Ulaan2015: The 2017 half Marathon

As many may recall, I did a solo trip from Clifden to Ulaanbaatar in 2015 for Temple Street Children’s Hospital. I left Ireland on May 1st and returned July 10th. The journey was around 25,000 miles and to be honest was amazing.

So, now I have decided to travel to the city of Perm, Irbit and Yekaterinburg in the Ural region of Russia. This will happen this coming May. I have simple plans, I want to be in Moscow for the May 9th celebrations which I missed in 2015.

And in Perm I will meet up with Irina Shevchenko, and hopefully we will travel around the region together. I just have to persuade her to get a motorcycle helmet first. You know you want to Irishka

The outbound trip is possibly via the U.K., channel tunnel to France, then up to Amsterdam. Then up to the Baltic states before entering Russia at the crossing I used in 2015. Then the next day to Moscow to meet my friends, Denis and Nadia.

Then down to Perm, a 2 day drive. And a rest break. Before I return. The return leg, I am doing as I did in 2015, not planned. That makes it more fun. I have decided that it will be either via Ukraine or over to Kazakhstan and Georgia. 

To be honest, Ukraine is my preferred route, as I want to visit the country and I also want to visit Auchwitz camp.

I will bring less than half what I did on the 2015 trip. However, I will bring my TomTom Bandit action cam, the various mounts and leads. Unlike 2015, when my GoPro played up,my TomTom Bandit will keep recording.

Keep an eye on here, the Ulaan 2015 Facebook page and I will also create a thread on boards.ie. the IDonate page again for Temple Street Children’s Hospital will be put up in the next day or so

Recovery update

As you can tell I am not the most constant blogger. But I feel that it is important to update on my recovery from th heart attack. 

I was in hospital for around 5 days. I was given advice to take it easy, slow gentle walks and other dietary advice. Also enough medicine to keep a pharmacy in business. But I was going home and that was the best part. 

I could not handle the two dogs, so I took Twiglet and swapped her for the boys. She still needed walking and that kept me going. Of course, I could lift nothing, even lifting her was a struggle. And I had to get the kids to fill the stove every evening for me. 

Karen did cook me meals which for the first few days was a great help. I cannot say how much I appreciated that. But I was keen to get back into my own routine so started doing the odd bit. 

Exercise was the one thing that I wanted to get back to. I knew I had made enough of a change to my diet and lifestyle for the exercise to work. So after a while, it was slow walks with the two dogs around the local roads, around 2.4km. I have not pushed it, though I now do the odd 5km walk. 

And a friend, thanks Tom, lent me a Cross Trainer. This is mainly for when the weather is bad enough to stop me going walking. But I have started to use it most days anyway. Started off at 5 minutes and now up to 20 minutes. 

I was back to the hospital early December for a checkup. Every was fine and the weight loss continued, even though I felt I had put weight on, must be muscle. They were happy enough to say that I didn’t have to return until the following year for a medicine review. 

I continue to do the walking, the kneesdont allow me to run, though I may ring the knee consultant and see if he will prescrip an off loader knee brace for the left knee. I have signed up to do a Run A Muck challenge in March and I continue to train for the half marathon for Temple Street. 

I will try and update this a lot more

TomTom Touch, a nice fitness tracker

Before I start this review, I will put two things into the front first. I was offered the Touch by TomTom to review, I do so independently of this offering. Also I have a TomTom Spark sports watch and recently suffered a severe heart attack. 

The TomTom Touch arrives in a snazzy box, I have to admit that the packaging is very eye catching. The Touch itself is on a plastic wrist which gives an idea of what it will look like. 

Opening the box, there is the Touch itself, a micro USB lead and a quick instructions. Given the number of devices with USB, there is almost no need for the cable but it is a sturdy one. 

Setting up, requires a laptop or PC. It is done via the MySports app which is available for PC and Mac. This will not only set up the Touch, but also updates the firmware. It is also how you setup the Bluetooth connection to your smart phone, though there is no need with a computer. 

Once charged, updated and setup, the strap is a flexi black rubberish material. It does up quickly. The screen is black until you press the contact button which performs a couple of duties, more on that later. 

Once the screen is activated, the time is displayed along with the progress of your daily steps in a neat circle. The screen itself is Touch and scrolling down, it displays a number of different options. Scrolling up, there is the options to start monitoring training, body mass measurement and heart rate. 

As most functions are similar to most fitness trackers, I am not going to review them all, that is needless. The Touch does have the ability to monitor heart rate and steps 24/7 as well as sleep. These are handy functions and compared to my Spark sports watch, I find the steps very accurate. The heart rate is not constant but one ready every 5 or 10 minutes. This gives a good average over a day. 

The Touch is not a sports watch, it lacks the GPS, multi sports facilities of it bigger cousins in the TomTom range, the Spark and Runner. This does not mean that it is less capable, it is meant for a different user. 
The body mass monitor is a major selling point. It is recommended that the watch is worn for a minimum of 15 minutes before a reading is done and the longer it is worm, the better a reading is. I have read up on this feature and generally it is well received. 

I know when I started using the Touch my fat index was 40% a figure I believe. But with exercise I have watched it creep down. I still have a long way to go. 

The Touch should not be confused with a sport watch, it is a fitness tracker. It has one “sports” mode and that is gym. This is possibly the most that most people will require. It tracks your heart rate live and gives you a work out analysis on the MySports website or app once the data is transferred. 

If I do have a complaint, I don’t like the strap material. I tend to find the material causes me to sweat under it and bring me out in a rash. But I have this issue with anything made from the material so therefore I am used to it and know how to sort it. 

The Touch is a well worth investment and is a capable competitor to other fitness trackers on the market. TomTom has a support forum and listen to customer suggestions and complaints. 

A reason to rejoice

Life is a series of challenges, some small and others not so small. But whilst you can ignore these challenges, they do catch up with you. It doesn’t matter the form of the challenge, accident, illness, natural disaster or whatever, these challenges at some stage have to be dealt with. 

Mine happened Wednesday when out for my daily walk. Since August I have taken to walking most days. The distance started at 2km and slowly I got to 5km and then 8km. Then the times started to tumble. 
During this, I also changed my diet. I won’t deny that my diet was unhealthy, I was and still am obese but I had started making efforts to change that. But I also was doing it solo. Gone were the sweets, biscuits, salts and other naughties. Now I was not being good all the time but by and large I tried. I developed a taste for Couscous and brown Rice’s done naturally. 

But this Wednesday it all came to a head. As I was walking I felt a slight pain in the top of my chest, under my chin. Now this pain didn’t appear to be moving or spreading so I assumed, wrongly, that I had not warmed up properly. 

But as I kept walking the pain seemed to be there all the time. To be honest, it never really went above a 3 or 4 on the pain level. What did change was my breathing, I was finding it harder and harder to breath. 

This was my second mistake because it was gone past lunch and I assumed as all I had eaten was a Chocolate Bar that my energy level was low. So I kept going. A friend stopped to chat, he remarked later that I was bathed in sweat and looked like I was gasping, though I did not notice  

At around the 2.5km mark, I knew something was not right. On my walks I either listened to music off my sports watch or a cheap sim less mobile, this was my biggest error. I waved to passing traffic but it was a wave of hello more than anything. Well it appeared to them as a wave of hello, I could not process what I was doing

So I decided to head home, started walking away but all the time my breath was becoming more and more laboured. I knew I was in trouble although I did not recognise it as a heart attack. 

Finally I stopped. My vision was all over the place. All I do rightly remember is seeing two vans, one I recognised, and I knew I was going to collapse and tried to falter my way down. From then on, I was in serious trouble, I knew that. 

There are no words to describe what was going on in my head or chest. The pain level just went up to 10. At that point I knew I was suffering a heart attack. But I could not communicate that. 

I have heard of being locked in, oddly that is what I felt like. I could hear myself screaming that my heart was in trouble but they of course could not hear me. I was aware of various sensations, someone rubbing my back, someone holding my hand. 

From this point, I have to rely on the words of others because my recollection at best is patchy. 

A doctor and the ambulance was called. To be honest, if the queen herself stood beside me, I would not have known. All I do remember is this strange detachment from the whole affair. I know people say you see a bright light , well I didn’t. Just a dim dark passage and getting darker all the time. 

I do recollect something being put into my mouth. I was not sure what it was, but at the time, I thought I was getting something to assist my breathing. But then my mouth filled with a gel. 

Another thing I do recall is the cold. Now to me, I had been there for only a matter of minutes. Later I discovered it was around 30 minutes or so. I was freezing to the core. 

I don’t recall much else. I have this weird sensation of trying to recall which way the ambulance went. I do remember seeing a bright light alternating with a dark light. Possibly the helicopter blades swirling above me. 

I did start to come around a little, once in the ambulance and then in the helicopter. Though neither time, I did not know where I was. It was only in the hospital as the professor started to do the angiogram and then to clear the blockage. 

He, the Professor, started on my right wrist but I was so cold that I went into a spasm and he had to start through the groin

The process of the stent is something I hope I never have to experience again. Not that it was painful more uncomfortable. He kept talking to me but at this stage I was beyond reasonable conversation. 

He said something about was it more comfortable. I think he had burst the blockage and put the stent in. I was still in amazing pain. But like a light being switched on, the pain almost disappeared as quickly. 

I am here to write this which is my answer to the challenge and new challenges as a result of the heart attack are opening up.  Sleep with me was always a scarse commodity but now I am frightened to close my eyes. 

Every itch around my chest, starts to process as a sheer panic, is it happening again, thankfully not but that concern is there. Every day now is a new leash of life, I know I was lucky. 

To the people of my community who stopped and helped, the doctor and ambulance crew, the crew of Air Corp 112,the Gardai from Clifden,  the Professor, doctors, nurses and every else in the hospital, my friends and family, I express my deepest gratitude, I would possibly not be here except for you. 

Life now is one of steps, new steps after old steps, and in time it will be day over old day. If there is one thing I learnt from this incident is that life can be snuffed out in a moment, get out there and enjoy it, for one day it will go away

Croí night time walk / run

This coming Friday, the Galway Croí night time Run / Walk happens. This is my first ever walk, the last time I would have done anything similar was at secondary school. 

I am looking forward to it with a sense of trepidation as I don’t like crowds. However as it is for charity and I have worked with Croí prior and I was also a user of their services, I am proud to be assisting them

Today, Tuesday, I collected the participants pack, and then decided to walk the course. The course is along the Salthill Promenade which oddly as I lived in Galway for a number of years, I never walked. 

It was a cool day but I enjoyed the walked, averaging around 5.7km/h so really pleased with that. 

So hopefully some pictures from the event soon. 

Charity half marathon for Temple Street Children’s Hospital

Thanks to a friend who mentioned me on a Temple Street fundraising event for 2017′, I am now doing a Half Marathon with my buddy Mr. Mouse.

For those who don’t know, Mr. Mouse and myself travelled to Mongolia via Russia in 2015 as an adventure trip and a fundraiser for Temple Street Children’s Hospital. It was an amazing trip and one on which Mr. Mouse was almost lost a few times. 

For those who don’t know me that well, my daughter Zoe Louise died when she was two days old in England. This affected me as you can understand and I swore to do as much as I could to help. 

Since returning to Ireland, and getting back onto bikes I went to as many fund raisers for children related that I could. 

And so now I have a mini marathon to do with Mr. Mouse who I will have to carry on the event. Of course, I have dodgy knees so I may have to walk the course, but if I have to, then I will

So please donate via the IDonate Page every cent you donate goes direct to the hospital 

Did a walk with the dogs as part of my daily routine. Hoping to do most days except when it is raining as the dogs will just stand in one place https://mysports.tomtom.com/service/webapi/v2/activity/perm_ncJQ49APz45xMWurh79HImfRvU6wqRr2DQtDSqz2D3Ud5dnhA1uoqF7dhHQYe9RCtYaUf0OfBnsR3bzMpGkl-A?format=html

The first sub 1 hour 5 km walk

Yesterday was the first sub 1 hour 5km walk and it felted good. 

I started off as I usually do, getting the music right and the TomTom Spark watch ready, linked to GPS. And off I went I into the drizzly mist. I was in a confident mood which I think helped

Between the 3 and 4 km marks there is a hill that starts harsh, eases off, but then goes on for a long way which I have always found draining. Yesterday, I conquered that hill, not one stop

And as soon as I got home, took the 2 dogs out to do their business and settled down with a green tea

Ongoing walking

Since my last post, I have slowly, and emphasis on the word slowly, increased my daily walk(s) to 7.25km. This has been a struggle at times, only last night, I felt I was going to have to give up.

I have to admit to enjoying the walks, yes they are solo walks and given recent weather rather damp, but I put my Bluetooth headphones on, link them to my TomTom Spark and listen to one of the many podcasts that I download. 

I tend to listen to Techno or Trance, the beat is uplifting and keeps me on my time. I know at 53 I am supposed to be listening to fuddy duddy music, but I like the beat so it does me

A bid

Due to severe arthritis in both knees my weight has been an issue for the last few years, well I won’t only put it down to my knees, my marriage broke up, I lost a job I loved and just well over eating

Recently I managed to get some part time work which has reinvigorated me. I have gone back to driving, delivering Mussels and Oysters to Dublin once a week. Whilst it does take it’s toll on me, my knees are usually extremely stiff afterwards, i enjoy the social aspect of the work and whilst I deliver to the same places most weeks, no two days are ever the same. 

So I decided to pull the finger out and look at getting some kind of fitness back. Until my 20’s I would have been fairly active and even when I worked with the police in London I did maintain a good fitness level. 

I am not expecting to get back to the level that I had then but anything is an improvement. I had started to walk, mainly a 2km walk with the dogs using my phone but I found that either I was constantly checking the phone or having texts or calls to pester me. 

I know I could have put it into silent mode but that would not have worked, half way round I would be checking it so I looked at various sports watches. My initial thought was to get a Fitbit device, but I was also looking at the TomTom Spark. So my old friend eBay came through with a new watch for half price. 

Since I purchased the watch, I have walked every day, bar a few when I had a serious sickness. Initially I started at just doing around the block as I call it and then progressed to the High Road which is a 3.4km journey and now I am doing 4.3km. 

I have been doing it with Bowie and Oreo but I think it is a little too much for them, so it maybe a case of two walks a day, one around the block (2km) with them and the longer walk alone

I will endeavour to do a review of my TomTom Spark in the near future and hopefully do a monthly report on my progress. I am also seeing the consultant in early September so I am going to be pushin for a knee replacement on one knee asap