Thursday 30 June 2016

Thanks for nothing Boris

Work manic. 12 hours of nonstop mayhem starting at 8 and leaving at 8. Feeling lousy too. Quite a lot of the floor out sick.

Nothing more of note other than this is Ryder this morning, Tommy signed up for his Golf club at Langley and Jack got through to next round in Bromley district athletics after a 4th place in his race.


Still smarting

Left glute still sore. Though ran 10k in 4.15s at lunch - felt just about ok. The last 5k at 4s.

Massively tired tonight.

Tuesday 28 June 2016

Brexit followed by Eurexit. The worst week in living memory

43 min slot at lunch (I have now finally adopted my mother's German side) to get to gym. Left glute still sore so foam rollered it and then jogged 3k before getting bored. At least I got away from my desk despite Brexit now in full force.

This afternoon stress levels topped out a whopping 9 out of 10. Absolutely brutal.

The funniest quote of the day that 'Roy Hodgson is the sole candidate to lead a coherent Brexit plan'.

On that note there is really no point even talking about last night's events. I can honestly say it was the first time in my life I finally gave up on the English football team. At half time I really could not care less. One day seeing England win a major tournamnt is in my top 10 bucket list. May be even top 5 but the chances are unbearably slim.

Yesterday before the game I wrote that the problem with English football is the English people. We are so far behind it is untrue. We still think we are better than everyone else. It's a complete joke and the same goes to the Brexit vote. Even I sat there last night with a little Schaden Freude with England going out to Iceland and dare say it resonated with 99% of Europeans.


Monday 27 June 2016

Farce

No run today with left glute sore and no time permitting.

It's been branded the biggest constitutional farce in the history of the U.K. 2/3rds of the 650 or so MPs are against Brexit. We are now officially in limbo land as well as heading towards recession.

Football ceremony

Busy at Bromley FC awards today. Memorable for all the politics with our Jack deciding to go elsewhere. God help the next football coach who says that Jack will be making a big mistake by going elsewhere. Seriously. The problem with English football is English people.

Devoid of enthusiasm I did the same session as yesterday. Slow again but now I have a problem with my left glute.

Watched Germany in the footie and if they don't win the tournament I will eat my hat. Julian Draxler who Jack met at Schalke is an exceptional footballer.


Saturday sport

Managed to watch 3 games of footie as well as England beating Australia in the rugby. Good going.

Session today was 10x 1k on the grass across the road. Slow.

Still depressed.


Brexit: the unthinkable

I was in shock when I woke up on Friday morning and if I am being honest I have not fully reconciled and come to terms with.

Friday was spent dealing with all the mess which came as a result and meant I was working late on a Friday night and which followed me into the weekend.

I cannot say how disappointed I am. The fact that 52% of those who voted looked at this picture and effectively said 'keep them out' is the biggest dissapointment for me. In Australia this is the norm but should not be here. Simply disgusting. I will gladly disown anyone who was motivated to vote in this way.

Managed a 10k run at lunch - it helped lift the mood albeit temporarily. 5k in 4s and then 3k in 3.45s and 2k in 3.29s.









Thursday 23 June 2016

D Day (referendum)

Felt quite historic heading to polling station this evening. Like we were taking part in a life changing event.  Social media has been hot too with all the 'inevitable' views and dissapointing to see many borderline racist opinions. Messi summed it up: 'it would be good if people cared for others in the same way they care for themselves'.

Let's see. I have not given up hope and will be an intriguing night ahead and tempted to stay up.

Got out for 10k in the middle of the day. It was very humid and just explored Covent Garden and then swung back around to St. Paul's, Farringdon and the Barbican. Very slow and did not see one single leave campaigner but not surprising as the rest of the country is.










Wednesday 22 June 2016

D Day -1

Brexit vote tomorrow and really hoping common sense prevails.

Monster day in the office with usual intensity but again fell back to plan of running downstairs to gym to hit the treadmill. I felt lousy for the first 4ks running only 4.48s and nearly stopped but then grew into it running a 3.45 average for the final 5 or 6. 10ks in 4.14s or so.  Always good to feel better at the end versus the beginning.


Tuesday 21 June 2016

Forefoot running

10k in 4.04s on the teadmill at 1.5%. Really enjoying this forefoot running. Felt a million bucks.

Met Mark Zimm' who I've worked a lot with over the last 2 years. We've actually never met as he's based in Munich. I am always curious re people's ethnicity and background (I find it fascinating) and so plucked up the courage to ask. Turns out he has a German father and Tongan mother. Now there's a combo. A great story as his Dad met his Mum on a three week holiday and 2 weeks later they had married!

I then went on to tell him all about J's background with Aussie and Chinese parents but born in Botswana. We were chuckling as there aren't many of those either!

Brexit week

Monday's are always completely nuts I've decided. But proud of myself for allowing myself 45mins of down time by running the treadmill. Ran 10k in 4s without heal striking the whole way. Fantastic.

PS What was 'Woy thinking by benching 6 players? Now means we have zilch chance in reaching semis. We do this every single time. I want to SCREAM. Every time we balls up first place which means we take the path of most resistance.

Celebration part #2

Mum wanted us all with her again so after a late start we bundled all 10 of us into the van to get over to FH and then a train into town. Met Mum at the Tate Modern where all the relos were too. Walked over the wobbly bridge to St Pauls before taking the #15 down Fleet Street to Trafalgar Square and heading back home for food with at my Mum and Dads again.

Said our farewells to all. Had a really nice time with Nils and Katja. I've not seen Nils for 8+ years (he's been through an awful lot in that time) but it was like we had never been apart. Weird how family works like that.

Gone 8pm I was desperately in need of some exercise after 2 solid days of eating and so ran my home circuit in 4.13s feeling heavy (9.5 ks).

Pics of of the second cousins and Brexit ham:





Mum's 70th celebration

Nils, Katja. Milla and Nola arrived last night and after Jacqui cooking up a pancake brekkie storm we headed into town showing the girls the sights including Covent Garden. We then followed the plan to be in Forest Hill at my Mum and Dad's for three for champers and cake with all the guests from Germany and for one of my Dad's typical speeches which turned into a Q&A about Mum's life.

All of my Mums family were there including:
Brother Dirk and Claudia
Sister Heide
All my cousins: Florian, Moritz, Tim, Malte, and their partners (Karin)
All the kids: Paula, Marlena, Milla, Nola plus my bros' kids
All my siblings and a bunch more.

We then all headed to restaurant in Dulwich Village where my brothers table started hitting the beers hard (standard for my bro). Nice evening spent chatting with Florian, Dirk and Nils mostly.

Dave then took the hardcore lot out until the early hours whilst I took mine and Nils' family back to Beckenham for more beers in the garden garden.

Most importantly Mum had a great day.

























Friday 17 June 2016

Parks

Ran the Royal parks at lunch including Hyde, Green and St James for just shy of 15k on a sunny Friday but the air is still crap. Really shit to run in. A million miles away from Zermatt last week.

Never really felt good today (mainly due to air) but happy to get around. Is always mentally releaving to get out of the office for a while as the morning and afternoon were manic. Got home to help J with dinner, pick up the middle two from Bromley FC, jump on yet another call and now watching Spain waiting for the boys' German (girl) cousins to arrive from Berlin. Mum is celebrating her 70th this weekend and the entire extended German family are coming (whilst they still can). Around 30 in total with Nils and family staying with us. Nils and I were close growing up and in my teens I spent a lot of time with him getting up to no good. Looking forward to spending time with him as have not seen him for more than 8 years.

Euro16 is massive here, MASSIVE. If it was not fever pitch before yesterday's game it is now. It does not get much better.

The route with the first 4K GPS failing:

https://www.strava.com/activities/612123465



Thursday 16 June 2016

How many Welsh players get into the England football team?

None (ok may be one).

Same old same old at work but at 2pm I closed my office door and watched the game on my second screen on bbc. I was bloody nervous all day. I wish I didn't take this football malarkey so seriously.

Then disaster as Hart is done by Bale. At HT I had to take a walk around the block. Then a little into the second half the phone rings AGAIN only then to see Nicotine (Vardy) smash home. I could not resist a little jig down the corridor. When Sturridge snuck in the 2nd fair to say I got a little loud.

It's been a long time since been back home during a footie tournament and absolutely loving it.


Wednesday 15 June 2016

Wednesday

Not much. Usual frantic day.

Ran home in 4.35s, 17k.

Big day tomorrow.

WTF:


Monday 13 June 2016

Commute

Busy day but promised J that I would get home at a decent time.

So left the office in the rain. After 3 ks I looked down at my watch and suddenly I was running sub 4 min ks but for once it felt like 4.30s. So I continued on in that vein. Going over the first hill at Camberwell it was still controlled and then through Dulwich and the heavens opened up and I got a soaking. Then the brute of the hill at Forest Hill (Sydenham Hill) close by my parents. It is a bitch of a hill and is London's second highest point. I was breathing heavy at the top but still the average was only 4.07s despite the steady incline for the prior 3ks.

Over the hill and I got the average back to 4.05s before stopping at the lights in Beckenham and accidentally saving. Really annoying. At that point I had been running for 61 minutes (c.15ks) and then had to restart for the final 2k in just over 4s. That got me to 16.8ks in 1.08.35 (4.04s). One of my quickest home.

I reckon sleeping at 1,600ms and walking at 2,000ms + every day definitely helped.

Strava loads:

https://www.strava.com/activities/608167790

https://www.strava.com/activities/608167999

Fam at dinner:





Sunday 12 June 2016

Sonnegga to Blauherd

We were all hungover this morning but given the clear skies we made the effort again to get out early. I was desperate to get my fix of the panoramic view of the Matterhorn, the Monte Rosa and the Breithorn etc all 4,000m + peaks.

The weather today did not disappoint and as we emerged from the Sonnegga Express (train funicular which runs through the mountain up to c. 2,000 meters) the Matterhorn was almost visible. It also allowed us to gauge where we were yesterday.

We then headed up to the Blauherd before looping back via Tufteren and back to Sunnegga to get down to Zermatt. Only 10 or so ks covered today but so pleased we had the views.

After picking up our gear from the hotel in town (Hotel Simi) we took the train back down to Täsch to pick up the car and the 2 hour drive back to Vevey.

J and I then said our farewells before taking the train back along lake Geneva to the airport.

J and I really enjoyed Stevie's and Jo's company and have already made plans for Stevie and I to run the Berlin marathon next year and sowed the seed for them and their boys to join us in Biarritz next year.

I love walking in the Alps and love the feeling of the boots on my feet and the rucksack on my back with nothing more to think about other than where to place your next foot. I find it incredibly therapeutic and the simplicity a great balance to my regular day.

A massive thank you for Jo and Stevie's hospitality.

Here was today's route: https://www.strava.com/activities/606817724