Monday, April 02, 2007

Withdrawal symptoms

I'm beginning to get the shakes as I haven't raced in a while - well, 32 hours. The thought of three weeks without a race fills me with dread!!!

I've been down the gym tonight and had a burn up on the exercise bike. After such short races on the weekend - literally sprints (3M and 10M) - I'm looking for a good final training flourish before my hols. Tomorrow it's up to the zoo - whoo hoo.

I wonder if there are any races going on in Florida in the next couple of weeks......

Thought for the day: Why do people parking at the gym always try to get as close to the entrance as possible? They drive round and round trying to get that spot right by the door. They're going to the gym - for exercise - but can't walk 100 yards to the entrance - what's that all about?

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 A walk on the serious side - this is scary not sure how to be serious! This is for Alun asking about filming races.

The kit I use for filming is an Oregon ATC 2000. Basically it's a small self contained unit designed for mounting on bike handle bars or helmets. I've bodged it onto a cap and that's it really. I'm no expect - very very far from it but I have improved my technic - oh er misses. It took several races before I had the vertical angle adjusted to capture the runners eye view. The first couple of films took in a lot of the ground, then I went over the top and filmed the sky. It only takes small adjustments but finally I have it adjusted about right. Secondly you will need to practice filming with it. It took a few attempts to be able to keep looking forward and not at the ground. You have to be quite focused especially when you feel tired at the end of a race where the natural tiredness tends to leave your head pointing towards the ground - well tiredness leaves me pointing at the ground anyway. You have to stay focused and keep looking ahead - hence the practice. Just make sure you do some test filming before the race you really want to film or you might be disappointed. Here is a link to an old blog post with a picture of my cap-cam - http://dna100.blogspot.com/2007/02/if-you-cant-see-bright-side-of-life.html

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