I've worked incredibly hard this month at being both injured and ill. My body has fought for a healthy balance between being broken and infected and has really done rather well. I rounded off January with a nasty bout of flu. Not the recurring man flu that I have been unable to shift for the past two months but a proper bout of my-body-and-mind-hurt-so much-i-cannot-move-an-inch type of flu. For the last couple of days I have laid prone in bed or on the sofa, so ill that I couldn't even read the text on my blackberry, let alone get out and exercise. It has rounded off what has been, without a doubt, the worst month of training I have had since I developed a Mars Bar addiction age 14. Not like that, just eating them. And all this since the idea crossed my mind to enter, and subsequently qualify for, the Ultra Trail Du Mont Blanc. It wasn't really what I had in mind when I enterred the race. Well, to be honest I was drunk when I decided to enter the race, so really all I had on my mind, other than trying to run 100 miles in one go, was a large mixed Ebineezers Kebab.
I mentioned I had enterred a whole host of local races to kickstart my build up to the big one and this weekend I missed yet another of those. Hong Kong's 50k Greenpower Hike. The Hong Kong trail is 50k long and winds from Victoria Peak around the contours of the island, finishing at a pleasant little beach towards the far east of the island. Due to its convenience it has become a home from home to me over the last couple of years and I was really disappointed not to be able to take part. As well as my knowledge of the trail, another reason I like the race is the name they give to anyone who finishes under 6 hours. This was to be my first year as a 'great hiker'. I've never been called a great anything before when it come to running, (well I have, but great plonker just isn't the same), so I'll have to requalify next year in order to race my first Greenpower as a great hiker in 2013.
I've decided that after this ordeal I may pursue a new career as an unofficial pharmacist. No, not a drug dealer, but maybe I'll start some sort of herbalist cult. I am now taking, in no particular order: Effervescent Vitamin C 1000mg 3 x day. Eccinacea 2x Day, Ventolin, Becotide, Hammer Tissue Rejuvinate, Omega 3 x 2, Panadol Cold and Flu every 4 hours. So far all its achieved is to give me a hair trigger stomach, but I am remaining positive. As always. Can't you tell. It is taking me 15 mnutes just to take all my pills in the morning and it's bankrupting me, but if I can shift this flu and get back in the gym by tomorrow, it'll have been worth it.
I am hoping that this is the week I get back out and do a little hiking. This week is Chinese New Year, we're enterring the year of the rabbit (which sounds promising), so we get public holidays this Thursday and Friday. I am hoping it is to be my first weekend of hiking since the fracture. Nothing too tough, but having some fun exploring some of Hong Kongs further reaches and islands. I'll write a bit about the trails I go and explore next weekend. I think people who don't know Hong Kong are always surprised that there is more here than just the famous harbour front skyline.
As I have no training to write up on, I'm off back to my DVD boxset of series 2 of Mad Men. It's awesome, I cannot believe I have missed it up until now. Unfortunately it seems to come with a minimum of 4 Ferrero Rocher, and not an ambassador in sight. No one is spoiling me. I have no idea whether a ship went off course back in September, or whether the chinese are famous for their love of nutty chocolate, or perhaps parties at the embassy, or maybe they are 'Made in China'; but Ferrero Rocher are absolutely everywhere at the moment. Mountains of the buggers, just sitting there in their golden splendour, taunting me about my lack of running and how Mad Men just won't be as good without their chocolatey creamy goodness. I admit it, I have no willpower and with these Ferrero Rocher I am really spoiling myself. In more ways than one.
I'm not going to bother with the ometers until I can go a couple of weeks without being ill. I feel my potential victory in 2011's stationary bike world championships slipping away with every day I am flu bound at home, let alone completing the UTMB. So, in summary for January, in my quest to be an ultra king:
- Run 0 Kilometers
- Developed some nasty saddle sores
- 0 elevation gain, several pounds Ferrero Rocher gain
- Man flu
- The flu
- I have learned how to coiff my bush rather effectively.
So not all bad.
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