Training Log Archive: jennycas

8 1/2 hour road trip, very heavy/tender shins and a dog that begged to be walked because he hadn't seen me for a week...

Telegraph Saddle - Waterloo Bay - Refuge Cove - Sealers Bay - Windy Saddle and back to the carpark. I had hiked this in 1997 and been wanting to go back ever since; I finally found an accomplice in Blair. 35km all up but I haven't counted the bits we walked. It makes a good loop run with no redundancy (except the beach at Refuge Cove that we accidentally ran along while the track turned inland) and enough variety to keep even Simon happy :)

First 7km is downhill on the 4WD track (lots of schoolkids struggling up the hill with packs as big as themselves). Next 5km across to the beach through sandhills. Then it's up to rocky headlands and down to beautiful white sand beaches, and repeat numerous times for 13km. I did an extra straight-up-and-down when there was a snake immediately under my feet! Each bay was more beautiful than the last, but I bet I won't be able to tell which is which from my photos. Poor Blair kept having to wait for me to take yet another photo of almost the same thing! Nowhere else that I've been, has the sea quite so many different shades of aquamarine.

Going anticlockwise was a good idea because the ascents were then on the shaded rainforesty side of the hills. I was feeling the sun a bit coming down each hill - probably didn't take quite enough water but I had expected to see drinking water at the campgrounds - so when it came to wading across Sealers Creek I did so with enthusiasm. Other people may choose to take their shoes & socks off and tiptoe across...From there it's 10km back to the carpark with boardwalk through amazing ferns to start with, then 300m climb to Windy Saddle in the middle 3km, then the last 3km is through recently burnt stuff and you can see how steep the hills really are.

This was a run totally worth doing, and I got my food right, which I was happy with. It's good to know that the slump at the 1.5 hour mark will always pass, but it's hard to remember that at the time. Not sure which was better afterwards, the very cold swim or the hot shower (we sneaked back into the campground at Tidal River) and even the thought of driving back to Adelaide on Saturday didn't detract from an excellent day out.

C • wow sounds great Jenny 1

Met Hania & Quentin's brand-new baby. Ella is 8 days old!

Direct consequence of meeting Vanessa (& Reuben at the bike shop) for lunch: purchase of a new bike :) Yes, it does fit in the car to get back to Adelaide!

C • Good Work 2

Scatter O, Melbourne style, at Canterbury. $4 gets you a black & white map and the company of about 200 other people. B course collects 15 of 20 controls. From the mass start everyone headed west so I did too. It was as good a choice as any. I wasn't feeling very imaginative so leaving out a cluster of 5 in the east and being as efficient as possible through the rest, became the plan. I think it worked. There were people coming from every direction, at every control, and I managed not to run into any of them! When I got back the people on the finish all yelled at me to punch the finish control. What the? How is this necessary for an untimed event? (Results are just points based on placing, I think.) Anyway, I don't know which B course guys beat me back, but none of the guys on A did!

Edit: I've seen the results and I beat everyone on B course back including Lachlan Fraser :)

Leisurely run from Melbourne Uni through Royal Park & Princes Park with Peter Taylor. Discovery of the day: he keeps 2 chairs at his desk; blue for when he is decently fresh & clean, and red which can be sweated on after running! Takes a mathematician to think of this, also to describe the point in the run with least altitude as the nadir. I'm still not convinced that you can use 'nadir' as a geographical descriptor...

C • Leisurely 2

Simon set 4 tricky short loops in the NW corner of the map (where WOC trials middle 2007 was) and we started out intending to do these as sort of sprintervals but it was too wet, muddy and slippery to race. My splits: 13.19, 12.16, 11.17, 13.09. I had a wonderful time in the pouring rain and for some reason received an easter egg from Simon as prize - either for being the only person daft enough to do all 4 loops, or for having the muddiest bottom afterwards! (After John went to the trouble of putting out tapes for his course, all the drowned rats piked on it and we went to the pancake parlour in Ballarat, where Sus demonstrated how to hold a sugar packet between top lip and nose then flip it into one's mouth. If imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, then this must be a highly prized skill, because soon most of the Arrows were trying it, with varying degrees of success!)

Bryce's Flat (Bryce's Area of Pebbly Undulations being too long a name to fit on tourist maps). Possibly my slowest km rate in a NOL race since WOC trials 1999 (80min for 4km on Non-Smokers) but I think I lost less than 2 min in error/inefficiency, and clearly half the field lost more than that. Maybe I got the knack of reading the mullock heaps quicker than some people?

1st leg 2.9km, 32:54; 2nd leg 1.3km, 15:54. I was concerned that Reuben had drawn the short straw being teamed with me, but think I actually held up my end of the bargain okay. All the girls (well, nearly all) turned right, across the creek, out of the mass start, getting the hill out of the way early on and following the track to the Blowhole. I was still within sight of Sus and Bridget till about 5, then V went past me, then Zoe & I tag-teamed the rest - I got away on the uphills then she passed me on each descent. (I was doing way better on hills than yesterday.) At the end Lauren came hurtling down the hill behind me but I held her off. Second run was less interesting because by the time Reuben handed over to me the top guys were already going out on their final leg - so I stood aside to let them cross the creek :) Ran the second half of this with Lucy McGarva, as I had done in the sprint. This was a great relay format, but since when does a relay involve not using relay software, or having cumulative team times displayed?