Because we’re twins it’s easy to remember Iain Twinbikerun’s birthday. It’s the same as mine! Easy!

This year I gave him a gift like no other because no other face mask has ears – or a tongue. Or make him look like a rabid collie. And this gift is special because, despite all the rules and regulation about wearing a facemark to protect people from COVID-19, he has a mask that shops will beg him to take off when he tries to go in.

I had three goals this month: one was to ride to complete a circuit of the Western Isles west coast; to swim at least one 3K swim and to run a half marathon. At time of writing I’ve completed two of them – the bike and run – but not yet the third, the swim. Although I am hoping to complete it this weekend, weather permitting.

I’m still not following any training plan other than trying to ‘do something’ five to six days a week. As September approaches and the weather starts to turn I have thought whether my ‘do something’ should morph into ‘follow a plan’ but I still think I’m too early for that. Why follow a plan when I could just be following whatever I want to do that day? If legs feel heavy, then take an easy spin indoors on the bike while watching YouTube. Feeling good, go for a longer ride outdoors. In short, this August update is more about marking process than sharing anything useful. So, in an attempt to justify this blog then I will share one thing I have found useful over the last two months:

This simple and easy flapjack recipe. And my top tip – swap the golden syrup for maple syrup.

Twinbikerun? Nah, this month it’s twinbikerunfood.

Back in May I started my challenge to try and run as many streets near my house in Glasgow in one month. You can find out how I got on here. But I didn’t stop when I got to the end of May. I loved finding new streets that I’d never seen despite being only a few minutes from my front door. And I loved that I was now getting a real sense of where I lived and how neighbourhoods changed even from one side of a street to the other. So, I carried on and this is what I’ve learned 25 runs later:

• Glasgow may be the home of world famous architect Charles Rennie McKintosh but did you know that, before he became a famous painter, MC C Escher also designed Glasgow’s streets. It must be easy to run an American city with identical blocks making it easy to navigate and criss cross. Instead Glasgow resembles an Escher painting with streets that you run for miles and miles only to find yourself back at the start and running in the opposite direction. I swear that the film Inception was filmed in Glasgow and the famous scene of Leonardo Di Caprio showing Paris fold in on itself was actually filmed in Clarkston and required no special effects at all. If you’re thinking of running every streets then pick somewhere flat and straight and ideally somewhere that doesn’t require you to navigate a maze worth of a minotaur.
• After 10 or so runs you’re starting perimeter will expand. You will need to run for five minutes just to get to an area you’ve not already covered. By 20 runs you’re probably running a mile to get to new streets. That means two miles of your run will be spent getting to and from the streets you’re ticking off. There is no way to stop this that doesn’t involve a car. I don’t know if using a car to get to places is within the spirit of running every street. It is called ‘running every street’, not ‘getting dropped off and then running every street’. I suspect by the 30th run I will be driving though as my runs will basically consist of running to a street, then, exhausted having got there, ticking it off and then running home.
• You do run longer than if you went out for a non ‘running every street’ run. It does give you that thought in your mind to just run another street or block or area before coming home. If you want to train for a marathon then running every street is good practice. Perhaps not good practice for an ultra-marathon though as you’ll never be able to follow a trail for 50 miles without going paranoid about passing all the tracks leading off in other directions.
• And, finally, having reached the milestone of day 25 and having run on average 10km every run I do intend to carry on. Not just because I’m still enjoying it but because I still haven’t completed the page of my Glasgow street map showing all the streets near me.

Saunas and steam rooms are crazy. I’ve mentioned that before. See blog here. But gyms are no better. When I look back I can’t help thinking why I thought any of this was acceptable.

Only in a gym would you see a girl and boy swap places on a weights machine and kiss each time they stopped while shouting “Smash it, babe!”. Not just once, not just twice, but three times, which means six times as they were each doing three sets. Smash it, babe. Smooch. Smash it, babe. Smooch. Smash it…. Stop it. This is a gym, not a kissing booth.

Only in the gym would you see someone taking a selfie in the changing rooms while flexing a bicep. I don’t care how big your bicep is and how keen you are to show it to the world, can you not show them my bare bum in the background too?

Only in the gym do you pull your hood over your head even though your running on a treadmill and it keeps bouncing off your bonce every twenty seconds. Why are you even wearing a hoodie anyway? Uisean Bolt didn’t wear a hoodie to run the 100 metres. Mo Farah doesn’t shop in George for Asda for his running gear? Why are you even wearing a hoodie? And why does it have no sleeves??!?

Only in the gym is it acceptable to have an entourage. Anywhere else and it would be a group or a gang or a gathering. In the gym, the five of you hanging out at the weights rack can only be described as an entourage, which is French for wallys because all of them are wearing trackie bottoms, a sleeveless hoodie – and a cap. Which leads me to…

Only in the gym will you see someone with superglue on their head. Yes, superglue. Because it can only be superglue keeping that cap on their heads because it stays on their head even when they lie back on a bench and press 200 pounds. Why does the cap not fall off? Does working out make you immune to the universal laws of gravity?

Only in the gym can someone have an orgasm louder than Meg Ryan in When Harry Met Sally and no one bats an eyelid. Who knew that lowering a bar would lead to so much joy you have to scream: “Oooooooohhhh Aaaaaaaahhhhhh Ooooooooohh” like Nick The Headless Horseman at an orgy.

And, of course, there’s only one thing worse that you can see at the gym. The one thing I’m glad I can no longer see while gyms remain in lockdown – yourself in the mirror. There’s no worst sight than catching yourself halway through a rep with a face that suggests you’ve just had a stroke while being slapped red raw with an extra big kipper.

Gyms should remain shut. Or at least all mirrors should be removed from gyms before they’re allowed to re-open.

Is there a minimum distance I have to swim before I can say I went for a swim?

Usain Bolt does 100m and I bet he says he went for a run.

The olympics has a 50M freestyle event so I will declare that the minimum distance required. In that case, I can say I went for a swim at Port Stoth Beach. It is the most northerly beach in the Western Isles.

And the day I visited it was also the beach the beach with most Jellyfish! There was hundreds of them. I don’t know much about jellyfish other than what Andrew wrote here https://twinbikerun.com/2016/12/01/the-one-with-jellyfish-in-it/

But I do know not to mess with things I don’t know about so as soon as I spotted them I turned around and I swam back to the beach.

REVIEW

Ease of Access:

Ness is 45 minutes from Stornoway. There is a parking spot beside the beach. It is a 2 minute walk from there to the sea.

Water quality:

The water quality is crustal clear and perfect for swimming (if there was no jelly fish)

Swim Quality:

Hard to tell. I didn’t swim for long enough.

Other People:

Not a soul

Would I go back: Yes. I’d like to try swimming further than 50m