Monkey Magic

I work in marketing, and in marketing it pays to know what your audience wants. The stats don’t lie – if you’re reading the desktop version of this you can see the most popular stories to the right – three out of the five involve me either injuring myself or suffering misfortune. So I guess I should continue along that theme…

As many of you will know, I can barely use my right thumb following a series of injuries. The first piece of damage I did to it was whilst playing football years ago. I was put clean through on goal which rapidly turned into a 50/50 with the goalie. We slid into each other, collided, and he landed on top of me whilst my fingers went one way and my thumb went the other.   

The good news was that I scored. The bad news was that I’d fractured my thumb and that the ‘cure’ for it, much like my broken collarbone, was a piece of standard sticky plaster as there is nothing they can do. The doctor told me not to use if for a week whilst musing that the main thing that separates humans from monkeys has been the evolution of our thumbs. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thumb

Having experienced how difficult it is to cope without the use of your thumb, the monkey thought was at the forefront of my mind in the immediate aftermath of my next injury. Back in 2004 I was playing for Cockfosters in a big cup game against Chingford. I was keeping wicket and we had the chance of a run out so I pegged it up to the stumps as Dec had a shy at them. To this day I’m still not entirely sure what happened, but I think I must have taken the ball and the stumps at the same time. What I do know was that it was immediately apparent that something hurt quite a bit.

I took my glove off and surveyed the damage. Whilst the bottom half of my thumb seemed ok the main problem appeared to be the top half, which was at a right angle in completely the opposite way than it was supposed to be. My first impression was that I must have dislocated it, so I tried yanking it back in. To my relief, it popped back in, but rather bizarrely it actually went way too far the other way so that it was limply hanging there. It was at that point I realised it was probably something a wee bit serious.

The general consensus was I should get myself over to A&E so I jumped in the car (which in itself was a bit stupid, as I couldn’t grip the steering wheel to drive) and headed to hospital. I walked in and saw the triage nurse. She looked at it and said that I needed to see a doctor but that I should know that there was a six hour wait for non-emergencies. I had a ten minute think about it and decided that I wasn’t prepared to hang around, so drove myself back to Cockfosters.

As it was a big cup game, I did what any self-respecting competitive person would do. Namely, with the team down to ten men, I decided to field for the last seven overs to help them out. That was all very noble, but I remember a bloke absolutely whacking it at me which hurt like hell. I also remember an equally painful sensation as I threw the ball back in with my thumb just flapping about in the breeze.

We went on to lose the game, but given the queue at the A&E, I decided to stay back, sink a few beers with the lads, and then go for a curry. Not particularly clever, but then I wasn’t prepared to sit in the hospital all evening. I popped along first thing the next day, got seen within the hour and the consultant then gave me the bad news. All of the cartilage which sits between the two bones in my thumb – basically, the bit that enables it to bend - had popped out. So the two bones were rubbing straight against each other. That explained why I could move it about, but also why it hurt so much and why I had no control over it.

The doctor game me two options… Option 1, the pain-free option: They’d operate and fuse it so that it pointed straight upwards for the rest of my life. Or option 2: they’d put the cartilage back where it should be, pin it all in place, and then with intensive physio I might get some of the movement back. I’m no expert me, but being given the option of trying to make it work or not bothering, it really wasn’t that difficult a decision to make. Shortly afterwards they operated and decided to put my entire arm in plaster for a measly thumb, probably for their own entertainment.

Whilst in plaster I went to Copenhagen on football tour. After drinking copious amounts of strong Elephant beer, I tripped going down the stairs to a pub toilet. I went down the entire set (being unable to put my arm out to stop my fall) and when I got up at the bottom the bouncer gave me one look before saying ‘crazeee Eeenglish’ and waving me on my way.   

Looking ridiculous with my whole arm in plaster

When I got back they took the plaster off and the upshot of it all is that I can bend my thumb about 10 degrees so it is pretty much obsolete. That explains why Clare has trained Evie so that whenever she sees a monkey in a book, on TV or at the zoo, she always points at me and says ‘Dadda’…  

Crack it back in, it’ll be fine

Not content with trying to render my thumb useless, I’ve also had a problem with one of the other digits on my right hand following another cricket injury. I was fielding on the boundary (my wicket-keeping days were finished after my thumb) at Finchley as we were getting plundered for bucket loads in a 20 over game.

Our bowler Wellsy, who likes to drop it short at the best of times, banged it in and the batsman pulled it like a tracer bullet at me. I bent down to try and catch it at shin height but made a bit of a hash of it. The bad news was I dropped it, but the good news was that I stopped the four and as there were 19.4 overs gone it didn’t make any difference.

I picked the ball up, threw it in and had a similar feeling to the one with my thumb. I looked down, and my ring finger was bent back at a right angle. Again my first thought was a dislocation but this time I was right. I waited until the next ball had been bowled and then plucked up the courage to yank it back into the socket which I can tell you was extremely painful.

The innings finished and after a quick turnaround I was down to bat at number 4. Rather than drop down the order, I padded up and sat waiting to bat with my finger in a pint glass full of ice. Eventually I went in but I can report that trying to whack the ball out of the park in a Twenty20 with a dislocated finger isn’t much fun. We went on to lose and it took the best part of four months for the joint to really heal (although I’m sure playing cricket for the rest of the season probably didn’t help either, but we were going for promotion so I wasn't going to miss out).

This is by no means an exhaustive list of my sporting injures as there have been many, but one final one relating to cricket goes back to my dodgy eye from nightswimming. Since that accident, you could argue it would be prudent to wear a helmet to bat, as if I get whacked in my bad eye it’s going to cause me huge problems. But that would be sensible, and I don’t like batting in a helmet unless the bowler is so quick I don’t trust my judgement or the pitch is a minefield where I don’t trust the bounce.

So anyway, we were playing a cricket week game against Malcontents XI, and it was petering out for a tame draw. Cricket week games are all about entertaining the crowd though, and as I was batting out this draw with Xav, a bloke who invented the term ‘get on with it’, we thought it would be more entertaining to go for some shots.

They put on their quickest bowler, and we had a bit of fun trying to go for everything. It came down to the last over and with just three balls remaining, there was nothing to play for. The bowler decided he would try and bounce me out and I as I wasn’t wearing a helmet, I should have got out of the way of it. But there’s no fun in that. So instead I made the split-second call to try and hook it out of the ground instead. I can only assume I was fractionally late on it (it may have been the port at lunch), as I got the thinnest of top edges and stopped a rock-hard cricket ball dead in its tracks with my eye socket.

I can’t accurately describe the sensation as it hit me. My whole head shuddered and all of my senses around me were completely out of focus. I dropped to the ground and play stopped whilst they brought out some ice and a towel to get the bruising up. The good news was that I was extremely fortunate and it had hit my good eye socket rather than my bad eye socket (how stupid does that look in black and white?!).

To a man, everyone said I should go off as there was nothing to play for – just two balls in a meaningless friendly – but I’m secretly extremely competitive and I was damned if I was going to give the South African quickie the pleasure of seeing me retire hurt. I called for a helmet, a case of after the horse has bolted if ever there was one, and settled in to face the next ball.

I took a calculated gamble that he’d be feeling bad and pitch it up rather than trying to knock my head off again. That gamble paid off as I was ready and waiting for a juicy half-volley which I proceeded to smack straight back past him for four. The crowd cheered and, point proven, I blocked the next before walking off and spending the entire evening in the bar with a pint in one hand, and an ice-draped towel in the other compressing my eye. I then spent the next week at work with the following answer to the staple question ‘no, I didn’t get punched, I was playing cricket’.

There isn’t really any link between these cricket stories and my marathon training, other than to try and raise some sponsorship by showing you just how stupid I can be. But having said that, the fact that in all three cases I carried on playing when I really should have gone off ought to bode well for when the going gets tough from mile 20 onwards. Especially as at the moment my right foot has not one, nor two, nor even three, but four blisters on it from my training…    

And I’m telling you this because…
I’m running the 2012 London Marathon for the Hertfordshire Community Foundation (HCF).

If you feel inclined to sponsor me to help the Hertfordshire Community Foundation continue their great work, you can do so here:  http://uk.virginmoneygiving.com/BenWood2 

Gloucester 20 – the races and the race

First things first, it’s a good job I don’t tip for a living based on what I wrote last week. The good news is that I’m pretty indecisive when it comes to horses, so I changed my mind on the selections I’d put here and actually did alright.

I had two 12/1 winners on Day 1 (Rock on Ruby and Balthazar King) which paid for Wednesday and Thursday, where I had a couple of big priced places. But the main focus of the week for me, as always, is on course on the Friday.

The first four races - including the Gold Cup as predicted - were a nightmare with not a single winner for me nor for pretty much anyone else I was with (apart from Tobe who had the Giant Bolster at 50s in the Gold Cup). Fortunately at that point my luck turned. Salsify at 8/1 came flying up the hill in the Foxhunters with Oscar Delta placed in third at 40/1. That put me even for the day, but the best was still to come…

One of the first things I learnt about Cheltenham is to study the form of the last three races on the train on the way over. That way, you’re not the worse for wear when making decisions. That paid off handsomely this year by backing Attaglance in the Martin Pipe Conditional’s. Whilst it was travelling well, it didn’t look like winning. That is, until the leading horse hit the fence at the last knocking it out of stride, and Attaglance was handily placed to take full advantage. At 31/1 on the Tote, it basically paid for the whole day out and some. I think that’s what they call a result!

The only other thing to report from the day is that combing my hair in a side parting is apparently completely unacceptable. I faced a barrage of abuse from my mates, and Scott even took a photo and posted it on Facebook to gauge opinion, which, I can report, appears to be divided. It’s a good job I’m middle-aged and don’t care about my image or I’d start to get a complex...

Enough about the racing and onto the race itself, the Gloucester 20

It is perceived wisdom in the marathon world that you cannot properly train your body for the last six miles, when your energy stores are depleted and you hit the wall, without doing serious damage to yourself. And that’s a risk not worth taking, hence why you don’t run anything more than 22 miles in training.

This much might be true, but it is the main reason why I forced myself to do the Gloucester 20. Primarily because taking part in a 20 mile road race that kicked off less than 36 hours after a 14 hour drinking session at the Gold Cup was never going to be anything other than hard work.

The start was pretty shambolic, but warmed my heart as these are the reasons why I’m proud of my roots and love the West Country. Basically, the police wanted £3,000 to close the road, so we had to walk over a mile from the registration point to the start (ideal when you’re running 20 miles, obviously). By the time they’d walked everyone there, it was one minute before the start time.

You then had to put your bag into the baggage area and I was in such a rush I handed my bag in without realising I still had my woolly hat on. So I had to carry that around with me for 20 miles too. We then filed onto one road, got told to go back in a car park, then there was a manic dash to another road and someone shouted go. All a bit haphazard, but to be honest I was just relieved to get away.

It was a gentle start out of an industrial estate and into the countryside via one reasonably busy road. My ‘plan’, other than to get around, was to do the first 3 miles slow, then do 14 at the pace I want to do the marathon in (one mile for each hour drinking on Friday as punishment!), then finish up with another 3 slow as a warm down.

I can report that doing the first three slow was never going to be a problem. In fact, I really struggled to get going and was fearing the worst for what was to come. I was also sweating buckets of booze, having decided to wear my hat for as long as possible to avoid having to carry it. I resembled Gazza in pre-season training, if you will – overdressed and sweating pure booze out of his system to lose weight.

I tried to up the pace a bit at mile four, but still couldn’t quite hit what I wanted to do and it wasn’t until we reached the first climb that I actually got myself into gear. I'm not sure what it was – probably that I had to work hard to get up it – but it really shook me out of my slumber, and I was off and away.

To cut a long story short, it was a really nice course. It was 2 miles out, then three laps of 5.5 miles of countryside, then 1.5 miles back. The laps section was never really flat, and had three differing climbs. One of them I don’t think I even realised was a climb on the first lap, but certainly did on the last one. A second that was gentle, but went on for a bit, then one pretty steep one that, on approaching it first time up, I immediately thought ‘this is going to be a killer after 17 miles’.  

Lap one was pretty uneventful apart from feeling quite good about myself as I was overtaking quite a lot of people. Not because I am any good, but because I started the first three slowly, so was now going faster than those who were similar to me but were going steady throughout.

Three laps around the picturesque Haresfield countryside

Lap two was pretty good, and I was feeling as close to normal as I was ever going to be. Normal, that was, until I got to the foot of the steep climb at 11.8 miles, and got lapped by the winner. Not very good for the confidence! But to be fair, I looked him up afterwards and he’s currently trying to get into the GB team for the Olympics so I’ll let him off…

By the time I started the third lap I was still feeling surprisingly alright but I was conscious that the sole of my right foot was beginning to rub on my shoe. This was due to my own stupidity, in that I packed a pair of socks that I’d never run more than 8 miles in. That’s a big no no for running, and a complete schoolboy error. Anyway, I persevered by counting down the miles to 17 when I could mentally take a break and start winding down.

As it happened, I got to the 17 mile marker and really struggled to slow down. On reflection, I think it was probably my sub-conscious telling me to hurry up and get the weight off of my foot, because by the time I finished it was really beginning to hurt. I finished in a respectable 2:41:25, which I’d have taken your arm off for had it been offered at the start. And then I trudged/limped the mile back to the showers with my body screaming at me from all parts.

The good news first. Not only did I finish it, I actually achieved better than what I set out to do – namely 17 miles at marathon pace rather than 14. The other good thing is that I did it whilst having run around like a lunatic all weekend and having drunk heavily. Two things that I won’t be doing in the run up to the marathon. However, there were two bits of bad news too.

Firstly, the blister has got a lot worse, so I now have about an inch and a half long, narrow blister on the sole of my right foot. It has meant I’ve barely been able to train this week which, given I’ve had about three interrupted weeks of training on the trot through illness and injury, is not good news. Even more so when I’m supposed to be at the peak of my training at the moment.   

The second bit of bad news is that whilst good for my state of mind that I completed 17 miles of marathon pace, it wasn’t good for my body. My right thigh didn’t react too well to being pounded for 20 miles and has been hurting quite a lot. It has taken until Thursday to calm down, which isn’t ideal, especially given I need to do another 20 mile run first thing Saturday morning.

Anyway, I’ve now got just 10 more days of hard training to get through before starting to taper. Whilst that’s good, if I get injured now it will be unbearable, so I’ve got to respect the aches and pains and not push too hard at the moment.

I can’t quite believe it has come around so quickly and, whilst my training hasn’t gone exactly to plan (I’m not sure I’d believe many people who said there’s has), I have to be satisfied that I’ve managed a half marathon PB in a monsoon, and a 20 mile race with a hangover along the way. Which should hopefully, fingers crossed, bode well for the big day, which, coincidentally, is exactly one month today...  

And I’m telling you this because…
I’m running the 2012 London Marathon for the Hertfordshire Community Foundation (HCF).

If you feel inclined to sponsor me to help the Hertfordshire Community Foundation continue their great work, you can do so here:  http://uk.virginmoneygiving.com/BenWood2 

Long Run

After Berkhamsted last week, this is another week I’ve been really looking forward to. That’s because it’s the one week of my training where the words ‘long’ and ‘run’ take on more than one meaning. For those familiar with racing, I won’t need to explain that’s because this week is Cheltenham Gold Cup week.  

Having bagged my ticket (only just, by all accounts) I’m off for my annual outing to the races with a massive group of my school mates. You might think I’m a bit old to be getting excited about things like that, but for those that have never been my words here won’t even begin to do it justice. All I’ll say is that if you experience it once, you’ll be hooked for the rest of your life. The atmosphere and camaraderie you get in and around Cheltenham on Festival week is truly amazing, and has been responsible for some absolutely awesome days out down the years.

Anyway, before I go all misty eyed, here is a quick explanation of the first meaning of the words Long Run.  

Long Run Mk I

The staple diet of any marathon runner is the weekly long run. To the uninitiated, the prospect of running 14, 16, 18, 20 or even 22 miles, just sounds like sheer hell. But in a bizarre way, I actually look forward to them. And here’s why…

During the week, you have to flog yourself half to death doing different types of high intensity work whilst holding down a decent job. A typical week for me includes the following;

-       Tuesday AM: Four or five mile long intervals run practically flat out, with short 2 minute recoveries in between;

-       Wednesday AM: A midweek long run which is anything from 10-13 miles normally undertaken prior to work;

-       Friday AM: A tempo run which is normally 6-10 miles, with a 40 minute segment in the middle where you run virtually at full tilt

I don’t mind admitting that I find these sessions pretty tiring. So by the time you get to the weekend you would think that running long is the last thing you want to do. However, in a quirk of fate you are told, nee forced, to run your long runs at a really slow pace. So actually, all you’re really doing is going out for a pleasant jaunt into the countryside where you’re doing a slow plod.

The other thing that the long run has in its favour, is that I can do it in the Hertfordshire countryside, as opposed to jumping off of the train at Finsbury Park and setting off in a not so salubrious suburb of London at 7.10AM.

Whenever I mention at work that my weekend is going to entail a 20 mile run, everyone looks at me as if I’m mad. So I thought I’d let you enter my world, and see the lovely villages that I end up running through on my leisurely Sunday morning jaunts...   

The Cricketers at Ickeford

Letchworth Lane

The picturesque village of Preston

The view from Wymondley

The duck pond at Willian

I'm not entirely sure that these photos do my run total justice, but they give a little insight all the same. Now onto the other Long Run that is at the front of my mind this week...

Long Run Mk II

I should say at this point, that I don’t think I’ve ever won any money on the Gold Cup. That’s generally because I’m not a favourite backer. I love a plucky outsider, and plucky outsiders don’t generally win the Gold Cup because the best horse pretty much always wins off of equal weights. That is why I was a bit surprised that Long Run won it last year, being the first horse under the age of 7 to triumph since Mill House 48 years ago.

I have no idea if he’ll follow it up this year as everything was pointing to the resurrection of Kauto Star. That was, until he had a bit of a fall a couple of weeks ago. As for me, well I won’t be backing either of them. I’ve got to go for Midnight Chase again as I love this horse as he’s a brave front runner. He hasn’t had a great season this time out, but he rolled back the memories, making all from top weight in his last run at Cheltenham in January. I am sure he won’t win, but as he’s a front runner you generally get a decent run for your bet, and if he’s placed I’ll be happy as anything.

As for the rest of the week, I’m no tipster me, but it does look like there are plenty more ‘bankers’ than usual. And I’m not really one for ‘bankers’, as you don’t tend to win any decent money on them unless you’re prepared to stake a huge amount, so I’ll be steering well clear. I would love to see Big Bucks win the World Hurdle again, and I’d also like to see Zarkander upstage Hurricane Fly in the Champion Hurdle (which is always my favourite race of the week) although I highly doubt it will happen.

My final hope for the week is that Alan King and his stable jockey Choc Thornton get right back in amongst the winners. I’ve definitely won more than I’ve lost following those two in festivals down the years (Katchit and Voy Por Ustedes being two of the best), but they both had a bit of a lean time of it last year. King’s stable was under the weather, and Choc is pretty much the unluckiest jockey ever, having had more serious injuries than anyone I can think of. So I really hope they have a good one – fingers crossed they can get the Festival off to a cracking start with Montbazon hosing up in the Supreme Novices at this time tomorrow.   

And I’m telling you this because…
I’m running the 2012 London Marathon for the Hertfordshire Community Foundation (HCF).

If you feel inclined to sponsor me to help the Hertfordshire Community Foundation continue their great work, you can do so here:  http://uk.virginmoneygiving.com/BenWood2 

Race Report: The Berkhamsted Half Marathon

So this was it, the moment of truth. With the Watford Half-Marathon abandoned due to snow, all of my pre-marathon hopes rested on this. Had I completely wasted the last eight weeks training like a dog for no improvement in my performance? Or could I summon any energy out of my tired legs for a big psychological boost prior to the marathon?

As I mentioned in my last post, my ‘form’ at Berkhamsted CC has been shockingly poor. So when I saw the weather forecast – namely, about an entire month’s rainfall in one day – the omens weren’t looking good.

I had a feeling it was going to be bad by the fact that visibility on the M1 on the way over was about 30 metres. And by the time I’d walked from my car to the start I was soaked through to the bone. Deciding that every second in the dry was a bonus, I made my way into the cricket pavilion which, unsurprisingly, resembled a tube train at 5.30. Beggars can’t be choosers, and I found just about the only spare space – stood under one of the taps in the men’s showers – and proceeded to get changed.

Whilst I was changing I recognised a friendly voice which turned out to be Garry, a guy I used to play football with years back. When I first moved to London (back in 98) Garry was my fellow centre-half in a cup game over at Hertford, one of my first ever games for the club. It was a real back’s to the wall performance as we were trying to keep a team a couple of league’s higher than us at bay. But my abiding memory of that game (I can’t remember the result, but I think we might have sneaked it 1-0) was whilst trying to concentrate at a set piece, Garry turned to me and said that he’d just realised he was wearing his wife’s underwear. Anyway, I digress…

I made my way to the start line at 9.55 and it was raining so heavily that I resembled a drowned rat by the time the gun went. The first couple of miles were gentle (flat/downhill) but I was mindful that miles 3 and 6– 10 were all uphill.  By the time I got to the bottom of the first hill, I had 20 seconds in the bag. Which was pretty useful when I saw how steep it was. I made it to the top (just about) as I was fresh, but was thinking that if the others were anywhere near as bad as that, I’d have no chance of a PB.

In my head I’d decided miles 4 – 6 were all about regaining composure and getting my heart rate back down before attacking (OK, hanging in there) through miles 7 -10. I sort of did this, but mindful of having lost a good 50 seconds from the first climb, the not-so-logical side of my brain told me to keep pushing. And as it was a monsoon – my shorts by mile 5 resembled that moment when you get out of a swimming pool - I decided to go with it.

All good and well, but when I reached the bottom of the next serious climb, I was reasonably spent. I dug in, and told myself that although there were 6 to go, it was effectively only 3 because the last 3 were flat/downhill. However, it wasn’t long before I hit the stage where my head was saying ‘this is really hard work, you’re going to catch pneumonia, your shoes have picked up so much water they feel like two bricks and your socks are squelching with every step’. I was also getting increasingly fed up of dodging massive puddles on the semi-flooded roads.

I struggled on through and got just past 9 when we turned through a wooded section that started to go downhill. In my sodden state I thought I must have lost the plot and that the course actually started to go downhill at 9 instead of 10 so I pushed on. Big mistake. It did go downhill, but only for 500 yards or so, before a nice incline again, coupled with a water station that meant trying to drink whilst barely being able to breathe. I got through that, and looked at my watch to see that my virtual partner was telling me I was 40 seconds behind my time goal. Time to crack on.

Mile 10 was great and all was going well until I got to the 11 mile marker. I was absolutely cream crackered and I could see the road starting to go up again. This can’t be right? Unfortunately it could, it’s just that because of all the other hills that one doesn’t really register on the elevation profile they send you. That was the toughest slog, and my mile time dipped quite badly. But I made it through, and then steamed down the hill to the end.

When I went through mile 12 I didn’t think I was on for a PB, but my last mile was a cracking 6.32 (the benefits of going downhill) and I went through the finish in 1:35:23, a PB by 3 minutes and 34 seconds. What I’d forgotten was that I’d set the pacing device on my watch for a 2 minute PB anyway! I’d like to say that I am really happy with that, but by the time I got back to the car I was so cold and wet that I couldn’t get warm for three hours.

I’m sure in the coming days it’ll sink in, especially as doing a PB on a course that my Garmin revealed had 699ft of climbs is a pretty damn good effort, but it certainly didn’t feel like it at the time. It was nice to finally come away from Berkhamsted Cricket Club with a PB rather than the usual spanking and, having spent all of Saturday concerned that my knee was having a relapse, I was so damp at the start I couldn’t feel it so forgot all about it.  

Finally, I also did something that goes against everything I stand for. I asked a complete stranger at the finish to take a photo of me for this blog so you could see what a state I was in. But because you can’t see how wet I am, I actually don’t think it does justice to how bloody miserable a day it was.

Should've worn a wetsuit...

Anyway, onwards and upwards as I now have seven weeks left to go until the big day. That’s four really big, heavy mileage weeks followed by the gentle wind-down to the marathon itself. First things first, if I can make it through March in one piece I’ll be happy…  

And I’m telling you this because…
I’m running the 2012 London Marathon for the Hertfordshire Community Foundation (HCF).

If you feel inclined to sponsor me to help the Hertfordshire Community Foundation continue their great work, you can do so here:  http://uk.virginmoneygiving.com/BenWood2