My first attempt at this event did not go well. You can read about it here

Glentress Winter Trail Race 21K (Iain)

My last attempt at the race was better…

Glentress Trail Race (Iain)

I haven’t done much training since completing Dramathon but I was confident the little I had done would get me through the race.

Its a long drive to Glentress from my house. Its even longer when Andrew phones the night before the race and asks for a lift from his house. I had to set off 40 minutes earlier than planned so I had time to pick him up.

He claimed he knew the fastest way there but his “shortcut” took us all the way south until we saw a sign saying “Welcome to England” and then all the way back north again.

We took my way back and saved about 40 minutes driving!

Annoyingly, despite signing up for the race in August, there was no record of my entry. I had to quickly find proof on my phone before I was able to start. Which would have been fine if I hadn’t left my phone in the car, a mile away from registration. I had to quickly run back and get the info.

The race was enjoyable. The weather was damp but it was warm enough to run in shorts and t-shirts. The first six miles is mostly up hill. There was some congestion on the climbs but it wasn’t as bad as the last time I did it.

Towards the end I bumped into a fellow glasgow triathlon club member. I said “Only one hill to go – the wee climb at the finish” She replied – “They aren’t doing that this year. The finish has been moved”

I’m glad she mentioned it as I’d have gone the wrong way at the finish if I had not known.

The new finish was flat across a field. Which wasn’t as interesting as the old finish. The last wee climb made the finish line feel sweeter but I’m guessing they aren’t allowed to use the road at the finish line so they had to move it.

A fun day out. Check out the February edition – https://www.highterrainevents.co.uk/glentress-trail-race

and check out https://www.coltmans.co.uk/ for post race food. Delicious baking and sweets.

Can Will Smith lose 20lbs in 20 weeks? It’s an interesting challenge but not one that is at all relatable because Will Smith is not an ordinary man, or a professional athlete, he is a SUPERSTAR.

And being a superstar means that this challenge comes with a massive ‘but’. Does anyone other than Chris Pratt, Chris Evans or Chris Pine or any other modern action star not called Chris have access to a home gym, swimming pools, trainers and personal psychiatrist to help them achieve their weight loss goal?

I’d have like to see a video where Will Smith joins his local weight watchers and has to make to do with a DVD of Davina McCall for inspiration.

But… if you ignore the fact he is a superstar and everything about this has been through his PR team, it’s quite enjoyable because, well, it’s Will Smith and he’s a superstar for a reason. He knows how to entertain.

I’d planned to swim on Findhorn Beach, but six foot high rollers and a dozen birdwatchers changed my mind. While the fierce waves gave me second thoughts about venturing out into the water, the thought that risking swimming in those conditions would be captured by a dozen twitchers with foot-long zoom lenses ready to take a photo of my imminent demise was more than I could take.

Not that the birdwatchers were that interested in being there. When I saw them gather, I asked one of them. “Are you here to see anything in particular?”

He just shrugged and said “just some boring migrating birds.”

I wasn’t sure whether to be impressed by his disdain for his own hobby or to be saddened by the fact he was standing on a beach in November and didn’t even want to be there.

I did want to be there though having spent the day driving north from Glasgow and looking forward to a quick swim at the end of my journey. After going to the beach, I decided to drive to the south bank of Findhorn instead and swim in the sheltered bay beside the town. I wondered if it would be too public a spot for swimming. I was parking on the ‘Main Street’ and would be changing in front of people’s homes.

I shouldn’t have worried. While I was parking two others arrived to swim too and, when I went down to the water, another was already swimming. I shouldn’t have been worried about whether to swim. Instead I should have been worried about finding a space to swim.

Ease of Access: https://goo.gl/maps/vkcjfRm5cx6dYWt7A Park on the left hand side as near as you can to the Kimberley Inn.

Water quality: Shallow at the edge of the bay in high tide. Clear water and very calm even when the beach itself is not.

Swim Quality: Very good. Just watch out for trailing ropes between the shore and boats in the bay.

Other People: You’re swimming right beside a street with homes and two bars so expect company.

Would I go back: Yes. It wouldn’t be my first choice for a long swim but it was great for a short safe swim.

Does Sir Chris Hoy have to pay to work out in the Sir Chris Hoy Velodrome? Does Olympic swimming champion Adam Peaty have to find 20p for a locker when he pops into Uttoxeter Leisure Centre’s Adam Peaty Swimming Pool? Because otherwise what’s the point of having a sport centre named after you if you can’t get in for free?

Whether Sir Chris has to pay or not, he might first ask himself if he really wants to ride the cycling track in the velodrome? I assume after five gold medals and 15 year career racing in velodromes that the answer will probably be “yes, I, Sir Chris Hoy, gold medal winning track cyclist and one of Britain’s greatest Olympians will ride the track!” but, as he now spends more time racing cars, maybe he’s scunnered and doesn’t want to go anywhere near a 45 degree sloping wall?

I know how he feels.

The fear of a 45 degree sloping wall, not the whole being one of the greatest athletes in the world.

I thought it would be great to learn how to ride in the velodrome. It would give an opportunity to ride indoors during winter months and to learn a new skill: dangerous balancing. See also tight rope walking for more examples of dangerous balancing.

In order to start at the velodrome I had to complete four induction courses. You can find more details of them here: Velodrome

However I quickly realised that I didn’t have what it takes to ride in a circle again and again and again.

It wasn’t the steep walls. After the first couple of circuits it felt natural to ride the steep banks. It wasn’t other riders, though having seen one accident – Iain TwinBikeRun describe it here Welcome to the Velodrome (Iain) – I wasn’t keen to see another. It was actually a single thought that stopped me going back. That thought was this: “What if I get a puncture?”

You can’t ride a bike without getting a puncture. It’s as much a part of riding as wobbling and pretending to fall off is a part of tight rope walking.

And there’s nothing you could do if you get a puncture while riding 10 foot up a track.

Now you could say that all life is a risk and that at any moment a bolt of lightning could shatter a peaceful blue sky and strike you dead, which is true. Life is filled with randomness. But that doesn’t mean I need to be standing in the middle of a field waving a long metal stick while shouting “Everyone knows the Good Lord smells!”

Which, in my mind, is the same thing as riding a bike on a velodrome track waiting for the inevitable puncture.

It wasn’t for me.

Maybe it’s for you.

The induction is well run, felt safe and was fun. I’d definitely recommend trying it – but it just wasn’t for me.

Whoops!

This book was bought as a Secret Santa present for a colleague at work. He was moving to Elgin from Glasgow. It definitely 100% should not have been in Stornoway two years ago on Christmas Day. It should not have been opened by Iain TwinBikeRun as his Christmas present.

It was meant to be a thoughtful gift to a colleague. Instead, I mixed up the presents and my colleague received Iain’s gift and had no idea why ‘Santa’ had sent him a book called “So You Want to be a Gold Digger?”.

As I said, whoops!

But the book was only part of the gift, I’d actually bought Iain a one day gold panning course at the Leadhill Goldmining Museum.

Unfortunately, COVID and lockdown meant that all courses were cancelled in 2020 and they only resumed in August 2021. Luckily, we were able to book one of the few dates this year and popped down to Wanlockhead last month to find… GOLD!!!!!

But how do you find gold?

Well, first of all you need to dig out some earth and soil and gravel from a river. Then you have to sift it using either a large plastic ridged sieve or a plastic pan, just like the prospectors of the Eighteenth century. Once sifted you have to carefully swirl the lightest soil and gravel around the pan to separate it from any gold. Gold is a heavy element so it won’t move as easily as other rocks and stones. If you swirl water around the pan then the gold should sty in place, as it’s heavier than the water, and the soil can be washed away.

While the theory is fairly simple, it takes a lot of skill to move the soil and not the gold and to keep the gold in the pan while removing larger rocks.

“How much would you make in a good day,” I ask our instructor.

“About £200” he says, which is more than I thought, but to put that into context, there were 15 people on the course and over 4 hours they made around £50, which just shows how hard it is to find gold.

Unless you’re me!

And you have the gold touch!

As I found £50 in just one pan – woo hoo! I’m going to be a trillionaire and fly into space like Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk! Looks at this beauty:

Is there gold in them there hills? Absolutely!

DNF is available for pre-order here https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B09KTCL3G6

It will be released on Nov 15th.

Every one of our results tells a story, even the races we did not finish.

An extreme triathlon event challenges athletes to push their boundaries and be part of an unforgettable experience. Norseman is known among athletes as the most extreme triathlons in the world.

The race is point-to-point route starting with a four meter jump from a ferry into a fjord. Athletes then swim 3.8km to the beautiful town of Eidfjord, Athletes then cycle a 112 mile route which is very hilly and prone to bad weather. Finally, athletes run a marathon to the top of the 1850m peak of Gaustatoppen.

The race is limited to 250 competitors of which 160 finish at the mountain peak. The rest finish at the town below the summit. The originator of the event describes the race perfectly:

“I wanted to create a completely different race, make it a journey through the most beautiful nature of Norway, let the experience be more important than the finish time, and let the participants share their experience with family and friends, who will form their support. Let the race end on top of a mountain, to make it the toughest full distance triathlon on planet earth”

My twin brother and I watched a video on YouTube about the race. We were both instantly hooked. The race looked amazing.

My Brother and I grew up on an island in the Outer Hebrides. We regularly traveled by ferry to the mainland. It was a boring journey. I used to joke with my him,that one of us should jump off the ferry, just to add some excitement to the trip. Neither of realized that many years later we would both attempt to jump from a ferry,

There was only one problem with our dream. We had not swum since leaving school and we had never done a triathlon.

This is the story of how we tried to become Norsemen. It is a tale of 20 years of starting but not always finishing races.

The book is about the the joy of sport whether you come first or last.

It is cheating. It doesn’t just feel like cheating. It is cheating pure and simple. I stop pedalling, I look down, the speedometer says 15mph and I’m still going up hill. This isn’t a bike, it’s an escalator.

I recently moved office from Larbert to Glasgow. With the world opening up and people returning to offices, I didn’t want to return to commuting by car five days a week. Instead I moved office so I could work most of the week in Glasgow city centre and commute from Glasgow Southside, roughly three miles away.

It’s been seven years since I worked in Glasgow. When I did, I would always cycle into work. Not only was it good to get out on my bike, it was normally faster too as I could get to the office in the same time it would take to walk to a train station or bus stop and catch a lift into town.

However, I had one problem when it came to commuting by bike again. There was no shower in my new office! And I would be sharing a room with one other person, who I assumed, because I’d seen it and because most people have one, has a nose. And a sense of smell.

So, I thought an ebike would be ideal. It would mean I could still commute back and forth but with no effort and no chance of turning up to the office drenched in sweat.

I looked at a number of different bikes and settled on the Eovolt as:

• We have limited room so a folding bike was ideal as it wouldn’t block any corridor
• A folding bike could also fit in the car or be taken on a train if I wanted to go to Larbert while in Glasgow
• It has chunky moped like wheels which made it very stable and comfy to ride.
• It was cheaper then a Brompton, which I know is the traditional folding bike but with slimmer wheels, it didn’t feel as good to ride on pothole ridden streets.
• It has a range of around 40 miles before it needs recharged. I’d looked at cheaper bikes but they all had shorter ranges and would have needed charging more than once a week. I was wanting to buy a bike, not spend all my time plugging and unplugging it.
• It has a removable battery. The battery is in the seat post, which can be removed by unclasping one clasp. The seat post can then be charged in the house and the bike kept in my shed.
• It was bright orange (though other colours are available). I used to have black bikes for commuting but, with winter approaching, I’d much rather have one that stands out in a garish colour to help with it being seen at night. Bike colours can be cool, but. do you know what’s cooler? Not getting run over by a bus.
• It is relatively light (for an bike). I looked at full frame bikes but they were all closer to 30kg, this one is 17kg. While I couldn’t recommend it if you need to carry it up three flights of stairs, I’d definitely say it’s okay for one flight.

Overall

This is a cracking wee bike that has transformed my commute. I have 2.5 miles of flat and then half a mile uphill to get to the office. The flat now feels like a down ride and the uphill feels like a flat. And my roommate hasn’t complained about any smell so I’m counting this as a success.

Dramathon is an annual marathon-ish distance race set in the whisky county of Speyside – which is home to more than half of Scotland’s whisky distilleries.

The race was originally announced in the same year as another alcohol fueled event – a wine run set in Glasgow https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/scottish-news/glasgow-set-host-10k-run-7169804

The wine run was banned. Government ministers, Doctors, and athletic officials all said running should not be combined with alcohol. But when the Whisky run was announced they all said “What an amazing idea! Love whisky! Make mine a double!”

It seems the only alcohol bad for you in Scotland is foreign alcohol.

I don’t drink Whisky. So I was attracted by the promise of a scenic mostly trail marathon.

My wife and brother had also signed up to do the race but both withdrew a few weeks beforehand. I’d have withdrawn too (as I didn’t fancy the long drive up and back) but I’d already paid for the B+B!

I recommended https://craigellachielodge.co.uk/ it was very nice.

The race starts at Glenfiddich distillery in Dufftown at 0900 by boarding a bus to Glenfarclas distillery so the race can actually start at 1000.

I wouldn’t get to Dufftown too early. There is plenty of parking near the start. I arrived with 5 minutes to go and easily made it onto a bus in time.

Once I got to Glenfarclas there was a 40 minute wait until the race began. I would have preferred to just start. It was very cold and I don’t like hanging about when I could be running instead.

The first part of the race was very scenic. I ran through the distillery grounds out into the countryside. The paths was mostly grass and mud. I settled into an easy pace. I didn’t want to go too fast.

There is a nice downhill section to the a road crossing. At the crossing I dibbed into a timer on one side and then dibbed out on the other. The clock stops between dibs.

It was then into a castle’s grounds. A women ahead of me said “This is beutiful”

A man replied “That is because this is a trail marathon. A trail marathon is much more scenic than a normal marathon…” he then spoke for 5 minutes at her as he mansplained marathons and running.

He finally asked if she did much running

She replied “Not much since I completed Celtman!” Celtman – the infamously difficult extreme triathlon which culminates in a marathon over two mountains.

He looked at her and said “I’ve not hear of that one.” and then went back to telling her more about his exploits!

Once I was out of the castle grounds there was some nice sections on a golf course, through some distilleries and out onto riverside paths.

My aim was to run for 18 miles or 3 hours. I was feeling good at the half point point. My time was just under 2 hours.

And then the race hit the Speyside way path. It was sooo boring. The rest of the race was not scenic. It was just long boring paths in amongst trees. Nothing to see by path and trees.

Thankfully I had a Crunchie choclate bar in pocket. That was the only thing that kept me going for the next 10k. I promised myself I’d eat it once I reached the 10k to go point.

At that point my cousin’s wife appeared and shouted “hey Iain.” I was surprised to see her but it turned out she had entered the 10k race. She asked if I was doing it too. I said I was doing the marathon. She seemed surprised by this. I must have looked very non marathon like ambling along with my Crunchie.

The last 10k was more boring trees and boring path. I checked my time and saw that I was going to easily get in before 4h 30min. Which was my pre race aim. I did just enough running to ensure I made it.

At the finish I received 8 miniature bottles of whisky. That’s Xmas presents sorted for 8 people!

I’m lying on my side staring into my stomach. I’m getting a nasal endoscopy – a video camera at the end of tube inserted via my nostrils – and I think I’ve been conned. 

Before coming to the operating room, I had a chat with a nurse who checked my medical history and then gave me a spray to numb my nostrils and throat. 

“We’ve just started carrying out these procedures at this hospital, but don’t worry, you’ve got Dr Sinclair and he carries out lots of them. There may be some other doctors though as they want to know what to do.”

Great, I thought. I’ve got good ol’ Steady Hands Sinclair. Nothing to worry about.

Except, I’m now on my side, a cable down my nose and throat and stomach and the doctor pushing the cable down my gullet is shouting “Whoa ahh! I always perform best under pressure!” like he’s Tom Cruise in Top Gun. This can’t be Steady Hands Sinclair?!?!

I’m not nervous, I don’t know enough about what’s going on to be nervous. I just trust that everyone knows what they’re doing. But now the Doctor is saying “I’m running out of scope!” and I’m not sure if I’ve got a surgeon or a submarine captain.

It’s a strange experience to see your insides on a screen in front of you. I don’t even know why they do so. Who thought: “I know what a patient wants to see when we carry out an endoscopy, they want to see it live on screen, so lets get a second telly so they can watch it themselves.”

So, I watch the camera approach my nostil, which I assume will be the easiest entry the Doctor will have all day as my nose is so big you could thread the Flying Scotsman down it. Then I watch it pass the back of the throat, through my vocal cords and then into a pink ribbed stomach and gut. 

I stop watching.

“Are you okay,” asks a nurse.

I can still talk, the cable doesn’t block my mouth but it’s uncomfortable with my throat numb and the plastic snake sliding through my belly so I just nod. But what I want to say is “Switch the channel! I don’t want to watch this! Put on Homes Under the Hammer!”

While the Doctor is pushing the tube and saying “C’mon, c’mon” like he’s a ten pin bowler trying to direct a strike. 

This only takes four minutes. It feels longer. Maybe it was longer, but it feels like it won’t end until it does and I’m handed some wipes for my face and the doctor says “everything looks normal.”

That’s good to know but I didn’t need to see it. I would have just believed him.