Friday 5 August 2011

Running home for tea


The Grey Corries

The other day after baby group I went for a wee run. With the Experience Tour trip to Norway just over a week away I am needed to sharpen up and shed a pound or two quickly after having put in a few weeks of training. So after a 12 hour fast Claire dropped me off in Glen Nevis and I headed up over Meall Cumhann, across the empty Coire Giubhsachan and up that savage slope of Aonach Beag (via a wee scope about the crags of course). I was still feeling bouncy of leg after that but as I headed out across the Grey Corries I began to notice the knuckle under my left big toe getting progressively sorer after an awkward landing on a stone. Sgurr Chionnich’s Beag and Mor passed ok although running was kind of off the cards by then as the fuel switched almost exclusively to lipid. On the way up Stob Coire Nan Easain I very quickly felt like a lie down. My body was giving me a message. It emphatically did not want to ascend any more without sugar. 
It was hard to bail when after Easain it’s a steady cruise without much more ascent, but it’s been a while since I’ve ran so I took the chilled option and stumbled down into the massive and wild Coire nan Eoin. Despite feeling pretty lousy, the solitude of this glen was something else and I tramped quite happily in my own little zone through it’s meanders out into Leanachan Forest. 
However, once in Leanachan Forest, I was really ready for some dinner let me tell you so it was a fine training exercise to tramp through it’s seemingly endless tracks leading here, there and everywhere and finally back to my car in Spean Bridge.
I had a pound coin in my car. It’s been a couple of decades since I’ve done this but I dived straight into the Spar shop and stood carefully in the sweetie isle calculating how I could buy the maximum amount of chocolate for 1 pound. I couldn’t believe chocolate bars are 70 odd pence these days! My prizes lasted well under a minute (1 picnic bar, one fudge, 11p change).
Good day out. Might do this again next week. Tomorrow feeding midges as Steall again.

3 comments:

  1. Hi Dave,
    Interested to hear the thinking behind starving yourself before a run like that.

    Presumably this forces the body to burn fat?

    Is this a safe training strategy for an average climber looking to shed a few pounds who runs a bit (E1 leader, runs a 10k & a 5k per week, max, plus a couple of climbing sessions) or should this be reserved only for those at their physical peak looking for a quick gain?

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  2. Pretty clever tactics to drop weight quick. I bet you need some will power to do it though! Also yes chocolate is ridiculously expensive, coming from a confessed choco-holic.

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  3. Having just gone for a jolly around the Mamores over the last two days (Caught you just as we were about to cross the Steall bridge yesterday) I can wholly relate to the hell that is the Glen Nevis midges this year. They appear to be a particularly brutal crop this year...

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