Getting old but feeling good

I may be getting older (turned 32 on October 18th) but after a few weeks of good injury free training I am starting to feel like a proper runner again! I have my flights booked for the 20th November to go back to Iten and starting last week until I fly out I am working on my strength an speed whilst also building up my basic endurance. This training phase includes fast reps, hill reps, strengthening exercises, tempo runs and the good old long runs. I definitely have no problem finding hills in Torquay as where I am living is on the top of a 400m long hill.

Last Sunday I cycled to Totnes to join Adharanand Finn for a long run, he is doing the New York marathon on the 6th November and this was his last long training run. Apart from getting soaked on the cycle to his house the weather turned out to be beautiful and we ended up doing about two and a half hours around the countryside and country lanes of Dartington/Totnes. The first part of the run was on the route of the Totnes 10km which must be one of the most picturesque 10km in the country but probably not the best course for a pb! All in all a great run and I'm sure Finn will run a good time in New York.

Adharanand and myself in Iten

This week on my birthday I was treated to a tough hill session and then got stung by a wasp on my evening run, lovely birthday presents! Looking forward to seeing my Kenyan buddy Edwin Kipyego who comes to the UK next week for another series of races. He tells me he is in good shape so hopefully if he gets a good race with good conditions he can break his half marathon pb of 61.23. It seems this year that half marathon and marathon running has really moved on with a number of people running 58 minutes in the half and 2.03 in the marathon, crazy stuff!! Edwin really needs to knock a minute off his time to start becoming competitive with a lot of his fellow Kenyans.

Tiptree Champion..... Nearly Essex Champion.....

Another step forward in training this week as I took part in the Tiptree 10. Some unexpected competition in the form of Kent ACs James Connor who recently came fourth in the Bristol Half marathon. Fortunately for me James was using this race as a marathon pace training run (aiming for 52.30) so I used him as pacemaker especially into the wind in the second half of the race, then with about a mile and a half to go I pushed on getting the win in 52.22.

This year the Tiptree 10 was also the Essex 10 mile Championships and as I am eligible to run for Essex I was looking forward to receiving my county gold medal. Unfortunately as I couldn't find my club vest (I think it's waiting for me in Kenya) I got disqualified from the county championship race :-( not sure what difference wearing a Winchester & District AC vest would have made but rules are rules I guess!

Back off down to Torqauy this week as I need some proper hills to run up, Essex is far to flat!!

Churston Champion

After not being able to break six minutes for a mile a few weeks ago the sea air down in Torquay seems to have done the trick and yesterday I won the Churston Flyer 5 mile road race in 25.49. Not a spectacular time but if you had told me even last week that I would be running that time I wouldn't believe it.....

I had some family support at the race with my mum finding her new vocation as a camcorder operator getting a few short videos of the start and finish of the race.

As I've said before Torquay is great for training and I even joined in with Torbay AC for a few of their training runs, a really nice group of guys and it always makes a run go quicker when you have someone to chat with.

Hopefully my training will continue to improve and I can start to look forward to racing well this Autumn.

The Tour of Britain

Last Thursday the Tour of Britain cycling race was in Devon and part of the stage was only about 15 miles north of Torquay, having got into cycling in a big way over the last few months I had to go and have a look. Luckily (or unlucky) the nearest point to Torquay was a category 1 climb from Bovey Tracey up to Haytor, 6km of some pretty tough climbing, it was a really good cycle and at the top there were some really big crowds.

One of the more enthusiastic members of the crowd

As we all waited for the cyclists to come through the atmosphere slowly built as more police motorbikes than I've seen in my life went through clearing the road followed by some of the team cars then in the distance we could see the helicopter meaning the cyclists weren't far away. The cyclists were really shifting considering the gradient of the climb with some looking as though they were finding it harder than others. I managed to see all the big contenders including Mark Cavendish and the gold jersey.

The Gold Jersey (Leading rider in the tour of Britain)

After all the cyclists had gone through along with the broom wagon there was mass exodus by all the cyclists that had come up to watch. I took a scenic route back through Dartmoor back to Torquay.

Up close and personnal with the Tour of Britain cyclists

My training is progressing just about as well as I could have hoped for and on Saturday morning I met with my good friend Adharanand Finn. This was the first time I have met Finn on English soil as we met out in Iten. Finn moved out there about the same time as I when I first went out and we met at a cross country race in Eldoret. Finns reason for being out in Iten was that he was/is writing a book called "Running with the Kenyans" (which you can pre-order on Amazon) I can't wait for the book to come out as in some ways it mirrors the experiences I had whilst living out in Kenya so to relive it through someone Else's eyes will be brilliant.

Finn out in Iten proudly displaying his "Iten Town Harriers" racing vest

Jogging Along

It's been a while since I last posted and I am now based down in Torquay as my injuries seem to have cleared up and my training is progressing quite well. I love it down here for running although the wind isn't much fun at the moment but I guess that would be the same wherever I was based in the country.

Haven't been up to that much over the past month but I did spend a day at the Notting Hill Carnival with my "fresh from Amsterdam" friend Mark. It was a good day out with a good atmosphere although I probably won't go again.

Notting Hill Carnival

There were some great GB performances at the recent World Championships, I was really pleased to see Hannah England win the silver medal in the 1500m. I've known Hannah since she was 14 or 15 and feel she was unlucky not to make the GB team for the last Worlds and Olympics, but a brilliant performance and a definite chance of medalling next year on home soil. Another superb performance that didn't get much notice was Dave Webb in the marathon, gaining a top 20 finish which counts as an Olympic A standard, pretty much guaranteeing his place on the GB team for next years Olympics. I have also known Webby for many years, living with him while we were at Uni in Birmingham. Webby was one of those runners who was never the best as a youngster but through perserverance, hard work and some smart training has turned himself into one of the top distance runners in the UK, a real inspiration for runners like myself.

Webby and his wife Sian after this years London Marathon

I paid a visit to my Kenyan palls in London this weekend just gone and even managed to keep with them for a 40 minute run through the streets of London. Some good reults for the Run-Fast team, Edwin retained his title at the Bristol Half Marathon with another Run-Fast athlete Allan in second. We had both the winners in the Robin Hood Half Marathon as well as the Cardiff 10km where one of our new guys Milton in his first race outside Kenya ran a blistering 27.44, winning by nearly two minutes!!

Hopefully I can stay injury free and get in some good consistent training and look at possibly racing some time in October.

Longest Run, Longest Ride

A vast improvement on the injury and last week I managed about 25miles in total with a longest run of 40 minutes yesterday (Sunday), I followed this with my longest bike ride to date, a 143mile round trip from Tiptree to Southwold (and back).

Lunch stop in Southwold

The weather was absolutely perfect for a nice long ride, warm but not too hot with only a slight breeze, and Southwold was a great stop for lunch where I had the best sausage roll ever, it was worth cycling there just for that!!

So with my injury nearly cleared up I can concentrate on building the miles up and getting back into some sort of shape. I think a marathon this year is probably out of the question but I'm sure I can start racing again in a month or so.

The long slow road to recovery

First post for a while as I haven't had too much to write about. First things first, the beard has gone, much to my mothers delight.

With Beard

With Moustache (definitely now gone!)

My injury seems to be clearing up and last week I managed a total of 4 miles for the week, consisting of 4 x 1mile runs. On each run I still had some discomfort but every day it takes a bit longer for the discomfort to start. This week I have upped the run length to 2miles, it's all going in the right direction but it's going to take some time before I'm firing on all cylinders.

On a brighter note, I purchased myself a second hand but pretty much brand new road bike and have been keeping fit with cycling and absolutely loving it! I have to keep reminding myself that I'm a runner not a cyclist, but like I say at least it's keeping me fit.

My new bike (the smaller red one)