So, Friday’s here and I’ve managed an exercise packed and alcohol free week as planned (apart from one accidental pint of Guiness over a poker game at the Loose Cannon last night!). All ready for a week of Christmas excesses, starting tonight with the HSBC Christmas party, going on tomorrow for one of the last nights at my erstwhile favourite club “The Cross” before it closes down permanently at the new year. Sunday’s a day off, then partying hard through next week and into 2008.
So, finished my big week long health push with a run up to the West End this morning, an hour in Naomi’s yoga class at the Tri-yoga studios on Kingly St, and then a long loop home around the back of Hyde Park, Kensington Gardens and St James Park. It’s a lovely day today, brisk, crisp and clear out. The parks were nice and quiet, just me, the ducks and swans (plus what I think was a monsterous looking heron on the lake outside Buckingham Palace).
Anyway, here’s the usual data. Managed to delete my run into town, so just have the 7 miles home stretch logged.
Took my Saturday afternoon down to the Empire for a bit of poker action with Alb. We’ve got a series of solid results against that regular field of 80 players, but yesterday the tournament didn’t go so well for either of us, both of us busting out about 30 minutes after the rebuys. We were meeting the gang for dinner and booze a few hours later, so I convinced Alb to hang-around for a few hours of cash game action. This is the marathon blog rather than the poker blog (www.extremepoker.co.uk) so I won’t bore you with the details, suffice to say that I went on a bit of an unprecedented tear, taking down a rather nice £350 in about 90 minutes. A personal best for cash poker.
Feeling rather out of shape at the moment, mainly due to lingering post-flu symptoms and a rather persistent cough that Kat seems to have aced back my way. Post sushi and somewhere through my third pint of the night (a not particularly great “Yuel Fuel” guest ale from The Cambridge, on Cambridge Circus), I think the whole Christmas booze and no exercise thing got to me, so put the remainder of the pint aside and vowed off alcohol and onto more focused exercise for a week - which on reflection just got truncated to six days, as I’ve now remembered that Friday is the HSBC Christmas Party!!
A lazy Sunday therefore got upgraded to a day on the streets. Started off planning a 10 miler out to Docklands/Angel/home, but got rather lost around Limehouse Basin, and ended-up cutting the loop short in error. So instead of wimping-out, I took a bit of a double-back through the rather prestigious Bunhill Fields cemetary at Moorgate, resting place of an estimated 120,000 bodies, including three of Britain’s most eminent Nonconformists - William Blake, John Bunyan and Daniel Defoe. Early evening was setting in by the time I passed through, but didn’t get mauled by any zombie poets or authors, so continued the route up through the City, past the Barbican, and back down to Blackfriars Bridge and the turn towards home. Felt pretty good when the Nike+ called out the 10 mile point as hit the river, so figured I might make it a personal best weekend double and turned West to clock-up another mile and a half for a half marathon total.
Realised as I was turning back to the East over Westminster Bridge that I was in with a shot of a sub 2 hour half, and you’ll note the spurt of speed in today’s data for the last mile, however got snagged up in the ‘Frost Fair’ along the Southbank so ended-up racing home to miss the mark by 24 seconds. Felt pretty wrecked for an hour or so afterwards, but all recovered post-dinner and movie (blueray of “The Island” that Firoze dropped in to watch with us). Figure I’m probably up for a few more long ones on the run into Christmas.
Fran’s yoga class and then a straight run home along the Highway this evening. The park gate closes at 4.30pm in Winter to save little old ladies from being mugged by tree lurking Wapping hoodlums, so am having to divert along the main-road as I head West back towards home.
Spent today planning my Christmas vacation. Shaping up to be a combination of poker and volunteering shifts for the Crisis Open Christmas homeless charity. Will have to try to squeeze some running in somewhere…
Just about feeling well enough to run again now that have broken the back of the flu that I had last fortnight. Firoze was over this afternoon (well, actually rather early this morning given hangover levels from a Friday/Saturday night one-two), so while he was busy chopping vegetables for a chicken curry he promised to cook for a few of my friends I thought I’d spin down to Vauxhall and back for a quick 5 miler to get myself back on the road.
Rather slow as you’ll note from the Nike+ data, but something is better than nothing. Will have to fight to stay regular again now that Christmas party season is upon us. Have drinks planned for Tue/Wed/Thr/Fri this week, so may try to get out over lunch one afternoon, probably Tue given that I have a colleague Vivek visiting from India for most of this week.
