I Drink, therefore I Run

Marilyn Monroe and Tim Ewell in "The Seven Year Itch" (1955) They say that, no matter whether you take up running at 35, 45 or even older, you get between 5 and 8 years when you see improvement almost every time you run and race. Having taken up running again in 2007, about 20 years after leaving it behind at school, and initially targetting a local 10k, I can vouch for that. Within 3 years I'd dropped my time from 47:11 to a 'personal best' of 39:05, matched the following year on a tougher course - and I might have beaten it if I hadn't been knocked sideways rounding a bend on the final 100m by a corner-cutter! My weight fell by nearly 2.5 stone, and I completed several marathons, with my two best in 2010 and 2012. There's no doubt that between 4 and 6 years after starting, I hit my 'sweet spot'. And then it all just got harder. My first real lay off came from running two races on consecutive snowy, cold January Sundays, kicking off a ches...

Two events have encouraged me to start my running blog again. One was meeting my dearest friend Jason, who, having emigrated to Melbourne, has really embraced the 'running life', and is inspiring me with his glorious 10k morning runs in wonderful places. Here's a recent photo from his trip to Paris, before coming across to the UK, and a morning run... Secondly, the realisation that I have 30 weeks to the Brighton marathon, and the scales are tipping towards 172 lbs...about 10lbs over my fighting weight if I am going to do well. My running for the past months has been a bit sporadic - sufficient to keep a bit of fitness, but not in any sense 'training'. So...here we turn over a new leaf - I am going to allow 4 weeks of running as I fancy, and then start a 26-week lead-in to Brighton. Key to this is making running more fun, and re-capturing some running 'social', which I have really missed in my London jaunt. Also, making it less of a grind. With th...

October 2013 27.9 miles Rain and hail Blow, winds, and crack your cheeks! rage! blow! You cataracts and hurricanoes, spout Till you have drench’d our steeples, drown’d the cocks! subtle shoes MASI Campofiorin Intense, deep, dark ruby red colour; very viscous with purple edges. Strong and attractive cherry aromas on the nose with a pleasing spiciness. Great power and balance on the palate, with aromas of ripe fruit, cherries in spirit and blackcurrants. Soft and well balanced tannins benefitting from good acidity; long aftertaste with hints of vanilla and cocoa, just like an Amarone. Semi-dried grapes were added to the young wine and a second fermentation started to produce a double-ferment lasting 15 days. This enriches the colour, flavour and body of the wine, which is then aged in oak barrels for 18 months. Campofiorin is built to last and has the potential to age for a further fifteen to twenty years, but can certainly be enjoyed now too £12...

Bank Holiday weekend... 7 miles this morning, 3 miles at tempo pace, through the woods.. Belgian GP qualifying.. Papers.. 6pm... Beefeater (all we had in..) Fever Tree Lemon Ice Aaaahh!!

Greetings all. It's fair to say that the last 3 weeks have knocked me for six, with the horrible week of the chest infection (and no wine), and a couple of weeks of steadily getting better. So, it was with some trepidation that I stepped outside of the front door today for my first Sunday run in a while. Before I talk about that, Saturday brought an altogether nicer experience, in the form of a lunch with Janet at Hotel Terravina in the New Forest (well, edge of..Netley Marsh). For those who don't know, this is the recent venture of Gerard Basset (formerly of Hotel du Vin fame, now a Master of Wine, a Master Sommelier and winner of numerous worldwine prizes for generally being a great and super-knowledgeable chap in the world of vino). I have written on Terravina before. Its real draw for a wine-lover is that food and wine get equal billing and importance in the experience. So, you have lovely food (tasty, not huge portions) and a really great time with the wine list, includi...

Hmm...have got bronchitis..hence no running and nothing to drink either. Bored rigid waiting for the 7-10 days to clear up (and expecting the same again before I really start running again) So - little to report...

The snowy weather has put many things off course in the past few days..but we runners are a hardy bunch, and need only the glimmer of a possibility of a run to declare that all is well. And so it was with the Stubbington 10k, a well-known course for local speedsters, with only 100m of climb during the race (limited to 2 sharp inclines) and a mostly traffic free, pretty and well marshalled course. As well as excellent facilities, plenty of portaloos and lovely home basked cakes afterwards at a staggeringly good value 30p, you could hardly ask for more. A really great event...which, in the dark days of last week, we whispered 'might it be cancelled?' We waited patiently... However the good news rang out at 1pm yesterday, and so, this morning, slightly trepidatious about the journey down to Lee on Solent, I sallied forth into the cold and quiet morning on the M27, hardly a soul to be seen. I'd be lying if I didn't admit that the commencement of the falling of the powde...

Aha - a post today that neatly combines running and wine! Went out for a steady 5 miles last night, nothing too dramatic. It was cool but not as bitingly cold as the previous week. Dressed in long top and bottoms, but no beanie or gloves. As usual, after about 10 minutes the extremities had warmed up and all was well. After about 20 minutes I took the path by the park, which goes past a row of old farm cottages and an open field, which was shrouded in a very enigmatic mist, rising from the damp ground of the field. And, suddenly, within about 30 yards, the drop in temperature was immediately noticeable. Not having a thermometer with me (not being a critical part of a runner's kitbag!) I couldn't say if it was 1 or 4 degrees. However it was appreciable, and it got me thinking about what this might mean for the world of wine...and 'Terroir' The word "Terroir" is a peculiarly French word, which encapsulates all of the factors that are special and specific t...

It's been quite a while since I posted, so I must apologise to my (small) readership. And, I fear that I will be a further disappointment today as well, as I shall be talking about a beer! I have downloaded Blogger to my iPad, in the hope that it will encourage more blogging. So, today will be brief and we will see... Today was a beautiful morning, cool but not cold, dry, and fairly quiet. I was a bit later out running than planned, as I was enacting a small DIY repair on the bathroom light (oh yes!). Today, the challenge was to tackle Toot Hill, a fairly beefy incline about half way in, and I motored up it with ease, most satisfying. All in all a gentle 9 miler, as I knew I needed to retain energy for the afternoon of The Decorating Of The House For Christmas... For lunch, a glorious Trappist beer from the excellent beer shop in Bell Street, Romsey. I urge you to try both the beer and the shop out. What I had failed to consider was that a 33cl bottle at 11.5% is more al...

What a  glorious day! Time for something fresh to tickle the tastebuds. Out comes an old favourite, Gruner Veltliner from Austria. Do not be fooled by the thin bottle, it is a DRY WINE! And lovely too..real character. On the palate, spicy, minerally, fresh. Produced by Austria’s acclaimed Domäne Wachau estate from their beautiful terraced vineyards along the banks of the Danube. I shall be easting this with a chicken stir-fry, and that's a great match! (Waitrose £8.99)

Sunday was a good day. Went running in the morning. No more than an hour - I am still, after all, recovering from the marathon. I have been nursing a niggle in my right knee, and fearfully inching up the miles -3 ,4, 5 - to find the bite point when it hurts. So, what a pleasure it is not to find it after 8. Now, I did experience a bit of stiffness in the aforementioned muscle, but that's fine, we are on the right path. And I have one more week of doing what I want before I really get back into training. But for what, I wonder... I reflected on how the lack of a goal in running can make it all quite strange. I don't think many people are truly spontaneous, and just run when they fancy, with no thought of purpose. Maybe there are folk like that. Not the ones I meet, though. The need to have some kind of a target just makes it all make sense to me. It doesn't have to be a bold one, but it does need to be there. So, I have not yet set my sights on the next 3 months, I feel ho...

The race is run, the miles toiled through. Marathon number 5 and a personal best. 3h 18m 09s is forever mine in the annals of Marathon running. OK, it's not exactly a Kenyan pace, and I did just miss the 3h 15 which would be a Boston Qualifier standard. Doesn't matter. What does matter to me is that I ran it well.  I've always struggled to hold back the pace for the first few miles, the excitement of the event usually getting the better of me - and of course, having tapered down in the weeks prior, you feel springy, alive, like you can challenge the world. I know enough, now, to know that the feeling of elation can slip away from you in a heartbeat at about mile 16. It really is save now, spend later, where this race is concerned. I did find myself chasing a man dressed as a monk at mile 3...and then had to have a strong word with myself to slow, slow, slow... I am getting ahead in the story.  Sunday morning. 06.45am, Marriott, South Ken. Poor night's sle...

It's fair to say that my wine consumption habits are probably not the ideal pre-marathon training - however, in my pursuit of good-for-age running times, I am not prepared to don the hair shirt, which therefore tells you enough in the way of revealed preference for the amateur psychologist amongst you about the relative importance of the goal to me...ie important but not a 'be-all-and-end-all' kind of thing. So, the weekend prior to the marathon, two lovely wines to titivate the palate.  First up, Petaluma Riesling 2011 (Waitrose, about £11?). This was so perfect with a stir-fry, all lovely ripe citrus and lime fruits, juiciness personified in the mouth, and with a clean finish that just lingered on. These cool-climate Rieslings from Australia (Clare Valley this time) are just sensational. And, whilst they are not exactly unknown to the wine drinking community, still, I think that too many people are put off by a tall brown bottle - some kind of Pavlovian reaction ...

9 days to go to the marathon. Perhaps what I did not to have to deal with was a sharp, continuous pain in the right knee after about 3 miles... Today's treatment is the glorious 'dry needling' which is every bit as unpleasant as it sounds. It's like acupuncture without the soothing music... We shall see if it does the trick!

I am in curious time right now. 16 days to the marathon, so the running plan is definitely in taper mode. The usual plan is to cut the miles, but maintain the intensity. My last two weeks of training have been compromised by going to Italy (pasta, house, heat, wine, mozzarella di bufala, hills, time..) and a knee problem that seems to come on at mile 3. So, I have missed my last big long run and the one before that wasn't perfect. I've read enough to know that the right approach is not to panic, most people rarely hit 80% of their plan, and I do have a lot of the fitness banked. And on the day I will be able to manage, it feels like this is in the category of 'painful but not damaging'. However this stage of training is all about the mind - trusting in the work completed, relying on years of experience that says your muscles need 3 weeks to feel fresh, and knowing that you cannot 'cram' the training now, even if your knee was fine - which is isn't. So, a...

A great run today. I signed up for the Silverstone half marathon again this year. It is a fabulous event, well organised, and highly exciting. Given the central position, and a venue that can soak up a 200,000 crowd, it deals easily with more like 20,000. It is also off road, and thus has a 12 o'clock start (well, 12.05 actually, as they held it for a bit because of queues on the going road, ironically...). And of course I am a F1 fan, so the opportunity to run on the hallowed ground is surely only akin to a football fanatic having a training session at Wembley. And, I got to see the new stand, and run on the new track and pit lane. Fab! The morning was simply lovely. Crisp, fresh spring had properly 'sprung'. As I rounded Oxford, a couple of air balloons rose gently and majestically. I would love to have been in them - if it had not interfered with the race, of course!  I followed the pacer for the first 3 miles, then stepped out a bit myself, and managed to hit my ...

Last night. Home from work, feeling very tired. Need to do a hard session. Legs still from the day before. Very easy just to say no... ...and then you don't. So, you head out, and after you have passed the 'terrible tens' moment, and stretched a bit, well, maybe it isn't so bad... ...and then you pick it up and hit the tough work. 5 x 1 mile at pace..first mile ok..maybe we can do this? ..then mile 3 comes and that's a push but you do it.. ..and then you find the second wind ..and before you know it, it's over and you can bask in the glory of having cracked it! Not sure it helps understand how or why!

Last Sunday, I took to the trails for the 21.2 (by my GPS..measurements vary!) extremely hilly, cold, muddy Meon Valley Plod. Quite an experience. The goal was to test my endurance out - and I am delighted to say that it passed with flying colours. I came 44th out of 250ish, and even had some push left for the last few miles. But oh my gosh, what a course! There is something very special about these kind of long events. You sit at the end, and run your mind over the 3 hours 15 of running, and all the things you have seen..and it is incredible. Sometimes you can't even believe it was the same event. So, now I need to let my legs recover, and then I have 3 weeks to get a totally different type of training in- faster work, to be road ready for the Silverstone half marathon in 3 weeks. We move away from time endurance and towards speed endurance. This is gonna hurt... On the wine front, last night Janet was in Scotland, so I have a chance to try 'the wines that come in tall think...

Two evenings of running in the cold tests the patience of even the most committed runner. There is the philosophy that cold weather makes you run fast, to keep warm - ok, sure that might work - however it also makes you feel entirely unlike pushing yourself in 6min/mile reps. The thought of all that cold air rushing in the lungs is enough to make me go for 'just a steady one tonight' On the other hand, winter food is great. Lamb shank is bubbling away tonight, partnered with a Moss Wood 'Amy's Blend', a cabernet, merlot and petit verdot Bordeaux blend from Margaret River in Western Australia. This is lush, sweet fruit, brambly, hint of mint, delicate and powerful. Yummy. Tasting note from Matthew Jukes sums it up well “A cabernet sauvignon-dominant wine of jaw-dropping class unequalled anywhere.” I shall ensure i enjoy it..

For the third time in 8 days, I am drinking a (plastic) glass of British Airways red wine, a merlot from negociant Laboure-Roi. More well known for their burgundy, this is humble vin de pays. And the strange thing is that each bottle has tasted worse than the previous one! I am curious as to whether my state of mind has influenced this, or is it the perils of repetition...or is there really this level of variation in such a standard product? Suffice it to say that I shall not be seeking this particular blend at my local merchant any time soon. But hey, it is free!