Light drizzle

my ar$e, it tipped it down all day and was bitterly cold, walked 30 miles up the Grand Union Canal from Tring to just the other side of Wolverton and then got the train back to Tring...
This week i will be resting in preparation for next weekend's Brecon Ultra and if the long range weather forecast is correct today will have been great preparation...

Good training for the Arctic...

The actual temp wasn't that cold but the strong wind and quite exposed route did its bit to lower the temps and make it quite a chilly 28 miles on the Ridgeway yesterday, the cold (i assume) made my hands swell quite alarmingly as i somewhat foolishly remembered my hat but not my gloves a mistake that i will not be repeating.

The training focus has switched towards the 6633 so most long training sessions will be walking from now on with the added bonus that the old leg injury doesn't hurt so much after walking....

heddiw glawiedig a glawiedig bit hychwaneg

A great if not wet day up in Brecon today, did the 20 mile loop section of the Brecon ultra that I'm doing next month (the Brecon ultra will require me to do the loop twice), initially mist and drizzle and then proper heavy rain,what was quite bizarre was that it was raining on the hills and when you looked down into the valleys it was sunny!!

heddiw glawiedig a glawiedig bit hychwaneg:- welsh for today rained and rained a bit more

looney tunes....

Another mad man moment on the canal this morning, while cycling along the canal towpath by Ware i was approached by reasonably normal looking bloke the conversation when as follows.

Man:- have you got your flask with you
Me:- I'm sorry my flask?
Man:- mine was stolen by Agatha Christie
Me:- what the author
Man:- no the lead singer of the German band, you know the one
Me:- OK
Man:- he looks a bit like you, he's dead now
Me:- (time to go me thinks, tried to cycle off)
Man:- can you cook??
Me:- (as I'm cycling off) my spaghetti bolognese isn't to bad
Man:- you shouldn't eat that it got puffins in it

He still shouting things at me as i was cycling off, something about not jumping into a canal because of the ice bergs.....

Just lope off my left leg and be done with it....

Finally got to see the specialist about my ongoing groin/ankle injury, not good news really, in both cases he suspects i have torn the the muscle/ligament, the only remedy for this is surgery....to assess the state of the damage i have to get both ultrasound and MRI scans done the waiting time for these seems to be about 4 weeks...once the scan are done we can start planning when/how...
My initial thoughts are to wait until after the 6633 and if required to pay to have it done privately, the big downside is that it will probably put me out of action for 3 months!!! so we may have to rethink the GUCR and Tooting 24hr

3 Months!!! no running/cycling/walking for 3 months now that is going to be tough....maybe i will fit in a couple of relaxing holidays........

One day i must do a relaxing holiday.....

Been in San Francicso this week, hotel had a great gym so have done all my running on the running machines this week and been using the weights, managed to walk 4/5/6 hours each day and covered most of San Francicso!!! it was only on the last day that i found the San Francicso bay trail which is a 50ish mile loop of the whole bay area, took one of the 'mountain bikes' you can hire to cycle the golden gate bridge up into the bay national park i just about managed to bring it back in one piece!!!