Johnny Hall's Travels and Travails

I'm running again. I managed to get out for two 3.5 mile runs on Saturday and Sunday. I seem to have lost a fair amount of fitness, which is a bit annoying. Not much I can do about that now, other than redouble my efforts now that I am able to run. All I wanted to do when I was sitting on the couch watching Deal or No Deal for the last couple of weeks was to go running and cycling and it's distressing to me that I can't even enjoy myself now I can run because I've lost some fitness. I'm having trouble stretching properly too because my collar bone is still a bit shonky, so now my legs are a bit sore. My plan for this week is to do a few easy runs and to get on the turbo trainer every night. I'll have a day off on Friday because we're moving house and then at the weekend I'll try to increase the distance of my runs (which should be very pleasant since we'll be in the country). Overall, I'm pretty pleased with my recovery. I'm not quite finished yet but to be able to run after around 3 weeks is more than I could have hoped for when I was sitting in accident and emergency last month.

There's a fair amount of controversy in Scotland at the moment about whether or not the Scots should be supporting England at the World Cup.  Personally, I don't feel that they should have to support anyone that isn't their own country but I don't understand why people feel they should actively support England's opponents.  Why would someone support Ecuador for any reason other than resentment that England are in the competition and we're not?  And being resentful or jealous isn't particularly healthy.

I'm actively supporting England because my wife, half my extended family and a great number of my best friends (after living in England for 9 years) are English.  I'm disappointed that they aren't playing very well at the moment and if they do get any further without actually putting in a good performance, it'll be a bit embarrassing for them, I think.

Anyway, I made a short trip into Edinburgh to watch the England - Ecuador game with some of my (Scottish) friends.  Ironically, it was in a pub called Teuchters (look up the meaning).  The atmosphere was more or less neutral really - no big cheers when Ecuador threatened (not that they really did much of that) and reasonably positive when they scored.  My friend David (who complains that I don't mention any of my friends on here) and I were the only ones in our group actively supporting England (his mother is English), whilst I think my brother was the only one actively rooting against them, though I'm not sure why.  He has the same attitude as my mum who seems to have a built-in dislike of the English, forgetting that Becky is English (she doesn't seem to count).

Anyway, I've been told (by David) to spice my blog up with some more exciting tales, mostly involving football, which I don't play, which makes me weird (again, according to David).  Anything which relies on the charity of other people not to try to deliberately injure me, is to be avoided, I think.  I have enough trouble avoiding injury in my solo activities without allowing others the opportunity of kicking me.  And I'm rubbish at football as well, an opinion of which I'm sure David will concur.

I'm hopeful that I'll have some more interesting stories in the coming months - moving house, new babies, running races, David's stag parties (congratulations BTW) and so on.  Mind you, my idea of an interesting event and David's are somewhat in opposition.  Maybe you should start your own blog, David?

22 days after my accident, I'm training again.

I didn't get training again quite as soon as I would have liked, most of which can be blamed on piss poor service from this shower of sh*t. I ordered a decent turbo trainer on the 4th and (after being continually lied to) it finally appeared yesterday and it wasn't even the model I originally ordered. Very poor. I don't care how cheap they are, I'm not using them again - there are plenty of other outfits who'll take my money (and deliver within a day or two).

Anyway, that's neither here nor there at this point. I did half an hour in the garage on the new trainer and I'm really happy to be exercising again, I have quite a bit of fitness to make up. My collar bone came through it ok - sitting in the saddle and putting weight on the handlebars doesn't seem to put any pressure on the bone, so that's hopeful.  Mind, I should read the instructions properly so that my bike doesn't come out of the trainer halfway through!  Idiot.

I can still feel that the bone/ligaments/muscle is damaged but I've got most of my range of motion back. I can't put a great deal of weight through it yet but that isn't far away. I'm going to go running on Saturday, all being well.

We move to Cardrona a week tomorrow, so I'll have plenty of opportunity to get out into the country and train. I can't wait.

I've found my new browser. It's built on top of Firefox and the Mozilla rendering engine and works pretty much like FF (which is good). The difference is that Flock is supplemented with social networking tools for blogging, photo sharing and bookmark sharing. So, that allows me to blog directly from the browser (this is my first post from within Flock), upload and photos to my Flickr account and it uses del.icio.us as the favourites manager. On top of that, it has a great RSS news reader built-in. I've not found a decent news reader up to now (I know that they exist), so this is a big bonus. Firefox's RSS features are weak. All in all, it's excellent. It's only at beta (version 0.7) so there is a way to go but it seems pretty solid so far. Highly recommended.

I think I'm slightly mentally deranged. I get an idea into my head and it takes hold and doesn't let go. Until another idea takes hold. The original idea will come back and re-assert its grip at some point. But usually there's only one idea with a really tight grip at any one time. Right now, the idea is Ironman. A month or two ago, it was marathoning. Luckily for my sanity, and the sanity of those around me, both of these are compatible. Indeed, you can't be an Ironman without being a marathoner. Having drawn up my training schedule for next year (which is all I'm good for, since I can't write and I can't work at a keyboard for any length of time), I stuck all my eggs into the half ironman and L'Etape basket for 2007. The plan is was to do a full distance Ironman in 2008. Now I'm thinking, that if I have spent the effort to get fit enough to do L'Etape in July, I'll be fit enough to do an Ironman in August, so it would be a waste to not use that hard won conditioning. So, I've added an Ironman in August to the schedule. Which, on the face of it, is insane. However, to my eyes, all of the events before August (spring marathon, 70.3, L'Etape) can be considered training for the big event. There are 2 IM events in the schedule for August this year - the UK (which is 30 miles from Weymouth, where Becky's parents have a house) and Canada (which is in BC, which we love) a week later. Assuming that these take the same spots in the 2007 schedule, then either will do. I'd definitely love to do the Canada event but it'll be a lot more expensive (take a family holiday?) and entries are difficult to get hold of (apparently, I can email them for an application form after the 2006 race), so it's not definite that I'll even get in. The only real doubt in my mind is my swimming - can I get my technique good enough to swim for a mile and a half? Let's assume I can, with the aid of Total Immersion. So, the next year is starting to look very busy. But you're only young (ish) once. Next year might be one of the last few years where I can do things like this before family commitments become too much (that sounds bad, but it's not the intention). Becky thinks I'm daft but the intention isn't to race these events, it's simply to complete, which is a whole lot easier to achieve. Again, we'll see. I'd love to have a year in my life where I run a marathon, cycle L'Etape and complete an Ironman. That'd be something, I think. No harm in ambition, is there?

I've always been a bit impatient but right now, I'm getting antsy. The healing seems to be going well. I spoke to a physio on the phone last week and he seemed to think that I should be wearing my sling until my next doctor's appointment - which is in 6 bloody weeks! No chance. Last time, I only wore the sling the French gave me for about a week. This time it's the same. Wearing the damned thing makes my shoulder stiff and decreases my mobility. I think, as long as I don't jerk my arm around too much, it'll still heal ok. It was back to work today for the first time - I have to avoid swinging my arm around too much as I walk but it seems ok. One thing that's slightly concerning me is my new collar bone is completely deformed - it sticks right up in the middle. I'm guessing it's going to be a bit weaker now, as well as a bit exposed. I'll have to be super careful when I mountain bike and snowboard from now on. A few of the female members of my immediate family (wife, mother, mother-in-law) will probably want me to stop but that's not going to happen. You've got to live your life and outdoor activities are a big part of mine. A broken bone is an inconvenience rather than a show-stopper. I've rewritten my training plan until October and the marathon. It looks busy. I've started next years plan as well. I'm aiming to peak for the 2 half ironman efforts in June and September and I should be good for L'Etape. Anyway, time to watch some box. Let's hope the replacement for Prison Break is decent.

So, I'm sitting here stewing on the couch, and all I can think about is training. I guess one (and the only) good thing about being broken is that I'm more likely to buckle down to my training plan when I'm whole again. I've rewritten my plan to take my downtime into consideration. Lots of turbo work (which I normally hate) in the next few weeks and then it'll be running, cycling and weights/flexibility work three times a week (each). This is quite a lot of training but I think I should be able to manage ok. I've also written a first draft of my plan for next year. It's pretty busy - I'm not sure if I'll do all of the main events I want to get done but I'm aiming big. My season looks like this right now:

• New Year Triathlon (on New Year's Day in Edinburgh)
• A spring marathon (London if I can get in or Paris maybe)
• Ironman 70.3 UK
• L'Etape (a mountainous stage of the Tour de France, probably in the Pyrenees next year)
• The Helvellyn Triathlon (perhaps equivalent to a half ironman)
• An autumn marathon (maybe Snowdonia or Loch Ness again)

A big year! Maybe it's over ambitious but since in all of the events that I want to participate in, I only have to complete rather than race, I only really have to work on endurance and economy. I think the swimming is going to be an issue, so I'll have to come up with a plan to (vastly) improve my technique.

So, it's been a few days now. I attended the fracture clinic at the infirmary on Friday. I was only in a few minutes and the doctor told me that it was a "nasty" injury and that because it was the second break that there is a chance it won't heal on it's own. Surgery will be very bad, as it will completely write off my season. There's a 25% chance of it not healing (though I think that figure is inflated). Anyway, it seems to be healing ok. I was concerned because the two bone ends seem to overlap each other but I think it's knitted together. I've got a degree of movement in my arm and it's not painful, just a little uncomfortable. I discovered that there have been studies which indicate that taking NSAIDs (Ibuprofen, Aspirin, etc) may increase the healing time. Whether it's true of not, I've stopped taking the Ibuprofen that I was given at A and E. I don't need them anyway. I'll take paracetemol if I need them. I've bought a new turbo trainer (a Tacx 1680), which should be here this week, ready for me to start training again next week. Hopefully, only one week of non-training won't have affected my fitness too much. If my healing continues as it has, then I'll start jogging again in a couple of weeks. Cycling on the road is a while away though.

I've done it again. I've broken my right collar bone for the second time in 3 years. The first time it was snowboarding and the this time it was mountain biking. Me and Ally were out for a nice run around the Traquair XC at Innerleithen and pretty much at the top of Caddon Bank at the end of the whoops, I lost it and landed badly on the back of my right shoulder. It was on a fairly easy section that I've ridden fine 20 times before. Too much speed is bad, kids. I knew I'd screwed it right away and a quick poke around confirmed it. After walking down with my bike for 10 minutes Ally met me on the way back up (looking for me) and helped me down. A few hours in the Royal Infirmary later and I got home early in the wee hours with a lovely stylish sling. It doesn't hurt as much as the last one (though I have almost passed out twice, which wasn't a good experience). So, where does that leave me? Well, I'll have to abandon my plans for the Skye ridge in a couple of weeks, and Iain and I were to have another long distance walk over the Grey Corries, the Aonachs and the Ben. Not no more. I'm going to take a week or two off training to ensure the bone knits properly and then I'll get on my turbo trainer. Hopefully, I'll be running again in 3 or 4 weeks, if the bone heals as it did the last time (90% after 4 weeks and 8 weeks total before it was completely right). I might or might not do the Selkirk MTB Marathon but apart from that, everything continues the same. Certainly, I'll still be running Loch Ness as it's still a fair way off. C'est la vie.