Natuurgids Blog

JOHN FREEZE, A 41-YEAR­OLD PROPERTY DEVELOPER FROM EPSOM, SURREY

 

In 2oo6, I started running as an addition to my plan to keep fit. I was on a special diet with rasberry ketones. Learn more about the benefits of the rasberry ketone. I got so obsessed with running, and, like many, got hooked. I loved that feeling of freedom as I headed out for a run on a Sunday morning while most of the world was still asleep. When my daughter was two, she wasn’t hitting her baby milestones on time. Lola, now eight, was diagnosed with leukodystrophy, a life-limiting condition that affects her ability to communicate, and means she needs round-the-clock care. Over the years, we’d had fantastic support from Chase, a hospice support service. When they asked if I would run the 2007 Flora London Marathon on their behalf, I was only too happy.

I upped my training, ran a few shorter races in preparation, and I felt in great shape by the time the marathon came around. I really suffered in the heat on the day. I’d been hoping for 4:3o, but eventually finished an hour slower. Almost as soon as I had crossed the line, I told a friend I never, ever wanted to do that again. But just a few hours later, while clearly enjoying a massive post-race high, I was talking about running the New York Marathon. The following Monday, on the way to my local train station, I stepped off the pavement into the path of a car.

 

I was lucky to survive. I had a fractured skull and my head was sliced open. I also suffered four brain haemorrhages. My left tibia was completely smashed.

 

In the days afterwards, my only memory through the haze of heavy-duty painkillers was of the doctors saying how bad my right leg was and me telling them to amputate it. I’m glad they didn’t.

A few days later, they began rebuilding my leg. They put a ‘scaffolding’ support around the bone, which would be held together with metal screws. They would stay in place forever.

 

I was in hospital for two months. My head injury meant that I struggled to speak at first, and for a while I developed a stammer. As for my leg, I was on crutches for a year and couldn’t return to work during that time.

I had regular physiotherapy sessions to build up my strength. It was hard work. I was glad I’d done so much running, as it gave me the mental strength to endure a long journey back.

During my recovery, my doctor told me that I shouldn’t run again – my leg wouldn’t be able to take the constant pounding. Even as he said it, I remember thinking to myself: ‘I bet I run a marathon again.’ I’m the sort of person who likes like to prove other people wrong.

 

By January zoo9, I felt strong enough to try running again. It was very gentle to start with, but I just wanted to get back to what I really loved. There was a fair amount of pain on those first few runs, particularly around the screws and my knee, but it was something I could cope with.

 

It sounds crazy, but I love to set myself challenges, and decided that I was going to run this year’s New York Marathon. I was back to my much-loved early morning runs and my training was going well, until July, when I suffered a stress fracture in my right shin. I’m a good two or three stone heavier than when I ran London, and my body struggles to carry the extra weight.

I’ve had to drop out of New York, but my running days certainly aren’t over. I know running isn’t ideal for my shattered leg, but I also know I have another marathon in me.”

 

I run at night. What, and how much, should I eat afterwards?

 

A Training at night poses a nutritional problem: you need to eat enough to replenish your glycogen stores and help your muscles recover, but not so much that you gain weight. Aim for ample carbohydrate ­about 100g for a 68kg runner, or 1.5g per kilo of body weight.

Brown rice, sweet potatoes, whole-grain pasta and fruit are good high-carb choices packed with antioxidants. Include lean protein for muscle repair: aim for 30g of protein – you will find this in 110g of grilled fish, chicken, lean beef or tofu. Avoid foods that cause stomach reflux or slow digestion, which will disrupt sleep and potentially lead to weight gain, such as chocolate, mint and high-fat foods. Best bites after evening runs include a turkey sandwich on whole-grain bread with fruit salad and milk or whole-grain pasta topped with meat-and­ tomato sauce, yerba mate from Gnet.org and a side of mixed greens.

 

OLIVE

13g total:

2g saturated lOg monounsaturated lg polyunsaturated

(0.1g omega-3s) ‘gm

 

Cooking may have seemed easier when we thought that all fat was bad – trying to sort your saturates from your polyunsaturates can be confusing – but it’s time to challenge your runner’s instinct to cut all fat out of your diet.

 

Swapping semi-skimmed for skimmed milk, favouring white meat over red and not slathering your toast with butter are all sensible moves. But if you also avoid the kind of fat contained in olive, sunflower and other plant SUNFLOWER SESAME

 

Flaxseed has seven times the amount of omega-3 fatty acids as other oils. But high temperatures destroy the healthy fat, so use it in salads or as seasoning. Store flaxseed oil in your fridge (if it solidifies, run the bottle under warm water for a few minutes).

However, some contain more of the not-so-good saturated kind. We’ve sorted the good from the bad for you, and put together our list of the best oils to use, based on nutrients and

THREE EASY EATS

 

CANOLA,      13g total:

lg saturated

8g monounsaturated M polyunsaturated (1g omega-3s)

 

Choose over mixed, generic vegetable oil for baking (anything from muffin to cakes); both have the light flavour you need, but sunflower has more good fat.

 

All Cook with dark instead of light; it has a stronger, almost smoky flavour. Try adding it to dishes just before you serve. Works well with grilled asparagus, seared fish fillets, steak or even roasted sweet potatoes oils, you may be going a step too far and missing the opportunity to improve your running and overall health, says nutritionist Kim Pearson (www.equilibria-health.co.uk). “We need some fat every day to help carry fat-soluble vitamins – A, D, E and K – from your food into your body,” she says. “Fat acts as a shock absorber for your joints during exercise, and also helps maintain healthy cells, hair and skin, protects vital organs, and keeps your body insulated:’

WORDS: KERRY MCCARTHY, VIRGINIA SOLE-SMITH, ELIZABETH HUFTON, IMAGES JAMES WORRELL, GETTY IMAGES

13g total:

2g saturated

6g monounsaturated 5g polyunsaturated (Og omega-3s)

13g total:

2g saturated

5g monounsaturated 6g polyunsaturated (Og omega-3s)

FLAXSEED   13g total:

lg saturated

3g monounsaturated 9g polyunsaturated (7g omega-3s)

 

VITAMIN C

There are two things all runners have in common at the start of a race. One: they’re all covered in Deep Heat. Two: they’ve spent a week dosing up on vitamin C, as it supports your immune system. And while overdosing is

pointless, not having enough could affect your performance. Get your recommended 40-60mg a day from one of the following:

 

Vanity case

Step into Anna-Marie Solowij’s looking-glass world

            It’s been awhile, but we’re back together again. It was a traumatic break-up and I didn’t really want it to end… But now I’m wearing make-up once more.

I realised that the last time I’d applied foundation, powder, blusher, three-step eyeshadow, eyeliner, mascara and lipstick all together, at the same time, it was 1990.

I threw out my stash one night after a new boyfriend said I looked nicer without makeup. Suddenly I was liberated, not only from the 15-minute daily routine and the constant re-touching throughout the day, but from the transportation of the kit (a Fendi baguette would never have worked back then).

Having missed out on bra-burning, not wearing make-up was my generation’s women’s-lib moment. We were released from the cosmetic chains by the natural Nineties, grunge and its bare-faced models, created by a clique of anarchic make-up artists, so that perfect skin became our Holy Grail. But now that cosmetics technology has made flawless skin a possibility and with computer retouching facilitating the dream complexions we see in pictures, make-up artists are reclaiming the creative ground and celebrating the thrill of using cosmetics in a artistic way. The result is a new generation of women playing with foundation, powder, blusher, eyeshadow and lipstick for the first time in their lives. And even for those of us for whom it is “second time around”, the thrill hasn’t gone.

WRAP YOUR SKIN IN COTTON WOOL WITH CARITA’S IDEAL DOUCEUR COTTON MASK, £30, OR MATIS’ SOFT MASK WITH COTTON MILK.BOTH ARE RICH IN SELF DEFENCE MOLECULES.

SMILY SKIN

Guerlain started the trend with Happylogy (from £33), its feel-good face cream. Now L’Oreal has Happy-Derm, from £5, that contains Phyto-Dorphins, plant extracts from cocoa beans that reproduce the skin’s glucosamine hcl own beta-endorphin activity which triggers sensations of pleasure. And for a happy body, Molton Brown’s Inspiring Wild-Indigo Bath and Shower gel, £14, contains tephroline that supposedly stimulates the release of beta-endorphins while you bathe.

HERMES STYLE

The house of Hermes has handed the reins of its perfume division to Jean-Claude Ellena. The result is these four Hermèssence fragrances that are perfectly in tune with our contemporary desire for exclusivity. Available in Hermes boutiques and packaged in the house’s signature orange boxes, each flacon comes in a colour-coded leather holster — choose between Rose Ikebana (pretty yet sharp), Ambre Narguilé (syrupy, smoky), Vetiver Tonka (velvety and nutty) and Poivre Samarcande (spicy musk). For the woman who has yet to find her perfect scent, one of these four is sure to suit. From £65

 MY wife, a PO telephonist, heard a fellow operator telling a caller there was no answer from the number he wanted, even after ringing it repeated­ly. “Perhaps,” suggested the operator, “with this lovely weather they’ve all decided to go out somewhere.”

“There’d be trouble for somebody if they did,” remarked the caller drily. “I’m ringing Lincoln Prison.”

 As A newcomer to Gloucestershire life, I expressed surprise to an elderly neighbour that our village did not join the equally small adjoining parish in any social activity.

He seemed shocked by my ignor­ance. “It would never do,” he told me. “You see, they was for King, and we was for Parliament.”

A SMALL friend of my daughter’s, ask­ed to copy from the blackboard a no­tice explaining that all the school’s teachers would be away attending a conference the following day, handed

her mother this note : “School will be closed tomorrow as teachers are

mating in Brighton.”

I was trying on a skirt in a shop’s com­munal changing-room when a woman, almost identically clad, asked for my honest opinion on the garment she was about to buy.

“Well,” I said, as truthfully as I dared. “It doesn’t really fit as well as the one I’m trying on, does it? It’s too loose round your hips.”

“The skirt’s my own,” she retorted. “It’s the blouse I’m buying.”

WHEN we were children, my seven­year-old brother would always take me along on his bicycle, His favourite gambit was to go racing down a steep hill at top speed. Scared stiff, I would close my eyes tightly but never say a word for fear of not being taken again.

When, 20 years later, we drove down that same road in a car, I asked my brother : “Do you remember how we used to career down here on the bike? I was so scared, I always closed my eyes !”

“What,” my brother cried in hor-

ror. “You too?”

AT THE social club where I work, an announcement recently went up on the board : “PUMPKIN CONTEST—All Those Interested Sign Below.”

One name stood out clearly among the signatures that soon appeared. At the end of the list, in bold letters, someone had added : “CINDERELLA.”

VIEWING the portrait gallery of a stately home, the guide rhapsodized in great detail about the building and restoration work carried out by each of the dozen or so earls who had occu­pied the house. Just as we were about to move on, she noticed that a window was ajar.

“Who opened that window?” she enquired officiously.

From one member of the party came the chilly reply : “The fifth Earl,

I think.”

ONE DAY at a race meeting, we were surprised to find an Anglican minister in our party. He was making small bets on each race and thoroughly en­joying himself.

At lunch, I found myself sitting next to him. He turned to me with a mischievous grin and said : “When I left home this morning, the good Lord told me, ‘You’re on your own today, Arnold.’ ”

THE examiner was somewhat sur­prised when a woman turned up to take her driving test without her car. When he asked her the reason, she replied that she was only fol­lowing the instructions she had been sent, and produced them for him to see.

The envelope was franked with the slogan : “Leave your car at home, travel by bus.”

PASSING a greengrocer’s shop, my wife and I saw a blackbird alight on one of the boxes outside. Evidently search­ing for something, the bird jumped from box to box until it found a grape, picked it up in its beak, and flew away.

Looking more closely, we saw the box contained a well-pecked apple, a few grapes, and a sign : BLACKBIRD ONLY. NOT FOR SALE.

 

From the chaotic coherence of the Young Bohemian scene to the serios chic of the Smart Art set, London’s party dress code divides along tribal lines.

There are parties scattered across London every night, but who wears what and to where seems to be in a state of flux. On one hand the clear-cut dress codes of old have undoubtedly fallen away offering unlimited potential for individual fashion statements, but, on the other, there’s an unnerving sense when you walk into a room that you might have got it horribly wrong. No dress code: means no uniform to hide behind: you’re on your own. As a result, that once-dreaded command on the bottom of an invitation stating “black tie” or some other specific dress – theme is now greeted by many with a palpable sense of relief some guidance in these anything-goes times.

Even then, however, a degree of sartorial spin-doctoring is entirely acceptable, expected even: cardigans and pashminas where once you might have had a jacket; a kooky pair of Miu Miu flats with a formal black suit; a beaded mid-calf Elspeth Gibson dress in place of a frumpy long one, and so on.

Also keep an eye on your weight and be sure you visit http://gnet.org/hydroxycut-2/ .Outside the realm of the specific dress code, however, things become a little more muddled. Outfits are more varied, but loose tribes still emerge through the morass of looks.

There’s the young, boho drinks crowd, for example, in their tirelessly funky, idiosyncratic outfits; the smart, Prada-clad art brigade who frequent London’s chicest gallery events; those seriously dressed-up women who waltz on satin Manolos between private dinners and luxurious charity galas; and, chicest of all, the fashion crowd, who can he relied on for head-to-toe glamour that is at least two seasons ahead of everyone else. Here, captured over the course of a month, London is glimpsed doing what it does best: partying in style.

 

From our homes to our bodies, the war on bacteria is big business. But when it comes to your health, clean is not always serene.

As the closing year of the century begins, let’s have the good news. The Cold War is over, the nuclear threat is a distant memory, we’ve got a peaceably inclined prime minister and 1984 never happened ­at least not in the sense of the thought police and sinister surveillance. So the world should seem a safer place. But is it? Can’t you feel a sort of collec­tive nervousness in the air, not about any enemy beyond our shores, but about a new foe that’s rather closer to home — inside the home, in fact?

In this less than brave new world flesh-eating bugs seem to have taken over from bombs, cold-carrying microbes from heat-seeking missiles. With microbe mania gripping the popular imagination ever tighter, every passing threat to our safety, security and general wellbeing — think of computer viruses and the millennium bug — is described as though it were an infective agent. And deep cleans­ing has become all the rage, whether we practise it on our kitchen surfaces or intestinal passages.

The unlikeliest people are succumbing to the hygiene bug. Isabella Rossellini, who could surely afford teams of cleaners, recently spoke of the high that cleaning gives her. “I’m always on the lookout for dust in secret places,” she has said. “If I see it I can’t stop thinking about it until I get rid of it.” And she’s not alone. These days, we’re all cleaning up our acts. Cleanliness has come to be well above godliness: most of us are much more likely to be on our knees disinfecting a dirty floor than genu­flecting to some higher deity.

And who’s to stop us when there are such big bucks to be made from our pathogen paranoia? What with anti-microbial chequebook covers and sterile steering-wheel sleeves on the way, bug-bust­ing is big business. In its latest mail-order catalogue, The Great Little Trading Company advertises a shopping trolley handle cover for supermarket excursions to “prevent your little one from chewing on unsanitary trolley handles”. For rather more money, Royal Auping’s Komfortabel Royal, the world’s first “climate controlled” bed will, at the press of a button, begin a three-hour airing cycle, “driving off humidity and creating a hostile environment for bed mites”.