Training Log Archive: grilla

5 * Reabold - 4:22, 4:18, 4:24, 4:21, 4:04
Did push a bit harder on the last one, but that was the only one when I could see the road so that helped make me a bit faster too.

C • Hills 10

Heavy legs tonight.

A novel way to stop Aoife eating rocks, she whinged for a bit but got about 1/2 hr sleep.

Only got time to do the medium course and still didn't push hard enough as I was a bit tired from the earlier ride and still made some massive route choice errors. Managed to ride an unmapped track to 1 (was a bit confused out there & worked it out on GPS later), wrong way to 2, missed a turn after 5 & I think took wrong choice, missed one of the cross-overs to 8 (they'd taken the tapes in by now) and spent time looking when I should have just kept going. 9 had been collected before I got there but didn;t really waste time looking for it. Steep hill out of 9 tough.

Reminder to me - do some road bike maintenance & tighten your MTB cleats!!!!

Around the river with Richard then Nicole (who'd had a mechanical problem earlier). Finally did Mt Henry but swapped Mounts Bay Rd for Mount St (all sounds very mountainous for non Perth people but that's a complete fallacy). Westerly blowing for a change.

4 * Broadwalk Hills 3:37 3:34 3:34 3:35
Another improvement in times but more likely to be due to the tailwind rather than fitness. Happy to do the 4th without even thinking about it.

met Leida in Shenton Park & then through KP home.

8km KP loop. Took it fairly easy and got a lift home because my calves were very tight, need to stretch NOW.

Well I approached this race not expecting much, had heard horror stories about the map and knew I am not fit enough for a Classic race.
The map is in fact beautiful & I lasted the distance OK especially with a downhill run to the finish.
Lost time on 1, but it was a bit hard to find a waterhole in the swamp & even when you did the control was hard to find as well. Made massive execution errors on the way to 3 (just can't handle spur gully) and was thinking at that stage I was all alone in the forest. In hindsight I went pretty straight line so just slow here, need to learn how to be aggressive on these legs... By some chance the Shannon express went through on the way to 3 within my sight & it was heartening to know I was not so far off track for the control & that someone else was out there...
Thought I chose a radical route to 4, but Jo came past the same way & that was also reassuring. Saw Jim near 4 as well as Kel & a QLDer. Had seen Jim just after 3 so knew my route had been OK. Went well to 5 through to 9 and was really enjoying myself. Blew it on 10. Knew I had to be careful coming off the hill and was too busy concentrating on remembering to be careful rather than actually being careful. Got very confused & lost over 6 min! The only thing that saved me was seeing Kathryn running obviously to 11, so I knew which way I had to head to find the control (>3 min back up hill). Saw the Tassie girl I'd passed earlier along the way back as well & decided I wanted to catch her again. Managed that & also caught up with Kel & her QLD mate. Was still running OK at the end, but marshes & green were getting hard. Went for a swim before 12 & almost got a hamstring cramp trying to get out of the chest high water. Aoife lifting turned out to be good training here as I had to haul myslef out with my puny arms.
Overall an enjoyable race that could have been so much better...

C • More Climb 1

Event: Sun Coast Classic & WOC Selection Trials
 

Sprint Race - not a bad start, scrappy on 2 & 3 but lost mega time on 4. Jasmine & Aislinn were around from 6 onwards. Rest of run was pretty clean but I ran out of steam towards the end & found the (slight) hills hard to deal with. Should have saved a couple of minutes on 4... Would have liked it to have been a bit harder near the end when I was navigating well.

Running 37% over the straight line distance on a relatively flat area tells the story. Started well but again a bit scrappy on 2 & 3. Lost big time on 4 as I was low on the spur and went down rather than up. 5 I did OK but lost time at the end when I was right on target, just couldn't fit terrain to the map. The control was exactly where I was expecting it to be, I just wasted time trying to sort out stuff I should have ignored. 8 was my disaster - went on the wrong hill (for about the 4th time this year) & had NO IDEA. Lost my rhythm completely for the next few but got the easy controls coming home OK. Lost 14min in big errors!
Still love this area though.

Mainly trying to get Aoife to sleep in the pram (it worked twice!) but also served as a good warm-down/up between the races.

KP with Eoin. did Law Walk, botanic garden & banksia garden on a beautiful sunny day.

Wish I'd ridden today

Short loop at KP with Kim. Ankles quite tender from the weekend still - not used to running that hard on rocky ground.

C • Sorry to hear about your fa... 2

Got off to a shocking start. Kellie caught 4 min on me by 5 and from 6 I started to concentrate better & kept up with her until 2nd last. I then blew up and lost a minute in the last few hundred metres... I was lucky that once she caught me I was able to relax and run well whereas she was a bit thrown I think. This kept us leap-frogging each other for the course, very good race practice & a learning experience for both of us! Very pleased with my planning and executing of the long leg.
Was lucky that she spotted I was about to run off with a course 2 map instead of course 3 - whoever thought Adrian and Graham should run a harder course than the girls, especially given they're both officially old men now?????

C • who? 3

Eoin came along this week but Richard still did all the work. Should have done Mt Henry but legs were way too tired. Next time for certain.

Mundaring Loop then start of Munda Biddi with Dad, got part way up the long single track before we ran out of time & had to turn back. Dad blew the valve off his back wheel on the pipeline track so I raced back up to Mundaring for the car while he hiked it. Mostly stuck to the bitumen on the way up but did one section of gravel. Had to hike up the usual pinch on the loop trail, but only a short section. First time on this ride for AGES.

C • I wondered 4

Spent the rest of the hour getting hip flexors, glutes & back sorted.

3 * Broadwalk Hills 3:45, 3:44, 3:37. A bit disappointed with the first,thought I tried harder on the 2nd, 3rd approaching the realms of acceptability. A decent improvement on the last attempt at least.

C • Broadwalk 3