I’m not saying I’m a sports TV addict but due to the lack of mainstream sports taking place, I watched the wood chopping world championship.
The athletes compete in six different disciplines. Which included more chops than a butchers shop with names like the standing block chop and the underhand Chop. The underhand chop sounds like a secret sneaky attack on the wood.
Each discipline was quick, competitive and exciting. Perfect for television.
It opened up my eyes to a world of sports I would not normally watch.
Sports like chess boxing. The match starts with a four minute round of chess. The players then go into the ring for a three minute round of boxing before again returning to the chess board. The match ends when either player wins the chess match or boxing. It claims that the winner is the ultimate fighter because they are brainy and strong. I can’t help but think the truly intelligent wouldn’t get in the ring in the first place!
Then there is competitive sign spinning. Which implies there is also a non competitive sign spinning. Maybe done to music like some weird form of interpretative dance. Actually, now I think about it, that is a great idea. I’m off to film a video now!
And then there are some ports which make me think WTF – Stupid Robot Fighting League!
When the Lockdown is over, people will ask me what I did to pass the time? Did I use it as an opportunity to educate myself? Did I learn a musical instrument? Did I master a new skill?
And I’ll have to admit – I mostly watched YouTube.
It rained virtually every day in February. It was an awful, miserable month where training outside was almost impossible. At the end of February I thought, “surely March will be better?”
And then, March arrived. It’s fair to say that I am now looking back at February as a golden age of training.
At the start of the March, I worked in an office managing a team of eight. I’m now work at home wondering if any of my team are doing any work. My only interaction with them is via video conference calls. I now know more about the inside of their houses than I ever wanted to know.
At the start of the month, I was fit and healthy but most of this month has been spent ill. I picked up a flu bug that I found very difficult to shift. It left me run down for longer than usual. Thankfully, I feel much better now and I am nearly back to full health.
At the start of the month I bought a five player board game. It’s fair to say I won’t be playing it any time soon. Also my car’s MOT was due. I got it done the day before the government allowed a six month extension to all MOT’s expiring. D’oh!
At the start of the month, I was looking forward to race season. Now, I have no races. Every single event I had planned to do has been cancelled or postponed. Which in the great scheme of things doesn’t matter. It saves me from writing a Celtman training update every month.
Who knows what this month brings. All I can do is follow the government advice. Stay home, Protect the NHS, Save lives. Luckily I live out in the country so I have some great walks next to my house. I’ve already discovered lots of new routes on my doorstep.
I wish everyone good health and I look forward to getting back out training later in the year.
It’s fair to see we were not very good as a double act. That did not stop either of us from trying to go solo. We are both believers in the adage – if at first you don’t succeed… fail in a whole new way instead.
I was terrible as a solo comic. I was wooden on stage, my jokes were bad and I struggled to enjoy it. I did a few five min spots in pubs and then gave in.
Andrew persevered and got to a point where he wasn’t bad but he wasn’t great either. Which is an achievement in itself considering how hard it is to stand in front of strangers and try to get laughs.
During one of his stand up performances, a journalist saw him telling some jokes about the independence referendum. That journalist knew a member of the Better Together campaign (the anti-independence group) and mentioned to them that he’d seen a comedian doing independence jokes.
The comment was well timed. Better Together were organising a comedy gig in Edinburgh starring Eddie Izzard but didn’t have anyone to support him. Every comedian in Scotland they’d asked had either said no or they supported independence. They must have realised it would be a bad career move to alienate half of Scotland.
So, in desperation they phoned Andrew! He had no comedy career so it made no difference if he alienated anyone. He said “yes” which is ironic for a ‘no’ gig
My role was to write jokes and get Andrew gig ready i.e drive him there and supply moral support.
We were introduced to Eddie before the gig. He was quiet and seemed very guarded. He probably wondered what he was doing there too. I mentioned I was from Stornoway and that he’d done a gig there. He perked up a bit chatting about that. He remembered the local church had tried to ban him! I asked if he was ok if I took a photo. he said yes but only if he could check the camera afterwards and delete any pics he didn’t like!
Me and my showbiz chum Eddie.
We had our own changing room in the theatre. It had all the glamour of a cleaners cupboard. Which is propably what it was before the organisers put a note on the door saying “Support – Andrew Todd” It contained a bag of crisps and two bottles of beer. I had the beer. Andrew had the crisps.
We had to wait on the side of the stage before Andrew had to go on. I was extremely nervous before the gig. I was worried no-one would laugh at Andrew. I dread to think how nervous Andrew was. At least I wasn’t going on stage.
Waiting to go on
As Andrew walked on stage all I could think was “PLEASE LAUGH!”
He told his opening line. There was silence. OH GOD NO-ONE HAS LAUGHED!
The silence seemed to go on for ever. Andrew looked crushed. But then the audience laughed. It turned out the delay was due to the way sound travels in the theatre. You need to delay slightly after each line to give it time to reach the audience.
Thankfully the gig went OK. People laughed. Eddie said well done afterwards BUT the next day the Scotsman’s front page said “foul mouth’d comedian Andrew Todd shocked audiences at the anti independence gig”
Which is an impressive take on the event as Andrew doesn’t swear and the only shock was that people laughed.
Which just goes to show don’t believe anything you read in the papers! They will print what they want, not what happened.
When working from home with your spouse it’s important to establish some Spotify ground rules. And, according to my wife, rule number one is that it’s entirely reasonable to listen to One Direction’s album ‘Made In The AM’ five times in a row.
I added a second rule this month. It’s entirely reasonable to watch Celtman’s 2019 official video ten times in a row until I stopped crying…
It’s over. Celtman is postponed. The organisers have made the sensible and correct decision to cancel this year’s race and offer everyone the opportunity to take part in 2021.
It’s the right call. My parents live in the Western Isles and I know how stretched support can be for people looking for medical treatment. The islands struggle to recruit doctors, patients are flown to the mainland for complex operations, and even consultation takes place via videolink with staff on the mainland. They don’t need tourists increasing the demands placed on them and they don’t need visitors increasing the risk of bringing infection to the island.
Applecross is no different. The peninsula is remote and has an older population. It wouldn’t be fair to race until the only public safety issue is whether you might get run over by a cyclist on a time trial bike failing to look up. While the risk of the virus is significant, no one should be using the Highlands and Islands for ‘fun’.
I’m disappointed. I can’t deny that. I started training in November 2018. I’d entered Challenge Roth and November 2018 was the first month where I went out with a thought that this was ‘training’ and not just ‘fun’, even if the only difference was in attitude rather than how far or fast I would run. At the back of my mind though was another thought, a distant dream, one as out of reach as Applecross should be now, I would use Challenge Roth as the springboard for Celtman. If I could get fit enough for Roth then I would carry on and work towards Celtman in 2020.
I’m 42. I know that taking part in long distance triathlon’s requires time and commitment. As I get older I have family and work commitments. I know that training for long distance is optional. I don’t have to do it. And I taking time away from others to concentrate on myself. It’s inherently selfish, which is good that Iain does it too, as it means that we’re both being selfish, but selfish together, which kind of cancels it out… 🙂
That’s why I thought this would be my final chance to race Celtman. Life would get in the way. And it has, just not in the way I expected.
Celtman has been cancelled. But it’s not been cancelled because of the threat of death, the fear of an unknown virus, it’s been cancelled by the possibility that cancelling it could help save and protect people.
That’s why, although I’m disappointed, I’m also happy. The decision was right. It was taken to protect people. A triathlon will never save a life but if cancelling one can, then it should be cancelled.
So, here’s to 2021. I’ll be there and I hope, with the actions of Celtman and others and through the actions of the government and of other countries, everyone else will be there too.
Monthly Stats
No stats this month. A dose of lurgy (not sure if Coronavirus but some minor lurgy or other got the best of me) meant I was out of action for a couple of weeks.
The UK lock-down (which sounds more like a wrestling event than a disease prevention measure) means a lot of people are spending time at home instead of at the office.
This free time is a great opportunity to learn to write, or you could learn to paint, or you could learn to play a musical instrument – which means once lock-down is over there will be a lot of bad novels, bad art and bad music around!
Here at Twinbikerun we’re ahead of the curve. We’ve being making bad novels, bad art and bad music for years. As a bonus we also produce weekly blogs for people to enjoy/endure.
But there’s an important lesson we learnt doing these things. Our first book was “The Fat Minister’s Question time”
The Fat Minister was a character we created for twitter (https://twitter.com/thefatminister) so we could write jokes abut the Scottish Independence referendum. Any resemblance to any former First Minister is purely coincidental…
We collected the Fat Minster’s best jokes into a book. I re0read it before writing this and I can honestly say, like the SNP white paper it was based on, it hasn’t aged well.
We had no aim for the book. It was just a fun project to do so that we could work out how to write a book, publish it and sell it.
We’d have been happy if it sold just one copy.
It actually sold quite well. Beyond our expectation – two copies! One for me and one for Andrew. It helped that it was priced at 99p. Reviews were mixed. Some people loved it
and other didn’t love it as much.
But because we had written the book we received a couple of interesting requests.
We were asked to contribute to a BBC radio show about the independence referendum. Each week for six weeks we would go into the studio and give our comedic take on the weeks news. I still have the cheque from the BBC for my work. Considering how much I’ve paid them in licence fee payments, it was nice to get a bit back.
We were asked to support Eddie Izzard in concert! Yes – the real Eddie Izzard! We would go on before him and tell jokes to 2,000 people.
I’ll write about that next time….
The lesson I took from the book was don’t wait for anyone else to publish your book, or sell your painting or play your album. Just do everything yourself. You never know where it might lead.
DAY ONE Up at 6am. Breakfast: homemade kale smoothie. Shower. Shave. PE with Joe Wicks. He’s BRILLIANT. Isn’t this fun? No telly for me, I’m going to learn to play Metallica’s Enter Sandman on a 12 string Mandolin. Can’t wait for rest of the lock down!
DAY TWO Up at 7am. Breakfast: Coffee (two cups). PE with Joe Wicks. Eff off, Joe, it’s too early in the morning. Back to bed. Watch every episode of Friends on Netflix except the London episodes. They’re awful. I still have standards. Skip!
DAY THREE Wake up. Surf net. Find a punchbag of Joe Wicks and order on Amazon. Up at 8am. Breakfast: All the purple ones from a Quality Street selection box. Switch on Joe. Switch off, Joe. Joe must die. Is 10am too early for Jack Daniels? Look out window. Why are people jogging on the street? Don’t they know the world is ending? You can’t outrun death – he’ll get us all in the end! Watch London episodes of Friends. Twice. Why did Ross say “Rachel” at the wedding?! Why, Ross, why?!? Emily loved you!
DAY FOUR Up at noon.
Food runs out. Bed surrounded by empty Quality Street wrappers. Must go out but supermarkets are filled with infected checkouts. According to a post I saw on Facebook I can only survive if I gargle lukewarm PG Tips and rub my chest in marmite. It must be true. I saw it on Facebook. But I have no marmite. 😦
Never-mind, I can survive without food. I’ll need too to as I have no bog roll.
Joe Wick’s punchbag arrives. The masked courier complains my delivery was not “essential travel”. They’re wrong: Joe. Must. Get. TWATTED.
DAY FIVE Later, as I sit on my balcony eating the dog, I reflect on the unusual events that had taken place within this huge country during the previous four days.
What’s the point of a breakaway? Every time I watch a stage of a bike race I wonder why does the peloton allow a group of riders to race ahead – break away – and then spend the rest of the race chasing them so that they can overtake them in the last few miles? Once or twice, a break away rider would win but, given the number of races in a season, it seemed an exercise in futility. Why spend all day racing ahead when you could spend all day in the main group and end up in the same place all battling to get to the finish line. This book answered my question. If you weren’t in the breakaway then those riders would never win so they take their chance that their race might be the one in one hundred chance they have of winning a stage or race.
But why race on other days? Why continue to battle even when it’s clear the peloton will overtake you. The answer to that is experience It’s about finding out information on your opponents and how they and their team react so that when you’re in a break that could matter you might have an advantage over the other riders because you know their team is slow to react or that they tend to bluff and pretend to be stronger than they are.
While ‘Full Gas’ is not a complex book. It assumes the average reader knows little about bike racing, it is one which has unexpected depths by interviewing a wide number of riders to offer an impressive range of opinions on different parts of racing – from race tactics, how teams work, winning sprints or just what each member of a team is expected to do.
I’d recommend this to anyone who’s interested in knowing more about why cycling is a team sport and who want to know more about how every race is both a mixture of team work and individual brilliance.
Recent weeks have been very surreal and life has changed in many ways. Shopping is much more exciting than it used to be. At the weekend I spotted some curly fries at an otherwise empty supermarket and nearly cried with joy.
I now work from home rather than in a university. It only took a day before my video conference meetings became a farce. Someone discovered how to add a virtual background to their image rather than have it display their room. Since then I’ve had a had a meeting with a person pretending to be on a tropical island, with a person who was in space, and another who seemed to live in a house designed by a blind interior design. Even Laurence Llewelyn-Bowen would have described the room background as a bit over the top. I worry that was a real house and not virtual.
But most of all I’ve learnt “Adversity reveals one’s true character.” And my true character is a chocolate biscuit hoarder who likes hiding from strangers.
Considering everything that is happening in the UK I wasn’t surprised to receive notification that Celtman is cancelled. Thankfully they have moved all this years athletes to next year. Which means I now have much longer to train. After three months in the house eating biscuits I’ll need all the time I can get.
My local bike shop normally sells two turbo trainers a week. Last week they sold eight a day.
Normally, when I go on Zwift, I see 2,000 other riders logged on to a course. Last week I saw 17,000.
It’s fair to say once this crisis is over we will be a nation of very fit cyclists – unless we eat all the chocolate biscuits we are hoarding from the supermarket.
If you have not used Zwift then here is an idiot’s guide. That means a guide written by an idiot.
What is it?
It is a virtual cycling platform. You ride your bike on a turbo trainer at home and a Zwift virtual cyclist will ride in the virtual world.
What do you need?
A turbo trainer.
What’s a turbo trainer?
A device you attach your bike to that allows you to cycle without moving. The device applies resistance to your back wheel to simulate cycling and to get you to work harder.
Are there different types of turbo trainers?
A simple trainer
Dumb – This is your basic turbo. It doesn’t have any connectivity built into it so it won’t work with Zwift unless you get accessory. (see next question).
A more expensive trainer. Note the cable to control resistance.
Smart – This will work with Zwift. Normally, you connect it to your home wireless network. This needs to be the same network as whatever device you are using to run Zwift.
Super quiet and super expensive
Direct drive – The most expensive option. It will be smart (see above) but instead of riding on your back wheel you attach a cassette to it and ride using that. Normally this is the quietest and has the most realistic road feel. If you can afford one then get one but it won’t make you any fitter than a basic model. You still have to train.
How do I make my dumb trainer smart?
You will need to get something to record the speed of your back wheel, like a Garmin or Wahoo speed sensor, and you need something to pick up the signal from that sensor.
The sensors work with two formats Bluetooth and ANT+. If you plan to use Zwift on a laptop then get a ANT+ dongle
If you use it on your iPad or iPhone then use Bluetooth.
Now what?
Install the Zwift app on your laptop or iPad and create an account
And then?
Zwift will try to find your turbo trainer. It should do this automatically but if it can’t find it then check your turbo is on the internet or your Bluetooth is connected to your iPad.
Where to start:
Don’t overthink Zwift. There’s loads of options, routes, training programs and races but choose “Just ride” to start with.
This will drop you into a virtual world and you can start cycling immediately.
What next?
Download the companion app, enter races or do structured training programs but for now just ride your bike for fun and get used to a whole new world of indoor cycling!
My mum said that when she first went to school on the Isle of Lewis in the 1950s that there was a teacher who spoke with a posh English accent. Every day the teacher would tell the class of crofter’s children to “wash their hands”, which puzzled one boy who couldn’t understand the teacher. He turned to my mum and asked “why does the teacher always tell us to wash our hens?”
Last week I worked four days in the office and one, Friday, at home. On Thursday I had a slight cough and a feeling of tightness in my chest. I didn’t have a temperature and the cough was so infrequent it could have been a bus.
To be on the safe side, in case I was asystematic, and, as I could, if I wanted, work from home. I decided that I should keep away from work and try home working.
Mrs TwinbikeRun (Andrew) was already at home, she started on Thursday. She’s working one week in, one week out. We’d set up her desk on Wednesday night. It was beside my Wattbike. “You won’t be able to use it while I’m working,” she said.
“Maybe you won’t be able to work while I’m cycling,” I replied, “the bike did have the room first”.
“Does the bike pay the mortgage?”
“No.”
“Exactly.”
I may need to move the bike next week…
On Saturday we popped to the supermarket. A few people wondered the aisles clutching 16 packs of toilet rolls like a shield. We’ll be okay, they say, we have bog roll!
There a gaps in the shelves, though more there to buy than expected. Pasta was empty but nachos were okay. Currys were empty, so was chicken but there was plenty of pork and steak. Also no diet coke. So, that’s panic buying logic for you, while everyone might be binging, at least they won’t get fat.
With all this going on, this has not be a week for training. Instead I wanted to preserve my strength, see what happens with the mild symptoms I do have (thankfully, they appear to be easing on Sunday so may just have been a cold) and then, once there’s a sense of routine, see what I can do. Training comes third this week. Maybe even fourth. Health and family first. Then work. Then finding Diet Coke, of course, we’re nearly out – dear God, we might have to have Coke Zero! Then training.
Twin brothers swimming, cycling and running in Scotland 