Washing of the Water - Peter Gabriel

Yikes!!!

Lyric:- 'Take me on your back for a ride' - Gabriel

Following on from yesterday's blog, today's Washing of the Water, seems most apt considering the miles of levadas (inland water channels) we've seen in Madeira but also as this is a true Eden it seems only right to feel reborn.

A new pair of legs would be handy too as I destroyed my pair on a couple of thousand steps in just over a kilometre on the climb out of Encumeada today. Now Encumeada ain't exactly at sea level at 1004m but the climb out feels nigh on vertical. Well at least for a Cardiff Boy anyway. Makes Pen-y-Fan seem quite pedestrian in fact as it's that mountainous - are you getting the idea it's high?

The thought of bashing out 41kms more, let alone another 114 for the entire MIUT is very levelling.

Anyway, I'm off for a well earned sit down and then I'm off to find a good orthopaedic surgeon.

More tomorrow shipmates :-)

Rory Coleman - 910 Marathons - 233 Ultras

12 Marathon des Sables - 9 Guinness World Records - 21 Years' Alcohol Free.

Location:Machico, Madeira

Only Us - Peter Gabriel

Lyric:- Seduced by the noise and the bright things that glisten - Gabriel

Song Choice:- A much lesser know n PG offering but the lyrics fit s treat on the day I fell in love with Madeira.

It's been a four day seduction but this island is simply a wonder and one you need to see yourself if you haven't already. It's a really positive seduction too...

I say this as one of my clients text me today who is struggling right now asking me how can they be satisfied with what they have and not get tempted into a sea of temptation and addiction, especially as like me they have struggled/struggling with alcoholism.

It's a tough one to answer but possibly it stems from a need to take action on aspects of our lives, relationships, money, jobs, etc and instead of facing up to failure looking for a diversion or emotional crutch to support our internal Jenga-like lives.

Sometimes pushing the life reset button and facing up to our demons and life-baggage we've created can move massive emotional mountains. I hope this happens as 61 days dry is a great achievement and needs starting over again today. I'm 7000 days in and still need a good kick now and again to keep me straight.

If you can you'll find a way home from the great escape as Gabriel sings. If you are luckier you'll come and run in Madeira - it's the ultimate high!

More tomorrow :-)

Rory Coleman - 910 Marathons - 233 Ultras
12 Marathon des Sables - 9 Guinness World Records - 21 Years' Alcohol Free.

Location:Machico,Portugal

Steam - Peter Gabriel

Lyric:- 'Picking up this heat, this heat' - Peter Gabriel

Song Choice:- One of my all-time Gabriel Favourites and being in the heat of Madeira right now, this feels more than apt as I write tonight.

We think we have a few mountains in Wales and we do, but nothing like the Bad Boys out here on the exquisite island of Madeira. At 1862m Pico Ruivo, the islands highest point is quite runnable the organisers of the MIUT (Madeira Island Ultra-Tour) told me yesterday at my evening talk to their running club and again, very proudly at our hill session in Machico this morning. They can certainly run their hills!

The thing I really like about them is that they are so welcoming and delighted that we’ve come to experience their trails first-hand. I'm out first thing tomorrow trying some rather less severe gradients to get acclimatised to the sheer stifling humidity of nearly 100% I'm told on some days. Put it this way, the mountains are engulfed in Steamy Clouds at various times of the day making it very muggy but it's also really easy to get sunburned too when the sun shines.

I've been baited to run MIUT just a week after MdS next year - I wonder how my knees would like the 6800M+ over the 115km? Hmm.

I'll know more tomorrow after my first run perhaps.

Blood of Eden - Peter Gabriel

Lyric:- Saw the End as We Began - Gabriel

Song Choice:- Eden could be in Madeira. A volcanic new world of an island with a amazing topographical horizons and not a flat road in sight!

A wonderful place indeed for a new beginning and Gabriel's, 'Saw the End as We Began' lyric has always intrigued me as so many times we set off on a project, maybe with a group of other like minded folk, a new job or even a long-term relationship knowing full well that eventually it's not going to work out.

You see we live our lives in hope and I'm just as guilty as anyone else at believing my glass is overflowing rather that just half full sometimes...

I meet so many people in the same predicament with that an all too familiar life experience. They hope their partners will shape up, their job will get better or that the lottery after 20 years will actually for once payout that elusive £1m jackpot that will solve all your problems.

The Dragon's Den Programme would no doubt invest in a 'Hindsight Spray' where you could with one easy spray learn all those pitfalls ahead of time and know the End as you Begin.

Would that make life better or less exciting - alternatively you could plan a future and then let it play out as there's nothing worse than a told you so comment when you told yourself it months or even years previously.

Try a new beginning, maybe on s rock off the coast of Portugal. When you do and you tell me it's just like Eden - I'll tell you I told you so...

More tomorrow...

Rory Coleman - 910 Marathons - 233 Ultras

12 Marathon des Sables - 9 Guinness World Records - 21 Years' Alcohol Free.

Location:Machico,Portugal

Love to be Loved - Peter Gabriel

Lyric:- So, you know how people are, when it's all gone much too far, the way their minds are made - Gabriel

Song Choice:- A much more sombre offering from Sir Peter yet it's got a great vibe and some wonderful lyrics that on my eve of speaking at this year's Flame Conference in Telford seem most apt.

Sure we all 'Love to be Loved'. Not needed, required or be part of the furniture. We need to feel loved and cherished by those around us. Sometimes as time goes on that makes for irreversible situations and people give up on each other or things so much so, their minds are a closed book to change.

I'll speaking about 'Change, Changing and the process of Change tomorrow...My mind is full of how well my 'Dixons-Carphone Guys' have understood this very process and how fired up my 'Bigmoose Posse' are right now about the prospect of changing their minds on how they live their lives and how they will live them in the future.

It's powerful stuff and I feel ready for action right now - let's hope I do at 4am when I set off nice and early to get to sunny Telford, incidentally the scene of my First Marathon in 1994.

Yikes, that's a lonnnggg time ago and so much has changed since then...

Hopefully my audience with like where I'm coming from as 'I like to be liked', just as the above song's lyrics go. Have a listen yourself here .

More tomorrow my friends...

Come talk to me - Peter Gabriel

US - Sir Peter of Gabriel (1992)

Lyric:- 'We can unlock this misery, come on, come talk to me' - Gabriel - Listen Here

Song Choice:- Well it's a new week and a New Classic Album Series of Blogs and the Next Album is....(drum roll, cymbal crash)...the 1992 Album 'US' by of course his highness Sir Peter of Gabriel, that old musical God and Hero of mine.

Why? Well because it's Bloody Brilliant, that's why! Oh and it's got some great tracks and lyrics on it that mean a lot to me and might mean a lot to you too.

This whole album always makes me feel good in fact and as I'm still buzzing from a 'bigmoose Average2Awesome' Coaching Session on Saturday and from a 'bigmoose' inspired 10km around Cardiff this afternoon, I feel really empowered and very glad to be alive. It's amazing this group of people embarking on this fitness journey has made me feel.

The energy within their group is already infectious. I'm looking forward to seeing how they change over the next weeks leading up to the Cardiff Half-Marathon. I'll keep you posted with their progress as we continue to unlock their boundaries and self-imposed limitations. Until as Gabriel puts it in the above track, 'All the barriers are blown away'.

More tomorrow folks...

Foreplay/Long Time - Boston

Lyric:- 'And time doesn't wait for me, it keeps on rolling' - Scholz

Song Choice:- After a day running with my good mate Mark Wynn (he of the similar musical taste to me) this was the highlight of our run. Take a listen here as it's simply bloody awesome!

And that was to day...simply awesome and awesomely simple. It's amazing how the miles just fly by when you are moving in harmony with a like minded soul. I'm sure you've all had those runs...I know I have and they're really special.

It did help that the weather was just perfect on a wonderful Summer's day in Wales...what could be better than that?

Folk spend a lifetime trying to manufacture a World to live in, well it's just outside of your front door, perhaps?

It was for me with Mr Wynn today!

More tomorrow...

Dogs - The Pink Floyd

Lyric:- 'And when you loose control, you'll reap the harvest you have sown' - Waters & Gilmour

Song Choice:- A brilliant Floyd song from the Dynamic Duo of Waters and Gilmour. They always pull out all of the stops writing together I've found. Dogs is one of my all-time must have 'Desert Island Discs' in fact so using it today gives me a great excuse to play it again...hear it for yourself here.

Anyway, I thought 'Dogs' would highlight quite nicely something that as you will probably know if you know me, are something I don't like very much or at all if I'm being honest. If they float your boat well that's fine by me but I just don't like 'em especially after the infamous face-to-face giant f-off scary, snarling, barking poodle incident of 1967. Need I say more...

But, it got me thinking as I've spent most of this week encouraging people to do things that they don't like doing or find scary. Now if you asked me to look after your Dog, well I'd probably decline the offer but if I did an Alaskan Dog Sledging Race, I'd have to get over my problems of all that Doggie Breath and Soggy Coat Smell etc. and get on with it.

I wonder if I could? The answer is that I'm sure I would  if I had to but I'm not sure it would make me fall in love with our four-legged friends. Maybe you think I'm missing out here and maybe I am. Then again I do think that at heart, everyone's a killer.

Maybe I should start a bit smaller...Goldfish perhaps?

More tomorrow...

Marathon - Rush

Lyric:- More than just a spark, more than just the bottom line or a lucky shot in the dark, in the long run - Peart

Song Choice:- Overwhelmed with running up Leckwith Hill, this hit my eardrums - VERY LOUDLY. It certainly did it for me and it could do it for you too, take a listen for yourself here. Never has so many drums been hit SO hard by one man! Neil Peart has to be the best drummer ever.

Anyway, it's been kinda emotional as I watched a couple of 'An Hour To Save Your Life' on the BBC iPlayer. If you haven't seen it, it will give you a big throat lump seeing some amazing Medics and Doctors trying to save the lives of some very broken people indeed. Some make it and some don't, in some cases just managing to keep their hearts long enough to get them to hospital before sadly dying. Luckily in most cases they make miraculous recoveries as the human body is fantastic as repairing itself.

The throat lump comes from the medical people interviewed, they are simply amazing...

Watching it makes me wonder what we make all the fuss about in our everyday lives. Some of today's headlines are 'Celebrities without makeup', presents for your Dad on Father's Day and Kate Moss misbehaving on a Plane. Really? WTF is all that about?

Geddy Lee sings 'You can do a lot in a lifetime, if you don't burn out too fast'. And so right he is...watch the above TV Show and then think how much we take our lives for granted. 

Wear a bike helmet? I had a bike crash when I was 18 and was knocked out cold, maybe that's where my madness started...

I'm very lucky to be out running 10 miles, injury free, enjoying the fresh air and Cardiff Panoramas at 53 years old.

Life's a marathon folks, go steady and you'll enjoy all of it's 26.2 miles...

I intend to!

See the lights - Simple Minds

Lyric:- 'If you can see the lights shine in front of me' - Burchill & Kerr

Song Choice:- In a random week of Blogs, I thought I'd choose a bit of Simple Minds to lighten the mood. They were always more uplifting yet not as popular as U2 as I remember. Anyway this one does it for me quite nicely for me and you might remember it too. Have a listen here.

I always like to think as LIGHT being there at the end of a tunnel. You know the feeling, when everything's gone pitch black, yet there's just a chink of LIGHT to guide you along and give you hope to an end of your time in the dark.

You'll know just what I mean if you've ever run the Grand Union Canal Race and gone through the Canal Tow-path Tunnel at Shrewley, in Warwickshire. It's so dark in there, it's darker than a very, very dark black when all the dark blacks in the world have joined together and made the darkest black possible and then gone one shade darker. 

Yup, it's Dark...it's amazing that you know where to put your feet going through it as it's steep and has steps in it too. Find it and try it, you might like it and then consider how dark your life is in places...with you going headlong into it not knowing where your size 11's go. It's kinda weird.

Anyway...I've hopefully shone a bit of guiding light today for my lovely clients who've been living in their own shadows and have now decided to get into the 'Spotlight of Life', the one they desperately want to live.

It's heartening stuff and it's been a good old day - one to celebrate. Just like any other.

Are you in the DARK and need LIGHTENING up?

Do you know where you are going?

I'm here with some illuminating help if you want it. 

Granite - Pendulum

Lyric:- 'You were sucking life through the needles eye, this is a new day' - Thompson

Song Choice:- During a training session with my Average2Awesome Guys from Dixons-Carphone, I was asked what music would get you through the 100km of Race to the Stones. My reply, rather lengthy and full of a thousand songs included this one. This one really helps me pick my feet up!

And why not on a perfect day out on the Ridgeway Trail near Avebury, which has to be one of my favourite World Locations. There's something quite magical about the place - must be all those Stones and Lay lines that get people all buzzed up and giddy.

Anyway, the green fully grown barley swaying in a very Gladiator Film-like fashion, bright sunshine and blue skies really made me feel glad to be alive. Thompson is right in saying that we can waste time 'Sucking life through the needles eye'...

This is new day and there's a new dawn tomorrow with a full summer sun of fun to go out and drink in. I feel really invigorated from just a few hours and miles outside and away from email, phone and civilisation.

Maybe you would too?

More tomorrow.

D'Ya Know What I Mean - Oasis

Lyric:- 'Get up off the floor and believe in life, no one's ever gonna ever ask you twice' - Noel Gallagher

Song choice:- Well with Rumours firmly in my review mirrors, I heard this today and it's ages since I heard this little ditty from the Angry Boys of Madchester. I don't know how long since your heard it (listen here) but if you have a similar musical bent to me, you'll think it's bloody brilliant.

The lyrics are bitingly acidic as you would expect from mid-90's Oasis Brit Pop. The Gallaghers had made their money by the time this song charted and they could raise two-fingers to anyone they encountered. 

Success brings an air of...'Arrogance'. I've been called 'Arrogant' but maybe 'Confidence'  would have been nicer.

There are some gems in here though, 'Get up off the floor and believe in life' - Well that could be an anthem for anyone's life couldn't it. It could certainly be mine...

I hope it's going to accompany my Dixons-Carphone Clients as we run 10 miles together for their final coaching session with me for the Race to the Stones, tomorrow at Avebury.

It's going to be emotional...

"D'You Know What I Mean?"

Gold Dust Woman - Fleetwood Mac

Lyric:- Take your silver spoon and dig your grave - Nicks

Song Choice:- A very powerful lyric to this FM Classic and a better album finale perhaps than Silver Springs which was included in future releases.

I like the 'Silver Spoon' Reference in this song as there's nothing worse than trying to buy true success as true success has to be earned in my book.

Just because one can be born to riches and wealth, that doesn't mean that the 'Silver Spoon' it's dished up with is bound to make life taste a whole lot sweeter. In fact it can be an inhibitor I see it all the time.

Good honest hard work pays dividends that money just can't buy. I know. Do you? Maybe it's Rumour! Amen

Rory Coleman - 909 Marathons - 233 Ultras - 12 Marathon des Sables

9 Guinness World Records - 21 Years' Alcohol Free.

Location:Cardiff

Oh Daddy - Fleetwood Mac

Lyric:- 'I don't understand why' - Ries & McVie

Song Choice:- The Penultimate Track of the Rumours Albums and a real favourite of mine, with more great guitar work and poignant lyrics.

You see it's very difficult sometimes to 'understand why' when you are in the now and that the 'understanding why' may come at a later date or maybe never at all. Yes, life isn't an equation that you can work out and sign off with a definite QED. Life isn't an exact science. It's a shame as we live in a time where everyone wants to know 'why?' and when they don't it causes them great deal of pain, me included.

I find with my coaching that folk come into my world, become a big part of it and then disappear after their race or life-event has passed.

That's only natural I suppose as that's my job, and it's up to me to deliver but there are some that lose their way and vanish because they might feel weak, overwhelmed or slip from the path and get things wrong - just like the lyrics in the above song.

That's the time when I believe that I'm at my best and really worthwhile knowing. The thing is you don't have to understand why, what, when, who or anything... All you need to know is that wherever you find yourself it won't last forever and there are people out there who want to help...

More tomorrow and the end of the Rumours Blogs. It's been emotional!

I don't wanna know - Fleetwood Mac

Lyrics:- 'Take a listen to your spirit, It's crying out loud' - Nicks

Song Choice:- I'm reaching the end of my Rumours Blog Series and if you are still hanging in on there with me please 'Take a listen to your spirit as I bet it's crying out VERY loudly indeed.

It's that voice in the back of your head that shout your thoughts that echo around the inside of your head on everything and everybody in your world. It tells you everything you know and everything you didn't know that now you do. It tells you to forget people as they don't deserve you and talks you back into talking to them again and giving them one last chance to be part of your world.

Your Spirit, can be your biggest asset and your biggest downfall. Controlling it is a very fine art indeed and takes a lifetime of learning and causes a lifetime of heartache along the way. Why do we let ourselves be turned inside out, time and time again?

It's because we're human and we have hope...hope that one day everything will be right. It will be perfect and everything will fit into place and the one zillion piece jigsaw of life will make the magic-eye picture of salvation that will underline our importance of being part of this world we live in.

Until then we have our Spirit to keep us going so when it's crying out loud to YOU, please listen!

More tomorrow.

The Chain - Fleetwood Mac

Lyric:- 'Running in the Shadow' - Buckingham, Fleetwood, McVie, McVie, & Nicks

Song Choice:- What would the F1 Coverage be without this little ditty? - Oh, didn't you know it was a Fleetwood Mac Classic?... Well you do now.

It's an awesome tune and anything with 'Running' in the lyrics has got to be good in my book BUT the opening lines have a great sense of anticipation for me. It goes, 'Listen to the wind blow, watch the sunrise'... I just love that.

In fact I love everything about this song, (which is unfortunately a song of heartbreak) which includes some great guitar playing from Buckingham and triple FM harmonies before the famous bass line and drums come in at 3.04 mins into 4.31 mins long song.

Any 'Chain' is an interesting concept to me as if any link is broken the whole thing falls apart. It can be a dangerous though if you consider your life to be a chain then as if one area breaks then your whole world can come tumbling down. Sometimes it's better to ring fence the problem and park the problem and come back to it when you're ready.

If you're depressed and your jobs driving you to the edge, then isn't it better to take time out, get feeling better and then re-consider your position. Head down and get on with it, doesn't get the job done.

Are you 'Running in the Shadow' of something that's causing you to be in a dark place? Time for some Sunshine Sunshine I'd say...

More tomorrow...I'm going to listen very carefully to The Chain again...

Songbird - Fleetwood Mac

Lyrics:- 'And the songbirds are singing, like they know the score' - McVie

Song Choice:- Another Christine McVie Classic and some wonderful lyrics to match the great musical score...

You know what it's like when you are 'On-Song'. All the planets have lined up, there's a following wing and nothing stands in your way. YOU ARE ON FIRE! - Yes we've all been there and felt the force. Getting to that state takes a huge amount of effort and staying there almost impossible. Yet, we keep on trying and trying when sometimes all we need is a break from whatever we're striving for.

Following a break, the tendency is to hit the road or gym just as hard as before and quickly return to the same 'stalemate' again. This not only happens with fitness, it also happens in relationships and at work - I meet so many people that are in that 'stalemate' conundrum listening to anyone who'll lend an ear hoping for the magical solution to their woes.

The answer of course lies within and a clearer understanding of oneself and not the one others are only too glad to supply will soon get you singing the high notes you once used to reach.

McVie's opening lyrics says it all - For you, there'll be no more crying, for you, the sun will be shining...

Dandy or what...

More tomorrow.

Go your own Way - Fleetwood Mac

Lyrics:- 'How can I ever change things?' - Buckingham

Song Choice:- One of Fleetwood Mac's most enduring songs and a great Lindsey Buckingham number - in fact it's one of my favourite tracks on the Rumours Album.

And the question Buckingham asks is most interesting as sometimes it can seem a proper conundrum at times as one's predicament can often feel unchangeable, when in fact things always DO change only not at the speed that we desire perhaps. Life in fact works in a very slow motion I've found... When you looked into the bathroom mirror like I did this morning did you notice that you'd dramatically aged, gone bald or since you checked yourself out some 24 hours earlier. Well, unless you had a particularly bad day, of course you didn't BUT you might have done all three things in the last 10 years, I know I have.

No doubt, we'll all go through another such transformation and will have changed again by 2025. I wonder where we'll be and what we will have made of ourselves with another 3653 days under our belts. If you are still wondering how to change things by then, well you probably won't and there will be some people whom will be in the same predicament they are in right now. Is that you?

If it is maybe you should 'Go your own Way' and not the way others want you to...

More tomorrow.

Don't Stop - Fleetwood Mac

Combined Weight Loss in Sugar in 80 days...

Lyric:- Yesterday's gone, yesterday's gone - McVie

Song Choice:- I love the 'Rum-a-tee pum-a-tee' of this track as it gathers momentum towards Buckingham's great guitar solo. Christine McVie's song about her marriage break up always sounds so positive to me, when in fact within it there's so much about being sad in the lyrics.

Feeling that a new day is out there and only a few hours can always help, especially when it feels like you are helpless and your day can't get any worse.

It's easy for folk to say that there are people a lot less worse off who'd love to have your problems but that doesn't help much when you are in need.

Asking for help isn't as bad as it's made out and contrary to the male belief of not asking in times of need, being lost, emotionally drained or where the beans are in ASDA isn't a sign of weakness, it's a sign that you want to help yourself make a change.

I've been at the Carphone Dixons Conference at the NEC with my Average-to-Awesome Guys today who did just that some 80 odd days ago and between them they've lost over 80kgs and not only look amazing - they are in fact shadows of their former selves and have undergone a massive personal upgrade!

My message to them and to you is Don't Stop thinking about tomorrow, as tomorrow is what you make it. Also Don't Stop thinking about yesterday as that's what's got you to today and that's the only place you can start putting things right as it's going to be here in just a few hours - Better than Before.

More then Rumour Lovers...

Rory Coleman - 906 Marathons - 233 Ultras

12 Marathon des Sables - 9 Guinness World Records - 21 Years' Alcohol Free.