Over 60s training.

 Lamorbey House, Sidcup

Lovely pic. Very peaceful-looking river, - slow and deep. Or maybe it's a long narrow lake?

Gardening Assoc. Autumn Show today. 9 x firsts, 8 x seconds, 3 x thirds. Not the best show we've promoted.

Kitchen floor is finished except for pointing but at least it's usable.It's a largish kitchen and we spend a lot of time in it.  Hall, stairs and landing paintwork and ceilings done. New burglar alarm installed with wiring relocated. Next is new utility room floor and a vanity unit in a spare bedroom.

Ceal
Neither of us get stressed if we are making improvements unless the contactors don't perform. Not too much chance of that though because the first part of any job is for me to meet them and make sure they're working to the programme we expect then there's no misunderstandings.The main problem is that it give MrsJJ ideas for other changes elsewhere.

Columba
I think that in Sidcup it must be a lake. Nice looking place though. Wonder if it's open to the public.

Graham
I would do a couple more 400m sessions at the same pace before increasing again.
JJ

Evening

Aws nice painting i don't remember seeing this when i did the Sidcup 10 i guess its not part of the course, mores the pity

Columba is it this weekend your race or has it been and gone best of luck anyway

Impey yes variety of pace is the way to go

Didn't parkrun today as felt i needed the lie in but ran 4 miles this evening

Thanks for the interest in my painting of Lamorbey House.

Columba - It is a lake.

Pammie - Lamorbey House is situated within the loop of the Sidcup 10, so you don't get to see it.

JJ - It is now an Adult Education Establishment and forms part of the Rose Bruford College of Theatre and Performance.

If anyone is interested, here is a more recent picture than mine. If you want further info Google "Lamorbey House".

al

Good morning

Bit like K2 I'm lurking but not getting much time to post, part time work has gone manic with a shortage of staff and massive increase in workload has meant part time is more like full time plus - oh well keeps me out of trouble!!

Graham well done on a great 10 mile time, to be only 2 mins out from last time with the probs you've had recently is a brilliant performance.

Lots of other good runs going on as well.

Pammie 100+ days streak is starting to become an ultra-streak. Fantastic, I'm sure you will reap the benefits.

For me I managed 100 miles last month, pleased with achieving that in third month back but it is really hard work, the on/off training in the last year plus the 4 months out this year with the knee is proving to be a real challenge; perhaps harder even than when I first started.

One good thing is that I start a race for the first time in year next Sunday and although it will be a PW it will also be PB as I'm now in a new age group .

Very warm 10.5 this morning, don't think I'd be wanting to start the marathon so close to mid-day today. Faded a bit towards the end but still went through 10 in 1:32 so hopefully at GSR should be able to do 1:25'ish.

Mike T

Mike, thanks. You're showing great commitment in keeping going and running such good mileages when things haven't been going your way recently. It must feel great to be looking forward to a race again though. All the best for next Sunday.

I did a XC relay yesterday. It felt strange all round - to be running XC in a temperature of 22 degrees and to be running a course at such a higher speed than usual (because of the shorter distance). Each leg was 1.8 miles and I did mine in 12m 11s. Our team of four came last but, as so often, I'm very sure we had the highest average age by some distance. Younger ones in the club don't seem to be interested (in general) in inter-club racing, which is a shame. It was a good course, on shortish grass and quite steeply undulating at times. Not much level, and a small stream to cross which had me using both hands to scramble up the bank!

Fourth comeback run was a vaste increase in distance to 5 miles. Took 53 minutes but about half of it was off road and there was a big hill near the end.

Empty
Nice to be young again!
Your 10 mile time will be about 1:20.

Graham
Nice race. Relays are always hard. None of us want to let down our team colleagues.
JJ

Aws - very odd thing. Your picture at the top of the page has disappeared, and been replaced by a reference. Can't even click on the reference; would have to copy-and-paste it.

JJ - cleaning up at the garden show again, I see. 

The weather was kind for today's half-mara; sunny in the morning but clouded over for the 1.00 o'clock start, and from time to time a cooling breeze sprang up. I completed it in 2 hours 36 minutes by my stop-watch (official time yet to come, but won't be far out; this is a PB by around 14 minutes (only done one half-mara before, and that was Hastings last year). It was very hard, and I felt quite emotional as I staggered past the finish line. Got a medal and an over-large T-shirt.

Columba, hey, great stuff! That's a real improvement and you must be very pleased. I think we've all felt emotional at times as we finsih a race.

Columba
Pbs by 14 minutes are a real success story and worth feeling emotional about. I've felt that way after each marathon I've run.

The t-shirt might make a nice mini-dress?
JJ

Columba - that's over a minute a mile improvement! Great stuff.

JJ - congrats on the prize haul at the flower show. Sounds like you are going to have a show home by the time you've finished. It's not going on the market is it?

Graham - sounds like you've been hard out racing!

Empty - good to see you on the come-back trail!

Aws - you are a very talented man.

I had a very hard 32.5km run yesterday, made hard not by the distance, but because I was leading the 5.45 km pack.

Not my cup of tea, too many complaints. As you know I don't have a garmin, and just tell the pack, as long as we don't catch the 5.30s or the 6.00s don't catch us, we're doing alright. Problem was the 5.30s, got lost, not reading their map correctly, several times, and so we spent most of the run with them, so had a few telling me we were going too fast, but on the return journey I realized that the first half had been mainly downhill with the wind behind us, so it was going to be the opposite on the return journey, fighting into the wind, we ended up averaging 5.37km pace so I wasn't far out, but a run that I usually find very enjoyable on a marathon buildup was spoilt by a few half my age - I really felt like telling them to harden up! 

Mind you, I did tell them I was from the old school of running and shared my running stories. It would be easier if noone had a garmin and we just ran to feel like we did in the good old days.

Columba - Pic is still OK on mine. Maybe your PC wants a reboot. Eh!! What?!!

al 

Columba
Great work!!

NZC
We wouldn't be spending money on the house if we were selling it.    Even so, a decent kitchen will be a good selling point when the time inevitably comes.

I would have thought fhe problem children would have been pleased to get round quicker than they expected.

Columba
Pic is OK on my system.
JJ

Good Morning,

Columba
FANTASTIC PB. You have trained hard for that and certainly deserve it. More info please and what is your age-grading for the race.

Graham
Great pace for your leg of the XC relay especially considering the hills and hand scrambling that you had to do.

JJ
In my opinion for your 4th outing, 5 miles is too far and not necessary, especially with tough hills too. 30 mins is plenty for a week or so then up to 40 mins for a couple of weeks. I can hear you telling others this same advice!!! Well done on your Flora Medal Haul. You obviously prefer to have the larger builder and decorators in whereas we prefer the one man band.

Mick6
Seems like your AT and PF problems are/were connected. How did you 5k race go, any heel reaction? Lucky daughter being taken to Paris for a shopping expedition for her Birthday.

Impey
I think the warm and humid that you referred to has gone out of the window now. I hope you both had a good time in G Y with similar weather to that we have experienced down here in the South.

aws
Lamborby House-----I had designs, many moons ago, on being a speech therapist, and Rose Bruford was the college I wanted to study at, but of course it wasn't at Lamborby House then.

Empty
Your running is developing well, all the best for the Victory 5, I hope  the tropical storm which is being forecast is all over by next weekend, otherwise one direction of the race will be horrible!!!!   


Stewart & I ran an easy paced 6 miler yesterday with a few hills thrown in and half of it was on a stony trail.

I get the feeling that not many of you have been following the Paralympics. Well most certainly nothing has been posted about them. I have thoroughly enjoyed them and have been gripped by many a race or field event. I have screamed and shouted from the sofa in the same way as when I was watching the Olympics. I have been awe as to what was achieved and mostly forgot the disability. Although, watching the blind long jumper with her guide was something I didn't expect at all. the courage to run as fast as one can down the track then leap into the air, must take a very special trusting bond between athlete and guide. I have cried at success and at unexpected failure.

I have come to the conclusion that the coaches of both the athletes and swimmers must be very special people. Their understanding of bodies and the different techniques needed for every different person is immense. I learnt such a lot from the different commentating specialists. People like Giles Long, who used to be a para swimmer. He explained  so very carefully how the water affected different swimmers disabilities and what they had to do with their swimming technique to decrease this negativity, so very carefully and with illustration. I applauded Ewan Thomas so many times with his careful understanding of what it took for certain times and distances to be obtained by the athletes.

Conclusion, I learnt a lot about bodies and how techniques can be used to get the most of what we have.

WE, you and I, seem to suffer from injuries resulting from bio-mechanical issues in our bodies  but what we have just seen over the last 12 days, with bodies which are not complete in many cases, can perform to a very high standard indeed. I guess that injures must occur and work done to overcome this but if they can then so can we with our, yes, we have more aged bodies in comparison with others, but we have a whole body to work with.  

I shall continue to bore you further with a description of our last 2 visits to the Olympic Park. We wanted to make the most of our last Olympic Park visits and arrived before lunch to wander around the vast park yet again. The weather was wonderful on both days. Warm/Hot but with no humidity.

The Park was heaving on both days, on Friday there were many, many small outings of Primary School Children looking excitedly around at everything.

We actually made it up to the Velodrome this time which is situated next to the Basketball meringue. Eton Manor is further on. If anybody wants any photo's please message me and I will be happy to oblige.

The Westfield shopping centre situated next to the Park is somewhere I would like to visit again. It is enormous with a lovely J Lewis at one end.

I spoke to several Games Makers, one of whom was in charge of the medals and flowers. She said they have to wear 2 sets of gloves to polish the medals and then are horrified when they see that one of the first things the Athletes do is put the medal between their teeth!!! All that I spoke to had wonderful experiences to relate and all were so pleased to have volunteered 2 years ago. Many of them were University Students who had no idea 2 years ago what they had let themselves into.

In the Park we saw several Paralympic Athletes who I recognised, one being Lee Pearson. We found a new area to eat up in the Market Square and sampled the Spanish Tapas, it was delicious and certainly the best food we had found in the Park.

On Saturday we had a trip up the Orbit, the very quirky red structure by the Olympic Stadium. The views over London and beyond were spectacular, the weather certainly helped on that one. It is strangely quiet up there, one can hear the buzz of the traffic etc below but the noise was certainly dulled.   

Both Friday and Saturday had very little British involvement in the Pool and the Stadium. Friday finished with the Ladies relay which was  a real tense finger biting, hell for leather screaming race with a very close Silver Medal finish for GB. Saturday saw a very frustrating disqualification of our Javelin guy. Then the evening finished with Oscar P winning the 400 m's. What a fantastic finish to a fantastic Games. Unfortunately we had to leave before his victory lap of honour, not wanting to miss the last train home.   

The fact that there was little British involvement in our evenings didn't deter from our enjoyment. One applauds everybody for their efforts whether they are a medal winner or not. The Mexican waves were awesome. The sound itself is something else but to observe 80,000 people, most of whom have Union Jacks of various sizes, be raised as the wave moved around the Stadium was truly remarkable and certainly spectacular. It was like a red, white  and blue enormous wave, a bit like a Tsunami gathering pace along the beach.    

We had very good seats for the Athletics, we were on the 8th row. However, in many ways I preferred it when we were 6 rows from the very top of the Stadium from there one could see everything, whereas at the front it was difficult to view the home straight properly.

Then last night what did you all think of the Closing Ceremony? I hope some of you viewed it, if not, then you missed a treat. It was amazing and it held my attention from start to finish. I though Cold Play were exactly the right group to have been performing. 

I am NOT going to complain about the adverts during the Games, I thought Channel 4 did an excellent job.  

If you have read my last 2 posts, well done and thank you. x

NZC
I am not sure why you were omitted from my post higher up. You were certainly on my list. I guess what I wanted to say in simple terms is "You were the leader of the Pack". I hope the younger ones had some respect for your experience and guidance. I am sure they did even if they didn't express it.

Now I must get on with my day if I am going to be able to sit down and enjoy the Parade through London. This evening I am hoping to find some coverage of Andrew M's match tonight at the USA open.

Tomorrow life must get back to normal! what ever normal is.