This is one of the longest films I’ve recommended on Film Friday. It’s long in running time at 85 minutes but also long on running time as it covers ultra runner, Rickey Gates, run across America from east coast to west coast.
It’s a fascinating film because it spends very little time on the mechanics of the run itself. We learn little about how many miles he ran each day, how many hours it would take or how he dealt with food and water (except when talking about crossing Death Valley). It’s mostly Ricky talking about what the run meant to him and the effect it had on his view of America.
Highly recommended. And, next week, a second video from Ricky Gates about what he did next.
There are many reasons for not starting a race and I think I’ve experienced them all.
I’ve been injured. That’s a common one: a strained ankle, shin splints or a dodgy knee. They’re all common reasons for not starting. Less common is a broken rib caused by tying a bungee cord around my waist while playing five a side football aka Bungee Football.
Bungee Football is a stupid, stupid game that recreates table football by tying players together with bungee cords so that they have to work together to play. Of course, it doesn’t work like that because when you run right, the rest of your team runs left and you’re thrown to the ground faster than a losing scratchcard. And, unlike an actual bungee, where a lot of time and effort is spent making sure that you don’t hit the ground, in bungee football you hit the ground again and again and again until you break a rib.
I’ve never played it since.
But I did play it four days before I was meant to take part in the Caledonian Challenge, a 56 mile walk along the West Highland Way in 24 hours.
I tried to take part, I went up with my team the night before but, as I couldn’t sleep as I could’t lie on my chest and I couldn’t carry a rucksack with tweaking my broken rib every time the chest strap moved across it, I had to pull out.
That wasn’t the strangest reason I’ve ever had to pull out of a race. Iain TwinBikeRun and I were going to take part in the Tour of the Borders – a cycle Sportive starting in Peebles. The forecast was poor, it was meant to rain all day but we still went ahead as we knew we had waterproofs to manage the bad weather. It turned out though, that what we didn’t have was a front window wiper for Iain TwinBikeRun’s car. As we drove down, and as black clouds gathered and the forecast predicted the start of a 36 hour downpour, the windscreen wiper fell off Iain TwinBikeRun’s car. Blimey!
We stopped at Abingdon Service Station to see if they had a replacement but they didn’t have anything we could use. We were left with no choice: we could carry on, but with no wiper to clear the rain from the windows – and no certainty that if we could get to Peebles before the rain started that we’d find a wiper there the next day so that we could drive home safely. Or, we could abandon the race and head home and order a wiper knowing we didn’t have to drive again until it arrived. We decided to head home.
Most times though when I’ve abandoned a race it’s because of the weather – I used to regularly take part in a half marathon in Fort William in November until I realised that of the five times I’d entered it, I’d only taken part twice. Fort William in November is a good month for submarines, goldfish and putting out fires. Every race day I’d open the curtains of my bed and breakfast, look out at the torrential rain and make a mental note to start gathering animals two by two.
When I think of Celtman 2021 now, I think of it in terms of the races I’ve not entered and how it compares. And I think it stands on it’s own as I can’t think of another race where I’m injury free, the weather was good and I’d trained as much I could yet that training wasn’t enough. There wasn’t any more I could do as I couldn’t swim before the pools were open in Glasgow and I could practice outdoors until the lochs had started to warm up too.
Knowing this, I don’t regret not taking part because there was never a chance of taking part. Just like Bungee Football, there was a limit to how much I could do safely – and that limit was set by the pandemic. There was nothing I could have done to change it.
So, after 32 months of training, effectively the lead up to Challenge Roth in 2019, the postponed Celtman 2020 and this Celtman 2021, I suspect I will now hang up my Celtman training. I doubt I’ll apply next year as 44 months of training is at least 32 months too long and it would be good to be able to swim, run and bike without thinking that I need to hit a target for training.
Unless I change my mind when entries open in October… 🙂
Andrew and I both entered this year’s Celtman, He has detailed his training on this blog. I prefer to not write about training. That way when I drop out of an event, I don’t have to tell anyone!
I abandoned my place a few months ago but unlike Andrew it was not due to Swimming. I live in a different council area than Andrew. I have been able to swim throughout the pandemic as there is a loch near me.
I abandoned as I’ve struggled for time to train properly. I was training well until March but since then I’ve lost 7 week due to injury and another 4 weekends due to a family bereavement. I only had limited free time so I abandoned bike training and stuck to running as it was easy to fit into my week
I knew I could do the swim and run but I would have hated every second of the bike leg. Every awful second of It would have been mentally draining so I dropped out to save my sanity.
We prebooked accommodation for the Celtman weekender. I didn’t want that to go to waste so Mrs Twinbikerun and I drove up north and enjoyed a race free weekend in Torridon. I had my swim, bike and run gear with me just in case I had a last minute change of heart BUT thankfully the injury fairy visited me the night before we left and gifted me an injured elbow!
I couldn’t bend my arm properly or put weight on it for the whole weekend. Which is very annoying when trying to fall asleep as I struggled to find any position that did not make my elbow sore.
I’ve no idea how the injury happened, My wife suspects it was a new extendable dog lead she purchased. That week I’d walked my dogs with it for the first time. Thankfully I’d made the decision to drop out before getting the injury. Imagine having to drop out because of a dog walk! I’d be gutted.
I’ll enter next year and see what happens. If I do get in, hopefully i have more luck and don’t get injured so often! I’ve had more injuries this year than the last 20 years.
A September To Remember? Let’s see if that’s right…
In the BBC Scotland home show “Scotland’s Home of the Year” the judges mark every home they visit out of 10. Except they don’t – they only ever mark them out of four as homes either get a 7, 8, 9 or 10. No one has ever scored six or lower.
The judges could be reviewing a home with one wall, no roof, a raging fire burning down the living room and, worst of all, a “Live, Laugh, Love” sign in the kitchen, and they would still give it a 7.
It’s a nice show. And it’s nice touch that no matter how crap the home they always try and find good things to say about it.
“The out of control fire really keeps the home toasty and warm while providing a degree of spontaneity that shows the home owner’s fun loving side!”
So, all I’ll say to this week’s Film Friday is that a film about a man who challenged himself to sleep in a different London park every day in September deserves a seven.
And any film that talks about sleeping in the parks without once mentioning homelessness is, in my books, morally suspect as I couldn’t help shake off my feeling of unease watching someone say “it’s better than sleeping in my own bed!” without acknowledging that for many people this is not a fun social media challenge. But, looking at the positives:
“The lack of mention of serious social issues really show’s the filmmaker’s fun loving side!”
I’ve covered the White Loch before and if you want know about parking then check out our guide here and if you want an updated version you can find it here and if you want to know what it’s going to be like in six months in winter then you can find that too.
So, this is a review to bring you up to date with what the White Loch is like in 2021 after a year of lockdown, a year of closed swimming pools and a boom in wild swimming.
Well, the answer is easy: it’s become one of the most popular lochs for swimming, paddle boarding and for taking a quick dip in the south side of Glasgow. I regularly pass it when I’m out cycling and I count 10 – 20 people there most mornings, days, evenings and nights (though I’m guessing with that last one as I haven’t checked that out as I can’t ride my bike in the dark!)
In one way, this is fantastic as it means that you will always have company if you want to go for a swim. However, popularity brings its own dangers.
First, the more people use the White Loch the harder it is for it remain ‘clean’. It’s important when swimming to always wash your wetsuit between swims and especially if you are changing locations. You don’t want to bring microbes from one loch to another. What is natural in one loch may be harmful to another so please wash between swims.
Second, not everyone welcomes wild swimmers. While the law may be on your side, and the right to roam includes a right to swim, that doesn’t mean you have a right to the loch greater than anyone else who might use it. There are farmers, there are fishermen – and above all there’s Scottish Water. Be mindful of where you park, how you get changed, what you bring to the loch and what you bring away – everything. And most of all remember that the right to roam/swim doesn’t include a right to have a barbecue, a right to litter or a right to, erm, relieve yourself.
The White Loch itself remains a great place to swim. It has a nice loop round the loch, it’s relatively sheltered and it’s very easy to get there from Glasgow. It remains one of my regular swim spots but, in order to keep it safe for everyone, do remember that you’re not the only one who swims/fishes/walks/farms there. And the easiest way to do that is to join the Southside Swimmers Group on Facebook to keep up to date with everything happening with the loch:
As Glasgow drops to Tier 2 and we finally get permission to move around the country I finally decide to stay in Glasgow and not move around the country by withdrawing from Celtman.
In the end a combination of two things led to my decision to withdraw. First, I need to be confident that I stand reasonable chance of completing the course. I know that people say you should face your fear and that it’s normal to be scared of the challenge ahead but I need to be realistic: I don’t have the swim strength to complete the swim leg and then cycle 120 miles before running a marathon.
My longest swim this year was 2.5k two weeks ago and I didn’t come out of the water feeling energised and ready to cycle. I came out sore and tired and doubting I could have swum another stroke. If I’d another month I believe I’d have had enough time to train but, I don’t have a month, I’ve got two days and I’m not where I need to be to swim 3.4k in the open sea.
Second, TwinBikeDaughter is only five months old and the thought of leaving Mrs TwinBikeRun and TwinBikeDaughter for four days, while taking part in a race that I almost certainly won’t complete, would have been asking too much of them. I would have returned home to find the locks changed and unwelcome visit to TwinBikeDivorceLawyer..!
Sadly, Celtman has been my dream race and it looks like conditions would have been perfect – dry weather, warm(ish) water and a light breeze. But I can’t change the fact that with only five weeks to swim after Glasgow swimming pools re-opened I’m not yet ready for the Celtman swim course.
A sprint triathlon comprises a 750m swim, a 20k bike ride and a 5k run. It was created so that a professional could complete it in around 60 minutes. Which to a pro is a sprint…
To most normal people even a sprint triathlon is a real challenge.
I have not done a sprint race since 2016. I prefer longer distance races but when I saw this was on I thought it would be a good re-introduction to racing after a year without any events in my schedule.
What I didn’t know was that this year’s race was also the Scottish Triathlon Sprint Championship.
Swim – My aim was sub 15 minutes
The swim was split into waves of 50 people based on age groups. I was in the 40-50 age group. I was a bit nervous as I’d not raced in a while. I was also intimidated by just how fit the other other men looked.
In normal life, if I compare myself to the average 40-50 year old then I consider myself very fit. But in his lineup of lean, fit middle aged men I looked like a beached whale of unhealthiness. I tried to stay positive – I might come last but I’ll still be in top 50 in Scotland.
The course was an easy loop. The water was very warm (17C) so I set off fast but I couldn’t keep up with the really good swimmers. I settled into a nice rhythm and I got round with no issues.
I was pleased to be out in 18th place in 13 min.
It would be my best results of the day.
Transition
My transition was slow as its not something I practice or care about. I’m only interested in the times for each leg of the race. I think that comes from only doing long distance races were transitions are not that important to my overall result.
Bike – My aim was sub 45 minutes
One of my favourite games to play on long car journeys is “nice town, crap town”.
The rules are very simple. Whenever I am about to pass through a town I’ve not been to before, I try to guess, based on just the name of the town, whether it’s a nice town or a crap town.
The bike route passed through three towns I’d not visited before – Cowdenbeath, Lochgelly and Lochore.
My guess was that Cowdenbeath would be crap. Cows are big ugly beasts so a town based on the name ‘cow’ must be ugly too. I thought the other two would be nice as lochs are beautiful places. I was wrong. They were all crap!
Caveat (twinbikelawyer says I shouldn’t slander whole towns) – I should say, the bits the bike route went through were crap. The other parts of each town might be nice!
I knew my bike leg would be slow. I’d forgotten to check my TT bike until the night before the race. It uses hydraulic brakes but the water pressure was low. The brakes didn’t work. I didn’t have time to sort it so I used my normal bike instead. This bike is comfy and reliable but it’s not quick. All the swimmers who were slower than me soon caught up and passed me.
The course was undulating and the road surface was poor in places. It wasn’t a very scenic course but I was happy with my time of 42 minutes. It was as quick as I was likely to go considering the bike I was using.
Transition
I jumped off my bike and then held on to my bike as I mounted a pavement. As I lifted my bike over the pavement the front wheel came flying off. Narrowly missing an official. Is killing an official with a bike wheel a DQ or just a 15 second penalty?
Run – my aim was less than 25 minutes
The run was an out and back course alongside Lochore. I’d only run 200m when I passed by the finish line. My number fell off. I didn’t bother to pick it up as I couldn’t be bothered holding it for the whole race. But a nice man picked it up and handed it back to me when I ran back at the end. Thank you to whoever you were.
It was quite warm on the run. I’d have liked a water stop but I’m guessing COVID regulations don’t allow it as there was none on the course.
I was happy to plod around in 23 minutes.
Overall
I was happy to beat all the times I’d aimed for. It was nice to be at an event and see people out enjoying racing again.
It’s my first time in a shop (excepting supermarkets) in over a year.
Salesman: “You don’t want that, it’s shite. I only have it in the shop as a warning not to buy it!“
It was good to see customer service in Glasgow hadn’t changed…
It was both ‘less strange’ and ‘more strange’ than I thought to be shopping in town.
It was strange to be shopping as Mrs TwinBikeRun and I had brought Baby TwinBikeRun with us and it was harder than I thought to move around while pushing a pram. We even walked different streets because “it’s quieter if we go to the next street rather than walk up this one”. While, in shops, Mrs TwinBikeRun was stuck by displays blocking the pram from getting round – shops are not designed for babies, which I’m okay with, as they don’t have a wallet so why should they have a say in how shops are laid out!?!? 🙂
It was less strange than I thought to be in town because there wasn’t a great change in how I shopped. I walked in, I looked round, saw nothing I wanted to buy and then walked out, just as I did a year ago. I’m not a slow browser: I check shops with all the speed of a soldier running across an exposed courtyard with a sniper somewhere on the roofs above.
I was in town to find a new pair of jeans as I don’t like ordering jeans on the internet. They always look different, and you can never tell the fit from a website photo. And I don’t want to order them just to send back. It’s for the same reason I wouldn’t order a mail order bride. Some things need to be seen first.
Baby TwinBikeRun slept through the whole trip and missed out on seeing all the shops with queues out of the door. Primark’s queue stretched along the front of the shop and around a corner. Zara too had a queue which stretched down Buchanan Street. I wondered if the queues were a sign of popularity or a sign of a decent social distancing policy. Perhaps the shops without the queues are the ones to avoid because they spray COVID on the clothes and cough in the changing rooms?
Most people were wearing masks, even on the streets. A few had them over their mouth, most had them around their neck, or, in the case of one man, on top of his head like a clown hat.
“That’s because he talks out of the top of his head,” says Mrs TwinBikeRun.
We put masks on each time we go into a shop, so did everyone else but, in Glasgow, the numbers have still been rising all month. As the rest of the country has moved in tier 2 we remained in tier 3 and, as I write this on Friday 28 May, it looks likely we’ll stay in tier 3 for at least another week.
If so, it’s another week I can’t leave the city unless it’s essential travel – and Celtman is not essential travel.
I now put my chances of taking part in Celtman at less than 10%. I don’t feel at all confident that I have the swimming strength for 3.4km. While I have managed 1 – 2 swims a week since mid April, my arms are very tired after 2km and I haven’t managed to do anything longer.
I’m comfortable with the thought of the bike and the run, and think my running is probably the strongest it’s been before any other long distance race, but, just like evolutionary biology, you can’t run before you can swim.
On Monday, someone had used white chalk to write the following message on a nearby pavement: “Ally, I love you, please call me!”. It was surrounded by love hearts.
By Friday, the message was changed to: “Ally, you are a GIMP!”
The path of true love does not run smooth, even if you use an actual path to declare your love…
This message was the only thing that changed this week as Glasgow remained in Tier 3 COVID restrictions for another week, month and year. We’ve now been locked down so long that, if we were in prison, we’d have been eligible for release on compassionate grounds.
I must admit, despite trying to follow the rules, that I’m not quite sure what the current rules actually are. I live in a postcode that borders the highest rate but also borders one of the lowest, an area which is in Tier 2. If you turn right at the end of my street the pubs are open, if you turn left the pubs have been turned into an emergency COVID vaccination centre to halt the spread of the virus. It’s all quite confusing.
So, this report is brought to you with the slight caveat that I’m not sure if I was or wasn’t breaking the lockdown rules by swimming in Loch Ard last week. Certainly Kinlochard, the village at the end of Loch Ard, was giving very strong ‘Haste Ye Back’ vibes with every parking space displaying a “Do Not Park Here” sign and the local community hall car park closed.
Instead, I parked in the same spot as last time and would point out that there’s only space here for four cars so you may want to come here early to make sure you have a spot. I was there for 9am and there was one other car parked.
The loch itself has warmed up nicely and was around 12 degrees. Depending on your cold water reaction it was either starting to turn cold but pleasant or still on the chilly side. I wore a vest underneath my wetsuit and was fine without gloves or boots. At the end I tried swimming without a wetsuit and it was okay…ish…
For the swim, I swam to one of the islands and back, a swim of around a mile, if you can swim in a staightline. My goggles kept steaming up so I was more crooked than Al Capone and veered to the left as I swam.
Be careful of the water becoming colder the further you swim out. While the water is shallow near the bank it quickly becomes deeper and colder the further out you are. I wouldn’t try this swim unless you were confident that you can swim 2km.
Overall: a fantastic setting for a swim with plenty of options for short or longer routes. The water should only get warmer as we get into summer. Just remember though to check the COVID restrictions.
Twin brothers swimming, cycling and running in Scotland 