It's not all doom and gloom any more.

For the one or two of you assiduously reading this blog, you may remember that I had a shocker on Sunday at the OX5 run and - to cut a long story short - hurled my breakfast into a hedge just short of the finishing line. In my defence I had a bad cold but still it was a confidence sapper.

Monday was a dark day and I was wishing that that I had lived up to my name and chickened out of the whole triathlon thing for the third year running.After all, I have long been an admirer of the philosophy of Homer Simpson: "Trying is just the first step on the long road to failure."

But on Tuesday, feeling a bit over my cold, I put the running shoes back on and stormed over an 8.5mile route without even a teaspoon sized amount of vom appearing. Wednesday I hit the pool bright and early and peeled off a decent 800 metre swim and then charged round Christchurch Meadow with my running buddies.

So today my legs feel like lead, my arms feel like jelly but I am managing to quell my inner Homer and get excited about the Blenheim triathlon once more.