Pedal On Parliament

Hannah and Colin joined 4000 others for the Pedal on Parliament. We headed off to Morningside first to join a feeder ride to make the cycle a little bit more substantial. Good fun going down the Royal Mile with no traffic about.

Wild Thing

Max dressed up as Max from Where the Wild Things Are for his last day of school

St Andrews

After Normans Law we headed to St Andrews for a short visit and overnight stop. We went out along the beach on a cool but sunny evening. Dinner as Zizzis was a bit disappointing. They didn't quite get it right.

The next day we visited the Castle and Cathedral and then the Botanic Garden.

Normans Law

Max and Colin, supported by Cherry & Hannah went to Normans Law in Fife for a nice little hill race. The weather was still cold with lots of snow on the ground making running slow and hard work. Max set off strongly quickly getting 100 m ahead and then well out of sight of Colin. At the foot of the main ascent Max seemed to be slowing and Colin managed to pass just at the summit. Nice descent home with Colin coming in about 2 minutes ahead.

Nice cakes and tea afterwards.

Night O at Riccarton

Max and Colin enjoyed some great night orienteering at the Heriot Watt Campus. A quick sprint round the university buildings with some pretty sound navigation.

Yikes - 4 weekends without a race !

Changing jobs and colds have put me out of action for the best part of a month ! Still got the tail end of the cold and sore, swollen mouth. Hopefully get back to full speed soon.

Night O at Craigmillar

Hannah and Colin headed off to Craigmillar for a night O event around the park surrounding the Castle. Tough course including a bit through the housing estates. We got round pretty efficiently in just over an hour.

Walk with Hannah to Craigmillar

Sunshine at last.

Cati - O at Dalmeny Estate

Hannah and Colin headed off to Dalmeny Estate for a come and try it orienteering. Did pretty well on a reasonably challenging orange course with Hannah navigating pretty well.

Skiing

Hannah and Max on the slopes at Hillend.

Carnethy Talk

Hannah, Max and Colin went along to Kings Buildings to hear an interesting range of talks. Michael Nowicki talked nervously about his London to Edinburgh run and late Andy Mouncney talked about his ultra running exploits. All very interesting.

Esoc Sprint

Colin did the annual ESOC sprint orienteering, this year at Riccarton Campus. Very pleased with the results coming 7th in the MV category and 23rd of 69 from all competitors.

Big WeekEnd

A very busy weekend of orienteering. A night event on Friday at Kind Buildings. Short sharp race taking just over 20 minutes.

On Saturday there was a long city race starting at Bristo Square and going through the Old Town. A good performance probably as I know the area very well.

On Sunday a prologue on Arthurs Seat and some bitterly cold weather. Time was pretty poor for this one. Then a chasing event in the city centre starting and finishing near the Parliament building.

Tri-Trail Race Pentlands

White out conditions for the Tri_Trail race in the Pentlands. Weather was fine at home but on arrival at Threpmuir Reservoir the snow started and didn't stop for the whole race. A new event and first of a series this race brought a slightly different crowd of triathletes as well as hill runners. I started very slowly and was falling off the back of the field over the first half mile. Eventually moved forward into second last place and enjoyed a very slow paced jog in the freezing snowy temperatures. Was struggling a bit at Carlops but after snacks at Nine Mile Burn and a bit of a walk up the hill to Monks Rig I was pleased to run at a reasonable pace over the last couple of miles. Around 22 km in 2 hrs 43 mins. Tough but enjoyable.

Glentress

Colin headed off to Glentress for a ride round the blue course. Around 1 hr 45 minutes to complete the loop.

Greenmantle Dash

Another festive favourite. Temperatures were relatively warm at 8 degrees although the ground was very wet. Felt tough at the beginning and wasn't expecting a good time but was very surprised to be hitting the road at around 20 minutes and pushed hard to get a personal best time by just 3 seconds from previous best in 2007.

Portobello Promathon

My 7th time running on this new years day race. A nice clear morning and first year the race has run at a new start location and with pre-entry. Organisation and parking seemed to be an improvement. Set off at a steady pace and got HR up to around 164 and maintained this for a couple of miles. Pushed harder at the end but finished with a slightly disappointing time of around 29.45 which was my 5th best time at the event.

Later in the day we had a wee trip to the National Museum, the Caves and then to see Life of Pi in 3D.

New Years Resolution - never, ever go to a film in 3D again !

New Years Eve

We all headed out at about 11.30 towards the Royal Mile. Found a great spot to watch the fireworks just outside the Witchery Restaurant.

Torchlight Procession

We all headed out to join or watch the annual Torchlight procession. A huge crowd of around 30,000 out. We walked along North Bridge which was quite unpleasant with the volume of people out walking with their torches. After a coffee stop we returned to North Bridge to watch the fireworks at 8 pm which turned out to be an ideal venue to watch from.

ELO Festive Frolic

We all headed out to Newhailes House for the Festive Frolic orienteering with a twist. Hannah and Cherry's first event in a long time! The weather wasn't great but it was a good fun event.

Max did well coming 15th of 64 beating his dad by 4 places.

Beecraigs Handicap Race

Max and Colin headed off to Beecraigs for the Boxing day handicap race. The weather was quite kind with reasonable temperature and no wind. The ground was very muddy and a puddle was reaching lake proportions. Both Max and Colin ran well coming in the top quarter of the handicap and not a bad position timewise on the 7k race.

Eskapade

Colin's headed out early on Sunday morning in the rain and gales for a run along the Risk Esk from Musselburgh to Lasswade. A big crowd turned up at the start and at various points along the way. The full run to the Pentlands lasted all day but I bowed out after about a quarter of the distance as I've not been doing much longer runs of late.

Took the bus out and back which worked well.