Stargazing

I arranged to see Cassie again tonight. I dressed up for the occasion.
Two pairs of gloves and three layers. Far too much clothing for a mild night. I think my wife has an inkling that something is going on. She has asked to be introduced.

Is that a headtorch or are you just pleased to see me?

Its hard to get away from all the Christmas lights. I actually quite like the bright, sparkly lights, especially the traditional old school coloured ones that adorn every other house. They remind me of dark grey winter nights in Glasgow in the 70's.  The choice was much more limited then and their appearance heralded the holidays and the arrival of Santa.

This year, our house received more than its quota of head torches. It was on my list, but they arrived from all angles on Christmas day morning. So it was with no regret whatsoever that I jettisoned the one I bought in a budget store two years ago. It was cheap, it was loose and it slept around. It made me dizzy on the only occasion I ran with it.

Tonight, as I left the house in the dark for a night run down the Wannie line, a stretch of disused railway line that originally ran from Morpeth via Scots Gap to Reedsmouth and on to the Borders, I wore a new 'torch de cranium'.  It goes by the name of a Petzl Tikka. I had my cap on underneath it and as I ran into the  dark still night, the edge of the visor cast a shadow forming a black rim just below my eyeline. It told my brain I was wearing glasses. I wasn't. Even as clouds of steamy vapour issued from the breathing department, I wanted to wipe the non-existent lenses.

As I cut through the Common beside the local football club ground I thought there was every chance of a few players stopping me to ask if I'd be the fifth floodlight. Those cheeky little lumens dancing all around. I dropped onto the road and then off again into High House Woods and set about working around the 2 mile circuit a couple of times. It was slow but entertaining.

It was during the second circuit that I looked up. The sky had cleared and the stars were out and there she was, Cassieopea. I stopped and turned the torch off for a bit and took in the heavens. Astronomy was not on my list of subjects when I was young. Other than 'the plough', I didn't really take much notice. I bought a book of stars in the local Oxfam shop last year. It's sat on the shelf for months. This month, however, curiosity has got the better of me. Turns out 'the plough' goes by a few other names as well (you'll just have to 'wiki it' like I did).

Considering how much time I spend outside, the night sky remains a mystery.  We should be on first name terms. So, one of next years targets is to get to know some of Cassie's mates a bit better. I might even get a bit familiar with some of them. I should get myself along to Kielder with a telescope. Probably take the bike as well... and maybe my head torch.. perhaps a picnic and a nice bottle of ginger beer.....

Just over seven miles tonight and thirteen yesterday. Modest, but the new addition to the larder of a bottle of Castor oil, will, I hope, make the joints run that bit smoother. I've been pleased with how things have gone this year on the sporting front and with the cycling club picking up momentum, I hope the next 12 months will be eventful in all the right ways....

Next time, read about Orion's Belt and the blue supergiant.
 

Stolen workouts

I found myself running through Granton the other night. The moon was high and bobulous like the red bobbles on the tree. The rush hour was in full swing. Rather than get stuck in traffic jams, I dumped the car in a posh street and headed out for 3 miles along past Leith before turning at McDonalds. No, I wasn’t tempted, thank you very much.

It was entertaining to have a sneaky peer in the windows of the nice houses down from Trinity Road before the streetscape gave way to a more commercial  and dayglow vista. There were a couple of pubs that looked welcoming (the Starbank being one of them) and there were a couple of fancy restaurants along the way. I spent a little while dodging folk as they busied themselves getting on and off buses or standing peering in shop windows...always the cheapest way to shop! 

Once the festive windows ran out, I made do with snippets of the conversation of passing folk. I told myself I’d remember a few of them, but only the one from the two young men in trenchcoats and beanies stuck...’ but then its economics;  so I lost interest’.  Not an economist then, I mused.

I passed a female runner in pink top and backpack on the other side of the road as I came back through the exotically named Salamander Street. The wind was picking up then, so I was happy to finish and can report that my car was very definitely the dirtiest one in the street.

The busy week has seen me trying to shoe horn in any exercise I can snaffle wherever I am. This culminated on Monday in 20 miles over Plenmeller Hill just past Haltwhistle with over 2000ft of climbing. I was pretty much alone on the road and really enjoyed the workout, especially for the upper body...struggling up the long steep gradients with the odd sparrowhawk for company.  Cold, wild desolate moorland. I don’t know why they didn’t put the climbs around Alston and Haltwhistle in the '100 greatest cycling hill climbs' book, but evidently there are several monster climbs in the area, and I will be frequenting these with alacrity especially as I have work in the area that’ll mean a few return visits.   

Meanwhile while the mileage is suffering, I’m weighing in like a elephant seal whose had too many jaffa cakes, so the purge must go on. It’s the Christmas cyclo cross tomorrow at South Shields and the Morpeth 11k on New Years Day, so a chance to burn off a few of these mince pies I’m wearing. All the best.  

  

Up the West

It's been a very lazy week with the bare minimum of mileage and a weekend that would shame a sloth. I had raced twice the weekend before and not wanting to push my luck or break my gnarled body, I spent most of the week without the garmin. It's easy to become obsessed with a bit of kit or, for that matter, with a website like Strava.  I tried to wean myself off both, at least for a while. 

We took off for a long weekend spending Friday in Glasgow and the remainder in  Inveraray. Went for an hours run up to the watchtower before a foamy bath and slap up feed. Sunday was a walk along Glen Kinglas before a stop for soup at the Village Inn, Arrochar.

The garmin free holiday finished last night with a workmanlike 8 miles with the crowd knocking out one and two minute intervals. Felt good at the end and reckon the easy week has had the desired effect. The garmin had made a re-appearance.

Need to decide what's next on the sporting calendar. Anything to keep away from Winterfest! bah, humbug.

 

Double Bubble at Woodcock & the XC

I wondered how I would feel last night after my record breaking run at the Norman Woodcock 5 miler in Gosforth. It’s a flat three lapper around the race course and it was a cool and still day. My plan was to carve a sub-30 performance, but secretly I was resigned to creeping a few seconds over the half an hour.

With a few clubmates in attendance and a field of around 130, I felt surprisingly good during the first lap. Morpeth’s Chris Waugh crept up onto my shoulder toward the middle of the lap and then pulled away smoothly during the second lap.  Instead of chasing him, I focused on trying to catch the first lady runner, which proved a good test, but chiefly I tried to maintain an even running pace and technique right to the end.  Crossing the line I had shaved off 20 seconds from my 2007 PB.  Not the fastest 29:22 in the world at v50 but I was elated and, knowing how to party, treated myself and the missus to tea and cake. I also collected a £10 voucher from the Elswick Harriers event at the prize giving.  

Not surprisingly,  I felt fine last night, spending it dancing away into the wee hours at a 50^th Birthday. The DJ was the lad who had done my 50^th doo, and he was obliging enough to play many of the tunes I had requested at my bash. It’s not every day you spend a continuous 35 minutes on the dance floor.  We even had a Cure and Simple Minds doubler. Jim Kerr on the dancefloor, indeed.

Felt fine this morning. Made carrot and vegetable soup first thing which I think is great for a pre-race meal.  I tossed the veg into the pan.  Aunt Aggie was busy painting her cast iron miniature Crimean war heroes on the table. I suggested she'd be more comfortable on a chair. She looked over and said that I really ought to make the onions sweat first, so I sat them in the corner of the kitchen and gave them a maths test. The addition of yellow split peas was a masterstroke. It won’t be long before I’m on masterchef.     

The young un’ had said she was intending to have a run-out at the local Cross Country event at Monkton, South Shields at lunchtime and I thought I might have a run out as well. I drove the jalope southward to where it seemed like the whole of the North East running community had turned out. A huge 550 turned out in the men’s field. It meant that the course was well churned up before I got going, setting off in the medium pack (it’s a handicap event, see.)  It was pretty funky galloping past some of the slower guys at the back, but the juvenile bravado soon wore off and, after 20 minutes things were slowing, and progress was slower than waiting for a filling at the dentists. Finished mid table.  I was sure glad I’d had a big bowl of soup before setting off from the house. Those split peas did the job.

Getting back into the house, I had to have a pre-bath shower to get rid of the clag.  It seems we’ve now also got a collection of small Bavarian Grenadiers on the mantelpiece. Photos of the Woodcock road race 2013 and the womens cross country at Jarrow are up in the Gallery. 

Get your seven a day

I'm telling you it was wet tonight. Really wet. Driving rain, leaves swirling, wind whooshing, empty streets and me wrapped up like a loon and going through the motions to make up my mileage. I had a bit of Simple Minds, Frankie and Journey on the ipod. Out running with Jim Kerr indeed.

I'll do pretty much anything to avoid running around the town in the dark. I nipped out yesterday for seven through the woods at 4pm. It was still light when I set off. I passed top ex-top vet Rob Hall of Blyth some way along through the track and said 'Hi'. The stretch in the woods lasts about three miles, then its a short section of road that kicks up and then it across the fields for two miles. As I'm trying to do seven a day, I've taken to adding on a couple of lengths of 'rights of way' paths that cut over the railway and through the local Industrial Estate to make it my lucky number. The route is sheltered and, as the sun goes down, its got a great atmosphere as the soda lights from the various business compounds cuts through the narrow corridor of trees and hedges, casting impossible shadows and strobing the path at various points. There was very little left of the snow flurries from the morning.

Saturdays looking like a 5 mile road race in Newcastle followed by a cross country on Sunday. Not going to win the club grand prix but at least I'll go down fighting.

Durham CXNE: Bang Tidy

The question is ‘ can you still race with a puncture?’  Well, its unlikely, but if its cyclo-cross, you’ve got as good a chance as any. My 2013-2014 cyclo season started with a bang. Literally. I dug the bike out of the stables where it had been 'over-summering' and gave it a cursory check over. This was at 8am on a bleary Saturday Morning. I was due to set off for regional event at Durham at 9am. The 'vicar' (rhyming slang for the Ridley; vicar of Dibley..) looked fine and just as I’d left it last February. I loaded it into the motor and by 10am I was parked up and unloading in Durham.

The course was busy and the weather very fine. After putting the wheels on, I went to pump up the tyres, but found one of the valves had snapped. No bother. I had another tube in the car and bags of time. Trouble was the tube was for a road tyre (23mm) rather than for a chunky cross tyre (35mm). I fitted the slimline tube and pumped it up to the max so that the pump was wheezing when I disconnected it. The physics, however, doesn’t work and the tyre was still soft even though I believed the tube inside was groaning like a pair of Jabba the Hutts trousers; gasping and about to go ‘ping’.

I rode gently around the course and set about tightening the brake cables. Once done, I considered the machine was rideable as long as I went steady. Having paid my £12, I gathered on the line with the vets, women and juniors and before you could say ‘get a grip on yourself’ we were off and I was exchanging pleasantries to my Gothic clubmate as we watched the hardcore crossers snake off ahead.

Each lap of the University sports ground was around 8 minutes to get around, and after a couple of laps I was getting back into the swing of things and passing people (men mostly) with glib satisfaction. However, the glekit smile was soon wiped off my chops when over the gravel the front tyre, which had been doing very well up to now, went ‘bang’ and that was that. I walked the bike over the top of the course, back to the car and grabbed the camera and snapped away. It did look like a laugh from the sidelines and there were a few faces I recognised from fell running, notably Donnelly and NFR’s Robertson.  Its' just such a good aerobic workout. 

Afterwards it was a natter with the lads and a tikka roll and cuppa. Nipped into the bike shop later on the way back and bought two new tubes (the right size this time).  Also stroked a carbon framed Trek which had my name on it. But restraint was required.

Nipped out for a 7 mile run later in the afternoon, cause I felt the was some residual energy left. After a steady 11 mile run this morning, there seems less energy about and with an early start tomorrow, it’s off to bed.

Claybank Fell Race 2013

I arrived early in Teesside for the Claybank Fell race. Very early. I pottered around the leafy lanes in the car listening to Classic FM. Mellow on this remembrance day. Aled Jones was on. He thanked listeners for their requests and said 'it would be good to hear from you too'. If that was the case, I thought, he should be on Radio 2. I laughed at the sheer stupidity of me. 
There was a raw, early winter frost, but the sky was clear and the day crisp and still. I drove through Great Ayton on the way to the start. It was just waking up. It was everything middle England should be in November; Woman in hat and coat, on the drive scraping ice off the windscreen and blowing into her fingers; Dog with ball, man with paper; child on a bike; woman peering into the car mirror and squeezing a spot on her chin.

I parked up close to the Clay bank car park and joined the short queue to get my number from the fell-meister Dave Parry. I asked for safety pins and he said there were some in the back, but that I wasn't to go into the boot. It was heaving with wine. Money changed hands and I warmed up over the hill at the back. There were around ninety at the start.  After a short lecture on the FRA rules, we were off.

It had been a while since I'd raced around the Moors and didn't recognise many of the runners and riders. I dropped into 18th position once the climb along the side of the wood levelled off and I pushed on to try and pick up some places on the rocky trail. 

As we hit the first of two climbs, I was in with 2 or 3 runners and was aware of a North Shields Poly on my shoulder. He passed me on the way up. I convinced myself that I had to stay with him, but he had 4 or 5 seconds over the top. It was cold as we hit the flagstones across the moor and it was eyes down to ensure there was no slipping. No time for taking in the splendid view.  I was pleased I wore my cheap woolly gloves.

I was passed by one or two some way along the ridge, but tucked in and soon we were five and all together. We descended into the dip between the climbs in the heather, avoiding the icy steps and I dropped to the back.


The second climb was a stiff walk, and I found some energy at the top to pass a couple and spider my way clumsily through the rocks on the crag. Shields was away again. Good he was on the ascents (said Yoda later), but I wasn't finished yet and we caught up again.

The trail drops steeply left before the finish and three of us continued to the rocky steps. There is, however, a short cut that we missed. It drops down sooner across the shale scree. As I followed Shields, picking our way down the frosty steps, we spied simultaneously two cutting down early, long striding and making 50 metres on us. That was enough to set off my last-ditch  'shit or bust' booster rocket, my very own Hydron Collidor. My small ring of superconducting magnets throbbed and I shot past Shields, horsing after the two runners. One was a North York Moorer, the other of uncertain allegiance.

We entered the woods and the final 300 metres which is a steep, pine needle strewned track.  I was beyond 'full-on', eyeballs out and trying to salvage yet another last ditch finish. The legs were out ahead and my backside was trailing so far behind my legs, I looked like a bad impression of Max Wall.

While one got away just ahead, NYM man gave in with 50 metres to go and I galloped into the pen, feeling completely spent.

Discreet wretch and then up to change after a quick blether with Alnwicks Bruce Crombie.
Why can't I just play backgammon and read the papers....? First M50. Good event, this.
(Photos by Ms Brown. Esk Valley)