I may have mentioned that I’ve recently lost weight and occasionally experience periods of insomnia. Obviously I need toughening up a lot more…both physically and mentally, to cope with the worst that life dishes out (yes I am being sarcastic!).
Did two runs today, 40 mins round the Heath at lunch with my mate Steve, and a hard 5 mile training session on Moel Famau this evening (see map).
Hopefully some demons will rest, and I’ll sleep tonight!
Tonight I ran the “Trail Race up the Beast”, a 4 mile fell run taking in 1200ft. It started from the Miners pub in Maeshafn, near my current home in Mold, so would have been rude not to go. Afraid I was feeling pretty lousy during the day, quite tired and with an upset stomach, and this made the going even tougher! I really seemed to be lacking energy from the off, and struggled with 2 stitches along the way. Despite this, it was still great fun.
The route was mostly on forest paths with some exciting descending through the trees, just steep enough to go flat out without falling off! There were also some fallen logs to hurdle, just to add to the mix. The “Beast” turned out to be a very steep and long grassy bank which appeared out nowhere. It certainly lived up to it’s name. There was also some rather pleasant fells and several strength-sapping steps back up through the woods.
I’m not sure where I finished yet, but will update this when I find out.
Having just weighed myself I also seem to have lost a few pounds (that I didn’t really need to lose!). Either through running or my dodgy tummy it turns out I’m down to 8 stone 9 lbs. Bit worrying. There’s not much left on me to lose…
Decided not to ski today. This was partly due to me having a painful ankle, and partly due to me having a horrible stuffy relapse of my cold, which in turn could have been due to drowning my sorrows with several glasses of Stiegl last night. After all, there wasn’t much point in torture and I figured that having a day off today might allow my legs to heal enough to enjoy the last day of skiing tomorrow.
Today I made excellent progress with my current book - Philip Pullman’s Dark Materials, so much in fact that I got through over half of it in one sitting (which at 1016 pages is quite a lot of reading!). Also found time to fully explore Bad Hofgastein on foot and grab a pizza for lunch in a nice little cafe in the centre of town.
Today I took the free ski bus to Dorfgastein, some 15 mins away. Dorfgastein doesn’t have quite as many runs as Bad Hofgastein, however it is linked to GroBarl and together it’s probably got more.
The snow in Dorfgastein was ace! Hardly any moguls, superb fresh powder that was a joy to turn in, and few patches of ice.
On the downside, my left ankle was done for. As soon as I put the boots in the morning on I knew it, but just hoped it might go away and wouldn’t hurt too much…
When I got out of the lift at the top of Kreuzkogel (2027m) and got onto my ski’s I knew it was going to be a short day skiing, as the pain was like having a hammer knocked into my ankle bone :(. I literally couldn’t turn at all without grimacing through the pain. As a result my right leg became completely exhausted too as I was favouring it most of time to try and get the weight off my left ankle…
It was very frustrating but a difficult choice had to be made. I was very much enjoying exploring Dorfgastein and it’s wonderful runs, but the pain I was experiencing meant I wasn’t able to enjoy the skiing. And so I had to call an early end to the day in the afternoon. :(.
Today I skied over two mountains all the way from Bad Hofgastein, down to Angertal and over to Bad Gastein. It was cool moving from place to place on ski’s and exploring loads of new runs in the process. I stopped for a nice coffee at Angertal and savoured it in the bright sunshine.
The snow on Stubnerkogel (2250m) - near Bad Gastein - seemed to be much better than on Schlossalm (2050m) and it was a joy not having to dodge as many moguls. The moguls have really been making things difficult for me as my turning still isn’t that great, and I keep going over the damn things instead of around them! And there seems to be loads of them here too, probably as lots of the soft snow is artificially created (especially lower down the mountain) and it’s quite busy, hence lots of people carving them out.
By the end of the day I was totally knackered, and I’ve also started to experience a longer than should be normal pain in my left ankle. It feels like something isn’t right with my boots which is making them hurt quite a lot. This was confirmed later in the evening when my left ankle was feeling quite bruised, and also my right knee a bit sore - I’d obviously been compensating with my right leg to take the pressure off my left. Not good.
Still to make up for things, I ate another excellent five course meal in my hotel.
I feel like I’ve had a fight with a mountain, and lost. I think the mountain used a big stick to beat the cr*p out of me too. Got rather a lot of aches and pains this evening, some from skiing and some from this blasted cold/fever thing. Hate being ill on holiday.
Today I decided to throw myself literally into the skiing deep end, and without practice or tuition headed to the top of Schlossalm (2050m) to refresh my knowledge the hard way. It has been a day of falling over and being very wobbly really, although some progress was made. I’ve discovered that Bad Hofgastein is rather a tough place for beginners, as its mostly steep and narrow red runs and hardly any blues. In fact the only way off the mountain is down a long and vertical red - not really what you need after a day of humiliation and bruising… Still, I stuck it out for 5 hours before a sore left ankle and exhaustion made me call it a day.
Tomorrow I think I’ll take a bus up the valley to where there are more blue runs and practice my technique. I’ve just eaten the entire menu in the restaurant and am now planning to get an early night. I’m sure I’ll find some new bruises in the morning…
Here I am, sitting in the airport with sore throat, dripping nose and spinning head, waiting for my delayed flight to take me to a nice cold place where it snows an awful lot. There’s irony in there somewhere ;-).
But there’s no way it’s going to mess up my skiing!
