Monday 31 August 2015

Early morning jog ahead of NZ ordeal

Rolled out of bed at 5am to jog the Beckenham circuit ahead of my flight to NZ. Was literally just that and could only muster 9kms @ 5min ks. This is the earliest run I have done for an eternity and quite enjoyed the quiet streets. Therapeutic almost to see London sleeping.

On my return I brought J her tea in bed, gave Tommy a massive hug and bid my brief farewells to the younger three. J then dropped me at Bromley South BR for the fast train to Victoria direction Heathrow.

I only have a 1 hr connection in Singapore. It's going to be tight.

I still cannot get over the fact that this little man is starting high school in 24hrs. I still remember my first day like it was yesterday. Alphabetically ordered I sat next to the human giant Mark Asante and together we deliberated how you spell 'autumn' to write in our 1st term day books :) Life was a hell of a lot more simple back then.

Tommy A at 7am this morning - I love him dearly:

Back to sunny London for 1 day

It's been pouring all day and decided to rise early to avoid the Bank holiday traffic.  We belted it home arriving by 10.30 AM.

In summary, a lazy day involving packing my bags for tomorrow's rediculously long journey to the far corner of the planet, Auckland.  I somehow will leave my house by 730 AM UK time and arrive at my hotel at midnight, THE NEXT DAY! 2 days lost in time travel for the sake of a 2 hour presentation and will be on the ground in NZ for all of 12 hours, 8 of which I hope to be asleep and 1 hour spent running. I plan to meet Clyde early doors for a jog. A mission!

Cannot say I am looking forward to the ordeal, the sugar coating being that I miss my #1 son's first day at high school. Enormous sigh.

Consistent with my mood, I managed a p@ss poor workout in the late arvo. The plan was for 2 x 5kms but hit 3.5k and I was gone. In all honesty I am in 37.30 10k shape. I promised myself I would give 2.40 a nudge for the marathon next year. I am a million miles away from that and really need to start getting serious. It gets worse as come Saturday I will be forking out for Timmy Lindop's brekkie rations. I suppose it could all be much worse, heavens forbid I could be a Potter or a Toon.

Saturday 29 August 2015

Corfe castle, Dorset

Today was the visit to Corfe castle.  Freddie (nephew) would have had a melt down had we not taken the steam train there. Miraculously the weather held which made for a stress free relaxing day. 

Tommy, Jack and I walked around the castle whilst Jacqui, Tirana and the little people ate jam and scones at the Tea room.

In the afternoon Dave, Jack and I headed out for the jurrasic coastal path run. Jack (#10) is comfortable running 4.45s but the pace slowed as we made our way up the cliff face. Dave has started running only recently and runs a 19min Park run with no training. He generally cycles everywhere and goes well there too. It was a pleasant saunter with the sun appearing on que as we hit the beach.

Strava upload: http://app.strava.com/activities/381000814

Pardew's confident prediction ahead of the Chelsea game - this is what he brings:

http://www.express.co.uk/sport/football/601649/Alan-Pardew-reveals-how-Palace-beat-Chelsea-today?_ga=1.27981692.1979412693.1440312089

The Guardian's match report:

http://www.theguardian.com/football/2015/aug/29/chelsea-crystal-palace-premier-league-match-report

Pix from Corfe castle and the run with Jack and uncle Dave, plus my new green gem from the Thermomix, the green smoothie (kale, lots of ginger, lemon, apple and mango):

Swanage

Had a nice day with my bro's family and Sis. Basically took the open top bus from Swanage to Bournemouth taking the ferry over from Sandbanks. They call it the Jurassic coastline here.

After coughing my guts up all day I headed out for my usual coastal route whilst here which takes me eastwards along the cliff path. By that time the rain had come and hence decided to turn at 30 mins. I had passed a fair many walkers along the way sharing brief hellos.

Strava upload of today's run:

http://app.strava.com/activities/380226920

The day started well with Farah winning one 'Mo' medal and then things got stratasphareically good when Palace won away at Chelsea.  Now I hate Chelsea even more than Arsenal and we (J, Mia and the boys) all danced around celebrating like we had won the league. It means so much more when your local team wins!!!!!  

Nearly every Chelsea fan I know I have a strong dislike for. I can point to many a Stamford Bridge trip to reason my dislike but the most recent was in May when Jacqueline and I were on the tube home from Mike's wedding in Frankfurt and after they had just won the league. They were intimidating (all white) and blurting out line after line of obsenities. It was like the recent Paris metro incident all over again. Needless to say Jacqui was NOT impressed. So it must have been fate when half way through my evening run (after the game) that I spied a guy u-turning a car with a Chelsea top on. I simply could not resist and nonchalantly tapped on his window.  I could tell from his reaction that he thought I was asking him for directions. As soon as he had wound the window down I screamed 2-1 holding my fingers up with both hands and grinning like a Cheshire cat. For a brief second I thought he was going to jump out and chase me down so I turned and carried on my merry way. He sounded like a typical Chelsea fan as I heard him scream 'do I know you though?'. Karma, thank you! 

To say I am over the moon is an understatement and now celebrating with my Bro and a few beers. I retold the story at dinner and Dave reckons it's an Agnew thing. Dave is an avid Millwall fan (yes I know, he was corrupted at a very young age) and he even shared in my delight. After Dave downing a bottle of White (not to mention beers) a massive Nerf gun war ensued - the boys annihilated him.

Pix from our open top bus trip and my late arvo run + Nerf guns with 'hard top' ammo:

Friday 28 August 2015

Oh my god I think the sun is out, get ya guns out

These were the words I heard from Jacqueline first thing this morning, well perhaps not the last part.

A nice sunny morning after all the rain this week. I had 3 hours of work I needed to get done so went into the office and frantically multi tasked whilst on my usual Friday AM calls.

I then legged it out of there at midday to get home for the afternoon drive down to Dorset.

The Sydney crew banter is building up a head of storm ahead of the 10k race next weekend and once again it will be left to me to take the moral high ground and agree to a Timmy race off from scratch. Timmy is in his best form for 3 years and I have not ran a 10k in that entire period. Yes I have recently ran 18mins for 5k but that was a month ago and have not ran at all this week. I will be doing well to run a 36.59 whereas Timmy will be close to 36.15.

Back to the big boys stuff and have to say that I am chuffed that Alyson Felix won her first 400ms title. Dad and I saw her win the 200m Olympic title in London and she is as elegant a runner you'll ever see, almost effortless and never loses her form.  She now has 9 golds, one shy of Insane Usain. Dina Asher-Smith (the local Bromley girl) is an amazing talent too and has trained mostly at our local Norman Park track and came 5th in the 200m in a new British record (and she is only 19!). I have mentioned this in previous posts that the inner city talent in South London is immense.

At district races in Australia there were 10 decent runners whereas here you turn up and there are literally thousands - the competition is very deep. In the Lewisham borough alone there are over 1 million people living.

It is noticeable to me that nearly all the young English footballing talent in the Prem is also coming out of South London. This is why I dislike Seb Coe so much. His politics mean he cannot see further than the end of his nose and because of him the iconic South London Crystal Palace is going to be ripped up and with it many a talented youngster career.

Going back to Australia, whilst their talent pool is much smaller where I think they do well is that when any kid shows talent they are much less likely to fall out of the net.  Couple that with better weather, facilities and structured programs, Australians end up punching above their weight. The other key UK Australian differentiator is parental involvement.  It is simply taken for granted that all parents play a role whether it be coaching or turns on the bbq. In England the parent who volunteers often gets lumped with everything.

I would also go one step further than that.  In Australia particularly in Manly where our house is (a freak sporting environment and home to Olympic champions) there is not only an economic angle to social standing but equally also sporting. In other words to be a supposed  'succesful' family you need to be sportingly successful as well as economically.

Places like Manly also breed sporting stars so success becomes tangible.  What I mean by that is there are role models walking about the place who have won gold medals and not 50 years ago in obscure sports either but recently at the London Olympics.  Jamie's bro Murray won gold in London. It gives kids belief as they say well if he can so can I. It feels almost within reach.

Food for thought.

Minion VW dub on route & arriving in Swanage (the land of Harry Redknapp):