Tag: Ireland

One Day in Castlerea

Joseph P. Fenwick, in his essay which is contained in the book “Roscommon History and Society”, describes Rathcroghan as “A once thriving royal site and pre-Christian cult centre as evidenced by well preserved monuments” and goes on to say that it “served as a nexus of political power and religious potency.” It was thought to be the place where the “world king would come to intercede with the gods of the otherworld on behalf of his people.”

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The Great Limerick Run 2022

The Great Limerick Run 2022 Participants

“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.

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A Bad Week

I’ve been having a bad bloody week. One might say a bloody bad week even. I took my car to a garage for some routine maintenance, and, while it was driving just fine when I dropped it off, the engine literally started to splutter and jitter and buck just as soon as I drove it out of there, and by the time I drove it a mile down the road there was smoke pluming out of it and a good portion of the engine oil had burned off. This is the second time this has happened to me in recent years and this is the second mechanic whose door I shall never again darken. One does not mind paying for a mechanic, but when your car goes in drivable and comes out undrivable then it makes one wonder just a little bit if foul play is afoot. Of course mechanics will generally blame you or make out it’s a total coincidence, but that doesn’t really make the frustration any less….frustrating.

My car sounding like it has Covid after routine maintenance.
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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.

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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” →

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” →

Losing With Style At The Connemara Marathon 2018

“Well, at least you finished,” was a sympathetic response I got from several runners when I told them I did the Connemarathon last Sunday in 5hours 20mins. Most of these people had done sub 4 hours.

To this sympathetic tone and sincere look of pity, I felt the need to defend my manhood.

“I was wearing these barefoot shoes, see,” said I, showing them my VFFs as proof, “I’m doing Limerick in two weeks in ‘normal’ shoes and expect I’ll do sub 4 hours.”

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Death-match at EAMS’ 6 Hour St Patrick’s Day Challenge in Belfast

In the pre-feminist days of the caveman there must have been many, many occasions where such a man had to fight off a rival caveman who wanted to dash his brains in with a rock, murder his children, and take his woman for himself. Continue reading “Death-match at EAMS’ 6 Hour St Patrick’s Day Challenge in Belfast” →

How To Do A Marathon Without Training

img_8532Writing this post feels kind of stupid because doing a marathon no longer seems like a big deal to me. But notice how I said “doing”, not running.

I had aspirations of running a marathon since my mid twenties but every single time I got into the rhythm of training my knees, back, or hamstrings, or something else got screwed up and my running came to an abrupt end. Continue reading “How To Do A Marathon Without Training” →