Lost weekend

A song by Lloyd Cole and the Commotions if I recall correctly? Really showing my age now. ;-)

I would like to report some big numbers in my training hours but I would be lying. All week I have felt under the weather. For most of it I have been able to get out and train but not with any enthusiasm even though I have my brand new spreadsheet detailing the sessions that I should be doing. It came to a head on Saturday when I had a headache all day and just couldn't keep my eyes open, so ended up taking myself off to bed at 7.30. I slept like the dead and woke up to go for an early morning paddle with Adam. Unfortunately (or maybe fortunately) he had a sickness bug for the previous 48 hours so he text me to say that he was going to cry off. I crawled back into bed and didn't resurface until 10.30, which is absolutely unheard of for me. I spent the rest of the day being broody, annoyed and frustrated that I could not get out to catch the last of the autumn sunshine to do something, but at the same time I was feeling so wretched that I didn't have the energy to do anything anyway. By the evening I had perked up a little and did an easy hour on the turbo by the light of my headtorch suspended from the ceiling; utterly soul destroying.

I am back running again, but only very defensively. I am trying the 'little and often' approach which means runs of no more than 30 minutes, no speedwork and lots of stretching. I really am getting frustrated by all of this. I enjoy running so much but it's becoming hard to stay motivated when I cannot really get my teeth stuck into running fast, doing fartlek, intervals, hill reps; all the stuff that I really enjoy. I've just got to suck it up and get on with it at the moment and I guess it beats not running at all

Adam and I have enjoyed another paddle last night, out in K1's again. The conditions were much more tricky with a gusty easterly wind which threw up quite a bit of chop on the water. The highlight was Adam's capsize which resulted in me having to climb out my K1 at a very high bank in order to then lift both boats and him out. A fisherman sitting 10 meters away said "Ooh, I'm sorry you went in." Obviously not sorry enough to actually get up and help though.

We were concentrating purely on technique again with me following Adam as he paddled around the Sunbury weir stream, followed by a half hour run afterwards. He's still quite frustrated at his progress but I think that he's doing really well. Controlling a K1 is quite a black art and it just takes practice and it's not helped by the fact that he's trying to master it at night, with very little visual references to help him with his stability. I remember when I was trying to control a K1 and K2 for the first time and it's so unresponsive that it takes a lot of getting used to. I still remember taking most of the paintwork off the side of our Discovery when I smacked into the side of the Savernake tunnel during the Waterside D and it felt that the boat was in control of me and not the other way round.

Thankfully, those days are now behind me.