Category: Photos

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Legs out and a lot of fun guys

Okay, so I knew it was a mistake putting old mushrooms in the compost heap last year… I even remember thinking so at the time.  What came as a surprise however, was the return on my error.

The bag was heavy enough that it felt like it contained potatoes… had my brother Nigel been around to advise on their edibility, I’m sure we would have had mushrooms for tea, and probably for about a week!

There had been a rat or mouse in the compost heap, evidenced by a very curious cat hanging around last week, so I decided to empty it yesterday.  Aside from the aforementioned mushies, my willing assistant Kim spent most of the afternoon sieving out around 200 litres of light compost from the heap, while the rest was returned to break down a little more.

While Kim worked her way resolutely through this task, I hollow tined the lawns front and back of the house (an equally thankless job), cut the edges and then scarified… thankfully using the machine!

It was a wonderful way to spend a beautiful spring day!

We awoke this morning to a second glorious day and after reading for a while, I got out to do my normal Sunday jaunt… somewhat surprised that I could walk after our garden exertions yesterday, let alone run.

With my sights set firmly on the Beacon and my legs out for all to see, I had a really enjoyable run out past Oldlands Mill and down through Ditchling.  There has been much in the news about low ground water levels and this was apparent from the comparatively small amount of mud.

One walker warned me that it was ‘a bit mucky up ahead’ but he and I clearly have different concepts of mucky… mine being that my runners are completely caked and I am slithering around like a speed-skater on ice, with mud splattering half way up my back.  There were a couple of muddy-ish pseudo-puddles but it was pretty much dry really

In contrast to last week, I had more than enough energy and ran up the Beacon, reaching the top in about 52 minutes.. the same sort of time it took me to run there with a pack on last summer.

I stretched out my legs a bit coming back down the tricky Beacon path (which again speaks volumes about how dry it was) and then down the next section to Ditchling.  This is often where I start to feel weary, but not today.  I ran up Lodge Hill with ease and back across to Oldlands Mill.

From here it was a relatively easy run back along the road to Burgess Hill and home.

10 miles in 1.41 meant that I had run a rare negative split and averaged 5.94mph, at least a little faster than my ‘pack’ runs last summer.  My prize was to allow myself to ignore the other chores I had planned for this afternoon… with a little help from the sofa!

Now, I wonder what’s for tea?

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Five months between blinks

BIG man Daren is ever-present in our thoughts and our conversations so, although I’ve not run with him since September (can that be so?), it seemed like we’d only seen each other yesterday.

We met at Jack & Jill windmills (we call it ‘Upstairs’, for obvious reasons… huh?) which this morning was as windswept as a windswept thing, with a powerful South-South-Westerly blowing straight down the car park!  So much so that I actually changed into my muddy runners IN my car, which is pretty-much unheard of!

We followed our normal 10km circuit, which took in Pycombe, Wolstonbury Hill, the ‘Downstairs’ car park at Clayton Rec, and the Tank Tracks, which we goaded ourselves to the top of without stopping.    At the top we had our cobwebs blasted away by the wind, before running back down to Jack & Jill.

I note that our 1.14 time for the 6.2 miles was slightly slower than September, but averaging 5mph with a couple of serious hills to contend with (not to mention 5-months of conversation to catch up on) is not at all bad going.

As ever, a thoroughly enjoyable run!

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Lacking daisicals

One of the keys to developing strong organisational strategies is deciding what you will not do.  This was a little like the challenge I faced this morning, with too many options and only one pair of legs.  Except that I didn’t really feel like doing any of them.

It was a sunny day and that’s great for running from my folks’ place, but I didn’t feel like driving anywhere.  The Beacon is also a great place to run to when the sun is shining, but after a week of feeling listless, I didn’t have the energy.  It would have been very easy to run on the machine, but the sun was streaming into the house, which would have made for a hot run and also made me feel guilty at not being outside in the fresh air.

So the choice came down to either a road run, or an off-road run, the former winning, but in a half-hearted, lackadaisical way.  I set off into the sunny day wearing three layers under my jacket, two hats and a pair of gloves… which is a lot of gear and reflects the iciness of the temperature out of the sun.

Within a mile I was struggling, physically and mentally… my energy was absent and my sub-conscious was exerting strong pressure to turn around and go back.  I managed to stagger on, having the same internal dialogue several times before I had even reached three miles.

Ironically, maybe the chief reason for continuing was to deny my sub-conscious the upper hand… I’ve been writing about the subconscious in my slowly growing manuscript this week and have invoked irritating old habits in the process, so I didn’t want to give it any more latitude than I had to.

Runners are often tired, but that tiredness takes many different forms… this wasn’t heavy legs, or inability to breathe, but rather more of a general reluctance, but I soldiered on.

It wasn’t even that my mind was elsewhere, working on an interesting challenge… instead it was clattering, like having engaged a false-neutral in an old gearbox.  Not in any particular gear, but making a great deal of noise about it.  It’s useful for my work to allow these brain patterns to play out sometimes, besides which I lacked the motivation to do anything else.

I reached the five-mile mark in 48 minutes and ran back even more slowly.  I had taken my jacket off on the outbound journey, the sun in my face and the wind behind, but now the temperature dropped palpably as I ran back into the wind so the jacket went straight back on!

The rest of the run back was… well, I think that you probably get the picture, so I’ll save you the effort of reading about the effort and instead cut to the chase… 10 miles in 98 minutes, 6.1 mph.

Of course, there is always good value in celebrating the successful execution of a strategy that you did choose… which in this case was really about running and writing, rather than vegetating!  Well done Foster!

Now, where’s that sofa?

PS. Congratulations to Clive in the Brighton Half Marathon… 123 minutes is very respectable for an old bloke like you!

Oh to be the youngest in the school year!

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Chubby rides again!

Slightly unfair, I feel, the comment from Cliff on last Monday’s post, but the least I can do is to roll with it when I’ve blatantly blanked his excellent advice for such a long time.

This week I had a moment to celebrate.  In the past I have, on possibly two occasions, half-heartedly set out to write something longer than a post… and even longer than a letter to the Right Honourable Nicholas Soames MP containing yet more of my ideas that he really doesn’t want.  On each occasion my effort has fizzled out and quite rightly so.

However, at 3pm on 10th February, I set fingers to keyboard to write the inaugural words of my first proper book, on a subject that I have been teaching and writing about for a couple of years.  I know how long the book will be (thanks to Aidan Berry, Dean of Brighton Business School), have created the structure of sections and chapters, and in a little over 11 hours writing, over the last three days, have already clocked up 3,419 words.

I have also already had half a dozen helpful tips from my fellow alumni at London Business School, having replied to a fortuitously-timed post from someone else in the community who also just started writing a book.

There’s a long, long way to go, and writing it is only a small part of the challenge, but it feels great to have finally reached clarity about this project… I’ve effectively been preparing myself from it since 2007!

So my run this morning had to be shoehorned into a busy day, which is why (here comes the crux of the excuse that you were waiting for) I chose to run on the machine again rather than facing the seemingly sub-zero temperatures outside!

Based on my experience last Sunday, I didn’t bother to even put a tee-shirt on today, but I equally didn’t open the door either.  It’s FAR too cold outside!  I set the fan to blow air at me, filled a bottle with water and set off in the general direction of the cheese plant.

My approach mirrored that of last week, starting at 6mph and increasing by 0.5mph every quarter mile until I reached a mile.  Then I reduced by 1mph and repeated, eventually reaching a terminal speed of 9.5mph as I ran towards the 5 mile mark.

 

The Monday circuits have definitely improved my footing and although the last half mile was undoubtedly hard work, I was quick to feel a sense of recovery afterwards… albeit through a thick layer of sweat that even a shower couldn’t abate!

So 5 miles in 39.28, an average of 7.6mph.  And if nothing else, all this exercise is at least increasing the speed of my writing!

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Observations of a cheese plant

I always love the way that a covering of snow on the ground outside reflects the day onto the ceilings inside the house and enhances the quality of the light. I would be a very happy guineapig for a dimmable ceiling full of LED lights, but in the meantime I enjoy our occasional snowy days all the more for the change in light.

I’m not averse to running in the snow, but only if it’s off-road. There is far too little traction on snowy pavements and the risk of injury outweighs any other considerations… including any adverse comments from my more… er, manly friends.

So instead I put on my shorts and climbed aboard the running machine. I’m sure that visitors think it’s an odd piece of furniture to have in the middle of an otherwise Zen-ish environment like ours, but I think more houses should have one… in fact, one of my neighbours clearly agrees and has recently bought one, albeit a bit flashier than our rather purposeful machine.

The downside of its location is that it faces a wall with only the leaves of a cheese plant to break the view. Two winters ago when I was training for the Brighton marathon and the world outside was deep with snow, I clocked up a number of long runs including one at 20 miles. It seems odd in retrospect that the subsequent marathon would break my mind in under two hours, when my mental muscle was strong enough to keep running whilst staring at the leaves of a cheese plant for three hours!

Today my aims were much more modest… a mere five miles. The machine shows progress around a quarter-mile track of LED lights and I decided to change the speed at each completed circuit. Starting at 6mph I increased through 6.5 and 7 to 7.5mph, before dropping back to 6.5 at the start of the next mile and repeating the process again.

This meant that at the end of mile four I was running at 9mph. In the final mile I reduced to 8.5, then to 8 and 7.5, but realising that I had the opportunity to run a sub 40-minute time, then increased the speed to 10mph to sprint to the end in 39.47, averaging just over 7.5mph overall.

Early on, Kim had noticed my get-on-and-run lack of preparation and had opened the door to the snowy garden, turned on the fan and had brought me a bottle of water… just as well since I had shed my shirt within a mile and by the end was dripping as if I was in a sauna.

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An Almost Perfect Seal Launch

I took a drive down to my folks this morning and ran down the valley to Rottingdean and the sea, sparkling in the chilly sun.  I had already got the stitch chasing down another runner on the way down the hill and had all but run out of puff, but since it’s only a couple of miles I pushed myself on a bit.

By the Ovingdean steps, around the 3-mile mark, I really wanted to turn around but figured that it wouldn’t make much of a post (Ran to Ovingdean, got tired, turned around and ran back.  The end) so onwards I continued.

As I ran along the next section along the cliff-top to the Marina I saw five kayaks paddling on the flat calm sea towards Rottingdean.  I stopped to wave heartily just in case it was someone I knew from Martlets… I was too far away to be noticed.

I ran on and pushed myself past Penny’s to approximately the mid=point of the Lewes Crescent gardens – I recall that that’s around the 5-mile mark.

I finally started to retrace my steps towards Rottingdean, but this time along the Undercliff Walk…

…and at Ovingdean I caught the kayakers returning to their boats after a much-needed hot chocolate.  I ran over to find Nikki, Paula and Martina with two guys I didn’t recognise.

Whilst we had a quick chat one of the guys performed a perfect seal launch into the sea from high up on the single (reminding me of this clip of me a couple of years ago).  As his kayak came to a gentle rest about 15 feet out it was clear that something had gone amiss… on account of the fact that he was still standing on the beach!

The girls kindly came to the rescue and he got away without the swim that he probably deserved!

I ran on, energy continuing to escape me but not in a tired legs way… more in a burdened body & mind way… hence I was not looking forward to the run back up the hill from Rottingdean!  When I got there however, it was no worse than the rest of the run had been… though no better either, alas!

So 10.3 miles in 1.46, average 5.8mph including stopping for the mid-run chat.

I collapsed in an uncharacteristic heap at my folks’ and again when I got home and I’m only just starting to recover now… with Jackson Browne, Running on Empty, BLASTING out into an otherwise empty house!  Now THAT’s a record that should be on Stuppsy’s Desert Island Running Discs!

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Five miles at a time

Joe Jaworski, son of the lawyer who indicted Nixon, suggests that by opening ourselves to the possibilities in the world around us and responding to the subtle signs we then see, we can induce predictable miracles to happen around us.  That’s how I felt this week.

Having written about the power of smiling and then the benefits of focus over the last couple of weekends, I came across a significant piece of research which links the two.  Admittedly there is research and there is research and it’s often difficult to tell which is which, but this has the appearance of the latter, with half a million data points gathered from 15,000 people over the course of more than two and a half years… thus far.

The main findings around the subject of happiness are very interesting, but there was a side bar which suggests that, on average, we allow our minds to wander half of the time.  The percentage varies between certain tasks (for example it’s only 10% during sex!), but the crucial working day mirrors the overall average at 50%. It may be worth repeating that, in case you were thinking about something else.

Our minds wander HALF of every working day!

More interesting still is the correlation between focus and happiness.  When daydreaming, we can drift onto positive, neutral or negative subjects…mostly personal concerns.  Positive daydreaming has a largely neutral effect on our happiness, but neutral and negative daydreaming cause us to be less happy and downright unhappy respectively … and this results in decreased productivity, which I suspect is likely to reinforce the effect.

It is actually when our minds are focused on a task that we are at our happiest and, er… productive too!

With all this going through my mind this morning I can’t say I had a particularly happy run (in running terms), but it was at least a pleasant day… and a fitting close to the mild-mannered Year of the Rabbit which ends today.

I followed the same route as the last couple of weeks… I suppose I should name it my thinking route.  The first five miles were relatively hard going and the thought of cutting it short did cross my mind, but at the turn point I was one minute up on last week at 44 minutes.  The second five miles were equally tough but I managed to hold a faithful pace and returned another 44 minute time.

So ten miles in 1.28, average 6.8mph.

Lots of chores to do now to get the place clean in preparation for Chinese New Year tomorrow… it’ll be a miracle if we get them all done!

 

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Thinking about it

I’ve been thinking.

Sure, we are all thinking about something from moment to moment, but I wonder how many people sit down to deliberately think about one thing?

In fact, since I sold out of my marketing business in 2007 and have been thinking in a more focused way about thinking, I’ve observed that relatively few people do so deliberately or on a regular basis.

There are a couple of directions that I could approach the subject from (for example brain speed) but it may be easier to look at it in terms of focus.

If you have an imaginary 100 units of focus bandwidth at any one moment and you’re thinking about two different things, for example driving and talking on a  hands-free phone (or even to someone sitting with you in the car), then your focus is split between the tasks to some extent… in this case maybe 70/30.

This may be sufficient focus on driving provided there are no abnormal considerations, but the band-width required to take that split-second action that might have averted an accident is essentially tied up doing something else… in this case listening, thinking and responding.

The same is true if I am running and thinking at the same time, something that I regularly do… with last week’s contemplation of smiling being a case in point.  There my focus was probably biased more towards the thinking, say 30/70, whilst I allowed my subconscious to keep me moving from step to step.  One of the (numerous!) reasons I eschew racing is that the training required is a different task to merely running, or in my case, running and writing a blog about it afterwards.

If I were in training (like Phil) or actually racing, then my focus would need to be more on the running and less on the other cognitive flotsam & jetsam.  Frustratingly however, the mind is easily distracted away from the task in hand and into thinking about other things, for example the past and future, or in Phil’s case, probably into thinking about music!  Take the focus away from running hard and you slow down.

Likewise to my mind, driving requires 100% bandwidth in order to moderate speed and road position according road conditions and (a conscious awareness of) potential hazards, which is why I generally drive with the radio off and never answer my phone.  The habit I have formed here is essentially not to think about anything other than the driving.  My occasional passengers will be familiar with my tendency to stop talking, even mid-sentence, in order to assess a situation ahead.

My route this afternoon (after a shameless lay-in) was exactly the same as last week, chosen in part for the ease with which I could think while I ran.  It was a glorious if somewhat chilly day and I quickly got into a reasonable pace.  The running element of my focus consisted of noticing when I had slowed down and pushing myself on a little, while my head then generally spiralled back to the more cerebral subject addressed by this blog.

I reached the halfway point in 45 minutes, exactly the same time as last week and I made a conscious decision to focus more bandwidth on the running on the way back.  I first focused on my footfall, landing on the outside of my heel and leaving from my big toe as I was taught by Andrea Wright, my super-physio.  I also focused on relaxing my upper body, where the Bok’s trick is to relax the jaw, since the rest of you then seems to relax.  Then, keeping a watching brief on these two elements, I focused mainly on my breathing, in through my nose, out through my mouth, fully and in time to the pace.

Like trying to break any other habit, this was difficult (even for me, where I am conscious about what is going on!) and I found myself back in the earlier subject more than once (my breathing becoming shallow again), but I didn’t beat myself up about it, rather just drawing the focus back into the preferred place.

In general terms I made good time, finishing ten miles in just under 90 minutes, or 6.74mph average.

Whether you are running, driving or working, we should try to be more aware of the bandwidth we are using… and if it is less than 100% (and this wasn’t a conscious decision), then we should focus more clearly on what we’re supposed to be doing.

Keep thinking… and keep smiling too!

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Plenty to smile about

I was humbled that, at Christmas, my folks thanked me for my psychological support during last year.  I find it interesting that that despite being a highly evolved species, it is often the simple stuff that makes a difference to how we think and how we feel.

Take smiling for example.  It may be an automatic response to something we like or find amusing, but if you give yourself a big smile as you sit reading this, your mind will probably disregard the fact that you smiled for no apparent reason and post-rationalise that you’re feeling happy… which you will then feel.  You may even enjoy reading this post more, even though it’s a slightly obscure one.

It was late when I dragged myself from bed this morning and I played my guitar whilst supping my way through two quadspressos… before finally pushing myself out the front door at around twenty to midday.  I have a sense that Michael Apter’s fascinating Reversal Theory applies to my runs as well since, unlike last week, I had no desire to get muddy whatsoever.  In fact I was definitely in a telic (task-focused) mode rather than a playful para-telic!

I opted for my ten-mile pavement route on the basis that I could turn around early if required… the cough that I had all through Christmas is still lingering around, which is why I reluctantly turned down the offer of a run with Mark Johnson yesterday.

You may think that running alongside the road would be somewhat tedious, but I happen to be passionate about cars and motorbikes and it didn’t take long before I found myself smiling inanely at a Kawasaki as it rumbled past.  I smiled at more cars, some without thinking and some deliberately.  A Morgan with the top down, a Boxster, a 911, some MX5s… each time getting a little rush of happiness to ease the physical effort of running.

I smiled at neat new fences and tidy gardens and even at the thought that had clearly gone into the design of a new property on the southern outskirts of Hassocks.  I especially smiled as I acknowledged the people I passed along the route… some of them clearly needed a little extra happiness in their lives, whilst others were as Larry as me!

I reached the 5-mile turn point in 45 minutes… I smiled about that too, since it had felt like hard going.

The return leg was slower and definitely harder work and I was glad that I wasn’t trying to keep up with Mark, but the smiles kept coming.  A new red 911 4S convertible (BIG smile!), an old 911S, a neat new Jag convertible, a Ducati , more people (including some that I passed for a second time), more houses and gardens.

It’s curious how easily we can make life more interesting and less stressful: deciding not to get irritated at groups of people taking up the whole pavement, giving a nervous motorist extra time at a junction without adding to their stress, thanking someone who let us out or sorry to someone we have inconvenienced, saying good morning to elderly neighbours (one of whom stopped to give me a lift to the station as I jogged to catch my train, even though she probably has no idea where I live) or even just giving ourselves a little more time to get to work in the morning, or more space to the car in front of us.

Those of you familiar with my work and my England Garden Gang concept probably realise my wider belief that there are plenty of simple ways to make a difference in our organisations and in society too, with a little additional effort but no great sacrifice… for example keeping our neighbourhoods neat rather than assuming it’s the responsibility of someone else.  There’s plenty of stuff to smile about!

Towards the end of my run I passed several curry houses with their delicious aromas hanging in the stillness of the flat grey day, but rather than smiling this just made me feel hungry… such that I announced an urgent requirement for minestrone soup and toast when I eventually dragged myself back through the front door, quickly to be followed by two cups of tea and two hot cross buns.

10 miles in 1.33, 6.45mph and though my legs are already heavy, I can’t help smiling at the positive effect my run will probably have on my body and soul.

Despite whatever aches you might have, feel free to join me in a BIG smile as you wake up tomorrow morning if you want to improve your chances of having an excellent day!

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Good and Muddy

After a really fun, relaxing and generally somewhat studious Christmas and New Year break, FosterRuns got back to business this morning with a delicious run on a BEAUTIFUL sunny day!

I had decided on the title above as I sat studying this morning, so there was little question about where I was going to run… it was back to the old midweek circuit.

I set off with considerable aplomb, charging down the road section in a manner which might have suggested, to the casual observer, that I hadn’t just spent two weeks laid low with a cold and unshakable cough.

I was well into the woods before my conscious mind put pay to the speed, but I had already started to deliberately splash through the middle of the mud by then so the fun continued.  As I’ve written in these pages before, there is a difference in frame of mind between avoiding the mud and plugging on through regardless and on this simple scale I was well off the latter end.

The mud today was thin and wet, so my socks were quickly wet through, but the upside was that my runners didn’t clog up.

I went out past the (currently boarded-up) Royal Oak, touched on Wivelsfield and then ran up through West Wood where the gradient had me slithering all over the place… with a big smile on my face.  Other folk mashing through the puddles were sensibly wearing Wellington boots… they must have thought I was crazy!

Once around the industrial estate it was on to the magical path… as magical as ever with the sun filtering through the trees!

And then across a sun-stroked Common, before heading for home.

5.2 miles took me 51 minutes, so a merest shade over 6mph and a great start to 2012.  I hope that you all have a most amazing year!

And PS. HAPPY BIRTHDAY to Cliff who is forty-something today!