Training Log Archive: blairtrewin

Jim Sawkins Classic at Ratall Creek. I came here not really expecting a lot, but also remembered that I was sick for this event four years ago too and got through it OK. Got dropped by the pack immediately, as expected, and was hoping to settle down into a solo run, but the hip didn't warm up as I'd hoped and I was struggling a fair bit on the rougher ground; decided that next week is the main game and slogging around for two hours wasn't going to do that cause any favours. Lost concentration after I'd decided to call it a day, and dropped a minute or so on 7 (an area where the vegetation had grown up a fair bit), and then ran to a wrong number on 18 on my way home - was almost not going to bother looking for the right one, but decided I'd better just in case a wrong number had been put out and I could tell someone to fix it.

Ended up dead-heating with Martin Dent and Craney - they had a sprint for the finish (won by Martin) but had both punched the wrong 18...

On the way out to the event I saw the light-rail construction site on Northbourne Avenue, with signs pointing out that this was part of the original 1912 Walter Burley Griffin plan. Presumably the next step in implementing the 1912 Griffin plan will be to replace the War Memorial with a casino.

Hip was pretty bad last night (quite uncomfortable to walk on in Albury, although a few hours in the car probably had something to do with that), but much better when I woke up - though a head cold was added to the mix of issues. Both of these were manageable while running without giving me a lot of confidence about getting through 13k tomorrow, especially if the cold takes a turn for the worse as it was looking like doing this afternoon.

The run itself was one of my classic (short) Canberra ones - one I won't be doing again in its current form (or at least from its current start point) - round the base of the Aranda bushland and into the northern part of Black Mountain reserve. Even the more modest hills were a struggle today. Spotted somebody putting out controls for today's Black Mountain event, which I didn't run because of a clash with my social calendar (namely catching up with an old school friend I hadn't seen for about 18 years and had totally lost touch with until he popped up on social media a few weeks ago; now that I know the variety of things he's been up to the interim, which include three years cycling through Central and South America, managing a guesthouse in Guatemala and an aid program in PNG, it's not surprising he's been hard to find).

One feature of this run which you don't normally see in these parts was a burnt-out car next to Bindubi Street. A few weeks ago, four cars were set on fire in an Aranda street, possibly the most exciting thing that's ever happened in the suburb (in a criminal sense).

Original plan for this morning was to head into work first thing and then do a run from there. I thought that a spanner might have been thrown in the works when the 6.58am ABC radio cross to the Bureau didn't happen because of a fire alarm, but by the time I got there whatever had been happening was no longer happening - and then my hip was no good anyway...

Hit the road to Canberra tonight - doing the Friday night road trip for the last time with the family home as a destination (my parents are moving to Victoria next month). On a frosty night, part of me was occupied in the later stages tracking how the temperature varied with the topography, especially in the hillier areas. It's probably as well for family sanity that late-1970s cars didn't have thermometers.

Improved enough in the last 24 hours to give it a go and knew from the experience of the sprint the weekend before last that speed doesn't seem to bother it, so went for the intervals session that I'd originally planned for yesterday (14x45). Didn't feel like I had a lot of pace but only minor niggles (and my hamstring no longer seems to give trouble pushing off).

No dogs sighted today, on or off-leash. The cold weather must be scaring them (or their owners) away.

To All Nations and back. It's hard rubbish season in the City of Darebin (or at least our corner of it) at the moment, and dodging piles on the pavement is part of the game this week. (Indicative of the fact that our street has a lot of kids of mid- to upper primary school age, a disproportionate amount of the hard rubbish here seems to be outgrown car seats, alongside the usual couches and mattresses).

Hip still painful this morning and didn't like a brief attempt to run in the morning. By then I'd left it too late to do anything else this morning, so headed for the pool (Northcote this time) after work instead. A fairly mundane session which seemed to drag on for a while, trying to avoid being swamped by the backwash from the squad training in the next lane (Northcote pool is a busy place in the evenings).

Felt considerably better as the day went on and am hoping to be right to run tomorrow.

And it looks like the World Orienteering Day fundraiser has brought in $900 or thereabouts. If we need to raise some more money, perhaps we could follow football's lead and start fining organisers who don't provide lobster for officials.

C • Fines 8

The morning's heaviest band of showers cleared out a few minutes before I started which can probably be taken as a good omen. Quads not as much of a mess as yesterday, but this was still fairly hard work for the most part, on a hillier course than most I've done for training runs lately. Started to improve a bit over the last 15 minutes or so.

This route took me past my grandparents' old place in Ivanhoe East. I used to go past it occasionally when living in Heidelberg, but this was the first time that I've done so that someone has been outside, so I took the opportunity to stop briefly and introduce myself. The people who bought it from my grandparents when they downsized (late 1980s) are still there, and nothing much on the outside seems to have changed (in a street where old houses are beginning to be replaced by new ones).

Whilst it didn't trouble me on the run, my hip was a bit sorer this afternoon than it's been in the last week. Yesterday's verdict was that it was one to watch without being particularly alarmed at this stage.

New watch gave me five PBs this time :-).

C • PBs 2

Finished reading a book on historical AFL/VFL grand finals over the weekend. Just in case anyone is under the impression that there is anything new about sporting scandals, illegal betting was so rife until the 1930s that almost any player who had a bad game on Grand Final day faced speculation that they'd been paid off (although only two players, in 1910, actually got found guilty of match-fixing). Another feature which won't be missed was that in the 1960s and early 1970s, it was pretty much standard operating procedure for a team to try to KO an opposition star in the opening minutes - Peter Hudson in 1971 being one notable victim. (It was equally standard operating procedure that the concussed player was left out there, coaches being unwilling to use a substitute - in those days they were substitutes, not interchanges - on someone who could be left to stand on the forward line and keep a defender occupied even if they didn't know which way the goals were).

Quads pretty ugly this morning, but did improve somewhat after the first few hundred metres. Still very much a post-long-run run, but it's good to be in a position where I'm having post-long-run runs.

The watch mentioned yesterday got its first workout this morning, and informed me after the finish that I'd just done a PB for 5k (the small matter of 12 minutes outside my actual 5k PB), 1k, 1 mile and longest run. I won't get too excited (and don't expect too many of these to last another 24 hours).

An evening swim - seem to be settling into that for a pattern for this session, which seems to work OK (fits in nicely before a 7.20 massage session). Thought this would loosen my quads up, which didn't really happen (with a couple of foot cramps to provide evidence that I'd been doing some work). Reasonable swim notwithstanding those issues. Put some new goggles into action tonight, and they seem to work (better than the last lot, anyway).

The masseur definitely earned her money tonight.