This blog is moving over to richardpeyton.substack.com
Category: Photojournalism
Photojournalistic event coverage of events in Galway, Ireland, or Internationally. Areas of speciality include, but are in no way limited to, endurance events, sports, comedy, theatre, & music festivals. If it can be photographed and written about I will do just that, and I will do it in the most concise and engaging manner possible.
Sandal Pride at the Cork City Marathon 2022
“Jesus Christ, he’s running in flip flops,” is something I heard over and over and over and over again yesterday. “You mad bastard,” was said to me so many times that I started to feel like an “S” should be added to the LGBT flag so as to include folks like me that like to run in sandals. Personally, I find it shocking that so many can afford to run in €300 Nikes that one chap informed me last only 200kms. If that is true then that means each mile costs €2.50 and essentially makes them over 8 times more expensive than petrol on a per mile basis. I heard the opening line so many times yesterday that I started to fancy that maybe I am, in fact, Jesus Christ.
The Great Limerick Run 2022
“Oh, well done, running a marathon is an achievement,” is something a lot of people have said to me to which I generally reply, “Meh, getting out of bed is an achievement too”.
On race day, I find that the hardest bit is, literally, getting out of bed at stupid o’clock to go and stand in the cold for an hour before running around the road for a few more hours. I’m not a person that’s interested in finisher medals but I think I’d be partial to the idea of getting one for getting up early of a Sunday morning and standing, semi-naked, with a few thousand others of the same persuasion who, for some reason, seem rather cheerful about the prospect.
Continue reading “The Great Limerick Run 2022”One Day in Dublin
“Do you realise the implications of a cashless society?” asks a young man that looks to be in his late twenties on O’Connell Street.
“Yes, I’ve thought about it a little bit,” I reply.
“The whole world is changing, man,” he says, “we’re all gonna become slaves which is why for the past while I’ve been living in a tent as I’ve decided to go off the grid”.
“Sounds good,” I say, genuinely fascinated.
Continue reading “One Day in Dublin”Panic Buying In The Time Of Coronavirus
“Have you any tinned mackerel?” I ask the lady in Tescos who is in the process of stocking the shelves.
“I’m not sure. Oh yes, I see them here. How many do you want?”
“Two, please,” I say, and she proceeds to take two tins out of the box.
“No, I meant two boxes,” I say.
“JESUS CHRIST!” she utters in a biblical tone.
Continue reading “Panic Buying In The Time Of Coronavirus”
One Day In Aughrim, Galway
“He had this green growth on his langer and so he went to the doctor. The doctor asked him if he’d been out somewhere foreign and he said he’d been to Mongolia and so the doctor said, ‘ah, you have the Green Mongolian Veneral Disease then, you might have to have it amputated’. So, he goes to a Chinese specialist and asks him, ‘Will I have to have it amputated?’ and the Chinese lad says, ‘no,’ to which he breathes a sigh of relief. And then the Chinese doctor continues, ’It will fall off all by itself.’” Continue reading “One Day In Aughrim, Galway”
One Day In Bray
Sitting down on the train to go to Bray (all pics here) I get a bad smell, really bad, and it’s wafting off of my jeans. It’s a smell that reminds me of a teacher I had in school years ago. The man smelled so bad I used to sit right at the back of the class and his stink would still offend my nostrils. Continue reading “One Day In Bray”
One Day In Clifden
Arriving in Clifden with a sleepy head at 11.30, the first thing I go in search of is a cup of coffee. Entering a bakery in Market Street to acquire same I am served by a pleasant young black woman and when she speaks she has as Galway an accent as anybody could ever hear. I don’t know why this surprises me, but it does, and is a sort of wow moment which makes me smile a bit.
“Where’s the loo?” I ask.
“You mean the toilet?” she replies, to which I nod. These days I feel I am increasingly speaking a different language to the youth of today.
24 Hours On The Run In Belfast At Energia 24
I wasn’t properly trained to run for twenty-four hours but I did a beef-fueled 52.5 mile training run in early May after not training for four months. 52.5 miles was the longest run by 12 miles I’d ever done at that point and it took me 9.5 hours.
While I realise my choice of fuel sounds weird, last year I did a dietary experiment where I ate nothing but beef for a month. 20 years of chronic and worsening skin inflammation went away within that month. At this point I’m ten months without needing steroid creams which is quite something since I previously couldn’t go a week. Additionally, I experienced a dramatic reduction in chronic, and worsening, IBS and extreme fatigue. My weight reduced to what it was when I was in secondary school and my exercise recovery increased dramatically. Was it all fun? Hell no. I experienced insomnia, breathlessness, dry skin, and tightness in the chest, but I had felt all these symptoms before – every time I gave up smoking cigarettes. Can I afford to eat beef all the time? Hell no, I can’t, and don’t, and after my one month experiment I opted for a more ketogenic dietary approach, which seems to suit me better in any case. Is it healthy long term? I don’t know, so I don’t recommend anybody tries it; but one thing I am sure of is, from a subjective standpoint, is that carbohydrates can be detrimental to good health in many ways. Continue reading “24 Hours On The Run In Belfast At Energia 24”
One Day In Belfast
Foreword
“YOU ENGLISH BASTARD!” was something I was called regularly as a child by the children in the neighbourhood in Galway. Strangely though, it didn’t actually bother me all that much. In truth, I’ve been called worse things in my life. The most recent thing I get called is “The Mad Cow” which is kind of funny and I guess I left myself open for that one. (Photos on Facebook here: #1, #2) Continue reading “One Day In Belfast”
THE GALWAY COW 