Photograph Quiz:
Photo no. 75:- How – who – what – why – where?
Stone me Blog, have you tried running this last couple of days in the wind? Set off today with the wind behind me, GREAT, and I was almost sprinting along, no problem at all; then turned into the wind to stand around on the spot! Instead of going out for a trudge, I could just stepped out of the doorway and run the spot, it would have felt exactly the same. It was almost as bad as trying to run over the moors back home in Yorkshire when the wind gets up. At least there you have got the pleasure of running over moorlands, peat bogs, and the footpaths whereas in Coventry you are stuck with the road surface, circling the park or puddling on all the field footpaths. The only problem with the hedgerow footpaths is that they seem to get wet and boggy and muddy very, very quickly. With showers of heavy rain in the autumn, the land become saturated and then, as winter approaches, even with the slightest shower, the water stays on the surface. Being forced onto the road, of course, can be deemed dangerous. The driving rain and wind is easily strong enough to knock you off balance, and it only requires one inattentive driver and you're having a bed rest in the warmth of the back of an ambulance. You have to feel sorry for the post lady – at least I choose to go for a trudge in the extreme wind and rain but she's got no choice in the matter, she just has got to get on with the job.
Still on the subject of the high winds, I must say I'm rather proud. Proud I am, Blog. I had to rebuild the fence and concrete in the fence posts on New Year's Day and am very pleased that my handiwork has withstood all the forces that nature has been thrown at the fence since. So I have cracked mending fences, so building bridges is next on the agenda.
Out in the extreme weather, the rain and wind this morning, I reflected on some of the times in the past when the weather has been a bit of a nuisance, affecting my running. In the summer before I started University, I worked for about three months for the electricity board, pickaxing holes and trenches in the roadway to lay cables. Although it almost killed me, the effort involved, it did have the compensation of providing me with a reasonable wage – I earned more digging holes than my father did working full-time at the Prince Smith's engineering works in town, as a semiskilled fitter. And I got the same rate when I filled the holes in again. With the proceeds of my summer employment, I bought myself a Raleigh Runabout, which was basically little more than a bicycle with a 49 cc engine attached. The maximum speed was about 30 mph with a following wind … downhill … on a very steep downhill; if you came to an uphill, you had to pedal like mad to assist the engine. I remember one Saturday, I had entered an open one mile race in Oldham. Although travelling over to Lancashire (cross myself and say three Hail Mary's), Oldham was not very far away but it did involve steep climbs over the backbone of the Pennines. It was a warm day, and by that time I got to the track, I was knackered. However, the mile race was mid-afternoon, so I had time to recover and enjoy the sunshine. Unfortunately about an hour before my race, there was a torrential thunderstorm and downpour and the whole of the track arena was flooded, under a couple of inches of water. The meeting organiser, presumably from the Oldham Athletic Club, decided it was impossible to continue with the athletic events and the meeting was abandoned. I therefore had the task of peddling uphill all the way back to Keighley. Although I had not run in a race, by the time I got back home, I was totally knackered.
Another unhelpful extreme weather condition was in the winter at about the same time of my young innocent life:- I planned to run indoors at Leeming, Leeming Bar where the R.A.F. had an airfield and accompanying large aircraft hangars. The indoor races were to take place inside the hangars. The track was not banked; it was flat and about 200m around. Ever tried running 200m indoors, blog? Of course it hurts your hamstrings and the adductors and the Achilles and the ….. But what is worse, far worse, is the instruction that ‘spitting during the race is not allowed’!. Ever tried running a race without spitting, Blog? Impossible! Anyway instead of going to the race on my moped as planned, I woke up on the Saturday morning to find we had had a heavy snowfall. Undeterred I set off in the early morning and got a bus to the ring road on the outskirts of Leeds. I then started to hitch hike. I did quite well considering it was Saturday morning and I was carrying my kitbag which usually deterred drivers from offering a lift. I went via Harrogate [because that was the way the lifts took me] and soon arrived at the A1 road. It was not a motorway in those days. Then my problems started. Really started. I must have stood for an hour in the snow, freezing to death. I pretended to be a snowman in case a passing sledge had a space for me. I must have had another 20 miles to travel at least, up the A1 to get to Leeming. I was just about to give up and return home, and go out training instead of racing, when to my surprise, the gentleman in a, believe it or not Blog, in a Rolls-Royce, stopped to pick me up. A Rolls-Royce! A Rolls-Royce blog! Me, a penniless student in a Roller. He was very pleasant and the journey to the RAF airfield passed quickly. He wished me luck and dropped me at the side of the A1 road opposite the airfield. It seems crazy in this day and age, but there was no perimeter fencing or overt security around the R.A.F. airfield. It was under four or five inches of snow so it was impossible to tell where the runways were, the hangars being about a mile away directly across the snowfield. I set off and headed for the hangars. I must have almost reached the hangars after tramping through the deep snow with the wind slicing me in two when, for the first time, I spotted a sign of life. A jeep with security in, came out towards me, ….. I say what was I doing, I told them, they tell me to hop in, and they took me to the designated hunger! I managed to win the 2 mile race, 16 laps! I wrapped a handkerchief around my hand and spitting in to it rather than on the floor thereby avoiding upsetting the authorities. I assume I must have got a lift back with one of the other competitors, because I have no recollection of trying to hitch back in the snow.
Talking of snow, I do remember returning from the Morpeth to Newcastle Road Race on New Year's Day with a teammate many moons ago, when it started to snow before we had even reached Scotch Corner on the A1. Snow flurries turned into a blizzard. My teammate had a car which had a gear changer on the steering column, allowing the whole of the front seat to span the front of the car; it also had a steering wheel knob spinner which allowed him to turn the wheel very quickly. My driver was a well-known criminal, but I will say no more about that! The conditions got worse and worse and my team mate decided, for some crazy reason, that it would be quicker in the worsening conditions to cut across country on the road over the moors, the main road which passed the Fylingdales Early Warning Station. The road was most treacherous, visibility almost zero but my teammate still continued to keep his foot flat to the floor scaring the living daylights out of me. I must say with the column steering and adapted steering wheel he was in full control as we slid, skidded and spun at high speed over the moorland roadways. At least he appeared to be in control on the few occasions I dared to open my eyes. No other traffic about. Nobody stupid enough to be out at that time of night in the pitch dark and snow, trying to kill themselves. Boy was I glad to get home.
A session when the weather is not conducive to a reasonable session is not a session, Blog? I have seen coaches putting their athletes through an interval session on the track in appalling weather conditions. Crackers. Blog!!! But what do I know??? They have the badges which indicate that officially they know what they are doing. I don’t have a badge, so enough said; it speaks for itself? I think I have said before, that if for some reason you are unable to train according to the schedule you might have had in mind because of adverse weather conditions, then there is nothing wrong with just going through the process, going for a plod round, going through the motions because fitness is not going to suddenly drain away in 24 hours! And I have also said in the past, Blog, that an enforced easy change of routine can be beneficial; it can refresh the mind as well as the body, Blog. If you don't believe me Blog, I remember running a very fast half marathon two weeks before a marathon which I particularly wanted to win, but got injured when tripping over as I was warming down after the race. I could only hobble for six days and was worried on two fronts; firstly I was losing my fitness for this important race and secondly, by trying to hobble I was frightened I might induce another different injury. So I did my first reasonable run only eight days before the said marathon. With hindsight, because I started the marathon totally physically refreshed but mentally in something of a worried state of mind, I won the race a lot easier than I'd expected to!
So it looks as if the entries for the last four days in the training diary are: watched race – trudged – got soaking wet while trudging – trudging on the spot in wind and rain. Mileage - not a lot.
Colin
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