A Tangled Web....

A friend of mine emailed the following story to me this week (stay with it - it's pretty good):

A professor stood before his philosophy class and had some items in front of him. When the class began, wordlessly, he picked up a very large and empty mayonnaise jar and proceeded to fill it with golf balls. He then asked the students if the jar was full. They agreed that it was.

The professor then picked up a box of pebbles and poured them into the jar. He shook the jar lightly. The pebbles rolled into the open areas between the golf balls. He then asked the students again if the jar was full. They agreed it was.

The professor next picked up a box of sand and poured it into the jar. Of course, the sand filled up everything else. He asked once more if the jar was full. The students responded with a unanimous 'yes'.

The professor then produced two glasses of wine from under the table and poured the entire contents into the jar, effectively filling the empty space between the sand. The students laughed.

'Now,' said the professor, as the laughter subsided, ‘I want you to recognize that this jar represents your life. The golf balls are the important things; your family, your children, your health, your friends and your favourite passions; things that if everything else was lost and only they remained, your life would still be full. The pebbles are the other things that matter like your job, your house, and your car. The sand is everything else; the small stuff. If you put the sand into the jar first,' he continued, 'there is no room for the pebbles or the golf balls. The same goes for life. If you spend all your time and energy on the small stuff, you will never have room for the things that are important to you.

'Pay attention to the things that are critical to your happiness. Play with your children. Take time to get medical checkups. Take your partner out to dinner. Play another 18. Do one more run down the ski slope. There will always be time to clean the house and fix the disposal. Take care of the golf balls first; the things that really matter. Set your priorities. The rest is just sand.'

One of the students raised her hand and inquired what the wine represented. The professor smiled. 'I'm glad you asked. It just goes to show you that no matter how full your life may seem, there's always room for a couple of glasses of wine with a friend.'

A rather curious start to this week’s blog, I admit, but, as I enter a very busy period in my professional working calendar, I am trying to make sure that I don’t lose sight of those things which are important to me - the golf balls - and I find that the only way to do so is by organising my time efficiently. Enter ‘mind-mapping’….

Mind-mapping is a fantastic new find for me. It helps me organise my days so well such that I manage, just, to keep my head above water. Curiously, mind-mapping works not be remembering things (as the title would suggest) but by plotting things down on paper in a spider-web type format (see the image up top). I start the day by writing my mind map, which is made up of all the jobs I need to do that day, and ticking each one off as they are done. Some jobs lead to others which is where the map can look a little messy, but it’s not half as messy as if it was all in my head.

Recently, my training has benefited from a bit of mind-mapping. At the beginning of the week I sit down and plan what I am going to do that week and, often, this leads to other sessions. For instance, this coming week I intend doing a brick session (hard bike, followed by hard run), and so the map will show a ‘run’ and ‘bike’ sprouting off from the ‘brick’ bubble, then specific instructions sprouting off from each of those. Confused?

I have found that this type of organisation has revolutionarised both my professional life and personal life. Similar to the internet and email, I don’t know how I ever coped without it.

Having found some 'mojo' this week, I was able to put in a little more training than usual, but as it is nearing the end of the season, I have not been at full-steam. This week’s training looked like this:-

Monday – swim - club swim - intervals

Tuesday – no training
Wednesday – no training
Thursday – run - 45 minute tempo run

Friday – run with my mate Alex - long(ish), hilly Ashridge run, 63 minutes - 3rd fastest ever time

Saturday – no training

Sunday – bike - 10 mile time-trial, time 25:23 - 2nd fastest ever time - very pleasing final TT of the year

Next week’s exercise mind-map simply looks like this:-

You might notice that the only entry is my final race of the season on Sunday - the Bedford Autumn Sprint. I have competed in this race for a few years now and Sunday's race will be a true test of how my training has progressed throughout this season. Last year I came 49th out of 260 with a time of 1:15:47. I already have it mapped out in my mind how I am going to approach this race - something which, for once, I don't need a spider's web to help me with.

Cheers.

C

Desperately Seeking Mojo, Baby!

One of my pet hates (and I know this is going to sound ridiculous) is when people end their sentences at a higher pitch. You know what I mean – making a statement but making it sound like a question. Read this sentence out loud:

“I’m going to the shops?”

Or, how about:

“I’m feeling very happy today?”

Annoying, isn’t it? No? Well I think it is.

I have heard that we have our Australian cousins, in particular their daily soaps (Neighbours, Home and Away, etc.) to thank for this particular type of talking. It is predominantly spoken by teenagers and 20-somethings, but more recently I have even heard it spoken by people in their 30's and 40's. Arghhh! They should be bound and gagged, simple as.

There has been a definite proliferation of peculiarities like this filtering into society over recent years. Another is ‘text language’. Now, I think texting is a great way of communicating if you have something you need to say quickly and be done with it – something like ‘on my way home, put the kettle on’ or ‘go upstairs and wait for me there’ :-). What annoys the hell out of me, though, is the terrible abbreviations in 'text speak’ which make the whole thing incomprehensible, i.e. "gtg, spk l8r", translated as “got to go, speak later”. Texts are great, but, please, please don’t let the grammar and spelling slip. There’s no need for that.

A particular word which has sneaked into the English language recently, and one which I am hearing on a daily basis, is ‘mojo’. This is a definition of the term ‘mojo’ from Wikipedia:-

'Mojo (pronounced /ˈmoʊdʒoʊ/) is a term commonly encountered in the African-American folk belief called hoodoo. A mojo is a type of magic charm, often of red flannel cloth and tied with a drawstring, containing botanical, zoological, and/or mineral curios, petition papers, and the like. It is typically worn under clothing.'

In popular British culture, the term 'mojo' is used to express one’s level of happiness, and I think it has become popular since being used by Austin Powers. How it has gone from being a magic charm to an indicator of happiness I’ll never know, but that’s not important in the context of this week's blog.

The point of all this is to say that I have lost my mojo (which I think you could have guessed by the 'angry' tone of the opening paragraphs!). Well and truly. It does happen occasionally, usually when I am overworked, under-exercised, under-fed and under-slept, but strangely I think that it is now because I am actually over-raced and feeling a little burnt out from the constant weekly racing. You see, weekends, in the context of triathlon, should be spent training, with the odd race interspersed here and there, but instead I am racing every weekend and hardly training at all. My sleep is being affected, as is my nutrition strategy. My work is very busy at the moment too which I think is also contributing to my current loss of mojo.

So, here I am, not training and with little enthusiasm, frankly, to do anything. Look at this paltry display of training over the past week:-

Monday – no training

Tuesday – no training

Wednesday – no training

Thursday – bike - 10 mile time-trial, time 25:59 - three seconds quicker than last time (four weeks ago)

Friday – no training

Saturday – monster brick session - bike - hard interval session, 1 hour 40 minutes - run – easy at 177 strides per minute, incorporating hops, strides and sprints, 45 minutes

Sunday – no training

I think I just need to give myself a good kick up the backside and get back to work, both socially and professionally. I plan to take the brakes off after the Bedford Sprint on 5th October for a month in order to recuperate, but until then I need to find my mojo again. I know it's there, ready and waiting - its just finding it which is the issue.

Big-up this week to Jim from the tri club for a fantastic performance at the challenging New Forest Middle Distance, placing 27th out of 326 finishers!

Cheers and next week I will be more cheerful. That's a promise, Baby!

Colin

Inspirations and Innervisions

Highlight of the week is without doubt last Monday’s Stevie Wonder concert – his first UK live appearance in over 10 years and I woz there!

From the opening number – 'All Blues' (a Miles Davis cover) – to the close with the fabulous 'Superstition', we were mesmerized by the man’s talent and showmanship. It was easy to forget that he is blind, such are the wonder (no pun intended) of his songs and musicianship.

Stevie Wonder was blinded from complications at birth and so has no concept of what the world looks like, other, I suppose, than what he can make of it from his other senses and in his imagination. Despite this, or maybe because of this, he developed an amazing talent for song-writing and performing at a very early age. His breakthrough came at the age of 12 when he had a major hit with ‘Fingertips’ (with a young Marvin Gaye on drums). Such an inspiration to us all.

How can one not also be inspired by our fantastic paralympians? We thought that our able-bodied team did well (and they did), but what about their less-abled counterparts? The medal board currently shows that we are in second place – behind China but, more significantly, ahead of the Yanks, with 40 golds, 22 silvers and 25 bronzes. Wow!

There has been a noticeable increase in disabled triathletes at races at which I have participated recently. At last week’s miserable Vitruvian (see previous blog post) there were athletes who were cycling on their specially adapted wheelchairs (blinged up with Zipps!). A couple of weeks prior to this at the Bedford Olympic they were there too. And the same goes for this week’s race – the Dorney Orca Olympic distance at Dorney Lake, the same venue as the very popular Eton Super-Sprints.

All this has been very humbling. I am honoured and priviledged to be racing with these phenominally gifted and determined athletes and to line up with them on the start line provides fantastic inspiration as the season nears its end.

So, to this week’s training and racing – training was put to the back burner in order to recover from the Vit and also to taper for the Orca Olympic, but here is what I did (don’t laugh!):-

Monday – recovery day
Tuesday – recovery day
Wednesday – recovery day/tapering
Thursday – run – Ashridge XC with Alex – 5’ish miles – as fast as possible at 177 strides per minute
Friday – tapering
Saturday – tapering
Sunday – race – a very enjoyable Dorney Orca Olympic (1500m open water swim, 40km bike, 10km run) – 2:31:04 (just missing out on my second sub-2:30 of the year!) - see photos below (copyright the lovely Anne-Marie – thanks A-M, the best supporter
in the world!)





A big well done to Jev who, returning from a post Ironman Austria period of easy training and racing, posted a fantastic 1:10 in the Dorney Orca Sprint distance. Results not up yet so don't know his placing, but you can bet it'll be up there with the big boys.

This coming week I need to get back into the swing of things. The last two weeks have been a bit of a washout because of the Vit – the first week tapering, the second recovering – and so I will be increasing the intensity for my next (and final) race of the season – the Bedford Autumn Sprint on 5 October.

Another inspirational song by Mr Wonder last Monday was ‘Visions’ from the 1973 Grammy award winning album ‘Innervisions’ (a must-have for any self-respecting music fan). A beautiful song which brought the house down - all about the hope that a world of peace might one day exist. For me, my current vision is less dramatic (and a lot more selfish), and is my hope that I can emulate those fantastic less-abled athletes with a similar display of determination when I compete in those much-anticipated World Championship qualifying races next year.

Cheers, and bye for now.

C

Right then, children, what have we learnt today?

Adam, my youngest son, will be taking his 11+ exam in a few weeks time. If he passes he will be eligible for acceptance into one of the highly commended Grammar schools in Aylesbury, so it is quite important, although some might question whether or not so much pressure is good for the kids at such an early age.

For the uninitiated, 11+ questions are sorted into specific groups. They do not test general knowledge but instead they test an individual’s aptitude and ability to solve problems. Over the past few months I have been coaching Adam, in addition to his private tuition and school lessons, for the exam which he is taking early October. More recently this has concentrated on those particular types of questions with which he has been having particular difficulty.

This week’s question-type which Adam has learnt is type “C”. Here’s an example:-

If the code for TRAP is USBQ, what does DPME mean? The answer is COLD (I’ll leave you to figure out why).

It's all about learning the ‘method’. If you can do this then you will get all the questions correct; if not and they’ll all be wrong. Adam has learnt the method this week and, consequently, has got all the type C questions correct. The look on his face when the penny dropped was priceless.

I too learnt something very important this week and that is that I must not enter races unprepared. Take Saturday’s Vitruvian, for example. Whilst I am generally fit and ready for Sprint and Olympic distances, my fitness is nowhere near what it should be to take on anything longer.

From the moment I got out of the swim the race was sheer hell. My legs were shot to pieces and I had incredible lower back pains after 30 miles of the 50 mile bike. Getting off the bike, I could not feel my legs, and things just went downhill from there. For some reason, as I crossed the finish line I actually broke down in tears. I’m not sure why, but I think it was out of relief that I had finished and also anger at myself for having put myself through it all.



Truth be told, I only entered the race to join in with the other members of the club, but what has it done for me? I have raced over much harder courses, but I cannot recall any other race where I have struggled more to get past the finish line. I didn’t enjoy it and I am now a totally spent force for the coming week’s training. It wasn’t part of my season-plans at the beginning of the year, and it has cost me a small fortune.

I know now, more than ever, that I must not veer from my pre-arranged training schedule merely for the sake of vanity. I have been there, seen it, done it, etc. and have nothing to prove to myself at long distance races, so I must stick with what my coach Mark K has told me to do and nothing else. If I don’t then I know it will all end in more tears.

Very little training this week as I was tapering for the Vit, but here’s what I did anyway (in Portugal until Tuesday):-

Monday – run – progressions at 5k pace
Tuesday – run – fast 5k time-trial – 2 minutes faster than over same course last year
Wednesday – rest day (tapering)

Thursday – rest day (tapering)
Friday – rest day (tapering)
Saturday – race – Vitruvian Middle Distance tri (1900m swim, 85k bike, 21k run) – 5:39:52 (see some of the Shires Triers contingent below - from left to right: Jo, Rob (aka Bananaman), Paul's son (not racing!), Paul, Me)
Sunday – recovery day

Big ups to Jo for being the fastest Shire of the day, and to Tracey who completed her season aim and finished her first long distance race, but I think most congratulations should go to Paul Clutten who chopped off a whole 30 minutes from last year’s time at the same race. Goes to show what some hard, specific training can do.

But my biggest congratulations of all over the weekend must go to my good friend Robert Collis who placed first in his age group at the washed-out Northampton Olympic. Bob is a bit of a poser and so couldn’t resist sending me a couple of pics which I shall share with you all below. If you look closely in the second picture you will see a tent, half submerged, in the distance!





EDIT: Another big fat pat on the back to another friend from the tri club, Dan, who I have just found out managed a fantastic top 25% place in his first ever Olympic at the aforementioned Northampton wash-out. Dan hasn't ran 6 miles for over a year and yet still beats my PB! Git! Well done, Dan.

Next week it will be back to run-specific stuff, culminating in the Dorney Lake Orca Olympic distance race, my penultimate race in a very long and enjoyable season. Am looking forward to it very much.

Before then, though, I am off to see Stevie Wonder at Birmingham NIA on Monday in one of his rare UK concerts. As a big life-long fan I couldn’t resist the temptation of tickets as soon as I heard he was coming to the UK. A particular favourite song of mine is "Uptight", which is exactly how I feel right now about how I needlessly, but temporarily, let my training go off course.

Cheers.

C

Mr Blue Sky

Sun is shinin’ in the sky,
There ain’t a cloud in sight,
It’s stopped rainin’,
Everybody’s in a play,
And don’t you know,
It’s a beautiful new day, hey, hey

Hey there Mr Blue,
We’re so pleased to be with you,
Look around, see what you do,
Everybody smiles at you

Lyrics sung by Jeff Lynne of pop band ELO circa 1977 in the Number One song Mr Blue Sky. This past week has been filled with Mr Blue Sky during my annual trip away with the little Colin’s to Portugal’s Algarve where the sun beat down on us everyday with 30+ temperatures.

I was a big fan of ELO in my pre-teenage years, although I was alone with this fascination whilst the rest of my friends were jamming to the Jam and blocking to the Blockheads. Nonetheless, my love of Messrs Lynne, Bevan et. al. always reminds me of my early years.

Another early childhood memory was my frequent visits to the Kingsbury Lido in North London during the Summer months where, together with my brother Graeme, we would visit my grandparents each year. I have since retained a (some might call) nerdy passion for Lido’s (an Italian term, originating from Venice, pronounced ‘Leedo’, not ‘Lydo’), using them for both social and training purposes.

Lido’s are open-air pools, built predominantly in the 1930’s of magnificent architecture and design, but which have since gone into mass decline due to the costs of their upkeep and the low demand in the UK for open-air swimming. The Kingsbury pool has, alas, been one of those casualties, having been demolished and grassed over in 1994.

Over the summer I have been taking the kids to a local lido in Eversholt, the location of a sprint triathlon in which I participated, organised by Big Cow back in 2005, ironically before my most recent interest in all-things-Lido had re-ignited. The lido is a favourite of mine because it is in a beautiful location overlooking the village green. When the kids are mucking around in the water I can chill in the heat (an anomaly in itself) with a beer and picnic on the grass.

I have also been visiting the ponds at Hampstead Heath which, believe it or not, are also considered to be Lidos amongst the Lido fraternity. The Heath is such a wonderfully idyllic place, particularly on the grass by the ‘mixed’ pond, and it is great just to sit there and people-watch.

Very nearby the ponds is the Parliament Hill Lido. This is a 70-or-so metre pool at which I, along with my mates Simon and Alex, undertook a 5 ½ kilometre Swimathon a couple of years ago. The Swimathon was part of our training for the 2006 Ironman Austria. Shortly before this, we had cycled up to Cambridge to the magnificent 100-yard Jesus Green Lido as part of another training session.

And so all this brings me back to the beginning of the week where I raced the fourth and final Thames Turbo sprint triathlon. Location? The Hampton Lido. A lido built in 1922 and heated to a whopping 28 degrees - see picture below. The Thames Turbo sprint series is a 4-race series raced annually over the Summer bank holidays and the final event was the bank holiday Monday just passed. Competing with Dan (a friend from my tri club), we had a tenner stake on who would win out of the two of us. As it happened, I got a DQ (my first ever) – for apparently jumping a red light (don't ask!) – and Dan did a DNF because he was still carrying a cold caught earlier in the week – a fact of which I am grateful because I was odds on for losing my stake money – and so we are arranging a re-match sometime soon. Despite the DQ, a highly recommended series of races, and great for comparing your times over the season and gauging your improvements (or not) in speed over the same course.



My sun-kissed training over the week looked like this (in Portugal from Tuesday):-

Monday – race - Thames Turbo sprint race 4 - 1:10:00 - DQ - position not recorded
Tuesday – rest day
Wednesday – rest day
Thursday – run - 5 mile tempo run
Friday – run - 5 miles hill and sprint repeats
Saturday – rest
Sunday - run - 5 miles fast pace and 5 miles interval

Next week (actually, this week - I am writing this blog on Wednesday evening), I am tapering for the Virtuvian (Middle Distance), so am scaling down my training.

So, having returned to good old Blighty and its wonderful Autumn weather – you know, strong wind, grey skies, cold temperatures – I look up to the sky, wish I was back in the Algarve, and humm the words not from Mr Blue Sky, but from Why Does It Always Rain on Me, by Travis.

Ahh, roll on next Summer, but until then here's a few giant-sized piccies of our Summer holiday to the sunny Algarve.......

First up, the kids enjoying a giant-sized Pepsi - from left to right there's Emily, Joe and Adam....



Next, some waterslide racing - there's Emily splashing home in first place (left), Joe second (middle) and Adam third (right)....



And, finally, Adam (or, rather, the top of his head) doing some star gazing...



Bye for now.

C