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Headcase Ironman

~ Raising funds to help find a cure for Glioblastoma Multiforme (GBM) brain tumours.

Headcase Ironman

Tag Archives: Dan Russell

The Dust has Settled

26 Wednesday Jun 2013

Posted by Editor in Blog, Dan, Tony

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

Dan Russell, GBM Cancer, Headcase Cancer Trust, ironman, Nice 2013, Tony Russell, triathlon

SONY DSC

Well well well, now that the dust has settled and the aches and pains have begun to subside, I guess it’s time to reflect on the past 7 Months. The first email went on the 13th November and went like this….

SONY DSC

TONY “I’m so close to entering a Ironman”

DAN    “I think I’m gonna do it. I think I have to be there if you’re gonna do it and watching just wont be enough, Having said that, I am actually leaning towards Nice. I know the bike is harder but the times last year are a lot quicker….. It works better for me date wise as well. 

The run course is flat as a pancake as well…..”

TONY  “OK so …… Is that a date ? If we do it we should do sponsorship and I would like to do it for Colin ?” 

DAN     “I think if I don’t do it now I will just wish I had sooooo………………IT’S A DATE! (heart racing right now)  And yes, 100% should be done for Colin”

TONY  “God ….. So is mine and my stomach has just churned !! “

Editor “what is it with these ‘….’ , is it hereditary too”
This exchange was followed by a string of further emails with language that’s not for public consumption thereafter it was set in stone, we had agreed to do an IRONMAN!. Research then helped decide on Nice and on the 17th November I told Colin we were going to do it and raise money for Headcase.

The journey had begun, however even before the blog and Justgiving sites were up things had become challenging, courtesy of Chelsea football club !

As we have said this was all about raising awareness and of course cash for Headcase and of course Colin’s plight. The money and ideas came rolling in and we were well and truly on our way.

The training became all consuming and Dan and I were constantly scaring each other with articles we had read about this challenge, but it was ok as it was months away ! My first visit to Dubai was not good as I had to drop out of the Abu Dhabi tri, which incidentally the same guy who won in Nice won there too, and Dan did brill. Second trip we really did work hard and we could sense we were getting there.

1016660_10152921312150023_199081087_n

In the meantime the money and efforts of you all was really amazing and the support and donations came rolling in along with some very moving messages for Colin, but the most amazing contributions were from Colin himself and latterly Helen, when ever a ‘Colin blog’ went up the visits to the site doubled in the day and sometimes trebled.

The months began to slip by and the big day came ever closer, but there was also continuous fund raising activity which was really inspiring and ensured total focus. And then bang its done and its over, but what a great day, just one of the best. But the fight goes on, at the time of writing we are just over £32,500 with gift aid, but I would still like to see the magical £30k appear without gift aid. But a job well done, THANKS.

So it would be remiss not to say a few thank you’s.

Firstly Kirstin who in the roll of  ‘Admin’  a term that started as a bit of a wind up but seems to have stuck, seriously what can I say, well the whole thing wouldn’t have been such a success without you, I guess being bossy helps, but you never let up and for that I thank you.
To our on the ground supporters amazing, I think their voices have now recovered. In addition Dan and I have been overwhelmed with the messages of support, it really did make a difference on those last few strides.To all our donators, not sure there is such a word, but you have been brilliant.

But most of all, thank you Colin, Helen and your family for allowing us to invade your lives at a time of total devastation; your openness, honesty and humour have been amazing and your continued drive to raise awareness and cash for Headcase is a tremendous demonstration of wanting to help others when it would be easy to disappear into your shell.  Even when we went to see Colin on Monday when we flew back he was still talking about the charity and donations, unbelievable !

So while this chapter comes to a close another inevitably opens, the boys are doing the three peaks challenge in a couple of weeks and I’m  sure we will think of something else mental to do in due course, but with the London Tri in five weeks its back to the gym. A million thanks to you all from Dan and me for making it bearable and actually fun, and my thoughts, as I know everyone’s are, are with Colin and Helen. TTFN

Ok folks so where are you?

23 Sunday Jun 2013

Posted by Editor in Blog, Dan, Editor's Posts, Tony

≈ 5 Comments

Tags

Dan Russell, headcase, ironman, Nice 2013, Tony Russell, triathlon

Probably tucked up in bed, at least those in Blighty. Whilst the support crew are up and at ’em at 4am, fumbling for the light switch and  the tooth brush to be bright and breezy for when the guys are ready to leave. Bring on the coffee and don’t tell them we may well grab a few 40 winks after they head off up into the mountains!

24 hours to go

22 Saturday Jun 2013

Posted by Editor in Blog, Colin's Blog, Dan, Editor's Posts, Tony

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

Cancer, Dan Russell, GBM, Headcase Cancer Trust, ironman, NICE2013, Tony Russell, triathlon

Start

In 24 hours the Support team with have escorted the competitors to the beach, distracting the nerves.  Tony and Dan will have lined up with over 2000 other insane nutters, Considering the best method to cover the 2 or 3 meters of very uncomfortable stones and launch themselves into the waves to commence a race of a life time.

The walk back from the Pasta Fest last night covered topics such as the metal boredom of straight road run, the merits of setting a time goal for each stage vs being delighted just to complete it and the issues over pre-race preparation involving the bathroom!

The 5k walk, rather than waiting for the hot and overcrowded bus was an opportunity to calculate the view around the bay that will appear on each of the three circuits, and the hope that there will be as little wind as possible to battle with.

The guys talk of flick flacking between nerves and excitement and the desire to just get it started now. But in reality the last day of essential training involves doing very little, and resting, perhaps taking in the rugby, but definitely feet up, until they announce, “perhaps a little swim in the morning would be a good idea, oh and a small run later on” But for now it is a question of mental calm and biding the time to the start.

It is not clear where the live results are to be posted online, if we find out we will pass the information on through a blog post. But the start is 6:30am, remember Nice is a hour ahead, so obviously we hope everyone will be up bright and early at 5:30 to be thinking of them at their start line.

7:30-7:50 they hope to be exiting the swim., hopefully fending off any kicks to important parts of the body, and dodging the jelly fish.

Then the bike, a bit of an unknown really and with some pretty eye-watering inclines the challenge is immense:

BikeThe race is not possible to view en route unless you are residing in one of the mountain villages as lots of roads are closed and the thought of taking a car or taxi up to station yourself to see them wizz past but increase the chances of being the cause of a collision with a competitor in some freak accident is not worth it.

So after thy have done the journey they will return to the seafront. It is thought anytime from between 2 to 4pm local time.

Then the run, four times up and down the Promenade de Anglais.

Support crew on hand if required, mainly in full voice to cheer as loudly as possible, and post any and all news as live as possible.

Expected finish time, nothing firm and no expectations, but vaguely any time between between 7 and 9pm, But we will keep you posted.

Houston, We have a problem

11 Tuesday Jun 2013

Posted by Editor in Blog, Dan, Editor's Posts, Tony

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

Dan Russell, GBM Cancer, headcase, ironman, NICE2013, Traithlon

Hospital

So Dan might have beaten Tony by 3mins 44secs, but Tony did go to work the next day!

Dan arrived back from Dubai on the Thursday with a tight chest and sore throat (he also has Asthma), he seemed to have gotten away with it. Dan left the UK after the race at Blenheim coughing wheezing and with a sore throat, not good 13 days before the race of a life time.  He flew back last night and things got worse.

Barely feeling his feet on the ground again and he was into the hospital, and within three hours of landing, he had a chest Xray, bloods taken, he was put on oxygen and drugs injected to ease chest rattle, along with bottles of anti-biotics. He then slpt, and slept. He is on a tight timetable to sort this……everything crossed.

They are both supposed to start “tapering” soon, but Wikipedia didn’t say anything about being bed ridden!

 Seriously get better soon, you’re not getting out of this that easy !

4th race of the season

16 Saturday Mar 2013

Posted by Editor in Blog, Dan

≈ 3 Comments

Tags

Cancer, Dan Russell, Dubai, GBM, ironman, NICE2013, triathlon

Dubai2013

After what can only be described as a very boozy week in Beirut, confidence in preparation for an Olympic distance event wasn’t ideal it must be said but if you wanted to put a positive spin on it, I did get time to rest and replenish my glycogen levels?!?

Anyway, another early start, this time at Mamzar beach park for my 4th event of the year, the usual thoughts were running through my head. Why am I doing this again? Should I go back to bed? I could just do a big training session instead? Thankfully I chose to grow a pair in true ironman fashion and just get stuck in. I’m very glad I did…

The swim was less nerve racking than usual perhaps because I had completed a few already this year, but I had set a target of beating the 30min mark which was at the back of my mind. It was quite a feisty swim with lots of kicking and punching but eventually I got in my rhythm and got out the water in 28mins by my watch which I was more than happy with. In and out of T1 quite quickly I had a bit of a technical issue with my bike AKA falling off! A valid lesson learnt however that no matter how confident you are with mounting your bike, when you try and do too many things at once its only ever going to end in an awkward and embarrassing scenario much to the amusement of various spectators. I finally sorted myself, got my head down and posted a pretty decent time for the 40k which again showed me that I’m improving on the discipline I found the most difficult (we won’t think about the extra 140km ill need to complete in Nice come June for now!)

Feeling reasonably fresh off the bike I pushed quite hard on the run trying to get the heart rate up in order to see where I was at fitness wise towards the end of the 10k. Overall I was pretty pleased and by my watch I broke 45mins which was my secret target before setting out. The goal now for running is just to combine the speed work with endurance and keeping a steady pace for longer period.

So another event down and only one more to go before the season ends here I am reasonably happy where I am at. The heat is now my biggest worry until June given its now 32 degrees here and only going one way (I don’t expect any sympathy btw!) so will need to think about how I deal with that.

Lastly, I’ve been working with our creative director on some cool concepts for the head case charity. I hope to have some ideas to share in the coming months but for now would just like to thank everyone again for their continued support and effort shown so far, its massively inspirational, and also to Colin who never fails to make me laugh with his blog posts.

Until next time…

Abu Dhabi… DONE.

03 Sunday Mar 2013

Posted by Editor in Blog, Dan

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

Cancer, Dan Russell, GBM, headcase, ironman, Nice213, triathlon

Screen Shot 2013-03-03 at 11.30.06A very enjoyable day (for one half of the team at least) and another step in the right direction.

After the usual pre race nerves and watching world Ironman champions and Olympians (one of which being the current Olympic champion) start the swim, it was my go. Having still not done as much swimming as I’d like to have, confidence wasn’t at its highest but I knew If I kept a steady pace throughout the 1.5k and didn’t blow up I’d be ok and get out into T1 ready for the bike. Aside from the goggles steaming up and the glaring sun making it almost impossible to see, overall it was quite a good swim and I came out knowing that with a bit more training and some better goggles id be in a pretty decent position come June.

Out of the swim and into T1 I took my time knowing that I needed to make sure I had everything ready as I was about to embark on a 100km cycle. Off to the the bike start I saw my first fan of this years season shouting. Doesn’t matter how many people there are when doing triathlon, when you see someone you know it always gives you a lift and this was no different. I guess that was a good thing as in my head at that point I felt I needed more than just a bit of motivation! A propeller on the back wheel would of been great!

Screen Shot 2013-03-03 at 11.37.20

With that said I must admit I really enjoyed the cycle. It was pretty flat overall and quite windy in parts but on the whole I felt great and the 3 hours seemed to go quite quickly. Every now and then you would see the helicopters and motorbikes fly past you filming the elites. Brownlee went past the other way at one point and it still makes me question why I even bother doing this. Having ended up doing an extra lap of Yas Maina f1 circuit by mistake (around 6km) he still managed to break the course record on a day where the wind on the cycle caused the long distance time to be slower by 20mins on last year! Its just unbelievable for anyone to understand how someone can do that, but having taken part in triathlons for a few years now it becomes even harder to comprehend. Super human is really the only explanation…

So off the bike in just over 3 hours I went into T2 feeling surprisingly ok with the legs in pretty good condition. Again my fan and frustrated spectator was there at the start of the run to give me a kick up the arse which was most certainly needed on what was one of the hardest 10kms I have ever put myself through. The sun was beaming down and the temperature was 30 degrees which didn’t help, but the constant stitch and nausea was really the main problem from about 1km in. There were times on the run where I really did question why I do this which is something that doesn’t normally happen and the km markers seemed to be getting further and further away I’m sure of it. Eventually the pain was over and I was through the line to be welcomed with cramp in both legs and a bit of recycled electrolytes to share around 😉

Tri Medal

Finish Time :   04:37:28

Split Times

  • Swim (1.5km) :  0:30:31
  • T1 (Gross):     0:04:08
  • Bike (100km) :  3:10:52
  • T2 (Gross):     0:03:05
  • Run (10km) :    0:48:54

So the focus now is back to a decent block of training to take prepare for the much larger challenge that lies ahead. Short term goals are breaking the 30 minute mark in the 1500m swim on the 15th March and getting the other half of the team back to full fitness.

One last note to say that it seems that the donations are beginning to pick up again which is great news!

Thank you so much to everyone for the support shown so far and lets keep going to reach that target.

 

Cheers

Ironman Insanity

10 Sunday Feb 2013

Posted by Editor in Blog, Dan, Tony

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

Dan Russell, GBM, headcase, ironman, Nice 2013, Tony Russell, triathlon

Ok folks – we all think that all this “Ironman” malarkey is just another Triathlon, an excuse for a weekend away in the south of France, a nice dip in the water, a cycle through the countryside and a jog around the city. And the weather will be pretty good in late June too, wont it?

Its not just the distances that are unimaginable to those that don’t relish a sprint for that proverbial bus. Its the number of other bodies thrashing through the water, elbows, feet, blow back, I mean no breast stroke and keeping your new bouffant dry for the evening celebrations!!  then in the cycle, yes granted one is now seated! but its no best of DFS, with integrated recliner function, what is not always obvious to the untrained observer are the inclines, from sea level to nearly 1200 ft and pretty sharply too!    Then the run… not much to say about that, we are all pretty impressed at the thought of Paula Radcliff running a marathon, but not after swimming and cycling.

So lets recap:

3.8km swim

Swim

180km cycle (Note the course profile graph!!)

Cycle

42.2km run (reminding you yes this is a full marathon)

Run

First Tri under the belt

08 Friday Feb 2013

Posted by Editor in Blog, Dan

≈ 6 Comments

Tags

Cancer, Dan Russell, GBM, headcase, Tiathlon

Tri_Yas_2013_Certificate (2)

So the first event of the year is complete and under my belt and overall I’m pretty pleased with how things went. Slightly nervous at the start of the swim. I jumped into Yas marina without a wetsuit (yes that’s right) and positioned myself in the middle of the wave as I usually do. I hadn’t actually done any swimming for 2 and half months until today so that was playing on my mind a bit but I was confident I had enough fitness in the tank to complete it in a reasonable time.

The count down started and off we went. I felt comfortable throughout the swim and after a bit of kicking and punching I got into a rhythm. It was clear that I hadn’t done much swim training but I got to the finish line mid pack and off out into T1.

The bike course was very smooth as you would expect for an F1 course! It was 22.5 km rather than the usual 20 and very windy with some sneaky inclines. I was keen to push myself on the bike as that’s what I’ve been working on the most recently. I didn’t post an amazing time but I definitely noticed an improvement from previous events and definitely some positives to take from it.

The run was where I made up the time and I felt really good from start to finish. It was probably the best I’ve ever felt on a final run leg and I didn’t get over taken once! (sorry, had to drop that in there). Again like the bike it was a slightly longer distance of 5.55km rather than the usual 5km but I was extremely happy with my overall time and even happier to cross the finish line!

59th out of 361 and a good day all round. Next stop Abu Dhabi International Triathlon but until then, a lot of hard work in the gym, road and pool to get that endurance level up!

Keep donating, keep spreading the word and thank you all again for your effort so far!

Diet! Diet! Diet! Cheat Day

05 Tuesday Feb 2013

Posted by Editor in Blog, Dan

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

Dan Russell, ironman, triathlon

lean-protein-chicken

So obviously with intense training sessions you need to consider the fuel you are putting in your body. Believing you can eat what you want because of how many calories you are burning is a cracking theory however its unfortunately not very accurate and believe me if it was, I’d be the first one in the que at McDonalds!

So while I’ve been suffering from man flu and travelling across continents, I’ve put a few diet plans together which include the most important food groups my body will need over the coming months and more importantly the correct balance. Here is one example:

 6am

protein shake

8:30am

5 egg whites w/ a bit of turkey and green peppers
1 Greek yogurt
1 glass orange juice
1 bowl of oatmeal

 11am

protein shake

1pm

2 chicken breasts
1 small bowl brown rice
1 apple
1 side salad

 3pm

protein shake

6pm

1 piece of talapia or cod
1 side of broccoli
1 side of red potatoes
1 side of fat free cottage cheese

9pm

protein shake w/glutamine

Clearly its not very inspiring but at least I get a cheat day! I can smell the pizza already….

OK let’s get serious

05 Tuesday Feb 2013

Posted by Editor in Blog, Dan

≈ 4 Comments

Tags

Cancer, Colin Smith, Dan Russell, GBM, headcase, ironman, triathlon

5k Time

So there are 139 days to the event and I’ve now begun full time training starting last night with a 20k interval bike session and a fast 5k run to blow out the cobwebs from what was a very busy and generally unhealthy last couple of weeks. My aim is to have 9 days rest between now and the event which means I’ll be getting 130 days of solid training under my belt. Whether that’s possible or not is another story but that’s the goal so we shall see how we get on!

Tri Yas this weekend should be interesting having not raced for 10 months. Last minute decision to opt for the sprint distance rather that an olympic race which I think is the right one at this stage. Plenty more races in the coming weeks available but I think its really about getting solid training sessions in rather than competing too much in short distance racing.

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