Training Log Archive: blairtrewin

Two Bays Trail Run. The die was cast on this one sometime around the middle of Saturday afternoon when I started to feel rather out of sorts, and I knew something was fairly seriously wrong when I didn't feel remotely like eating when out for dinner with Jenny and George and only just got through a not terribly large plate of pasta.

I also slept very badly, but felt sort of better when I got up and was good enough on the warm-up that I thought I'd at least start and see how it went. Was pleasantly surprised on the first (and largest) climb, maintaining a steady grinding rhythm in a place when many others were walking, but by 10k it was starting to become like hard work; my original race strategy was to start conservatively and then wind it up in Greens Bush from 12k onwards if I thought I had something in reserve, but by then it didn't look like I was going to have much in reserve. Still kept plugging away through this section which doesn't have much in the way of meaningful climbs, but it was always on the cards that I was going to run out of fuel eventually, and it happened somewhere around the Boneo Road crossing. Jase (who'd started in the second wave 10 minutes behind) went through me here, and it was a real battle to make it to the finish from here, walking some pretty modest rises and sort-of-jogging the rest. Found something in the last few hundred metres to try to get under my time from last year, but ended up 20 seconds short.

The hour after finishing was awful. Evetually I decided to see if I could keep a banana down, a question which was emphatically answered in the negative. Actually felt a bit better after this and was up to eating sort-of-properly by lunchtime (although I'll still be surprised if I make it past 9pm tonight).

I've now done the Two Bays twice, once coming off an injury and once sick. One of these years I might actually be able to race it properly; 'one of these years' now means 2014 (or later) because I'll be in NZ this time next year. 2012 does have the useful function that when things are tough in a long race this year - not that I'll be running as many of them as usual because I'm IOF Event Adviser for the Australian Long Championships - I'll be able to think 'well, I did manage to finish Two Bays'.

C • After all that effort... 8

The main purpose of the early parts of today's run was to remind me that I need to do a good warm-up tomorrow - if I hit the Arthurs Seat climb feeling the same way that I did after the first kilometre today the outcome doesn't bear thinking about. It did improve a bit after that, although still numerous random bits of soreness and a fairly mediocre effort all round.

A reasonably relaxed session after a reasonably proper night's sleep for the first time in a while. A bit of cloud cover was enough to make Fitzroy a lot less frenetic than it has been the last couple of visits.

It takes some doing, but the Citizens Electoral Council have reached new heights of loopiness. I seem to have found myself on their e-mail list and got a missive today headed: "Isherwood: Anglicans side with Satan, Prince Philip to destroy Murray-Darling Basin food bowl". An impressive effort even by CEC standards. (There must be fewer wackos on the other side of the border because a couple of elections ago, a CEC Senate candidate in South Australia got one vote in the entire state, presumably his own).

The novelty of today was that it wasn't in the morning - I'd had an international teleconference at 1am which meant that getting up at 5.15 to run would be stretching it (as it was I got up at 7 and didn't really feel awake until about 10, which is most unlike me). The greater novelty was that it was the first time I've run home from work in our present office location (I did it once when we were on the other side of the CBD) - this requires a certain amount of pre-planning for the logistics.

It wasn't a direct route (that's about 16k but involves going along or crossing a lot of busy roads). Instead I headed along the Yarra (choosing the south bank where it was an option rather than the north, which at going-home time has its share of Cadel-wannabes), as far up as the Walmer Street bridge - a big advantage of this route at peak hour is an hour's running with no road crossings. Would have liked to have kept going further upriver but that would have made the run longer than I wanted - keeping it to two hours today was a concession to Two Bays coming up and the fragmented sleep last night - so instead headed north through Yarra Bend, Fairfield and the west side of Ivanhoe.

The run never sparkled but I got close to achieving what I want to be achieving out of a long run, that of feeling much the same after 120 minutes as after 20 - only in the last 10 minutes did I tire significantly. Not for the first time this month, a bit awkward on the small hills but reasonably strong on the bigger ones (notably Walmer Street).

From Surrey Hills in the name of positioning myself for tonight (a better option than it used to be because, as I discovered, there are now trains that go express from Surrey Hills all the way to Richmond). From there one of the nicest running areas in suburban Melbourne, Blackburn Lake and its surrounding streets, is within range and it was there to which I headed.

The run was very slow indeed for the first 10 minutes - just struggling to move, although the Achilles has been going OK lately. Settled after that but never sparkling, just a steady accumulation of distance.

The dark clouds were building to the south towards the end, in preparation for a reasonably impressive summer cold outbreak (although in reality snow on the peaks is something which happens at least once in most summers, and a maximum of 19.0 is not really extraordinary - in 1983, the Ash Wednesday summer, there was a run of nine days in mid-January when it only reached 20 once).

And, much to the annoyance of Melbourne's (commercial) radio listeners, the city's most annoying advertisers, Chris and Marie's Plant Farm (which went bust in November), appears to have risen from the ashes. Readers are invited to nominate other businesses whose bankruptcy would be of benefit to the airwaves (I'll start the ball rolling with National Tiles).

C • Nominations 17

Street-O at Valley Reserve. Easily my best street event of the season physically - was in a good rhythm by 2k and held it all the way to the end, and was even reasonably strong on the hills. (The cool conditions helped). It was a pity I made a mess of the route choice, dropping 14 and 16 rather than 10 and 13 and dropping 400 metres to Bruce - without that the five-minute gap would have been three, which would have been the closest I've been to him in a street event for a while. A couple of slightly adventurous controls (one near a creek, one on a rocky creek crossing) which slowed things down a bit.

Didn't get as much sleep as I would have liked (not the last time I'll be saying that this week) and was still pretty sleepy for my first hour up, which extended into the start of this run. Started to get going a bit in the second half and at least managed to get into single figures for the final loop.

On the way back I spotted a vacant business in Burgundy Street with a rather ambitious real estate sign 'surrounded by Australia's leading businesses'. I'm sure Shield's Stamps and Coins and Australian Home Brewing will be flattered (although there is a TAB a few doors up).

And spotted in today's Herald-Sun: a vox pop with Luke Poland, who sensibly declined to be outraged on the Herald-Sun's outrage du jour, allegedly high petrol prices. I'm amazed they printed it.

Morning swim at Fitzroy. Again more crowded than usual, despite the lack of a 40-degree day or a public holiday, and this time the crowds were a problem because of people who variously turned around in mid-lane without seeing what was coming the other way, pushed off to start a lap as someone faster than them was just about to turn, or stopped and started again repeatedly in mid-lane. Normally we don't get three of these a year at Fitzroy, let alone three on the same morning. Not a bad swim when others weren't getting in the way. Flat bike tyre was a bit of an annoyance.

A fairly unspectacular lunchtime run around the Tan, though showing some decent signs on the hill - something I'll want to see more of because there is a big hill coming up on Sunday.

A tough week coming up outside of training: I'm still at work at 10 tonight, expect to be again tomorrow night, and then have a 1am teleconference on Wednesday night. (The last of these means my Thursday run will be in the late afternoon instead; fortunately the forecast is friendly).