Training Log Archive: jennycas

I wasn't going to go to the night champs at Mt Crawford but I felt bad that there wouldn't be any W21s if I didn't.

Got my compass out, which was brand new at Easter, and it wouldn't settle because of a crack and a large bubble in it which can only have resulted from baggage handling on the plane on the way home. This hasn't happened to me in 20 years of travelling, and why couldn't it at least have been my old compass which broke? So I said "damn", "bugger" and "what a waste of $145" in quick succession. It's been an expensive week after having to pay the $500 excess on my hire car because it was so windy at the event on Sunday that the door of the car next to us was grabbed by the wind when it opened, and blew into mine, leaving a dent :(

Anyway, the night event was fun, I enjoyed running through the minty-smelling weeds which grow in the marshy creek bottoms, and I only made two 90-degree errors in the pine forest because of my dodgy compass, and I was sandwiched in time between Tom & Riordan Dose, so I didn't do too badly.

I came home from Helen M-F's 18th just in time to experience my first earth tremor (that I've been aware of). The windows and other things rattled for 10-15 seconds and the dog didn't like it. It was more noticeable at my grandfather's near Mt Barker (pretty sure the fault line goes through his farm, and the epicentre was a few km from there) and Sunday's daily tabloid quotes a worker at Mt Barker 'Natural Food Barn' as saying that he knew there was going to be some sort of activity, because Nostradamus had predicted it. Excuse me for being sceptical, but would Nostradamus have even known that Australia existed?

This was more than enough; my back's kind of tight. I'm sure a nice day at home tomorrow pulling weeds in the autumn sunshine will be just what it needs (not).

With Fern, Troy and Tyson up to the station, across to Belair triangle and back past the boys' house. Kind of tired, out of breath and my knees hurt, but better to feel like this now rather than Sunday.

The thermometer at the pool said it was 9 degrees when I arrived at 7.30, and steam was rising off the surface. Getting in the water was just like crawling into a bed where the electric blanket has been switched on half an hour beforehand :)

I escaped from a meeting in the city right on 5pm and thought I'd go to Morialta to see whether the waterfalls are still doing so, but I knew I was cutting it a bit fine. Made it up to Deep View lookout just in time to watch the sun set redly over the ocean while I stretched (calves were horrible, I blame last night's Kayanos yet again) and then I took it very cautiously on the way back down, which seemed to take forever because I was taking such small steps, and by the time I got to the bottom it was dark, but at least my ankles were still intact. (I heard, rather than saw, the trickle of water over the falls.)

On the way back to the car I ducked into the bushes to see whether there was any fruit on the roadside quince tree, April being quince season, and I emerged triumphantly from the bushes with 10 fine specimens and a big scratch on my leg. On the way home I started to feel guilty. Sure, that tree is on public land and we've picked from it before, but the fruit is so big and healthy that I wondered if someone has been watering the tree, and the next time they go there they will find that someone has nicked all the fruit they were keeping an eye on?

C • First in best dressed 1

The first of the North Adelaide Tuesday night winter runs, with Bridget and Simon, except we didn't do intervals, we ran up the river to the Highways Department and back, crossing the river 6 times including the suspension bridge at Hackney and the new footbridge behind the zoo, plus the uni footbridge, which also bounces when you run across it, but not as badly as the suspension bridge does.

Q: What goes Wheeeohshitbump?
A: Bridget sliding down the giant slippery dip, on a hessian sack, in the dark! The bottom was reached a bit soomer than she expected....

Short recovery jog through Blackwood Forest, Frank Smith Park, down to the Coro Valley shops and back up the creek with Tyson & Fern, to her parents' place. It was dark, not exactly warm, and really made me look forward to winter training.

Glenbrook, near Cooma. Semi-open granite where the trees have suffered severe dieback and the gaps between them are more open than originally mapped. Big bald hilltops with subtle gullies and lots of rocks on the sides. Not that different in parts from a certain prospective Aust long champs map, now I come to think of it...

Susanne started 10 min after me and I was kind of hoping I wouldn't see her before I finished (and I didn't). So I was going to push myself but run sensibly, which I did mostly, except that going across the saddle between 1 and 2, I wasn't 100% certain where I was even though I suspected I was right of the line, and when I crossed the creek on the way up to 2 the erosion seemed a bit deep but I still didn't catch on just how far right I was until I reached the boulder which a) didn't have a twin and b) didn't have a control on it. Quickly realised where I was and bolted across the hillside without wasting time swearing at myself, guess I lost 90 sec on that one.

Jasmine started 2 min after me and overtook me going up and over the hill to 3 and then Aislinn, who started 2 min in front of me, was also at 3, so they were both ahead of me across the hillside to 4, since identified as the most dangerous leg in the course. When I hit the clearing which I'd identified as my attackpoint I peered through the bushes down the hill till I could be certain that the gully with the control opened out below, then dropped into it while Jas/Aislinn kept going further west. They caught back up to me as I went into 6 (Jas said afterwards that she had been so sure I was behind them, and she was confused to see me at 6 before them) and we ran that short loop together but they pulled away up the long hill to 9, where Kathryn also powered past me. I wombled slightly over the saddle and slowed right down going into 9, likewise I was very cautious on the longer vague leg into 11. Would like to be able to read this stuff a bit better when running at speed.

After the spectator control the neuroma in my foot really started playing up, as it does at about the hour mark in O shoes where I can't wear my orthotics. So the climb up and over the rocky windswept hill was agonising, but thankfully the pain settled down again by the time I had done the long descent to 14 with the wind in my eyes. The rest of the course was fine and I picked up the pace when I realised I had only a couple of km to go.

11th, less than 14 min behind Kathryn, so I'm not complaining, but it's becoming increasingly clear to me that even on my best day there's a minimum of a dozen girls whose running is faster than mine, and so my position is just a matter of other people's time losses. Wow, this is what happens when no one drops out of the elite women for a few years! Everyone just gets faster and faster. On the drive back to Canberra Susanne & Lauren & Lachlan all gave me advice on how to become faster. It was a bit of information overload but the word "intervals" seemed to feature heavily, to my dismay. Hmm...now to integrate this with my (ultra)marathon goals!