Misty morning run

Saw the weather forecast and deduced using my amazing meteorological talents (there was a fog symbol) that there might be an inversion, so decided to get up early with the dog and go and see if i could get above it.

It was a bit dark for good photos but indeed a fine layer of fog lay in the valley and half way up south head we emerged into lovely clear morning air.

I took ages taking photos then realised i was going to be late for work so dashed back and had to go to work smelly as i didn't have time for a shower. Not sure anyone noticed the difference though..

Mellor MTB

So, went for a pleasant mountain bike ride with Steve and Trevor today. Weather alternated between bright sunshine and heavy haily showers but was on the most part good. Started from Steve's in Marple bridge and proceeded for a short distance before stopping for some saddle fettling. This would turn out to be the theme for the first part of the ride, as Steve and I hadnt ridden our bikes for some time resulting in lots of annoying failures. At one point my rear wheel fell off, i must have not tightened it after bleeding the brakes ages ago.. woops! Luckily i was going up hill at the time so no damaged occurred to bike or alun.

So after a rocky start (fnar) we made it to the track leading up to the shooting cabin, which was tricky as always, then a nice descent down into hayfield for a cup of tea and cake. This is a feature of cycling with other people that i like, i never feel like stopping on my own. So cake consumed we headed off into a hailstorm, which made me quite cold but soon cycling up to lantern pike warming me up, then the sun came out and it was fine for the rest of the ride.

At one point we passed the mysterious robin hoods picking rods, which steve had warned me not to get too excited about as it was just a couple of stones. Which it was, but at least i saw them and could marvel about their origin. Soon we were back at the car and ready to come home and clean my bike. A fine day completed!

Walkies

Went out for a walk of one of my running routes with Ffin on wednesday, ended up pretty knackered (me that is). We also had a run in with a water filled cattle grid, which resulted in much mirth and soggyness.


Nice path down near Wash.

Stream was full from all the rain.

Pennine bridleway towards South Head, nice for Ffin to be let off and run about. She especially like reeds for rolling about on, not sure why.

Stay still dammit!

Coming down Beet lane before our cattle grid encounter.

Evening South Head Excursion

Did a short loop with Steve this week, up South head after work. After the lovely weather I was hoping for some nice photos but it started off very grey and flat.


Mint sauce!

Steve surmounting South Head with Brown Knoll and Swines back in the background.

Finally on the way down the sun briefly came out a nice rainbow appeared over South Head, nice!

Dogs dogs dogs

Last week we went for a little walk around Macclesfield forest, with a few of Ffins family. Walking around the woods with 6 dogs four of whom are mental puppies is fun.. except when they all go to say hello to someone who was happily walking along one moment in a dog free world, only to be surrounded by panting maniacs the next.

Anyway here are some photos for your approval (I have forgotten ALL the names so I have made them up):


Barry with his stick, he liked sticks.

Little Artist formerly known as Prince got stuck in a gate.

Barry with another stick.

Puppies!

Dog cam with Fredrick the third.

Lots of dogs.

Dogs sitting for a treat.

Ffin was the only one that kept jumping up.. the shame.

Barry expands his stick collection.

More treats plaz

Mallorca 312

So a week last Saturday was my big goal for this Spring, the Mallorca 312. We arrived on the wednesday night to heavy winds and rain, which pretty much continued until we left! The race day itself was a mix of cloudy and heavy rain through the mountains and also later on. I managed it in 13:50 hrs, ten minutes under the cut off. My compadres managed it in 17 hours (two finishing and one abandoning after oh only 250km - cycling on spanish roads in the rain and dark is one thing, doing it when your lights die is one step too far!). I was planning to write a nice proper write up of the route but I seem to have contracted writers block so I'm going to just blurt out some impressions i had.

- Cycling in Mallorca is nice, the km's just seem to fly by on the smooth roads, even in foul weather it was pretty good.
- To get under 14 hours in the 312 you had to be part of a group unless you were some kind of double hard turbo nutter.
- Cycling in Mallorca in a group of 30+ riders is FUN and also FAST, especially with a police escort.
- The group does not slow down when you want to get a gel out.
- The group does not slow down even when you're so tired you go temporarily blind and start believing in god.
- The group does stop for nice long stops at the designated stations (this is how i leapfrogged one or two groups!)
- Spanish riders are cool and very vocal, no idea what they were saying but pretty sure it was all pretty positive.
- Swiss riders don't like being called German.
- 13km descents are exciting, when you factor in coaches and rain, possibly too exciting.
- When going out for a nice 20km spin the day after an event, take a puncture repair kit.
- When totally rain-soaked and having a sneaky wee stop, take care not to wee down your leg and into your shoe and also onto your water bottle.
- Always demand your finishers t-shirt (i failed in this aspect).
- Taking your own bike on holiday is great and surprisingly easy.

Erm thats about it for now, maybe i will remember more as time passes by. It's all getting a bit rosy to be honest, but I'm pretty sure it was quite hard. What next i wonder?

Kinder Downfall Race

So ran the Kinder Downfall race on Sunday... was hoping for a good time despite having done no running recently (but a reasonable amount on the bike).

After a bit of hanging around at the start and a nice pep talk from the organiser then off we went up the first hill to the shooting cabin. My previous experience with this race has taught me not to go off to fast here, so I plodded along trying to keep my pace steady and to avoid chasing people who were clearly much faster. This worked out pretty well and I got to the moor around the shooting cabin feeling pretty fresh, then the quick run down to the bottom of william clough before more steady pacing up meant I was feeling pretty pleased with myself towards the the first checkpoint at the top of the clough.

As we got to the top a brisk wind was blowing, which was fine.. been up on kinder many a time in a gale. What I hadn't counted on however was my fancy new glasses. Turns out they are less aerodynamic and prone to catching the wind than my old pair. Sure enough a little further on a big gust blew them clear off my face into a large pile of snow. Now being pretty blind without them I set about staggering about trying to locate them but to no avail... luckily for me a few other runners had detected my plight and come to help and the glasses were soon found. I'm not sure you get this kind of willingness to lose seconds helping a fellow runner out in other sports but it seems common in fell races.. brilliant.

Anyway after many profuse thank you's and kissing of shoes I set off again, but the glasses were not staying on.. so I decided to ask a couple of hardy spectators who were hiding behind a medium sized rock (yes it was very windy) if they had some string. Brilliantly they did and I spent some time behind the rock fashioning a device to keep me specs on me head.

By this point i had pretty much given up the concept of getting a good time but I was pretty keen to get round without ending up in Edale so set off again. The wind was ferocious and kept blowing my glassess off (luckily caught by my string device). This made progress slow and some experiments with running glassess-less proved a little risky. Still the sight of the downfall blowing upwards spurred me on and soon I was passing under the spray and finally turning head on into the wind towards kinder low. It was a pleasure to not have to worry about my glasses any more and I must admit i did do a bit of slipstreaming behind some bigger chaps. Usually this part is the hardest for me but after all my resting and falling over and general blundering I was still quite fresh.. brilliant.

On reaching kinder low I started the long fast descent.. usually where i get overtaken a lot.. however this time I seemed to have a bit more in the tank than those around me and I started to pick off people one by one. This felt good and it continued until the last flat road section, where I tried my best to immitate a road runner and managed to drop a few more people and overtake a few. Before I knew it I was coming through the playground and ahhh it's all over. Time of around 1:35, which is four minutes or so off my best but I like to think with all the blind staggering and wind that it was pretty good. A pint of beer and then back on the bike for the short ride up to peep o day to home and I was back on the sofa pretty well knackered but very happy. What a great race the Downfall is!

Here's the strava wotsit: