Trains, Travels

I was up at 4:30am today. It was a lot dark, a lot wet and a little cold. It didn’t feel so bad the past two nights have seen me up at 5:00am and this time I managed a good nights sleep. I switched off the computer earlier, had a read and then went to bed a lot earlier than usual. Since I’ve woke I’ve had breakfast, browsed the internet then taken an hours nap! So why did I bother? All part of my race prep plan. For the next week I’ll be getting up around 4:00am so come race day they’ll be no shock to the system. Ideally I would have liked to have set off on a run at 6:30 to give myself the full race day experience, but it was pissing it down and I didn’t fancy it! I may not get that choice on Sunday.

It’s all very close now. I’m getting those little moments of nerves fortunately brief and easily dismissed. Concerns pop into my mind from time to time during training. As I swam yesterday afternoon I started to wonder if I felt fresh enough. Have I rested enough? How did I feel at this point prior to Busselton? I’ve got so used to feeling fatigued I’m not sure how feeling rested really feels! I continued through my swim until there was a twinge hinting at a cramp when I pushed off the wall. I decided better to end the swim early (only 500m short) than have a cramp at this point. I downed some Gatorade on the way home too – my electrolytes were clearly off.

My left ankle is stiff too! In fact it clicks when I rotate it which hasn’t happened for a while. It hasn’t posed a problem though and according to my masseur it’s the right leg that’s really tight. For some reason I always feel more pain, tightness and discomfort in my leg left, but the right is more likely to be in the worse state. Too much compensation from the left side I guess. What can be done now though? Nothing so I just get on with what little training I have to do.

I’ve three days left here on the Coast before I drive South. I’m a little disappointed that it looks like cloud and rain will dominate that. Can’t really complain when the last couple of weeks have thrown so many sunny days my way. In these last few days I only really have 6 hours of training to do. I plan my days around this and fitting in trips to my favourite coffee shops. This morning after I post this I head off for a swim then breakfast at Barchino on the way back. A run midday and I’ll try and fit in a trip to Vintage Espresso for the best coffee on the Coast. It’s hard to tell whether the training or the coffee is more important!

There’s been a sense of finality to each training session the past week or two. With time and distance increasingly limited I was aware I wouldn’t be visiting these places again. I’m not sure if I came to appreciate them anymore, but at the least I enjoyed them. On my Sunday ride, the last long ride before the race, a mate commented how it’s good I get to change things every so often. I’m avoiding some of the boredom and staleness that comes with familiarity. I can honestly say when I left the UK I was sick of some of my local rides! Funnily I feel the same thing about some of the rides round here now. Doesn’t matter how warm and sunny a place might be there’s only so many times you find excitement riding down a road.

A race in 6 days, home in 10. The time has gone so quickly. Take another 6 months though and I’ll be back here, probably on the Coast again and probably excited to get back on the roads here. Sunday I get to see what 6 months of work has done. I’m excited, I think (hope) it could be good. When the doubts not there I believe I can perform my best yet. Then I think about things to come and wonder if 6 months gets me here where does the next 6 months take me?

[If you read this blog purely out of interest in my training you may want to skip this one. Having more free time and with wet weather yesterday I finally got around to seeing Watchmen. Many weeks after everyone else here's my thoughts and a few comments on comics.

And lame as it is - the title to this post is based off the 'What If?' series of Marvel Comics. The idea being change an aspect of a Marvel story and play out how things might go. Ranging from if Peter Parker's Uncle Ben hadn't died to the more absurd Bull Pen being the Fantastic Four. Personally though I'm a sucker for anything involving World War II heroics like the example to the right!]

A couple of weeks after everyone else I’ve finally got around to seeing the Watchmen movie. I’m surprised to say I actually really enjoyed it. I didn’t find it too slow, nor the sex scene as uncomfortable to watch as others have claimed. It felt remarkably true to the themes of the book even with the alterations to the ending. I would say it was a little bit too violent, I don’t really remember the comic being quite so graphic or extreme. Perhaps I’m just getting old in my opinions?

I encountered the comic in my early teens. A period when my dabbling in comics was largely influenced by what my older brother showed me. To be honest I had little taste or appreciation back then, but could recognise good comics. Watchmen was definitely that and being a young comics geek I also owned the smiley button and a T-shirt. Since that first time I’ve possibly reread it once and that would still be over 15 years ago. Despite the lack of familiarity it left a lasting impression which could have set the movie up for a fall. Watchmen was a significant comic in my comic book geek life.

As a slight aside I just want to vent a little comic geek frustration. It’s not hard to find articles or comments refering to Watchmen as significant, breaking the mould or redefining comics. It’s true, it was an introduction to a wider world of comics at a time when I was new to the medium. It was different to the bulk of other titles out there, but it wasn’t an entirely new concept. Moore himself had explored similar themes in previous works (reading some bits and pieces online reminded me just how good Miracleman had been). Others had touched on the themes too. The significance with Watchmen is that it is read by people who probably don’t read many comics and it show them that ‘comics aren’t just for kids’. Every week in comic book stores there are plenty of titles from the trashy to the intellectual. Watchmen didn’t change that, it was good, actually great, but comics covered the range from trash to treasure long before it was around. Grumble over.

So a classic comic from my youth that left a strong impression vague on details admitedly) made into a movie. That’s aready a big hurdle. Throw in that it’s a long movie and I like my movies to aim for around 90 minutes of entertainment then end. Really I was almost nervous when I went in the cinema potentially I’d paid to spend nearly 3 hours watching memories from my teenage years be trashed. Yet almost immeadiately I was drawn into it and from then on enjoyed every minute.

In my opinion it did a fantastic job of capturing the essence of the comic. I’ve seen complaints about it being slow, but the pacing seemed spot on. Perhaps there could have been cuts, but nothing really felt unneccessary. If anything the slowness worked for the film adding a heaviness as we head towards armageddon. Whilst I haven’t read it for years surely the comic was slowly paced too? Visuals were great though the nuclear kiss dream sequence is far more striking in the comic. That was a moment of disappointment for me, but I admit my Watchmen T-shirt was the image of the skeletons kissing as the bomb obliterates them. I didn’t have much luck trying to find an image of that. Poor google skills and with the movie out most of the images you get back are disappointingly from it.

I won’t spoil the ending. It was changed and I can kind of see why. Perhaps they thought the original events of the comic book finale were a little too ‘silly’. They work better in the context of a comic read by people familiar with the medium and its themes. In a standalone movie it would possibly have seemed almost random. I’ve seen it mentioned elsewhere, but Bubastis, Ozymandias’s Lynx is only really relevant to the story if you have the comic book ending. I guess if you’ve got a special effects budget to use though.

To sum up I liked it. It’s an unusual superhero movie just as it was unusual as a superhero comic. I think that may have worked against it a little. Comments I overheard from some audience members after the movie suggest to me it wasn’t what was expected. I’ll catch it again when it’s on DVD with apparently even more film to watch. It’s probably not going to have the same replay value that Iron Man does, but that’s a different, simpler kind of superhero story. Incidentally, during the trailers – a new ‘The Fast and the Furious’! Oh Good! (No really I’ve seen all the others, multiple times in some cases. There is something wrong with me.)

Normal service resumes from tomorrow onwards. Back to the triathlon stuff and upcoming race and I’ll keep the comic books to myself. I feel better for this! Outside of training and racing if you really want to get a long conversation out of me ask about comics. I can cover manga, bande dessinee a little, not too bad on Brit comics, pretty good on DC, OK on Marvel and can hold my own discussing indies!

Two weeks time and should I be making a blog post it’ll be from UK soil. Which having checked the long range forecast means I can look forward to being cold and wet. Whilst I am looking forward to coming home (for a while) I’m using some of the extra time in my taper to appreciate what I’ll be missing here. By that I mean the sun, the sea and the coffee shops.

With it being the second week of my taper training has really been scaled back. I’ve been letting myself lie in each morning, finding getting up when I feel like it leaves me feeling much more rested that sticking to a time. That comes to an end tomorrow with a 6am massage appointment meaning I’m up before dawn. I’d come up with a plan of getting up early in the week leading up to the race to get myself used to it. Just came around a little sooner than expected that’s all.

Some of my extra free time has gone into sorting through all I own and thinning out my possessions. I’ve actually done a good job of not accumulating things in the past 6 months. During the easy part of a bike ride the other day I considered how little I actually spend outside of food and shelter. It’s not so long ago I can remember spending a significant portion of my income on possessions. These days if isn’t necessary for survival I tend not to be so concerned! Ok sometimes I eat more expensively than I need to and it’s not that the basics are so cheap for me. Plus there’s all that flying about and the price of race entries these days! Still if I can take away something other than greater fitness from this trip it’s how little I need to get by.

Whilst I don’t need to own much my love of good coffee incurs quite a cost! Just like my last taper I’m almost planning my training around when best to visit my favourite coffee shops. I’ve four I’d consider favourites in the vicinity. Each good for a different reason and only one I visit for the quality of the coffee alone. I’ve been to them all in the past week, multiple times in some cases. I’ll certainly miss the cafe culture when I’m back home, I have no recollection of such good coffee shops in Reading. At least not the kind where you might kill an hour or two.

In between ensuring I’m suitable caffeinated there has been some training. Lots of easy efforts with judicious doses of harder paces. With greatly reduced volume those hard efforts are much easier and very reassuring. Watching the powermeter once I’ve warmed up on the bike gives me some confidence for the Ironman ahead. At the same time I’m aware of all the little niggles and you do start to worry just a little that there may be issues to come. It’s all part of the game though, not much to be done now!

It’s not all indulgence much as it might sound that way. There are important rules I am sticking to. No unhealthy foods. That’s number one, my diet is pretty simple right now. Lots or fruit and veg, a fair bit of sushi or fish in general. Been off the bread for a while. All those trips to the coffee shops? No cakes and always long blacks no sugar! I quite enjoy sticking to a set of rules. Plus it should stop me from gaining any weight as the taper goes on.

I want to keep this one short rather than the usual essay I dump on the site. I would have liked to ramble less! You’d think with all this spare time I’d have planned this better. I can assure you whilst I admired the views on the beach front I thought about what I’d post and it sounded way better!