On my late afternoon 10k today I was travelling along quite nice, thinking that I'm starting to get training for the running section of The Triathlon Challenge well under control, when suddenly while in full flow down a hill on mile four...
I felt a sharp pain in my left calf. Within six strides I had completely pulled up, literally.
At this stage of my run I was midway along Palmerston Way in Leicester, around one mile from my girlfriend's pad. I had no phone, no money, it was cold and getting dark and I had shorts and a t-shirt on; so essentially I'd regressed back to my teenage days, hanging out too far from home on an autumn evening.
As I walked back, meandering my way through Stoneygate I took the chance to enjoy the fine old houses that make up my favourite side of the UK's most central county. I also noticed that walking like a gangster through posh urban roads doesn't inspire the goodness in peoples hearts; not one stranger bothered to ask if the wounded runner was OK.
It took yonks to finally exit Southernhay onto London Road and when I did I was greeted by a bus shelter advert for Lucozade featuring Mo Farah and the caption: 'Faster, Stronger, For Longer', how very apt.
My hungover missus made us *posh cheese on toast for supper - it's not the ideal recovery meal, but then this was not the ideal recovery for a man attempting The Everyman Olympics.
*Posh cheese on toast is essentially made with any other variety of cheese apart from cheddar.
One man's accidental quest to complete a challenge in EVERY Olympic Sport
Sunday, 22 January 2012
Tuesday, 17 January 2012
The Basketball Challenge: First Training Session
Last Wednesday night I met up with Head Coach at Southend Swifts Basketball Club, Stephen Pearl. I'd landed on my feet...
Basketball first caught my attention when a Greek lad at school started playing the game in London and promptly stopped wearing trainers and starter wearing 'sneakers'. The year was 1990, I thought the kid was double cool.
Michael Jordan may have made the sport globally recognised but this kid in my school, also called Michael, was the only person we actually knew who played the sport. I think even our PE teachers secretly thought he was cool, despite their preference for football, rugby and athletics.
Around the same time my pal Johnny had a basketball net put up by his dad on the carport attached to their garden and my first playing experience came with the boys I grew up with; we'd try and 'slam dunk' the ball but at less then 5ft tall we would have to resort to sitting on one anothers shoulders to get the job done.
As we settled into our teens this Amercian fad passed, our hair grew, and grunge music and girls took our attention.
So when I met Coach Pearl in the car park of Eastwood High School I expected to be greeted by a giant from across the pond....though while Coach Pearl may not be a giant in terms of physical size, he is a goliath in terms of Basketball knowledge and hospitality.
Stephen understood my need to compete in the same number of games as a team would in the Olympics, from day one to the final, and what's more he'd already worked out exactly how I could do this all with Southend Swifts - what a star!
We talked about the club's set-up, standing in the community, the expectations of the players to give something back to the club - Coach Pearl was as proud of the young Swifts that helped introduce basketball to kids at local schools as he was of the 17 students who'd gone on to play in the United States.
I wasn't just there for a chat mind, within half an hour I'd joined the 16-18's and was doing lay-up drills under the coaching of Simon, one of the clubs talents who'd played in the US, he's now returned to coach at the club that gave him his opportunity.
We progressed through shooting hoops from the penalty line, practising 2-on-3 scenarios with an outnumbered defence, learning and role-playing set plays and finished on a best-of-three / first to seven baskets competition.
I thoroughly enjoyed my first training session for The Basketball Challenge, and was wholeheartedly welcomed in by the lads; including Louis (who gave me penalty shooting tips), and Little Darren (he's 6ft 9'...but is shorter than his brother!).
They've even got a player called Jordan, so they must be good!
I've a few weeks of heavy work, where I'll need to focus on challenges during the weekend, but then I'm looking forward to working with the Southend Swifts and will definitely make the effort to give something back.
Basketball first caught my attention when a Greek lad at school started playing the game in London and promptly stopped wearing trainers and starter wearing 'sneakers'. The year was 1990, I thought the kid was double cool.
Michael Jordan may have made the sport globally recognised but this kid in my school, also called Michael, was the only person we actually knew who played the sport. I think even our PE teachers secretly thought he was cool, despite their preference for football, rugby and athletics.
Around the same time my pal Johnny had a basketball net put up by his dad on the carport attached to their garden and my first playing experience came with the boys I grew up with; we'd try and 'slam dunk' the ball but at less then 5ft tall we would have to resort to sitting on one anothers shoulders to get the job done.
As we settled into our teens this Amercian fad passed, our hair grew, and grunge music and girls took our attention.
So when I met Coach Pearl in the car park of Eastwood High School I expected to be greeted by a giant from across the pond....though while Coach Pearl may not be a giant in terms of physical size, he is a goliath in terms of Basketball knowledge and hospitality.
Stephen understood my need to compete in the same number of games as a team would in the Olympics, from day one to the final, and what's more he'd already worked out exactly how I could do this all with Southend Swifts - what a star!
We talked about the club's set-up, standing in the community, the expectations of the players to give something back to the club - Coach Pearl was as proud of the young Swifts that helped introduce basketball to kids at local schools as he was of the 17 students who'd gone on to play in the United States.
I wasn't just there for a chat mind, within half an hour I'd joined the 16-18's and was doing lay-up drills under the coaching of Simon, one of the clubs talents who'd played in the US, he's now returned to coach at the club that gave him his opportunity.
We progressed through shooting hoops from the penalty line, practising 2-on-3 scenarios with an outnumbered defence, learning and role-playing set plays and finished on a best-of-three / first to seven baskets competition.
I thoroughly enjoyed my first training session for The Basketball Challenge, and was wholeheartedly welcomed in by the lads; including Louis (who gave me penalty shooting tips), and Little Darren (he's 6ft 9'...but is shorter than his brother!).
They've even got a player called Jordan, so they must be good!
I've a few weeks of heavy work, where I'll need to focus on challenges during the weekend, but then I'm looking forward to working with the Southend Swifts and will definitely make the effort to give something back.
Saturday, 14 January 2012
The Handball Challenge: Oxford Uni Tournament, Matches Four & Five.
Oxford University is famously the source of many great achievements and the producer of many of the greatest students of all time. On the Thursday 6th May 1954 medical student, Roger Bannister became the first man in history to run a sub-four minute mile; using two pacemakers he clocked 3mins 59.4 seconds on the Iffley Road track - bizarrely, despite having once been president of the Oxford club, he set this world record while running for the Amateur Athletic Association.
Saturday 7th January 2012 Brentwood Handball Club arrived at the very location of Bannister's amazing feat, it was to be another historical day, albeit at a far more modest level.
Coach Kuller Rabaca had liaised with both Cardiff and Thames Handball Club's to organise a mixed sex, mini tournament that would see athletes of all ability levels (from at least two continents) collide in a battle of whit, speed and agility.
The Handball Challenge: Match Four, Brentwood vs Cardiff
This was our first match with a mixed sex team this season, under the tournament guidelines we had to 'field' three girls at all times - as we only had three girls Coach had agreed that they'd all play as long as they could. Jo would be a goliath on our goal, while Julia and Steph both worked the wings and used their experience to instigate overlapping runs and attack the line.
I was chuffed to start the match and worked in partnership with Steph, switching our positions to give Cardiff problems in their attacks and ours. With strong options throughout our team we had the upper hand against our Welsh opponents - some of whom were having their first competitive experience.
Cardiff's main threats came from their captain and a tall lad who had travelled to the fixture independently and simply looking for a game, it turned out he was Brazilian and plays in the English First Division - luckily for us he was having an off day, throughout the afternoon he must have hit the crossbar a dozen or so times.
At one point the ball had flown over the top during a Cardiff attack, I was completely unaware of it as it bounced on my head, then bounced on my head again as walked backwards, landed safely in our area for Jo to collect - unwittingly I'd nullified them with ease. The crowd applauded.
Mark was enjoying the freedom of being out of goal and on a number of occasions broke free to counter attack successfully - bagging several goals in both halves of this game. Rob also had his scoring mitts on - his aggression in attack helped make up for some of our players who couldn't make the tournament.
Coach had made it clear to the team that if we got a penalty, then I would take the first one. While on the bench midway through the first half I got the call, temporarily replacing an in-form Rob. I had no time for nerves as all eyes were on me - this was my chance. As instructed I planted my left foot firmly behind the penalty line, eyes moving from left to right making my choice - the goalie was close enough to see my decisions as it was made...having meant to throw the ball away from where I was looking, I proceeded to launch it straight at the guy...thankfully he fluffed his lines and the net bulged, The Everyman Olympian had scored!!
We broke for the first half 17-10 ahead.
Duncan was frustrated with himself in the break, feeling he'd squandered scoring opportunities, I told him to relax, that patience would pay off - he spent 2 minutes in the sin bin during that second half, clearly my advice worked then.
The fear of not closing out the game drove us on, the game ended 30-14, we'd won both halves and more importantly we'd won our first match of the season!
Rest is for wimps...or is that breakfast?..or is this nonsense? Either way we didn't get much of a rest (or a second breakfast for that mater) as we had our second game of the day to play...
The Handball Challenge: Match Five, Thames vs Brentwood
Terry was worried, 'They've got matching socks', he was right to be.
Thames had a coach who looked like he was cut and pasted straight out of a scene from Rocky IV right onto the sidelines of this court, with an 'I will break you' stare to boot.
Their team consisted of more talented girls than you'd find in an 80's US chick flick and what's more they were fresh. By contrast we were fresh meat - Coach Kuller Rabaca called a time-out a third of the way into that first half to give us a wake-up call, 'Your minds are elsewhere, maybe twenty minutes ago. You need to get in the moment'.
Whether our lads were mesmerised by their No.5's cute bottom or like George Michael found sleeping at the wheel at a set of traffic lights, we'd simply run out of puff, it was hard to tell - but Coach was right.
By half time we were 18-6 down, Coach had his work cut-out.
After a long spell on the sidelines I was asked to come on for Sean in a slightly more central role, I felt my defending was weakened but enjoyed better efficiency in our attacks, laying up Julia to score goals from our right wing, while Duncan continued to enjoy better poaching chances in the centre.
The main incident in this match was caused by one of their few male players getting under the skin of Ian on our side, the two were both sent off when Ian reacted to some of the abusive comments being made.
We managed 9 goals in a better second half but Thames showed their class finishing 36-15 the victors.
I'd scored my first ever competitive goal, this won't go down in Oxford University folk law but it means a heck of a lot to me.
Saturday 7th January 2012 Brentwood Handball Club arrived at the very location of Bannister's amazing feat, it was to be another historical day, albeit at a far more modest level.
Coach Kuller Rabaca had liaised with both Cardiff and Thames Handball Club's to organise a mixed sex, mini tournament that would see athletes of all ability levels (from at least two continents) collide in a battle of whit, speed and agility.
The Handball Challenge: Match Four, Brentwood vs Cardiff
This was our first match with a mixed sex team this season, under the tournament guidelines we had to 'field' three girls at all times - as we only had three girls Coach had agreed that they'd all play as long as they could. Jo would be a goliath on our goal, while Julia and Steph both worked the wings and used their experience to instigate overlapping runs and attack the line.
 |
| Brentwood Keeper Jo making one of many saves against Cardiff. (The Everyman Olympian is No.8) |
Cardiff's main threats came from their captain and a tall lad who had travelled to the fixture independently and simply looking for a game, it turned out he was Brazilian and plays in the English First Division - luckily for us he was having an off day, throughout the afternoon he must have hit the crossbar a dozen or so times.
At one point the ball had flown over the top during a Cardiff attack, I was completely unaware of it as it bounced on my head, then bounced on my head again as walked backwards, landed safely in our area for Jo to collect - unwittingly I'd nullified them with ease. The crowd applauded.
Mark was enjoying the freedom of being out of goal and on a number of occasions broke free to counter attack successfully - bagging several goals in both halves of this game. Rob also had his scoring mitts on - his aggression in attack helped make up for some of our players who couldn't make the tournament.
 |
| Brentwood's Rob pounces. |
 |
| The Everyman Olympian scores his first competitive goal |
Duncan was frustrated with himself in the break, feeling he'd squandered scoring opportunities, I told him to relax, that patience would pay off - he spent 2 minutes in the sin bin during that second half, clearly my advice worked then.
The fear of not closing out the game drove us on, the game ended 30-14, we'd won both halves and more importantly we'd won our first match of the season!
Rest is for wimps...or is that breakfast?..or is this nonsense? Either way we didn't get much of a rest (or a second breakfast for that mater) as we had our second game of the day to play...
The Handball Challenge: Match Five, Thames vs Brentwood
Terry was worried, 'They've got matching socks', he was right to be.
Thames had a coach who looked like he was cut and pasted straight out of a scene from Rocky IV right onto the sidelines of this court, with an 'I will break you' stare to boot.
Their team consisted of more talented girls than you'd find in an 80's US chick flick and what's more they were fresh. By contrast we were fresh meat - Coach Kuller Rabaca called a time-out a third of the way into that first half to give us a wake-up call, 'Your minds are elsewhere, maybe twenty minutes ago. You need to get in the moment'.
 |
| The Ref looks on as Thames' rapid No.19 storms through Brentwood's sleeping defence early the first half |
 |
| Brentwood's Terry blocks Thames' excellent No.22 |
After a long spell on the sidelines I was asked to come on for Sean in a slightly more central role, I felt my defending was weakened but enjoyed better efficiency in our attacks, laying up Julia to score goals from our right wing, while Duncan continued to enjoy better poaching chances in the centre.
 |
| Duncan makes a break count against Thames |
We managed 9 goals in a better second half but Thames showed their class finishing 36-15 the victors.
I'd scored my first ever competitive goal, this won't go down in Oxford University folk law but it means a heck of a lot to me.
 |
| Brentwood Handball Club: Oxford Tournament '12 Team Standing: Coach Kuller Rabaca, Rob, Steph, Mark, Duncan, Ian, Sean Crouching: The Everyman Olympian, Jo, Julia, Terry. |
Monday, 2 January 2012
BBC Radio Wales December interview: Listen Again
Thanks to the Pistol Shooting Coach Morris hooking me up with my first national radio interview last October, BBC Radio Wales invited me back for an update in December, here's how to listen...
Click HERE for the interview, select 28/12/2011, click LISTEN NOW and fast forward to 2:40:10
Hope you enjoy this, let me know either way,
The Everyman Olympian
Click HERE for the interview, select 28/12/2011, click LISTEN NOW and fast forward to 2:40:10
 |
| BBC Radio Wales Presenters Louise & Jamie |
The Everyman Olympian
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