7 Miles with Kevin.

Kevin and I set off on our 7 miler...

Kevin and the clan came home yesterday evening and called to the house this morning wondering if...  Of course, says I, why not.  And so we did.  To be honest, we set off with the casual intention of doing the same as we did last week:  our three mile 'up and down the road' route.  However, when we hit the turnaround spot I asked Kevin if he wanted to push on up to the four mile mark.  When we got as far as the four mile mark, Kevin mentioned that he had hoped to get close to a 12k run this weekend, so we set off towards Doilín, and a 7 mile run. I's great to run with good company - one pushes the other and the the conversation shortens the distance.  We ran the hills with gusto and slowed down when we needed to.  There was nary a bit of rain and the weather, though gloomy for summer, was fine for running purposes.  A nice run, good company, great distance.

3 Miles with a Twist.

Bóithrín an tSagairt

You can't beat a summer's Saturday morning.  I got early to give the students their breakfast, and with a long free day stretching far ahead, I tore into some serious house cleaning -  basically turning the house upside down, cleaning and mopping and mopping and cleaning!  After about four hours of housework I decided to reward myself with a 3 mile run... my usual 'up and down the road' jaunt, but with one little twist in the tail.  On reaching the turnaround point I decided to head right, instead of turning directly back down towards the house.  This right turn would bring me on a nice little loop, stretching the 3 mile mark marginally in terms of distance, but significantly in terms of difficulty.  The road is known as Bóithrín an tSagairt (the Priest's Road), and is basically an unforgiveable hill that leads to the highest point on the peninsula.  From here, on a clear day, you can see as far as the Island of Garumna to the west, and out to the Aran Islands to the south.  I huffed and puffed up the savage hill and felt gggggreeeeeeat at the very top.  Just like Tony the Tiger.  The rest of the run was easy peasy after this!  Throughout I hummed the infectious 'what you focus on grows' tune that I heard the last day.  Running can be a great old life motivator...!

St John's Eve...

The lads make toast on the bonfire!

23rd of June is known as St. John's Eve, or Oíche San Seán - a time when villages along the west coast of Ireland are lit up with bonfires galore... There are 15 teenage students living in our house at the moment (learning Irish) so we gathered as much wood as we could, threw a bag of turf on top, splattered with some petrol and awwwway we went!  I got some bread and jam and the lads were trying to toast the slices as they dangled at the end of thin branches - faces were burning for the sake of the toast!  A lovely night - at least we kept up our side of the bargain.  Juneathon was ticked with some sit ups!

What you focus on grows...

There's nothing for me to do today but highlight a fantastic blog post from Julia, at Running to Learn. This post is exactly why I love to keep a blog - to find inspiration like this!

Wild Garlic.

We've been living here for three years now, in a beautiful and rugged spot by the sea.  Many years ago my father turned the boggy ground around where my house now stands to make potato beds - not an easy job in Conamara, for if you're not sinking into wet bogland or marsh then your hitting hard rock - and there's plenty of that, believe me!  What's also plentiful around here is wild garlic - standing tall and proud amidst the briar and heather.  I can't claim to be any great nature boy - it took a visit from my cousin Míchéal to point this majestic wild plant out.  Truth be told, I'm not wild about garlic, but I may just be wild about wild garlic - at least the look of it!  Exercise wise:  a paltry mile...

Ups and Downs.

Nice to run with company - well provided today by brother Kevin!

I've been letting myself down lately - dropping standards, dulling ambition, doing things badly.  I slipped with my Juneathon quest again yesterday, though that doesn't really bother me too much, it's the quality of what I've been doing recently that is gnawing at me.  This morning I had reason to be in a field beside our house and heard the clearest cricket song.  The little fellow was relentless, hiding somewhere in the long grass, he chirped and chatted away to the world like a madman amusing himself.  Our place is usually full of birdsong in the morning, but today belonged to this little fellow.  My brother Kevin was at home, so we decided to go for a run when my student lodgers left for college.  It's nice to run with a bit of company every once and awhile.  We did my usual 'up and down again' route, marking the 5k turnaround point at Cóilín Daddy's.  Our pace was brisk enough and we even decided to stretch it out for the last 1k.  I was upbeat again after this run, and decided to look at some positives:  I may not be training as hard as I was last year, but I'm still at it and, though they be short jaunts, I've still competed well enough for Juneathon.  Not too bad, an do better!

Sit Ups...

Not fun, not a run, but done.  30.