On Target

 Christmas is looming, just a couple more sleeps left.  The omicron variant is big news all over the world, and the UK is leading the way in the infection rate race - we seem to be very good at some things.

President Putin keeps announcing how aggressive the west are in the Ukraine - expect something on Christmas day when we're all busy cooking the turkey.

New year is just over a week away and my targets are getting closer, currently 136 more to bike, 38 more running miles.  I should reach them as along as the weather stays reasonable. I could probably do the biking on the turbo (17 miles a day) but my 5 miles a day run might take some doing.   

Home Straight.

There's been a bit of a fuss going on about the last F1 race of the season where Verstappen overtook Hamilton on the last lap to win the championship.  There was controversy because the safety car allowed lapped cars to effectively move out of the way before it pulled in and Hamilton's older tyres were no match for Verstappen's nearly new ones.  Comments are aimed at the 'artificial' way he won the race, which is a bit rich when nearly all overtaking nowadays relies on the DRS functionality which is a completely artificial invention (and the main reason I stopped being interested in this sport).  

I'm down a little on my required mileage - 146 per week for cycling, 26 per week running.  Getting closer!  I biked in to the office today, so will get the cycling average down a bit, but not sure to go a bit longer on the way home.  I feel I should because I'm 'out there', but at the same time, I like to get home. 

Walking in a Winter Wonderland.

I've noticed more articles this year about 'Winter wonderland' type of events where some entrepreneurial/ripoff merchant person sets up an area where they can charge adults to bring their children to waste money on junk.  I have no experience of these things (I guess they need to be near an area of population) so I only get my info from the press, then it will always be bad news.  No-one would write about a successful Winter Wonderland because no-one would read it.  Seems like we need misery to see up through to Christmas.

Talking of seeing things through...I need to be doing 152 mile cycling weeks and 24 mile running weeks until 31st Dec.  Last week was a decent running week, nearly 27 miles, but cycling was only 92, thereby slipping deeper into the red.  The weather is looking like I can bike into the office a couple of times this week, I just need to motivate myself at 6 o'clock in the morning.  I can only manage 15 miles on the turbo before I get bored/too sweaty, so the only way to get the miles in is to get out ion the fresh air. 

 

Oiling the Chain

"Oil companies made bigger profits when the price of gas went up, and didn't increase production to keep the prices down".  Tut tut.  Whatever next?  Bears defecating in the woods?

Companies really can't win when they are on the wrong side of public opinion, and reality never gets in the way of a good headline.

As for my reality, the end of the year is drawing steadily nearer and I'm still down on my targets, but not by too much I hope.  I'm 138 miles down on the cycling which means an average 135 miles per week, and the running is 21 down with 25 per week required.  Last week was a good cycling week (149) but running suffered because of it with only 10 miles.  Weather this week is looking very wet (atrocious at the moment) so I need to up my game on the rollers and get the waterproofs out for running.