Sleeping with the Enemy

 

 

Since the Islands Peaks race I haven't been running very well.  I am injured.  Yes, four weeks to the big one and I have a swollen lump on my shin across the tendon that goes from the top of my foot.  No worries I had felt it niggle after my fling run so I am sure it will go away again.  On Thursday I went out and ran just over seven miles but the last two were a nightmare with pain around the tendon and my ankle.  Straight away I decided I needed time off running and started to ice and take nurofen.  I surfed the net and found that it can be a common injury for Ultra-Marathoners or runs that have a lot of ascent.  Heck, the peaks had both.  But after a few days the swelling went down but the hair around the area all fell out and now looks like a small plucked chicken.  Weird.

Today though it felt sufficiently better to go out with the Lomond Mountain Rescue to support a charity walk up Ben Lomond.  The charity was The Rangers Charity Foundation which is a worry because I am a Celtic supporter but it is for charity so it's for a good cause.

My job was to go to the top and check off each person as they made it.  What I didn't know was that they were taking the Scottish Cup to the top so that each charity walker could have their picture taken with it.  So each Ranger supporter posed for a picture and each of them quipped "It should have been the UEFA cup"  There was of course a lot of Celtic comments but there was no way I would say anything.  Not out of fear but because no matter what team they supported each and every one of them had raised a lot of money and had made it to the top of the Ben.  Good on them I thought.

Connal, the chap that organised it, didn't take a hand off the cup all day.  He seriously looked worried about something happening to it.  I don't blame him as it is 114 years old.  I asked if it was a replica and they told me it was the actual one that Rangers won the day before.

Anyway he needed to do something and asked if I could hold onto it for two minutes.  Well at least one Tim got his hands on the cup this year. :-)

The Scottish Cup and me on top of Ben Lomond

I also just want to add congratulations to everyone that ran this weekend.  Caroline for a fantastic PB, Neal for surviving Edinburgh un-injured, John for getting 1:25:56 beating his goal for 2008 of running faster than 1:27 for a half and Ian for running 2 marathons.  Stornoway and Edinburgh.  Well done Ian.  Also thank you Ian for inspiring me to writing on my blog when he sent me an email wondering what happened to my posts.

Triple Thursday Taper

STONEYMOLLAN RUN

As I am not able to go to training with Garscube tonight I thought that it would be a good idea to do one of my old favourites.  My Stoneymollan run.  A great 7.5 mile run over the hills behind my house.  I woke up early thinking that this may be the chance to try out my new head torch that hadn't yet been tested outside the dark bathroom.  With the clocks still to go forward, at 6am the sun already looked like it had been up for a couple of hours and so that put that idea on the back burner. 

The idea of doing this run was to take it easy as I have the big WHW run on Saturday and this was meant to be a taper day.  However 20 minutes into the run it looked like I was finally going to beat the one hour mark for this run.  A long standing goal for a long time.  And so I was upping the pace yet again.  My record attempt wasn't being helped by the fact that I startled a dog walker whose dogs tried to attack me.  One even trying to take a bite.  The owner warned me "There is another dog in the field further on, but don't worry it has a muzzle"  Joy.  Luckily it must have been smaller because I didn't see it.

Onto the run and into the snow.  Good day for ankle socks and the numbing freezing pain in them was weird even although my feet were nice, warm and cosy.  From the top there was fantastic views of Ben Lomond.  No time to enjoy though and glad to be going back down hill.  The pace picking up and I was flying through Balloch but hit a low point by Christie Park.  A look at my watch soon gave me the energy needed and I finished strong.

7.52 mi 57:52 @ 7:42min/mi.  Elev +281m - 279m

Woohoo.  New record and finally beat the 1hour mark

 

RAPID RECOVERY

Feeling on a high from this morning I decided to go for a recovery run before Mountain Rescue.  Bad Idea.  Why do I always try to squeeze the most out of a day.  I had 30 minutes to do 4.5 miles.

Only point of note was getting hit by a car.  No-ones fault.  He looked one way and I ran the other.  He was probably doing all of 4 miles /hr.  It hurt my hand more than anything.

4.66mi in 29.22 @ 6.18 / mi

 

MOUNTAIN RESCUE

I was getting tired by now and 12 miles of hard running was taking affect.  Not to worry.  It was GPS / Map reading training tonight and that meant an easy night of wandering around a wood.  Wrong.  To make things more fun they decided an orienteering course would be fun.  So it was on with the running shoes again.  Andy Birnie who is in the team is also a runner with Bellahouston Road Runners with similar times to me and we were warned not to team up.  We ignored this and teamed up.  Good news though I could test my head torch.  And what a head torch it is.  A few people in the team I am sure will have one next time we meet up.  It's a Petzl Myro XP and I have posted about it before.  One word. Fab.  Not sure of the distances but Andy and me finished in 29 minutes.  31 minutes quicker than the 2nd place.  There was a prize for the winners but because Andy and I weren't allowed to team up we got disqualified.  Oh well.

 

So today I must have done nearly 15 miles of running.  So much for the taper.

Sonic on Conic

After yesterday's tough run Debbie and I decided a nice long lie and a walk up Conic Hill would be a nice way to relax today.  After three lovely bacon sandwiches (in my bed and made by Debbie) and an hour of Jeremy Kyle we at last started to get our stuff together.  At that moment I received a call out from the Mountain Rescue.  A woman had broken her leg on yes you guessed it, Conic Hill.

When we got to Conic Hill we were stood down as a paramedic helicopter was dispatched to fly her off the hill and the Mountain Rescue was no longer needed.  Debbie and I were joined by Joe from the MR team for the walk up the hill.

At the top we found that the paramedic helicopter was still there and had broken down.  So the woman had to be rescued by a Sea King helicopter.  Ever felt that you have been in the right place at the right time.  Well this was one of those days as I took photos of the helicopter and sold one to the Daily Express with the money being donated to our charity.  The Yorkhill Childrens Foundation.  All good.