Training Log Archive: blairtrewin

Heidelberg along the river to Finns Reserve and back - a routine run back in the day, which I succeeded with at the third attempt in recent weeks. Was always battling here and almost gave it away a few minutes in, but settled down enough to pull through and was good enough at the end to take it past an hour. Had to walk across the Finns Reserve bridge (a narrow suspension bridge) due to other people but that probably wasn't a bad time for a break. Longest I've done since last July; things have fallen a long way. Reasonable number of people out, but no groups so the message is obviously getting through to most people (though the beach shots from last Friday looked worse than they actually were; telephoto lenses will do that).

Headed out in the afternoon to have a look to see if there was any potential in the bit of forest out Toolern Vale way which I saw from the air coming in from an unusual direction in January. (Had a few misgivings about this, but surely there's not much difference between not interacting with anyone in a house and not interacting with anyone in a car?). The good news is that from a distance it looks quite large, not too steep and not too thick, the bad news is that it has no road access and is almost certainly private property (and many of the adjoining properties are posh horse studs), so I think we can scrub that one off the list. (The area around Toolern Vale is a mix of the very posh and the derelict - the latter are probably properties long since abandoned whose owners are waiting for their value to instantly increase 100-fold at the stroke of a planning minister's or councillor's pen, a phenomenon which has been known to lead to the distribution of well-stocked brown paper bags or the digital equivalent thereof).

Was a bit apprehensive when I felt fairly tight walking to the shops early on but this ended up being a pretty nice one by my recent standards - felt quite comfortable after the first few minutes (and didn't stiffen up with a level crossing stop in the middle as I thought I might have).

If it wasn't for everything else going on in the world it would have been a nice day. Did manage a couple of domestic achievements - finally getting around to setting up my speaker system and connecting my TV to the household wi-fi (these have taken about one and four years respectively), and the acquisition of some toilet paper.

Fox Footy have taken to showing replays of classic past versions of the games which were fixtured for this weekend, which will work better for some than others - there's no shortage of classic Essendon-Sydney or Adelaide-Port Adelaide games, but they're going to have to look pretty hard to find something for Geelong-Gold Coast.

Managed to get out this morning, some early tightness but settled down reasonably, though the fitness side was still a bit of a struggled until the last few minutes (maybe I was finally properly warmed up then). A little longer than I'd planned on as the area from Bellfield down to the creek was blocked off for works, so dropped down instead to the path on the east (quiet) side of Darebin Creek. Nice to get this one in the book.

Closer to being runnable today but not quite there, so instead headed out for a lunchtime ride on the Koonung trail as far as Doncaster Road. A nice day and plenty of people out, although none in groups other than families, so people are doing what they're supposed to. (The City of Darebin has one of the lowest case counts of any local government area in Melbourne, but I haven't yet heard any suggestion that it should close its border). Felt reasonable, though this route only has short hills.

There are not many winners out of this sorry situation, but one is probably the Narromine Turf Club, whose race meeting today was probably one of the only ones taking place on the planet (it was certainly the only one in Australia). I presume betting turnover was significantly above expectations.

And today's nomination for most stupid criminal goes to the person who tried to go through the newly-established Queensland border checkpoint in an allegedly stolen car with paper number plates. You probably won't be surprised to hear that the driver allegedly had numerous outstanding warrants and that a search of the vehicle discovered drugs and prohibited weapons.

C • Betting on the weather 3

Back not functioning today, and there's a shortage of available plan Bs (although I at least did plenty of walking during the course of the day). The day managed to fill up somewhat thanks to a total of 5 1/2 hours of teleconferences (just as well I'm on an unlimited internet plan these days). Managed to get a few other work things done too (like answering a request for temperature data from all corners of the world with a view to seeing what temperature dependence there is in Covid-19 spread rates).

First day of working from home. With no pool option I went for a bit of a hit-out on the Yarra Boulevard (which actually has some traffic at 8-something on a weekday morning, albeit somewhat less than it normally would). Struggled a bit through the first 15 minutes but felt reasonable after that. Coolest morning of the autumn so far.

Slept the best I have for a couple of weeks last night, which I take to be a good sign.

It's been reported that the loss of the sense of smell is one of the most consistent symptoms of Covid-19, in which case going past the Yarra Bend bat colony provided abundant evidence that I don't have it.

C • Smell 4

I suspected this would be the last such session for a while (something confirmed by an announcement later in the day, although at least the massage/physio side of the practice is staying open for now). Seemed to go OK, although with a slight air of surreality.

Took part in a teleconference for national sporting organisation CEOs/presidents today (organised by Sport Australia). The situation is challenging for us, but most other sports seem to be in a far worse situation - many will struggle to have the cash reserves to handle a shutdown of a few months. (The NRL gets a double whammy because the business model of a lot of clubs is dependent on money from leagues clubs which are shut down too - no wonder they were so desperate to keep playing).

Managed to get through this, which is a pass mark for a Monday. Pilates had loosened the back up enough to be functional through this, but still something of a struggle.

We're working from home from tomorrow for who knows how long (although I've been designated as "essential" which means I can still go in if necessary). Just about held it together during the day but got pretty emotional on the way out - if this is any indication then I'm probably not going to cope too well with retirement when the time comes.

C • Retirement 15