6 weeks / 42 days / 1004 hours (assuming the time difference). However you say it, it's not very long at all now to the start. Training, I'm afraid has gone right down the pan on the physical side. I'm not sure how the shin splints are getting on as for the past week I've been laid low with pharyngitis.I've had some advice on self physio for the shins so with that and the forced rest I reckon they should be good enough to recommence in a couple of days. Any twinge after that and it's on to the rowing machine and cross trainer.So with all that going on it's a good job that, mentally, I'm still well up for it and can still visualise how I will approach various aspects of the race - hills, shale, dunes, etc.
So 6 weeks to the race itself but a mere 10 days to the recce stage. 2 full days training in the Marrakech area, which should give us a flavour for the general environment and running surfaces if not the heat itself. On that score Adrian the student has been in touch to find out when we need to use the chamber so it's good news that that is still on.
Short update today as it's almost time to settle back into the sofa for the footy. Come on you Reds!
Sunday, 26 February 2012
Thursday, 16 February 2012
Simply Says "Bugger"
Following Lt George's confession that he's scared, the following exchange takes place:
Capt Blackadder: "How are you feeling, Darling?"
Capt Darling: "Not all that good, Blackadder. Hoped I'd get through the whole thing. Go back to work at Pratt and Sons, keep wicket for the Croydon Gentlemen <pause> marry Doris. Made a note in my diary on the way over. Simply says 'bugger'"
Over The Top scene, Blackadder Goes Forth
Possibly the most emotional scene of any series, comedy or otherwise, ever.
Where is he going with this, you might ask? Well I've got a bit of a bugger situation myself. Nowhere near the certain death situation of men going over the top but a tad miffing nonetheless. With less than 8 weeks to go to the start I'm suffering with shin stress or what most people would call shin splints. I've stupidly tried to train through it a couple of times but it is now beginning to hurt when I walk. Hopefully it will only (!) be the symptoms of exertional compartment syndrome and a short period of rest and some anti inflammatories the pain should ease. But with such a short time to go I've got to wonder how long should I rest. Answers on a postcard please.
There are a number of outcomes to this issue. There are two under the heading "not an option": failure to start and failure to finish. To even consider either of these would be an insult to the bravery of the very people I'm fundraising for. So hopefully the pain will subside, I can get a bit more training done and on 14th April 2012 I will collect my MdS finishers medal from Patrick Bauer. The ultimate finish position is no longer important. Then I will rest properly!
For when the One Great Scorer comes
To write against your name
He marks - not that you won or lost
But how you played the game
Alumnus Football - Grantland Rice
MTFU!!
Capt Blackadder: "How are you feeling, Darling?"
Capt Darling: "Not all that good, Blackadder. Hoped I'd get through the whole thing. Go back to work at Pratt and Sons, keep wicket for the Croydon Gentlemen <pause> marry Doris. Made a note in my diary on the way over. Simply says 'bugger'"
Over The Top scene, Blackadder Goes Forth
Possibly the most emotional scene of any series, comedy or otherwise, ever.
Where is he going with this, you might ask? Well I've got a bit of a bugger situation myself. Nowhere near the certain death situation of men going over the top but a tad miffing nonetheless. With less than 8 weeks to go to the start I'm suffering with shin stress or what most people would call shin splints. I've stupidly tried to train through it a couple of times but it is now beginning to hurt when I walk. Hopefully it will only (!) be the symptoms of exertional compartment syndrome and a short period of rest and some anti inflammatories the pain should ease. But with such a short time to go I've got to wonder how long should I rest. Answers on a postcard please.
There are a number of outcomes to this issue. There are two under the heading "not an option": failure to start and failure to finish. To even consider either of these would be an insult to the bravery of the very people I'm fundraising for. So hopefully the pain will subside, I can get a bit more training done and on 14th April 2012 I will collect my MdS finishers medal from Patrick Bauer. The ultimate finish position is no longer important. Then I will rest properly!
For when the One Great Scorer comes
To write against your name
He marks - not that you won or lost
But how you played the game
Alumnus Football - Grantland Rice
MTFU!!
Saturday, 11 February 2012
Longer, Harder, Faster, Stronger - well 2 of those anyway!
Well the planned 30km turned out to be only 24 and a bit due to running out of time. The trouble with families is that, although you love them dearly, they don't half impinge on your training schedule. So having promised Emma that I'd be back by 10:30 so she and Maisie could go shopping for stuff for Myles' birthday party tomorrow, I'd more or less restricted myself to the distance covered.
The pack, being short of hexamine blocks and a couple of other small bits wasn't quite full weight but still tipped the scales at 9kg with the addition of water. This obviously slowed my pace down but it never felt like a struggle. All contents of the pack sat snugly in their allotted space and consequently the packs (back and front) sat snugly around my upper bod.
Another great advantage of training with my pack is that it gives me somewhere for water bottles and nibbles. When I'm sans sac I can never really be arsed to carry bottles, which must have an impact on my performance. So today I quaffed down 500mls of plain water and 500mls of Nuun laced water and chomped a Geo bar. As I was glugging away I got to thinking that I really must start to think about my water strategy. That can be this week's task. Results to follow.
The pack, being short of hexamine blocks and a couple of other small bits wasn't quite full weight but still tipped the scales at 9kg with the addition of water. This obviously slowed my pace down but it never felt like a struggle. All contents of the pack sat snugly in their allotted space and consequently the packs (back and front) sat snugly around my upper bod.
Another great advantage of training with my pack is that it gives me somewhere for water bottles and nibbles. When I'm sans sac I can never really be arsed to carry bottles, which must have an impact on my performance. So today I quaffed down 500mls of plain water and 500mls of Nuun laced water and chomped a Geo bar. As I was glugging away I got to thinking that I really must start to think about my water strategy. That can be this week's task. Results to follow.
Thursday, 9 February 2012
Oh, Happy Day!
Just had the first proper go at packing my kit. Got all the tiddly health stuff in individual sealed bags and packed together in a dry bag. Light stuff at the bottom, heavier food bag at the top. First aid kit, venom pump and day 1 food in front pack. Couple of minor things still to add in but main thing is - IT ALL FITS!!!! Kit list said 8.7kg but it doesn't feel all that heavy and it sits comfortably. Going to take it all out on a 30k Saturday A.M. and see how that goes.
This is a big moment for me as I've been a bit apathetic the last few days just wishing the start would hurry up and get here but with this morning's success and a renewed effort at fundraising, I'm very excited again.
Fly out 8 weeks today!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Sunday, 5 February 2012
Tempus Fugit
Tempus is most definitely fugiting and at a fair rate of knots too. In the blink of an eye, 5 weeks has passed since my last blog entry during which time my race number has been confirmed. A combination of massive amount of "work" work, doing my share with the ankle biters and using the remaining time to train whenever I can means that the days just fly by. Indeed at this time in 9 weeks competitor #399 will have completed Stage 1 and will be sat somewhere in the desert experiencing any one of a range of emotions. In fact in just 4 weeks on Wednesday, Steph and I fly out to Marrakech for a bit of environment familiarisation and hopefully some acclimation.
Training (for the above reasons) has been sporadic but still of a decent enough quality. Unfortunately I'm not as confident of a top 50 place as I was 18 months ago as now realise that to achieve that level requires the kind of full time commitment that your average family man just cannot manage. Top 50 will still be the goal and I will approach the start of each stage with that in mind but won't be overly disappointed if I don't achieve. Better to go with that approach than to lower the target and lower my effort exponentially.
One thing that is going particularly well is the admin side of things. I've now procured all my kit with just a matter of stitching a row of velcro to my shoes. I've decided that I'm going with the MdS' own gaiters. I've read mixed reviews of both gaiter options but a couple of clinchers are that I can remove the chosen option when not required and at the end of the day the Sandbaggers just look so ridiculous!! Sorry Sandbaggers! I just hope I'm not left with egg on my face.
My menu is complete and, apart from some Pepperami that I will need to buy fresh, is now sat in the garage in an Exped dry bag. I've gone for a quite boring selection in that it's noodles every day. Noodles are something that I eat a lot of at home and have been able to try them out at home without having to spend a fortune on the like of Expedition freeze drieds. The noodles option hadn't occurred to me until middle of last year when I was in comms with Tobias Mews, the top placed Briton of last year. If they're good enough for him then they're good enough for me. I'm going to supplement these with the aforementioned Pepperami and also chilli flakes plus I've also got lots of mini boxes of raisins and geo bars for energy plus Complan shakes for post race recovery. I've managed to pack 17500 KCals into 3.5kg so overall I'm pretty satisfied with my menu.
I can't close this post without mentioning fundraising. Things had been going well until November 2011 but since then pledges have dried up. Admittedly I haven't been pushing it so I do need to pull my finger out over the next 9 weeks. I hope I'm wrong but there seems to be a feeling that I am fundraising for my own ends. This is not something that I need to raise so much to enter like one of those Kilimanjaro jaunts (no dig intended at anyone who has done Kilimanjaro). I have spent over £4000 of my own money entering, buying kit and the trip to Marrakech. Every penny raised fundraising goes directly to Army Benevolent Fund. I will try to get this message through and push on to raising the £5000 target. If you are reading this and haven't yet dug deep then please do so using the link on the right or inbox me with a pledge.
Cheers, Danny
Training (for the above reasons) has been sporadic but still of a decent enough quality. Unfortunately I'm not as confident of a top 50 place as I was 18 months ago as now realise that to achieve that level requires the kind of full time commitment that your average family man just cannot manage. Top 50 will still be the goal and I will approach the start of each stage with that in mind but won't be overly disappointed if I don't achieve. Better to go with that approach than to lower the target and lower my effort exponentially.
One thing that is going particularly well is the admin side of things. I've now procured all my kit with just a matter of stitching a row of velcro to my shoes. I've decided that I'm going with the MdS' own gaiters. I've read mixed reviews of both gaiter options but a couple of clinchers are that I can remove the chosen option when not required and at the end of the day the Sandbaggers just look so ridiculous!! Sorry Sandbaggers! I just hope I'm not left with egg on my face.
My menu is complete and, apart from some Pepperami that I will need to buy fresh, is now sat in the garage in an Exped dry bag. I've gone for a quite boring selection in that it's noodles every day. Noodles are something that I eat a lot of at home and have been able to try them out at home without having to spend a fortune on the like of Expedition freeze drieds. The noodles option hadn't occurred to me until middle of last year when I was in comms with Tobias Mews, the top placed Briton of last year. If they're good enough for him then they're good enough for me. I'm going to supplement these with the aforementioned Pepperami and also chilli flakes plus I've also got lots of mini boxes of raisins and geo bars for energy plus Complan shakes for post race recovery. I've managed to pack 17500 KCals into 3.5kg so overall I'm pretty satisfied with my menu.
I can't close this post without mentioning fundraising. Things had been going well until November 2011 but since then pledges have dried up. Admittedly I haven't been pushing it so I do need to pull my finger out over the next 9 weeks. I hope I'm wrong but there seems to be a feeling that I am fundraising for my own ends. This is not something that I need to raise so much to enter like one of those Kilimanjaro jaunts (no dig intended at anyone who has done Kilimanjaro). I have spent over £4000 of my own money entering, buying kit and the trip to Marrakech. Every penny raised fundraising goes directly to Army Benevolent Fund. I will try to get this message through and push on to raising the £5000 target. If you are reading this and haven't yet dug deep then please do so using the link on the right or inbox me with a pledge.
Cheers, Danny
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