Johnny Hall's Travels and Travails

Coniston 14

I had my first major race of the year at the weekend. I've been a bit slow to blog about it (along with everything else).

It went pretty well. It was an unusually warm day, which took a little getting used to but apart from that it was perfect running weather.

My main aim was to run strongly and to pace myself well but I was tentatively aiming at sub 1:40, which would have been about 7:10 minute miles. I managed the first targets but missed my time by a couple of minutes, coming in at 1:41.47. I was happy with that as I ran well - the hills were just a little too frequent to keep a higher pace and I didn't want to fry myself completely.

I placed 202nd out of about 1400 starters.

We had a good weekend away with my brother and his kids, though we didn't do too much apart from eat and drive!

Hot Fuzz

We went to the cinema for the first time since Emily was born, a couple of weeks ago, when we were at Becky's parents' place, who babysat. We saw Hot Fuzz, the next film by the Shaun of the Dead and Spaced fellas. I didn't enjoy it quite as much as their previous work, but I still enjoyed it. I won't review it here, there are plenty of better places for that but I can certainly recommend it. The kind of films that these guys do, don't get done by anybody else, and I appreciate them all the more because of it.

Work Project

I've been working on a website and a publishing system for that site for the last few weeks. It's been going well. I'm pretty happy with the publishing stuff - it'll be good for integrating blog-like functionality into more traditional navigation-based sites. Once it's done, I'll talk a little more about it. I'm going to move my work site(s) over to the system and also the Lanark Multisport site, which is currently using Drupal. I haven't really got time to learn Drupal, and it'll be easier to get the site to do what I want it to with my own (ASP.NET-based) system, since I know ASP.NET inside-out. Now I just need to come up with a name for it, and decide where to take it next (I have some ideas).

Race Season Starts Here

I'm approaching some decent fitness now, which is handy since my race season starts this month. I've got a 3up team time trial (TTT) with Lanark in 2 weeks, and the week after that, I'm off to the Lakes for the Coniston 14. Both my cycling and running have improved and I feel like I'm getting somewhere. I've just got to sort out my swimming now (still working on it).

OpenID

I set myself up with an OpenID last week. Hopefully, more and more sites will start to use the system, since it makes remembering passwords a thing of the past. I recommend that you take a look. You do need to have your own domain and webspace though.

Century

I rode over 100 miles on my bike today, which is the first time I've been that far. I went out with the boys from Lanark Multisport - 12 started, 6 peeled off after about 35 miles to do a shorter loop, and 6 of us continued for the full round. We finished in a little under 6 hours, at an average speed of over 18mph. I'm pleased with myself, since I managed to stay with the group, I took my turn on the front into the wind (in the first half, I was hanging on a bit towards the end) and I didn't get tailed off on the climbs. Our route was from Lanark to Moffat, then up to St Mary's Loch via the Grey Mare's Tail climb, then left at the Gordon Arms to Traquair and Cardrona and back to Lanark via Peebles, Stobo, Dreva, Broughton and Biggar. The pace was kept high all day and I was strong enough to keep pushing it. I had a bad patch through Cardrona and Peebles but I managed to ride through it. The ride itself neatly divided itself into 3 parts. The ride to Moffat was into a strong wind, which doesn't bother me too much, since I'm big. The wee guys have more trouble with wind since they get blown about more easily. Then the 2nd third was characterised by the climbs. They weren't too bad, nothing really steep but the pace was kept high. The final section was wet. The rain started in earnest when we reached Peebles and we were thoroughly soaked by the time we got back to Lanark. I ran my 20-miler on Thursday (in under 2:40) as well, so this has been a hard few days. I need a rest now.