Training Log Archive: blairtrewin

Yesterday was encouraging but today was very ordinary indeed. The lowlight was committing the cardinal sandstone sin, going for what I thought was a gap in a cliff line at 13 that didn't exist and spending about 2-2.5 minutes going around (in fact this run in general was an exercise in forgetting all of the advice I'd given the juniors on Monday night). I'd lost plenty of time before then, though; a minute apiece on 3 and 8, then a couple of minutes looking up blind alleys on the cliff lines at 12. (3 was perhaps a little unlucky; I came across the top, not realising that the 30 metres beyond the end of the cliff was occupied by almost-cliff which was mapped as rocky ground, but 8 and 12 were just careless). Running was so-so, particularly on the last few steep climbs, but I think some of that may have been my poor navigation going to my head.

I had been third start, and one objective was to come in with the clubhouse overall lead for Easter - to do this I needed to defend 8 minutes on Josh, which I didn't quite do (the fact that it was close suggested that he had a poor run too). There were 51 people in this field - which I think is probably the largest M21 field in Australia since the first half of the 1980s - and I only finished ahead of nine of them. Hoping for something better tomorrow.

Course 1 day1 - Splits

Event: Easter 2014
 

Easter prologue. A smooth, if not super-fast, run,, with only one trivial wobble of a few seconds at the second-last. Not too bad on hills either - in general consistent (which was reflected in having a straight-line splits graph). Saw the field passing by, including Lachlan, who eventually won the race (Rob Baker and Steve Todkill also went through me in the 10-11-12 sector). Ended up 4.08 down on Lachlan, which is a little better than par for me in a sprint in the last 12 months, but the Friday is only a trivial part of an Easter. Feeling a little sore on top of the left ankle but hopefully this is merely a symptom of the drive and will disappear.

The rest of the day seemed to disappear without anything much happening. I'd come up from Cowra in the morning; you know you're converging on a major event when you come up behind a Victorian car with L-plates and you can narrow down the list of potential drivers to about three names. There was also a bit of a case of history repeating itself when spotting one of our number (who shall remain nameless, but is the same age now as I was in 1991) in deep and meaningful conversation with the Ilford law, it turned out for not displaying P-plates after being stopped for a random breath test. My one and only encounter with the forces of justice came the last time Easter was in Mudgee, when I was fined the somewhat underwhelming sum of $42 for parking nose in instead of rear in on a back street at 9pm on a Sunday night.

At Fitzroy at the start of a long day (heading up to NSW after lunch). A nice morning to be out; the balloonists thought so too, with a flock of them out, including the Skywhale (aka the Hindenboob). Felt reasonable during the session, though difficult to read too much into this.

Easing off in the run-in to Easter, although my life schedule is still somewhat demanding - the combination of a late-night teleconference (although at least at this time of year it's 11pm and not 1am) and a 9am meeting at work. Still, off limited sleep, this one had a promising start - one of the better starts I've had in a while - but faded away a bit once it started to get hilly. Probably at around my high point of the last month, so hopefully can carry that through (or better).

It was certainly an interesting political day in the state we're heading to tomorrow. It will be no secret to anyone here that my leanings are not with the current NSW government, but if you're going to have a Liberal government you could do a lot worse than having Barry O'Farrell in charge of it. I was also interested to hear Andrew Constance, whom I know through being a few years below me at school, mentioned in speculation of possible replacements (although realistically he's only a chance if the two frontrunners turn out to have their own skeletons in the closet - I doubt he has any himself, if only because it's hard to imagine it being worth anyone's while to try to bribe a minister for disability services, his job until recently). If he does run he won't have any excuse for not being able to count his numbers - I tutored him in maths for a while when he was in Year 11.

Over past the Repat, down to Darebin Parklands and the newish bike track (a sign wisely states that construction of stage 2 is expected to take "several years"), then around the Yarra. A nice morning to be out and a run which was mostly decent. Not quite as horrible in the first hill-climbing kilometre as most comparable recent runs, either.

I hadn't yet heard about the most recent European Championships mishap; wasn't sure whether to laugh or cry when I did. It will certainly give us plenty to talk about at the next Foot O Commission meeting.

If anyone's got a charger for a Forerunner 610 that they could bring to Easter for testing, that would be great. I'm having trouble charging mine (have to hold it onto the charger for charging to work, so obviously a bad connection somewhere) and am not sure whether it's the watch or the charger.

C • charger 5

A change of scene today (thanks to post-day logistics) - the Brunswick Baths, whose outdoor pool is now open again after a couple of years of renovation. It's nice to be out in the sun but my swimming was badly in need of renovation this morning (or maybe it's just waiting to be condemned and served with a demolition order). My mood wasn't helped by the front page story (albeit one which should be taken with a pinch of salt, as with all strategic Budget leaks at this time of year) about swingeing cuts to CSIRO, which you can bet anyone who has anything to do with climate will be on the end of more than their share of.

(There's still public money around for some things: I read today that Sunday's trailbike events at Maldon, which were roughly the equivalent in standing and numbers to an orienteering World Cup round, got a $50K state government grant. Worth remembering the next time we're contemplating something big).

The Tan at lunchtime on a nice day. Not feeling as tight in the early stages as was the case on most of my runs last week, and the Achilles soreness has more or less faded away so the massage must have done a fair bit of good. Won't pretend this was a sparkling run though.

Southbank had even more impressionable children and people seeking to entertain them than was the case this time last week. It may or may not have been coincidence that the Jehovahs Witnesses and the Scientologists had set up within a couple of hundred metres of each other, although when it comes to targeting impressionable children, for bizarreness it would be hard to go past the rebirth of the Cookie Monster as a neo-Nazi icon.

Training at Mount Tarrengower - mostly a pairs relocation exercise, followed by a downhill control picking course at the end. For the relocation exercise I was teamed up with Adrian (Lian's partner) - a pretty inexperienced orienteer, who was good at getting himself between controls but still struggling a bit with the fine navigation part of the exercise, which meant we spent a bit more time standing around than might otherwise have been the case. It was therefore difficult to gauge this in physical terms but good to get a bit more time on a map, and in the terrain, into me before Easter.

One thing I noticed was a lack of confidence running across sloping bare rock, even though it was dry - perhaps there are still a few mental scars from the big crash I had at Radford.