I’ve finished the formal part of my teacher training.

One year as an ‘NQT’ (Newly Qualified Teacher) means that I will then be ‘fully’ fully qualified.

That’s all I’ve really got to say on that.

Running has been going alright. I’m anaemic, so that was a bit of a kick in the chuckies. Less coffee, more OJ, (sorry Jacob R-M) and some iron tablets will someday see me right. I looked into getting an iron infusion but didn’t win the lottery this week so decided to pass it up. Maybe next week.

Here’s some race reports…

Old County Tops

Had a pretty shitty May but this was a silver-lining after the death of a good friend, and a worthy tribute I hope. Paul (he of Wainwright’s record-breaking fame) asked me at Chris’ funeral if I’d any plans to race the following day. I had; the Fairfield Horseshoe. ‘Not so fast’ says Paul, ‘how about the Old County Tops?’

We won it with a sprint finish (well, as much as can pass for a ‘sprint’ after 36.99 miles) ahead of Josh J and Tom S.

Howtown

A lesser populated race on the other side of Ullswater. Deserves to be more popular, but I hope it doesn’t become so. Hard first climb then awesome runnable ups and downs with a bastard of a sting at the end. Quickly became a four-horse race; I was the fourth horse. Faded on the climb up the penultimate fell and, although I managed to catch back on before the final climb, the writing was on the wall. One to go back for mind.

Montreux – Les – Rochers – de – Naye

Uphill only race in Swizzy. Not done one of those before, that I can remember. A full 18km with 1650m ascent. A right bastard that I died a thousand deaths on. Fun though. I quite like that sort of thing.

Trail du Velan

The prize for this was a whopper wheel of raclette (soft cheese) and some wine. I don’t like either so they’re currently sat in my van in Chamonix melting. Another bastard of a race this one; a theme for the Alps I feel. Eminently enjoyable all the same. Absolutely biblical weather for 95% of it. Disappeared on the first climb straight out the village with three guys up the road ahead and no-one coming with me. One of them was pathetic on the downhills so it became a ‘two-horser’ (as it turned out) after the highpoint of the course (at an eye-watering 3100m). I went arse-over-tit and got a nice hole in one of my bum-cheeks (the left-one, seeing as you ask). The dude ahead (we were trading leads on the downhills at this point) stopped and waited for me, which was good of him. When he took a fucking whopper face-plant I had to reciprocate with the gentlemanly conduct – not knowing that we were 1st and 2nd at this point (the phantom third-person who had disappeared up the hill was obviously made of sugar or tissue paper as he wrapped his tits in once the rain started falling and retired from the race). If I HAD known I’d have fucked off and left him, and then disappeared before prize-giving so as to escape his wrath. Alas. We agreed to finish the race together….but I stuck my chest out on the line to get the official ‘win’. Ha.

Got one more race in the Alps (Glacier 3000 – 26.6km with 2015m ascent) before heading to the States in a couple of weeks.

I start my teaching job in September. Yup.

Can’t really be arsed with this blog anymore to be fair.