Easily the worst week of training so far. All was going well and last Wednesday I woke early to do a turbo session. I had a look online and saw that the Outlaw Half had opened for entries so quickly got my name down, what better training event than half of the main one. From there things went downhill so those of a nervous disposition don’t read on.
I had a pretty decent turbo session laid out for me including some one leg drills, spin ups and so on, 55 minutes worth all told. Not more than 15 minutes in my bike decided to eject itself from the turbo trainer and I fell into Kathryn’s bike next to me luckily managing to catch myself and both bikes before any real damage was done. Put things back together, with the lesson learnt to check the tightness of everything before starting, and finished the session. Then that lunchtime I played 5aside in work and ended up getting a black eye due to a clash of heads in the last minute.
The swelling then meant that I couldn’t put goggles on without some serious discomfort so I ended up missing the swim session, my first missed session of the plan but I reasoned I could move it to the Friday and gain it back. Then I got a phone call on the Thursday that I was getting a delivery of hedge plants a week earlier than expected, the fact that they were arriving on the Friday and I had to dig a 9m trench for them and get them back in the ground ASAP didn’t help my plans any.
Saturday’s ride was going to be impossible so I ended up bringing the Saturday ride forward and doing it at 9pm on the Turbo. 1h45 minutes of tedium was followed by a drive into Bristol to pick K up from a night out. The Saturday had me labouring in the garden, and I’m not built for manual work and it was late Sunday afternoon before I could down tools. By this point my hamstring was feeling really sore but some stretching meant I was able to do my long run on the Sunday evening.
Woke up on Monday with my leg really sore but was able to knock out 800m in the pool OK but decided to skip the run on Tuesday to allow it to heal and this mornings bike benefited from that extra freshness I think.
Also affecting my mood has been the Dougie Freedman saga at Palace. On the weekend we lost a 2 goal lead to draw with Millwall and then the rumours of Bolton’s interest gathered momentum. He’d clearly stated on Friday that he wasn’t interested so I’d thought no more of it. Suddenly by Monday it’s looking more and more likely and he’s allowed to talk to them before Palace announcing the move on Tuesday morning. Now those who don’t follow Palace probably can’t appreciate just how much of a legend at the club Dougie is. Having played for us in two spells and scoring many crucial goals, play off semi finals, a late winner at Stockport that kept us from being relegated to the third tier and being involved in the backroom team that kept us up when we were in Administration. Dougie, while being a childhood Rangers fan had become an Eagle, we thought as passionate about the club as any fan. When he got the managers job, an opportunity he would never have gotten elsewhere, we had good times and bad but the last few weeks we’ve been showing real promise.
Along comes Bolton with a mediocre squad, Premiership sized debt and a chairman willing to pay big bucks and off out the door he goes. The only word for it is betrayal. You get used to footballers being all about the money but Dougie was supposed to be different. If he’s not loyal then I can’t believe anyone in football is. It probably seems over the top but it’s really gotten to me. Hopefully he’ll do nothing at Bolton and we can get a manager in who can keep hold of our players and inspire us to keep winning as we have been. 6 wins and 3 draws in 9 games unbeaten is promotion form, I just hope we don’t plummet.