Now I feel like an Olympian

You know, I quite like this warm weather training lark.

Bit of sun on your back - it's still 30 plus degrees out here in Montenegro-land - and because I'm in a third floor appartment I'm getting in some much-needed altitude training to prepare myself for the Himalayan jaunt next year.

My training only actually takes about an hour or so in the morning. I usually pop along to the village square here in Przno and go through my anal crunches, pelvic squirts and other well rehearsed Ron routines. I can see I'm making an impression because the local taxi rank now has a queue of people waiting for me and they seem to really enjoy my routine. They get a bit animated but I'm sure that's just them being Balkan.

Yesterday, for a change I showed them my one fingered press-up routine and you should have heard them whooping and hollering! Mind you, in the excitement, I'd split my Lycra shorts and they were seeing just a tad more of Ron than I intended. I think they still enjoyed it though - they even recognised that the heat could be getting to me and playfully sprayed me with water. Wasn't that nice of them? They got a bit carried away though - some of them were so excited they hadn't even took the tops off the bottles before chucking them at me!

Anyhow I've just been running a few k's - nothing too far. I'm finding the heat very sapping - but I did manage a nice 6K jog yesterday. Then it was back to the room for a spot of good dietary intake before sloping off for a day on the beach.

I'm a very well read bloke so I brought a couple of books with me to chill out with. I brought a biography of Tommy Cooper and a bio of Houdini. Trouble is the Tommy Cooper book has disappeared and I buried the Houdini book in the sand and I can't find it now!

Yesterday's lunchtime training session consisted of a walk. We visited the city of Kotor - a stunning place which is now a World Heritage site under the auspices of the UN (so let's see how long it takes for the bally place to fall down then eh?). I like to think that these are kind of like missionary visits for me - I mean it was another place that perhaps hadn't heard of the phenomenum that is Ron.

Whenever I visit a new place I always go out of my way to introduce myself to the locals - do a quick demo of one of my training routines - you know, just be friendly with these people. You have to remember that places like Montenegro, Belgium and Canada just don't know what it's like to win anything - so I try to empathise with them. I even handed a few sweets out to some of the local kids and paraded my new yellow lycra shorts but I suspect that may have gone right over their heads because no sooner had I handed out a few mint imperials than the kids had been ushered away by what I took to be a load of blokes in black dresses but which subsequently turned out to be their mothers!

Dunno why the place was suddenly filled with local militia either. They seemed more interested in where I was staying rather than the fact that I'm a real live Olympian. And it's a problem asking me where I'm staying anyway because I can't say the name of the place without filling somebody's face with spittle.

It really is a country that could do with some vowels.

Anyhow, the Half Share decides we should go for a little walk. And so at precisely midday we set off to walk to the local church. Which is located 4,000 feet up a chuffing mountain!! 4,000 ft - at midday. In 35 degrees temp.

I've now got two sore feet and can't even run for a bus this morning.

Anyway, I'm just off for a Montenegrian version of a full English. Can't beat a spot of cucumber and carrots first thing can you?

Keep on tapering.

Ron.