town to meet her. A chilly 10km later and I was in Parnell Street and looking for sustenance. Into the nearest Spar shop I go, but they have next to no sandwiches. It's amazing just how much pork we eat! The pork ban must be affecting a lot of people if the empty shelves are anything to go by.

We went to see Quantum of Solace in the cinema, an entertaining if not entirely realistic film even for one of the Bond series. We both thought it jumped and skipped around a little too much at times.

Today, I'll be running home from work and then settling in for an evening of doing nothing :)

The weekend to now

I managed the run on Friday, slightly over 10km and then off to Brasserie 66 for lunch. Nice food, and good craic. Stayed for one drink in the pub and then headed home to Cavan to join Waggers bringing the car back.

Saturday was spent marching in town with Louise and the teachers, 40,000 if you believe the reports. Then it was back home and off for a run, the same as Tuesday with Waggers.

On Sunday, I bought a suit and when I got home, I had a nice little 10km run to Clontarf and back along the coast road.

I didn't get a chance to run yesterday but still got 30km of commuting in on the bike. I used the fixie for a change and got soaked in the rain.

This evening was a longish run, the same as Monday of last week because we got home early from the cubs meeting. Another 30km of commuting in the frost and cold rounded out the day. The run today was quicker and I really felt in the groove for a lot of it. It's nice to just run sometimes :)

Plan for today

Today I will be mostly eating a christmas lunch. But before that, a jog.

Leaving from work and trying to get as near to 10km as I can in a loop.

Another run

I got 10.2km done last night before heading to the pool to mess around for a bit with some polo and ball throwing drills. 55 minutes including a 5 minute stop at the train tracks to wait while two trains went past.

Last night's run brought me from Joeys towards the Halfway House, around through Ashtown and back around to Cabra. From there I went through Cabra to Phibsboro and then back out along the Navan Road to Joeys again.

I got the twinge in my knee again as I was coming up the hill from Phibsboro to Joeys so I started to take it easier there. I woke up this morning and my resting HR was way high, so it's a rest day today for me. Lots of water and some chilling out. Agus anocht, beidh Rónan Ó Snodaigh ag seinm i gClub Sult, rachaidh Louise agus mé ansin.

Another 11km

A late one this evening. I left around 9pm and did the route I was supposed to do last night. 55 minutes and 11.7km later I was back and ready for a warm shower. Boy it's cold in these parts over the last few days. The first proper frost we've had this year anyway.

I managed to keep to an average HR of 153 today which is about 30 below what I would usually have at this pace. Short, quick steps definitely have something going for them!

So the total now is up to 27.5km.

16km down, 306 to go

That's right, the December challenge has started. Run 200 miles in December. That's 322km give or take.

Went out for a run with Waggers this evening and it turned out to be a bit longer than I expected. I was looking for a nice 10k to try and ease myself into it, but we ended up doing 16km instead. Spent a while stretching and cooling down after and then ate a lot of food :)

On with the compression tights now and we'll see how tomorrow is.

Athlinks.com

I've recently joined up with athlinks.com after listening to the guys from IMtalk going on about it all the time. I've added in a couple of races and some information on me as well.

If you've done any races recently, go join up and keep all your results in one place.

I ran into work today too, here's my route mapped out on gmap-pedometer. They have a nice new thing where it automatically follows the roads for a runner or a cyclist so you don't have to click on each corner as you map out your route

Some photos of my damaging experience

I was thinking I could put up some photos of my injuries but then I thought that might just be tempting fate to give me worse ones, so I held back on that. Instead, here are a few photos of the small bits of damage that I did to the bike.

First up, the grip tape



And now the back skewer




And finally, the saddle




Luckily, I seem to have enough grip tape to replace the one that I used as sandpaper.

One last thing. Does anyone know if there is supposed to be a cover or something on this part of the crank?

New bike

Finished building up my new bike on Saturday morning and went out for a spin with Peter and Waggers to test it and see if anything needed tweaking. We decided to go up to Howth and all the way up the hill. Then to turn around and head down to Greg's house for coffee. It was all going well until we turned to head up the hill. I had to stop and fix the gears, I couldn't shift into the large cog on the front. After 5 minutes or so, I figured out it was because the cranks were slipping apart. Got them fixed and then headed off. Had to push it a bit to try and catch Peter who had gone on ahead.

Then disaster struck. I ended up on my head with the bike skidding down the road. Waggers was right behind me and he came off too after running over my back wheel. I was pretty shook up and it took another couple of minutes before I could go on. Made it to the top of the hill with no more problems. On the way down I took it easy for the first section and then decided to push it a bit for the last part. It felt good to be able to cut loose, hopefully I can do it properly next time without falling off!

We headed over to Greg's for coffee and stayed to watch the Ireland rugby match before going back to Antioch. I brought Peter back to his house and helped him to fix up his kitchen. Some more people came over and we watched videos for a bit before I headed out to the van to go to sleep. And to top off the day, I had been clamped! I had one wheel on the double yellow lines because I couldn't go back any further. Gits!!!

It turned out that if I had driven into the spot, instead of reversing in, I would have been fine even though the van would have been in the exact same position!

Runnity run

Went for a run last night to get back into the mood of exercising again. I'd been feeling a bit lethargic recently. Went out with Louise and ran for about 43 minutes.

Then today I found a challenge on slowtwitch.com
It's a challenge to run 200 miles in December. I'm not going to sign up there to do it, but I think I will try it out and keep track of it on here.

A video of me and Junior

Greg got some video footage of myself and Junior going hard at it in Manchester last Saturday night

See it here

Revolutions

No, not the communist type, but the track racing type. I went over to the velodrome in Manchester last weekend to watch Revolutions 21. There was a gang of us that went over, Louise, Junior, Waggers, Sparky and myself. We went with a group from the track in Sundrive and met up with Greg, Pauline, Peter and Carys.

We arrived over on Saturday on the ferry and didn't get a lot of time to chill out in the hotel before we had to go to the velodrome. Got the tickets and in we went. When we got in, there were a load of people warming up on the track before it all started. The most organised chaos I have ever seen! Some people were running pacelines and others were sprinting around and others were just moseying around having a chat and not a crash in sight!

There were 19 or 20 races over the course of the night and an expo type thing in the middle of the track. In there they had set up some bikes on rollers where you could go head to head over 500m. Most of us tried it out and I finished in 22.17 seconds for 15th place overall. Greg came 5th, Waggers 10th and Junior 19th.

After the track we went out to town where a small plastic snake entertained us for a number of hours. Then it was food and back to the hotel to sleep before the long journey home on Sunday.

Overall it was a good weekend, great to see the racers at the track and it was Bradley McGee's last competitive outing, so it was good to see that too.

A run

I jogged into work yesterday morning because I didn't get anything done over the weekend. I only just made it into work. I had a dull throb in my left hip and my left knee was in agony. I could only just hobble around the place but climbing stairs was excruciating. Louise came around and picked me up from work because I couldn't face walking anywhere.

I stretched it a bit this morning and after the sleep as well it was good enough to cycle to work on. It was still a little tender but I could move around. I stretched my legs out a few times during the day and it seemed to have made it feel better. I'll try it out in the pool tomorrow evening and see how it fares to some paddling and lepping around.

Congrats to Greg on graduating yesterday from DCU as well!

Next year

I want to do an Ironman distance race next year but I can't decide what one to do. Switzerland was lovely last year for the half, but I feel like I would like to see somewhere else now.
I have kind of narrowed it down to Challenge Roth, Ironman Switzerland, Ironman UK or Ironman France.

Help me decide, what do you think would be a good race to do as my first full distance Ironman

Some pictures

Here are some pictures from the ING Amsterdam Marathon site. The first one shows where I finished relative to other people


Next up we have my speed broken down into 5km blocks. This gets slow and nasty around 30 to 35km



As a comparison, here is the speed graph for the winner

Amsterdam Marathon

Well, it's three days after the marathon in Amsterdam and I'm now able to walk properly again! I went over there with 7 other people, three of us doing the full marathon and the others doing the half.

I finished in 3:14 according to my chip time, so I was really pleased, especially as I hit "the wall" at around 33km or so. I managed to get through it and hung on to the 3:15 pacesetter for the last 7 km. I was wrecked at the finish and collapsed on the track after getting my medal. Then I went and ate and drank all I could find. Waiting for the others in the stand was cold, and I probably wouldn't do that again (Sorry guys!).

Things that I learnt from the race were to eat properly the day before and even for breakfast. I was ravenous at the end of the race, more so that I thought I would be. Also, stay off your feet for the day before. We spent the day wandering around looking at everything, mainly because we were only there for a couple of days. And finally I learnt that I can push my body further than even my head thinks! I should never have been able to keep with the pacesetter as I was down to almost 6 minute kilometres as he was passing me. It's amazing what a challenge does for you!

Now, I'm going to spend a few weeks not running or training and get over the cold that I picked up (I'm blaming Sparky). Then it'll be back to look for another challenge, possibly the Connemarathon.

Photos and timings to follow soon.

Running again

I finished up my course of physio/acupuncture last night and to celebrate went out for an hour long run. I went out with Louise and Waggers and we did a lap of Bull island. We went around the golf course and back along the beach before cutting it short and coming back to the house. It was about 11km altogether.

My legs were tight after it, but I blame the running on the sand for that. There was no pain which was good.

This weekend, we're heading to Cavan to try and find some mountain bike trails and maybe do some of the Cavan Way.

Long time, lots happened

The last time I updated this I was struggling with blisters and finding it hard to walk. So what did I do? I went and completed a 22 mile hike on the Saturday afterwards! It was the Togher Padraig which is a pilgrimmage from Ballintubber Abbey to Croagh Patrick. It was a great day, the weather held off for most of it and we made it all the way to the top. My feet were in good condition after it but I was quite tired.

The week after we played the Quarter Final of the Championship against Mountnugent. We were beaten by 5 points in the end, but we were never really in the match. It was a huge disappointment as we thought we had put in enough work to get through that stage. It had been six weeks since our first match in the championship but that's no excuse really. I was playing wing back and thought I did alright. My man didn't score as far as I can remember and I set up a few scoring moves during the match.

Since then, I've been at the physio getting acupuncture on my shins. After 5 sessions the swelling has finally gone down enough that i am looking at sets of insoles to try out. I've been doing loads of stretching to try and get my calves and feet loosened out. That seems to be the problem, my legs are too tight. I have to remember to stretch at every opportunity and eventually they will start to loosen out. That will be hard to do, I have tended in the past to stretch, start to see some improvement and then stop, thinking I had done enough. Now is the time to go farther than that and keep the stretching going.

I've also been doing some running, light training runs with Louise, Junior, Waggers and Grainne. I am going to go out and do a long run on Saturday in Achill. Louise is doing the run part of a triathlon over there. I'm going to take some photos and then head off for a nice long slow run.

Looking forward to heading to Amsterdam next month, my aim is probably quite ambitious with a 3 hour marathon. But if you don't make goals, you can't beat them :)

Insoles are great for most things

I got me some insoles last week to try out over the weekend to see if they would alleviate some of the pain I've been having in my legs recently. (Don't you just love it when people self diagnose themselves on the interwebs) The ones I got were supposed to help with flat feet. Now I don't think I suffer from flat feet, but the internet never lies!

I had two matches over the weekend and managed to get through both of them with next to no shin pain. The only problem was that the arch support was a little too high. So now I have blisters under the arches on my feet. Nice open ones now after the second match. I'm some idiot!

Ah well, not much I can do about it now. I have some exercises that I am trying out that everyone seems to recommend for shin splints. Walking on my heels and then standing with my toes on a step and lifting myself up.

So in conclusion, insoles good, blisters on the arch of your foot, bad. If anyone knows of any way to heal blisters quickly, or stop them from happening again, please do leave me a comment.

Oh, and one final thing. The championship quarter final is in two weekends time.

Injured, bah!

I hate being injured. I've been trying to ignore the pain in my legs for the last few weeks, but it's finally gotten the best of me. After resting last week, and then testing it out over the weekend, I have decided that I need to go and see the physio. I have what I think are shin splints, so it might just be a case of resting and icing and resting some more :(

First ever triathlon win

Heh heh heh.

There was a very very short triathlon in Glenfarne on Saturday. Glenfarne is a small village down the road from Blacklion, and they were having a festival. So some people decided to organise a triathlon for it. It consisted of a a 2km cycle, 200m swim and 2.5km run, in that order.

The cycle started off with all 6 of us (yes only 6) on the start line. I got caught in some traffic, and had to wait for a few hundred metres until one guy tired out. Then I shot past Pauline and caught up closer to Greg. No more fun on the cycle until it was time to get out of the shoes. I saw Greg unshod himself and followed suit, it was a little hairy, I think the forks on my bike are loose!

Then the swim, nice out and back. I passed Greg shortly after the turn and just managed to stay in front of Pauline. On with the shoes and bam! I was away. Nice run course through the forest and up some hills. Then back down them and around to the finish. Finished in a total of 25:43.

Pauline came in second with Greg in third, coincidentally also the order of our entry numbers.

I had training then in the evening, but was a little bit tired and full of food, so it was quite hard.

Went into Enniskillen to watch some of the polo tournament and then back home before heading to Bawnboy to play a tournament match against Templeport. We were beaten by a point in the end. My legs were starting to seize up at the end after being moved from midfield to full back. I'll have to find some ice for the rest of the week and probably give the physio a ring on Monday.

Nice weather makes it easy

To train.

Went for a run yesterday evening, blowing off the plans to go to the gym and for a swim. 56 minutes or so for the run, felt good throughout and pushed for the last half of it after leaving Ronan, Junior and Gráinne to go home.

It rained heavily last night so I thought it was a good thing and I could go to the gym this evening. Woke up this morning and it was still wet. Good stuff :)

Then over the course of the day it got better and better and now it's warm and sunny again! Still went to the gym and then did 500m of a swim afterwards. Felt really tired in the swim and noticed that my technique was waaaaay off, so I left it at the 500m.

Home now, and about to make dinner. Mmmmmm.

Championship 2008

Shannon Gaels got off to a winning start in the championship last Saturday with a 2-14 to 07 win over Maghera. I was playing in midfield for most of the match before I was taken off "to rest me". At least I hope that's why I was taken off!

I felt really good throughout, did a good bit of covering off, but maybe wasn't totally at the races when my man had the ball.

A challenge match on Thursday evening is the next thing on the way.

Things I learned on my commute today

Both indirectly and directly.

Indirectly first.
Don't stop a delivery van in a bus lane right in front of a Garda on a motor bike. He won't be able to ignore you.

And directly.
Make sure that your pedal is tight enough to hold your cleats before attempting a skid stop at 30km/h! Otherwise panic and frantic attempts to back pedal ensue!

Cycley spin

On Monday I got home from work and felt in great humour so I decided to go out for a spin on the tri bike. Started off by climbing Howth hill. The gears weren't very happy and the whole way up was a fight between getting a nice gear to climb in and chunking between about three other gears. It was even the same on the way down! I was tempted to just bail home at that stage and cut my losses. But no, it was too nice an evening to think about giving up.

I went straight on from the bottom of Howth hill out towards Potmarnock and through to Malahide. Along by the estuary and out to the roundabout near the M1. On the stretch to the roundabout I was really tearing along, felt really strong and jus kept pushing. After the turn I kept up the pace all the way back to Malahide. Then it was in through Portmarnock where only one car pulled out in front of me!

Uneventful for the rest of the ride, made it home in 1hr 22mins. My speedo said it was nearly 43km, but I still think it's a little off. I have no idea though how Pauline managed to compete in the Beast of the East tri at the weekend with the gears in such a bad way! Oh and congrats to her for finishing in third place!

Red lights, what's the point

I know, as a cyclist, I am probably not in the best position to give out about people not obeying red lights, but at least when I go through them I've let the other cars go through first. On two occasions on the way to work today, cars went through the red lights about five seconds after they had gone red. I'm just lucky I wasn't about to make a break across the junction to get ahead of the traffic! And not a Garda in sight all day.

You couldn't go more than 10 metres 2 days ago without seeing a Garda when the French president was here but now that we're back to normal, they seem to be hiding again. Is it too much to ask that the Traffic Corps come out and actually do some traffic work. The way things are going, traffic lights wont matter soon and it'll be every man for himself on the roads.

Anyway, enough ranting, I promise the next entry will be about training :)

Dublin roads suck!

Why are there so many potholes on the roads of our capital city? Actual gaping holes that are at least 10cm deep! It does make for an interesting ride in to work though, avoiding potholes, man hole covers that are raised from the road surface, cars, buses and pedestrians that look straight at you before deciding that no, you don't exist and starting to cross the road.

On the plus side, I made it in before the rain started!

Runnity run all day long

Tuesday turned into a day of running. After going mountain biking on Monday evening and falling onto a sharp rock with the palm of my hand, I decided that running to work would cause less stress on it. So off I headed, with my new Polar foot pod.

I took it nice and easy, 50 minutes for the trip, and the foot pod was pretty accurate, giving the distance as 10.7km. Then after work it was a quick jog to Louise's house. From here, Pauline came over and gave me my bike. Then I cycled to tag rugby in Tymon Park and afterwards back to Louise's.

Overall a pretty good day of workouts. Oh and we wont the tag rugby match too.

Yesterday I went for a short 30 minute run with Louise and Junior. It was Junior's first time out in a long time and it was at a nice slow pace. Managed to keep my HR under 140bpm for the run. A grand wee recovery run.

Football training

Back to the grind of training :)

Last weekend I had two training sessions on the pitch. The first on Saturday was pretty intense. Lots of sprinting and hard ballwork. Then a couple of games at the end. One posession game and another with full rules, though only 9 a side.

Sunday was a bit more relaxed and skill based. Still plenty of running but not as much sprinting as Saturday.

Today I hope to head off to Three Rock and do some mountain biking with Waggers and Pauline. It looks like it'll be a wet one, the torrential rain we were promised has just started.

Some photos from Switzerland

I was looking through some folders and found these. Some photos from Rapperswil.


Waggers and myself with the giraffe.


Me on the bike leg.


The Stairway to Heaven, pure hell!


At the end, with my medal.

Amsterdam Marathon

And I'm entered.
October 19th. Information here

Time to think of next year!

I've been thinking about the HIM and in what ways I can improve if I am going to do a full one next year. One way is to stick to a more structured training program. To this end, I ordered and received Don Fink's book, "Be Iron Fit"

It's an interesting read so far, with a lot of it aiming at how to manage your training time effectively. There is a recommendation that all sessions are based on time rather than on distance. There are some training programs in the book too, so when I finish reading it, I'll post up a proper review.

Post Race

In the days following the race, I was like a zombie. I had to force myself to eat as I was too tired to enjoy it. I was constantly drinking to replenish myself too. Then when we got back to Dublin, we had a tag rugby match to play! It went well, we won pretty easily, with the three new Ironmen doing enough to learn the rules and get some trys.

It took until about Saturday before I felt that I was recovered enough to go and do anything extra. I had a match on Sunday, just a challenge match so not too important. I made the mistake of not getting enough sleep on the Saturday night and that meant that I was dead again come Sunday evening.

Last night I was back in the gym, time to start bulking up now that the big race is over. I have 7 weeks to work on upper body strength before the first round of the championship. More tag rugby this evening and then there is an aquathlon tomorrow evening on Bull island.

Race Report

The race day arrived. Up early and down for breakfast. We had brought porridge with us, but in the end decided to go for the hotel brekkie and coffee.
We got all suited up and put on sunscreen. Then over to the transition area to put on bottles and food and pump up the tyres. With all the gear laid out it was now time to go to the toilet (again and again!)

20 minutes to go and no sign of Greg. Went to put on the wetsuit and hop into the water. Heart rate was at 140bpm! Stopped the watch and restarted it, HR down to 110bpm. That's more like it!

Treading water for the few minutes before the start, more people start to arrive. Then the bang and we're off. Not as frenzied as I thought it would be, but once the course narrowed it became kill city! It only lasted for a couple of minutes before the field started to string out. Up to the first turn buoy there were people cutting across and slowing and going past. After the second turn buoy, I found a set of feet and settled in for the last bit. After a few hundred metres, someone else fancied getting in, but a bit of elbow barging and they dropped back. I looked up at one stage and there were at least three people in the snake I was part of! I spotted some faster feet after a while and dropped onto them. This is easy! 200m to go. Everyone is going the long way around the corner, not me, I look up and cut to the inside buoy. Last little bit and then being dragged out. Up the steps, down with the wetsuit and jog to the bike. 35 minutes. Going good so far.

T1 was a blur. Off with the suit, on with the helmet, shoes and glasses. A handful of jellies and I was off. Taking it easy, picking up water at every feed station. Some people going past. Then, 10km in, "Witches Hill". I charged up the first part, adrenaline getting the better of me. Then I settled in to the harder second half. Grab a half a banana at the top and relax down the narrow road. Onto the flat and push a bit, still drinking lots. The next 10km was almost all uphill. "The Beast", and boy was it ever. Cow bells, samba dummers and supporters all the way up. Then the top of the hill. Wow, 65km/h downhill without pedalling. Before I knew it I was back in the town. The girls had written "Éire abú" on the ground and our names. I had to chuckle! Second lap, passing some of the women on the course and then some of the other age groups. The hills went by quickly and before I knew it, it was 80 minutes later and I was taking my feet from my shoes. Into transition and remember where to rack my bike.

Rack the bike, off with the helmet and glasses, on with the socks, shoes, hat and glasses again. Grab a handful of jellies, but why do I always get the cherry ones?! 2km in, this is feeling hard, need to pee, decide to struggle through it. Get to the first food stop, grab what I think is water, but no, Buillion! Gah! Try again, wrong again, coke this time! Grab some sponges and keep going. Into the town, our numbers had our names on them, so people cheering for you by name, it made it all easier. Up the "Stairway to Heaven" (or as we christened it "Gestapo mountain", because it was evil) two at a time, recover on the downhill. Around by the lake and on to the soccer pitch. Got passed by Sergio, held on to him until the running track around the pitch, then lost him. It turned out I got ahead of him. He passed me again after a couple of km, and this time I stuck to him like glue. 1km or so from the turnaround I lost him again, but he had woken my legs up to running. At the turn around, a quick look at the watch, 4:06. A light goes off in my head, I can get under 5 hours! Finally, a goal. Back through the town, once more up the steps, catching more people, feeling good. Get to the running track, only a few km to go. Started to lengthen my stride, 20 minutes for 4km, this should be possible. Picked up some lemon and lime slices at a feed station, they woke me up good. Last feed station in sight, push harder. Up into the turn around point once more, go straight past it and into the finishing chute. The crowd were great, hands up in the air as I cross the line, 4:58:04. Get my medal, chocolate drinks and red bull. Sit down and relax! Waited until the other two crossed the line, then out to relax and get our finishers shirts.

Got out of the athletes area and was handed an Erdinger! How good was that?! Sat down and chilled for a while. Went to get a shower and massage and then for some food. I had to force it down, I was sooooo tired. 3 people at our table went up to collect prizes. We left to get our bikes from transition. The rest of the evening is a blur. We went back to the hotel and at some stage I fell asleep.

The first thing that went through my head after finishing? Never again! Five minutes later after watching people come over the line? Maybe next year. Five minutes later? When's the next one?

This is going to be addictive!

Looking back at Switzerland

On the Friday (our second day in Rapperswil) we decided to go out and do a loop on the bike course. We picked up a German guy as we were leaving the hotel and started out nice and slowly. Myself and Waggers hung at the back trying to get used to the distance we would have to keep. After 10km we turned to go up the first hill. It went on for a bit and this was supposed to be the short one! Once at the top, we regrouped and went gingerly down the other side. I lost the yellow spongy bit from my aero bottle and had to go back for it. This led me to tying it in with cable ties for the race.

We weren't quite sure where to go after that and after going up an even worse hill, and down the other side, we realised that we had skipped a good bit of the loop including "the Beast". But seeing as we had two hills under us, we decided that going back to the hotel was a good idea. It was also quite hot at this stage and we didnt want to be out for too long. We said farewell to the German guy and another girl that we picked up on the way in the next town. They continued around to find "the Beast" and we headed back. An uneventful trip back, no thunder storms or punctures or anything.

We went through the registration process on Friday too. It was quick if a bit confusing as to where we were supposed to go.

After food and resting for a while, Greg and I decided it was time to test the water. A quick 20 minute dip in the lake ensued. The water was cold, but once you got moving it wasn't too bad at all. There was great visibility too. That cleared out the butterflies a little bit for me anyway.


Saturday came quickly and dragged on for days! It was the day for doing nothing. We watched TV and movies and then Pauline arrived. Louise arrived later on before we went to the pasta party. Free food and Erdinger for all! Fantastic :)

Some photos

http://picasaweb.google.com/griffinm/Ironman703Switzerland

Some photos that Pauline took while watching and supporting us in Rapperswil.

It's all over

It's now a few days later, I'm back in work, my brain is starting to come back to life. I'll write up a report over the next few days and post it up here.

I finished in 4 hours 58 minutes and 4 seconds. Waggers and Greg finished it as well, so it was happiness all round.

First day in Rapperswil

We travelled to Switzerland today. Left from Dublin airport at 11:30ish and made it here around 4. It was quite nice out so we went for a wander and got some food. Then a walk over to the start area and transition areas. Saw a few people going out for a canoe polo training session, but we didn't stay to watch them.

Came back towards the hotel and got some ice cream before deciding it was time to put the bikes together. After that it was time to test them out. So out on the road (remembering to stay on the right hand side) I had some small problems with gears skipping but sorta got them fixed. We got a little bit lost and then a lightning storm started! So we quickly found the right road and stormed back to the hotel just in time. Time now to relax and have a quiet beer.

All packed

So, I'm all packed and ready to go. The bike bag is full of all my gear and I only need to remember to get my passport in the morning.

This evening I went for a last cycle just to keep a feel for it and to test out the new aero drinks bottle I got last week. I had meant to try it out at home at the weekend, but of course I had to forget something. That time it was my cycling shoes. Silly me. They are of course packed this time :)

Only a few days left now

It's time to take it easy. Ish. I'm not a good one at taking it easy. On Thursday last, I went for an outdoor swim in Malahide with Waggers and with Louise as our lookout in her newly repaired boat.

Friday was drinks out with work and then drive home on Saturday to play a league match. We were beaten by two points by Templeport in a lousy match :(

The B team were beaten today by Cornafean and after that I went on back to Dublin. Just back a short while now and going to head off for a swim shortly. It'll be Gráinne's first proper time in the open water. Luckily Malahide isn't too deep at all.

Pics from the weekend

Here's a few pics of me and the others at the Fingal tri

Fingal tri pics

The results are out

For the Fingal tri. I came 25th with a 2 minute penalty for drafting. I've sent the organisers a mail to see where I was drafting so that I can make sure that it doesn't happen again.

Fingal Sprint Triathlon

Woke up good and early and had breakfast of porridge and honey. Packed up the camper and drove around to pick up Greg. Got to the NAC at about 7:40ish and went to register. Got the goodie packs with a large toblerone and powerade and toothpaste. They do put the most random stuff in there!

Checked the bikes and then racked them into transition. Got all my gear laid out as I wanted it too. Then back to the camper for 40 minutes before the race briefing. Drinking a lightly dilutable drink and snacking on a few pieces of chocolate to keep my energy levels up. I watched the first wave go off and then went and got changed. I was in wave 2, lane 3. We got given swim hats and then into the pool. One length of a warm up and then 750 metres of a swim. I started off in front but got passed after 3 lengths by three people who were close together. I picked off two of them over the next few lengths and the last guy on the last one. So that meant that I was first out of the pool in my lane. I got whooshed out by the guy at the end and trotted out to T1.

Everything went smoothly coming out of T1 and onto the road. the Gardaí were out in force with the marshalls, stopping traffic and directing us around roundabouts. I got passed by a few lads but kept them in my sights. At the turn around, I had passed them again and they seemed to miss the cones. I powered out from the turn and kept the lead until near the end of a long straight. Two guys passed me there, but seemed to slow on the small incline after it, so back I went again past them. I kept pushing hard until the end of the bike and got in first.

Another decent transition despite throwing my glasses off when I took off the helmet and I was out in front. I pushed hard for the first few hundred metres and then got into my stride. Kept up a good cadence and felt really good. At the turn around, I got confused by the marshall asking me was in wave 2 and slowed a bit. I saw the next few lads behind me, so I pushed again up the hill to the corner. Then I eased back into my stride for the next bit. Turning the last corner and heding downhill to the NAC, I pushed up the pace again. I was starting to feel it now but pushed on. I didn't want to look behind me just in case I was being caught, this was about my race for me. Got in to the finish and across the line with no problems, all done in 1:08.

Overall, I was happy with what I managed, did a little bit of stretching and had a shower. Put on the compression tights and lived in them for the rest of the day.

We hung around for the prize giving and then headed home. Had tea and cake and watched the Cavan and Antrim match. Everyone was tired, some went for a snooze.

Went out later to get food for a pasta bake, ended up making three and salad and garlic bread. Got an early night too, it was well needed!

Up this morning at 5 to drop Pauline to the airport, no pains or stiffness.

Open Water Swimming

Remember, when you want to swim in the sea to check the tide times!
Went out this evening with Gráinne and Waggers to go for a quick dip down by Bull island. When we got there, it dawned on us that this was not going to be all that fruitful! The tide was way out. But we got in anyway and after wading out for a few hundred metres with the water no deeper than out knees, we came back again.

Jogged back home with Waggers and got beeped at by a few cars. Is it only Ireland that people can't accept that someone might want to go out and do some exercise?

They arrived!

Finally, I have a new set of tri bars. I had to change the delivery address yesterday because we missed a couple of delivery attempts. They said it wouldn't be delivered until tomorrow, but even better it arrived today!
A brand spanking new set of bars, so this evening will be spent putting them on the bike and getting it all set up nicely.

Happy happy, bounce bounce!

Swimming and running

Nice little brick session today. I ran from work to Westwood and then went for a quick swim. Just a little 750m at race pace. Then a run from Westwood to Antioch along the coast road.
Overall it took just over an hour and a half.

Wilmslow tri

We had an early start on Sunday last for the tri. My wave was off at 8:20 with Greg off earlier and Pauline off in the wave after me. The swim went well, I started first in the lane and passed out the two others in my lane. Out onto the cycle, I passed someone on the first corner but then didn't see anyone for about 15 minutes. I wasn't sure if I was on the right track, but kept going and eventually saw some signs showing me the way. I passed out some more people and kept tapping along at a nice pace, not too fast, but keeping my legs going.

On the way back to transition, I nearly missed the turn off the main road. I recovered and got back feeling fresh. As I went into drop the bike off, I heard Greg and Sarah shouting for me. Nice to hear someone cheer you on!

I spent a few seconds trying to take out the spare tyre and repair kit from my pocket, but then gave up and decided to run with them. The run was getting warm with no breeze and running through a nice little park before heading out through a housing estate. There was a great family out passing out water and hosing us down as we went past. Very nice!

The rest of the run was quite uneventful, passed out some people and kept a good cadence up. I felt like I could have run for a lot longer at that pace. Coming in to the finish line, I had to up the pace and sprint over the line :)

At the end of the race, Edinburgh Cycle Co-operative had a stand of free drinks and power bars, so myself and Greg fed and filled water bottles with as much free stuff as we could.

Pauline came through shortly after and got interviewed by the guy with the microphone and then he spent the next five minutes asking if the Dublin people would be having a beer or two that evening :)

After it was all over, we had a few hours to wait until we got the final results. Pauline came third overall in the women's section and first in her age group.
I finished in about 1:14 according to the official results, but I thought I was about 3 minutes slower than that. Not going to argue though!
After we got home, it was time for a trip to Decathlon and then off to the Curry Mile for dinner.

Greg and I went home on Monday, getting to the airport one minute before check in closed, being given priority boarding passes and getting to the gate as they opened up. Perfect!

Countdown

Only a few days to go until the first tri of the year. Wilmslow is on this weekend and while it's only a short one, it should be good. I also get to visit Pauline while I'm there, which will be good.

Things are starting to fall into place too, I have the tri suit, the new runners, a new bike bag and my watch all set up and ready to go. The only thing is that I still have no tri bars. Syntace are sending them out again as UPS sent them back to them for some reason. No official word from UPS on where they are yet either, so I wonder do they even know what they've done with them.

Greg is lending me a set for the weekend, except he still has to pick them up from one of the other guys who has them at the moment. I hope he gets them!

This week we had some great weather so it was a pleasure to get out and do stuff. Spent Monday in Bray at the beach, just chilling out and relaxing. Tuesday was a swim and then cycling home the long way along the Coast Road. Then a race back into town for a dancing lesson before dinner. Today was the long way home and then a 40 minute run with Waggers.

Tomorrow I'll probably take as an easy day, I might head to the pool in the evening just to splash about and do a few lengths. I still want to figure out the tumble turn as it keeps confusing me :)

Good swimming

A good week of swimming. A session on Tuesday and then a better one on Thursday. Feeling good in the water in the run up to Wimslow. I'll have to try and get a session in a 25m pool tomorrow before next weekend, just to get the distance sorted in my head.

I'm still waiting for my tri bars from Syntace, they sent them out a couple of weeks ago, but UPS seem to have lost it. I've started a trace, but I'll have to try and source a new pair for next weekend.

Oh, and another good win on Friday night against Butlersbridge in the League. We won 0-8 to 0-5.

People sleepwalk around Dublin

In the mornings, people sleepwalk. On the way to work today, I had to shout a warning at one person and had one other guy jump out of his skin when I went past him as he went to step on to the road. And then, just as I was turning in to work, a guy on a bike was oblivious to me coming the right way down a one way street right at him. Ther must have been something in the air.

On the training side, I picked up a cold on Monday and have been trying to shake it since then. I blame Greg! I haven't managed to get any swimming done this week, but I will be in the pool tonight, come hell or high water. I went to the gym last night with Louise so that go me in the mood to go back.

I'm also expecting a new tri bar any day now to replace the one that I broke a few weeks ago, so it'll be nice to get out cycling again, other than cycling to work.

Running to work

Wow, it's been running week this week. Went for a run on Monday, last night with Waggers and then ran to work this morning. This has been something that I've toyed with since moving into the new house. It's only 10km door to door, so it seemed like a doable distance to me. In the end it took me 47 minutes to make it in, that's with stopping for traffic and dodging people along Abbey Street. I was quite happy with that. This evening it's a gym session and then into town to watch Fiona in the mp3 DJ competition that Phantom FM are hosting.
I have DCPL tomorrow night and then 2 matches on Saturday evening.

Busy busy busy!

Running

Went for a run this evening, just a nice little one, just 12.3km or so. Took me just over 50 minutes to complete. The weather was nice, a little breezy heading south, but a welcome breeze. I felt really good coming back from Bull Island, I think it was the change in wind direction.

Last night I was in the gym doing session two of the Stronglift 5x5 program. Squat, press, deadlift and chins.

Oh, I also paid the last bit of the accomodation costs for the Ironman, and found out that Louise has finally booked a ticket, so she will be there for it too. Only 8 weeks left now!

Hailstones in April!

I went for a run at lunchtime today. About 5 minutes into the run, I was bombarded by hailstones for about 30 seconds. Then it stopped and the sun came back out. It got quite warm after that. I did about 9.5km and it took about 40 minutes.

On the way home, I decided that it would be a good idea to go for a swim for a change. I spent about an hour in the pool, mostly technique and getting a feel for the water back again. Then I did 4x200m to finish off and then home.

Poor week of training

Last week I moved house. Because of that, I didn't get much training in. I only really managed to cycle to work. I had planned to swim a few days, but what with things being moved around and having to tidy up the old house, it didn't happen.

Yesterday we had another match, we played Arva in Belcoo. The weather was horrible. It had changed from warm and sunny to cold and windy. We played with the wind in the first half and were up by a couple of goals at half time. In the second half, the wind seemed to drop and we managed to keep our noses in front. In the end we won handsomely enough by about 9 points or so.

I spent today painting my room, got two coats onto it, but the wallpaper is still showing through. Some more painting tomorrow, I think.

Disaster

I can't believe it. After buying a bike primarily because it had tri bars on it, one of the extensions broke! I was cycling home after the match on Sunday (which we drew, more on that later) and was about half way through when all of a sudden my right arm was waving about in the air. The bar broke at the exact spot where the hole to allow the gear cable in was. I then had no choice but to go the rest of the way on the other side bars, and unable to change the back gears as I needed to.

After examining the bar when I got home, I saw that there seemed to be some sort of damage from before, so I wasn't as strong as I thought I was! I'm going to take some pictures and send them into Syntace and see if they can cut me any sort of deal.

So far this Ironman has cost me a new watch, new bike and now new tri bars!

As for the match, it didn't look like it would be our day again. We were 10 points down with 15 minutes to go before we decided that it would be nice to play. We ended up drawing level and even had a slim chance to win it right at the end. A draw was all we probably deserved, but it was a weird match.

More cycling

I went for a cycle yesterday despite the bad weather. A nice long one, about 60km. I ran into some problems with my gears again and was limited to about 4 usable gears, but it worked out okay in the end. I went from my home in Blacklion, across to Belcoo, then out the Garrison road. Here I hit wind, strong wind, right in my face! It didn't stop until I got to Garrison and turned left to head to Rossinver. Then the wind was coming from the side, through the trees.

After a long climb up the hill outside Rossinver, I had the best part of the cycle, a long fast downhill on decent roads. I got up as far as 57km/h. It was hair raising in parts because I didn't know the road. Into Manorhamilton and I had to slow down going through the town, then take a left by the Bee Park and out the Glenfarne road. I turned off onto the Kiltyclogher road to stay off the main and windy road and turned off here after about 2km. Then over to Glenfarne school and off left up a small country road. Another long hard hill and then down the other side. I couldn't let go here because the road was only wide enough for one car to drive on. I got to the Ballroom of Romance in Glenfarne and turned left towards Blacklion. I had the wind behind me and flew along for the rest of the way home.

Over all it took me just over 2 hours and with the wind and hills I was pretty happy with the time. No real stiffness today, so that's another bonus.

More training

I had another VO2 max test on Thursday. Greg wanted to make sure that the machines he is using are calibrated properly, so guinea pig Mike came to the rescue!

I should get a cape and wear underpants on the outside of my trousers if I get to do another test :)

Afterwards, I went into town and got a new pair of runners. It's probably about time seeing as I have the previous pair for about 5 years. I did a gait analysis before hand and found out that I have a neutral stride and a heel strike. I got to try out 5 or 6 pairs of runners and eventually decided on a pair of Sauconys.

Then on Friday, I went out for a run, 12.75km according to www.gmap-pedometer.com. It took just over an hour and I took it as a recovery session. I thought I had training in the evening in Cavan, so I headed off from Dublin at about 4:30. Made it home for 7:30 and got to Loughan. Then I decided to check the message again and found it was sent on Thursday, who's the goose?

I had a match today against Kildallen in Ballyconnell. We were beaten by a point after being up 1-5 to 0-2 at half time. We just didn't get any breaks in the second half. As a team we need to work on starting the second half of matches stronger.

Tomorrow I hope to go for a nice long cycle, but I have some stuff to do around the house for Mum while I am here too

Swimming

I did a swim session tonight. 300m warm up and it was supposed to be 3x500m descending. It didn't quite turn out like that though. I got the first one done fine, and then on the start of the second, I got one length finished. As I touched the wall, some guy decided that was the time he wanted to start his length. The only problem was that he was a numpty. I managed to pass him out and gave it no more thought. Got through the rest of the 500m, but was slightly slower. Then on the third 500m he did it again. Exactly the same thing at the same time. I stopped until he was far enough away that I could pass him at the end of the length, but he stopped after about 20m. I gave him some more time and then headed off. At the end of my length, he was getting out of the pool. I called after him to tell him I wasn't happy with him and he went off on one at me. The lifeguards didn't seem to believe that there was a shouting match over some swimming!

I finished out the last 400m faster than the previous ones, so maybe I need to get angry before I start swimming :)

Now it's time to watch some ice hockey, Dallas v Detroit on NASN2

New Season

Last weekend was the start of the new football league season. We played Corlough away and were beaten by two points. The match was played in strong winds, but luckily now snow! We played pretty well, but just couldn't put the ball over the bar. We had a goal disallowed aswell.
Afterwards, I cycled home. I decided that I needed to test out the new bike properly. I also wanted to use my new watch :) The cycle went well until I got to the big hill at Florencecourt. Then the gears decided that they wanted to start skipping all over the place. I made it to the top eventually after much swearing. Total time for the cycle was around 50 minutes for the 30km. I also managed to cycle through about 8 minutes of pretty bad cramping in both legs. I think I needed more water, I only had power-go-faster juice with me, which I was taking every 10 minutes.

Today I went out for a run. Close to 10km in the park. Man was it windy though! I tried to keep my heart rate around 165, but going into the wind it crept up to about 175. Legs are feeling sore now after it, just my calves that had cramped up on Sunday.
Going to go to the gym tonight with Louise for a weights session and maybe a go in the sauna too.

I did it again!

I can't believe it, I went and did it again! I entered another tri :)
This one is in Manchester, near where Pauline is now. So I guess I get to go and pick up my ice cream, eh Pauline? It's happening on the 11th of May.

I've done two swim sessions this week and I'll be going to the gym tonight for the second weights session. Tomorrow is DCPL and then football training on SAturday night and a match on Sunday.
The football league starts in two weeks time, so this is my first and last chance to get back into the groove.

I managed to lose my HRM last week, so I've been on the look out for a new one. If anyone manages to find mine, or has a cheap one for sale, let me know.

Feeling better

I cycled into work this morning and felt good while doing it. I was a little apprehensive as to how I would feel today, being two days after the max test. Last Saturday, I did a great impression of a dead log, so I was hoping it wouldnt be the same today.
I went to the gym last night with Louise but didnt do a full session, I just did some light weights and some chin ups. Today, I'll be in the pool after work and then a 20-30 minute session on the turbo trainer to sort out my position on the tri bike.
Tomorrow will be a run and weights session, and Friday will be a run and swim.

If I get through all that, I'll be very happy. The last round of the Munster league is on Saturday too and I'm going to bring the bike with me so that I can get a good long spin in on Sunday.

Quiet weekend

I had a quiet weekend. On Friday, I drove to Cavan and then on to Knock. I got there in time for lunch :) Didn't do a whole pile, but got out "The Flying Scotsman" on DVD and watched that. It's the film of the Graham Obree story. Really good film, he went through some tough stuff to get to the top! I slept until 1pm on Saturday then, I think the max test hit me!

Went for a short 20 minute run with Louise and then headed to Easkey. We took the wrong road and ended up going to Strandhill instead. We got out Ratatouille and watched that in the van. Good film, quite different to the one the previous night. We tested out the van and picked a good night to do it, there was frost around in the morning when we woke up.

I'm back in Dublin now and getting an earlyish night before the second max test tomorrow. At least that one is in the morning, so I might be able to go and relax in the sauna afterwards.

Oh, I entered the Fingal triathlon over the weekend too. That'll be on the 18th of May. Greg has entered one the week before that in England, have to get the details from him on that one too.

VO2 Max

Today I was in DCU doing part one of the guinea pig work with Greg. He wanted me to do a Wingate test and then an hour later to do a VO2 Max test on the bike.

I got to do it on the Velotron (which should really be called a Velotron 2000, that would be be way cooler) which is as close to a proper bike as you can get while still not going anywhere.

The Wingate test measured how much power I could push out and how long I could sustain it, kinda like a sprint test.

After that, I went for a wander around DCU to see how it had all changed. They have astroturf pitches now and a staff canteen in my old engineering labs, it was shocking! :)

Then the VO2 Max test came up. It started at 100W and went up in 50W increments every three minutes. I got to within 15 seconds of the end of 350W before my legs gave in. As usual, I was surprised at how quickly you can go from able to pedal to not able to move. I have done max tests on a kayak machine and treadmill before and they both went quickly as well.

The best thing about all that was that I get to go back on Monday to do another set of tests, this time on a crappy cycling machine.

Tomorrow, I'm off to Cavan to let the tax man see that the new van is actually a camper and then over to Mayo. I hope to get a bit of surfing in, and maybe even a run and a cycle.

I still have to shorten the seatpost on my tri bike, but I can do that in Mayo tomorrow, I hope.

I am the greatest!

I was at the Shannon Gaels dinner dance on Saturday night and was presented with the Senior Player of the Year award. It was a surprise, and I was so shocked, I couldn't even make an acceptance speech!

It was one of my goals for the year from early on (the other being to win the championship) and it's nice when it comes to fruition like that :)

On Sunday, I went for a ride on my new steed, a Giant OCR with proper tri bars. It was only a short spin, about 27km, but it was cold, and the saddle was a smidgen too high.

That will have to be sorted out soon. Tonight, I am off to the gym, a weights session and then back to the pool tomorrow night.

Running around the place

I went for a run this evening, a nice long run. I decided to test myself a little and ran down to Louise's house. From there, I ran with her for about 30 minutes and then ran home. An hour and a half in total and it felt pretty good. I had no trouble keeping a pace and even managed to surprise myself on the way up the hill on the Swords Road.

I have been busy training recently, I was running on Saturday night, swimming on Monday and had a weights session last night. Tomorrow is back to weights, with a swim session planned for Friday. Then off home to Cavan. I'm going to try and get out on my new bike on Saturday before the Shannon Gaels dinner dance. Then on Sunday, I might go for a paddle on the lake.

That's all assuming that Dad hasn't got loads of work for me to do! :)

Note to self

Don't forget your cycling shoes when you go to work.

I never realised how difficult it is to cycle in the rain in runners on clippy pedals. And then the tyre that was threatening to burst all week started leaking air. So I had to walk home from the post office on Griffith Avenue. But the reason I was there was that my new cycling gear came in. Good old TRIUK and their sales! I got me a new pair of shorts and a windproof cycling top.

Top ten

I raced the first of the Punchestown Duathlons today. It turned out to be a nice race, despite the threatenings of the weather. It started to spit before the race started, but once it was on, it stayed dry.

I brought Greg out as well and we met up with Louis, Sean and a mate of Seans. There was quite a bit of faffing around before the race as the registration closed 30 minutes before the race was due to start. Despite this I still managed to make a hames of the start. I was using Louise's watch to time myself as mine is away getting a new battery. When the start came around, I was still messing with it trying to get the stopwatch started!

I managed to beat my way to nearer the front and finished the first run in 12 minutes. Then on to the bike. I was passed out on the first little downhill section out of the race course, but then managed to make up quite a few places on the uphills. At the turn around I was in 11th place. On the way back, I had a tit for tat race with two other guys until we got back to transition. Out of transition, my time was 50 minutes, so I reckon I was on the bike for about 36 minutes.

I passed one of the guys early in the run, but was caught by the other one. I stayed with him until 400m from the finish, when he put on a bit of a spurt and I dropped off. I finally finished in 1:04:22, taking 4 minutes off my time from last year! Yay!

It also meant that I finished in tenth place.

The next one is on February 10th, but I won't be able to make it because I have to go to the Shannon Gaels 30th anniversary dinner dance the night before.

Dirty roads

I don't like dirty roads. I'm just back from a short spin with Waggers and my bike is all dirty again! Ah well, it'll distract me later on from the work I have to do :)

This has been a good week. I got two weight sessions in, a run session and now this morning a mini brick session.

I went for a run on Wednesday evening and decided to try out a Fartlek style one. I went on a 10K loop and used street lights, cars, traffic lights and even counting my steps to break up the bits. I made one mistake though. Going down Ballymun Road, I decided to jog to the first traffic lights and run to the second one and so on. It wasn't until I got to about the fourth or fifth one (yes, there are lots of traffic lights on that road) that I realised I was jogging the short ones and running hard for the longer ones. Ah well, it still worked out in the end.

I had DCPL last night so that was my kind of break from the norm, we beat Kamikaze 4-3 and I scored 2 goals, yay me! :)

Today I went for a lap of the airport and out to the far side of Swords and then straight back again. On the way back I thought it might be a nice time to try out going from bike to run. We did one lap of the park and came back. So that was todays easy session, just over an hour in total.

Tomorrow there is the start of the Wheelworx Duathlon Series. A 3.2km run, 12km cycle and 3.2km run to finish it off. I'm looking forward to it. It'll be my first race using Pauline's tri bars. I'm so glad I got them for her :)

Hill running

I finished the hill race in Howth today. It was a nice little race, 8.5km over some pretty hefty terrain. It started out with a lap around a football pitch, which I am well used to. Then it was the start of the race proper. Straight into a big hill. It was like being stuck in traffic, quite hard to get past anyone. The rest of it was pretty rolly with a long downhill section. It was really muddy all round and the runners I was using had no real grip at all. I only fell once but there were sections of gorse that you had to run through as well.

I finished in about 40 minutes and in 13th place. Not bad for my first hill run!

And here are the results

Doirty!

I went for a quick blem up to Wicklow courtesy of the Waggers' mobile to try out the Scar trail with him. We arrived in Laragh and it was dry, but overcast. We got changed and started out. I was told that it might be a bit muddy on the way up, but we could always push up if it got too bad. The first bit was grand with a rocky firetrack and then onto a forestry ridge. Then the cycling proper started, through some ruts that had been washed out by the heavy rain. It was fun to go through the puddles not knowing if they were sandy or muddy on the bottom, or how deep they were.

We kept going up for about 30 to 40 minutes and then my bike decided that it had had enough. The chain came off first and dumped me on my head and then the gears started slipping so I walked on for about 5 minutes. By this time the rain had come in and we were traipsing through mud and puddles. So we decided to turn around and WHEEEEEEEE all the way to the bottom. I took the lead at one stage and thought I was going great until I decided I wanted to go from where I was on the edge of the track on to the track itself. Whump! Over I went and ended up facing backwards. I had hit a 15cm high vertical ridge and just smeared it.

Then later still as we were coming to the Wicklow Way, we met some scouts that were very enthusiastic about meeting someone else out in the rain. A final section with lots of speed and one more of some narrow rocky bit and we were back at the road. After some coffee, we headed off back to civilization and dinner.

Overall a very enjoyable hour and a half and much better than sitting around the house all day.

In the Groove

This has been a good week.

I have managed two weights sessions, a swim session and a run session. Going back to the pool was daunting, not having been there in a while, but when I got into the water and got going it was fine. I cranked out a kilometre at a steady pace but there were a lot of people using the lane, so I kept catching up with them and having to slow down or try and pass them out. And then Louise decided that she wanted to headbutt me on one of the lengths :)

I went for a run at lunchtime on Wednesday. I had a nice course set out in my head, but when I started to run it, I was finishing the loop far too quickly, so I changed it a bit. That meant that I ran slightly further than I had intended, but I still managed to get back inside 40 minutes. It was a good warm up for Sunday. I am going to try and do a hill running race in Howth (details ) It's only 8.5km but there are some steep hills over there.

Off now for a MTB session somewhere in Wicklow.

And I'm back

From snowboarding in Italy for a week. I was over in Cervinia near the Swiss border. It's a pretty good resort, no runs were too taxing or steep, but there was enough there to keep us all busy especially as it snowed heavily for 4 days.

The first day we got to ski had a beautiful clear sky and great visibility, but some of the runs were a bit bare. I lost New Years day entirely due to being sick from partying too hard the night before, but the second was snowy and the pass into Switzerland was closed. This was to be a common theme as it was closed for the rest of the week that we were there!

I learnt quite quickly how to ski through powder as deep as my knees but did manage to stop dead a few times and others to actually crash and spray powder everywhere including down my trousers.

Overall it was a great week of relaxing and taking a break from work, but as usual, I want to go back...now. I did feel the effects of the altitude a little bit, seeing as Cervinia is at 2050m and we were skiing from 3360m high.

Now it's time for bed and to read part of a book on triathlon swimming to get a few ideas on training for swimming.