Vegas - that's the way I roll now!

Off to Las Vegas, just for the day! Now that's crackers by anybody's standards.

 I went to meet someone, on business. I flew there, met the guy for two hours, and flew back. It doesn't really make sense but it does here, because everyone is so far away. In the UK most people are a drive away. For London maybe a train is needed. But here, it's a flight. Las Vegas is in the next state, Nevada, and it would take a day to drive it. So I'm going to have to get used to flying places. Even my staff are all over the place. I've got a team in Denver, one in Portland, Oregon, one in Austin, one in New York. I've got individuals who work from Ohio, Texas, and Lake Tahoe. I have to communicate by video conference, or a skype-type of thing called Fuze, or another one called Blue Jeans. Very "California". I'm trying to get used to the culture here. The developers stand up at their desks, on "standing mats". One guy asked for a special chair thing that I can only describe as like a space hopper on a desk chair. He said it was because he had a sore lower back. I told him to "f*** off". It didn't go down well. Apparently you don't do that sort of thing here.

As far as training goes, though, this place is sound. You can do anything, usually for free. There's a place to do open water swimming, marked out permanently with buoys. A running track, free to use anytime. It used to be the San Francisco 49ers football ground, so it's an American Football field, surrounded by a synthetic track. Fantastic facility, and better than many people in the UK have any access to. And the biking is just tremendous, up into Marin county. Right across from my house is a steep hill (in fact, across from most people here, there's a steep hill!) that is perfect for hill reps, although you do get some odd stares from the locals. I live two blocks from the Crookedest Street (Lombard, not Wall Street) so there are often tourists puffing and heaving their way there while I'm doing my apparently pointless reps. I went for a great run Sunday morning with dog Georgie and in just 45 minutes I went past Boudins, the famous sourdough place, Pier 39 and Fishermans Wharf, the Maritime Museum, the turnaround point for the Cable Cars at the bottom of Hyde Street, Fort Mason, Chrissie Fields and up to the Golden Gate. That's just about the full monty of tourists spots that people come to see! I was back home for breakfast. Despite all this opportunity though, I am still doing hill reps on my own street and "Stairmasters" on the fire escape at work. "Stairmasters" is an informal competition amongst a few of the staff here. We run up 11 flights, get the lift down and repeat 10 times. On the last Thursday of the month we do it for an hour - that's 15 times for me. We go from floor 5 because we don't like McKesson, who occupy that floor, and up to floor 17 because its vacant. I know some of the smarter among you will have figured out that is 12 floors, but there's no floor 13! So when you're suffering as you toil up, you get a free floor between 12 and 14. It really does make a difference, believe me. Again, despite the availability of all of California, I'm thinking of getting a turbo trainer to use in the garage. This is for two reasons: first I can't always get away for the amount of time I'd need on the bike; and second, I need some concentrated and disciplined sessions that only a turbo trainer can deliver. My biking has not been great recently, and I've entered the Santa Cruz triathlon which is next month. I need some pace, and soon.

I met Michael Johnson the other day in Bloomingdales. He's been a real hero for decades, and I visited the scene of his great 200m and 400m double Olympic triumph in Atlanta recently. He was with his son, and I really didn't want to interrupt, but I excused myself and had a brief conversation. He was exactly as you'd expect, and it was a real privilege to meet him. I told him I thought his book was one of the most honest sports books I'd ever read. He seemed pleased with that!
So that's my life at the moment. Some bits are constant (training, work, home life) and some are massively different (location, training facilities, culture). Overall I'm loving the new challenge and the all the new stuff but missing some bits as you'd expect. Particularly friends and - perhaps surprisingly - rain, but its generally going really well. We have an internal "rule" that anyone visiting from UK HQ has to bring PGTips, Marmite and Hobnobs to keep all us ex-pats happy, and that works well.