Training Log Archive: blairtrewin

The logistics didn't end up working for a run in the Blue Mountains (where a few of us headed for the day) so instead I did another one from Coogee, this time south to Maroubra. Something of a struggle for much of the way and definitely worked hard on the climbs (of which there were more than planned, because high tide made a section of the coastal walk - the same bit that Hoggster and I bailed out of last time - impassable), but starting to come good in the second half. Humidity a bit of a step up from previous days.

Heading home tonight, with something long in mind for tomorrow (exactly how long depending on how I feel, and perhaps how late I get in tonight).

Original plan for this morning's swim was Wylie's Baths. I got there to find they didn't open until 7 and I didn't have time to wait 15 minutes for that (I had the speaking spot everyone wants at a conference or workshop - first up the morning after the dinner), so instead took to the smaller rockpool at the south end of Coogee Beach (saving myself $4.80 in the process). Felt reasonable although it always feels a bit strange trying to swim in a straight line somewhere where there isn't a black line to chase.

Turned out to be a good workshop, as I thought it would be - smaller ones (30 or so in this case) focused on a specific topic often are. As always, we emerged with a larger to-do list than will probably get done. (I was tempted to add "achieve world peace" to the to-do list, as it is a necessary precondition to the full implementation of something which is there as a long-term goal, having a climate reference observing network with full global coverage).

By the way, the Uni of NSW campus (at least the part that we were on) is seriously complex. Competitors next weekend should consider yourselves warned.

Lots of hills on a Coogee-based run. Started out with a 25-minute loop inland up to the top of the hill and then back down to the south, then linked up with two of the others for an out-and-back to Bronte along the coastal path. Felt a bit flat on the early parts but got going reasonably well through that middle section. Headed out on my own again for a final half-hour, this time to the south. Felt somewhat plodding through here, and not a lot for the sharper climbs, but was happy with the handling of the distance - only pulled up short of 2 hours because I'd run out of time before the workshop start.

I left to the accompaniment of someone departing the Coogee Bay Hotel (an establishment which has a certain reputation for footballers disgracing themselves and similar) in the back of a police van. There were numerous other police around at various points on the coastal path; my initial assumption was that someone might have fallen off the rocks, but later on I saw three of them talking to a dubious-looking character (nothing relevant on the news). Also spotted the famously ambiguous (and much-forwarded) Randwick Council sign "If your dog does a poo please put it in a litter bin".

C • far less excitement on t... 1

10x1 minute along the foreshore path at Tom Caddy Point at Clovelly, named after someone who was a local swimming teacher for 70 years (makes a change from 19th century minor aristocrats or town clerks). Felt pretty sleepy when I headed out after getting in fairly late last night - getting from the airport to Coogee by bus was a more drawn-out process than I'd imagined - but got going quickly and had a fairly reasonable session. Saw a couple of the Brits at the workshop who were on the way back from their own run, and a few flashes of lightning offshore (somewhat to my surprise), although there was no rain on land until well after I finished.

Warm-up and down. As noted earlier, not very awake for the start, and lots of up and down.

Another step towards normality. Started very slowly (although without any sign of the back problems which sometimes manifest themselves with an uphill start), but gradually settled into it and felt quite reasonable for most of it. Still slower than I'd like but getting there.

Up in Sydney for the rest of the week for a workshop. Question for the Sydney crowd: anyone interested in joining me Saturday morning when I introduce some visiting international climate scientists/trail runners to the delights of the Sydney bush? Flexible as to time and venue.

C • Metrogaine on Saturday 2

Reshuffling the program a bit this week because I'll be in Sydney most of the week and don't want to take my belt with me (plus the Coogee baths seem like a good place for a swim, assuming they don't get swamped by a storm like they were the last time I was in these parts). This was a fairly routine session; not too many people around today.

Original plan was to go out at lunchtime (after a reasonably frantic morning at work - mostly about backgrounders on the cyclones, and to a lesser extent the extreme heat in WA). Seeing red and black on the radar in abundant quantities (and a classic warning map, with red circles and arrows going all over the place, which suggested that someone in severe weather had brought their three-year-old in with them today) was enough to convince me that this run might be better rescheduled, so I went out in the evening instead. This turned out to be the best I've felt on a run since I was sick (being the coolest it has been for a while helps), so the reshuffling was worth it. Didn't seem to feel any aftereffects from yesterday either. A promising session.

Only in Australia (perhaps only in Queensland): a news story on post-cyclone fuel shortages in Rockhampton (where some of the locals don't seem to be exactly distinguishing themselves) quoted a petrol station owner called Shazza.

Down on the Mornington Peninsula, including a reasonable amount on the sand (my classic London Bridge loop).

If one took a glass-half-full approach, you'd say this was a moderate success - after a couple of weeks of being unwell, getting through something 40 minutes longer than anything else I've done in that time, on a warm and humid morning, and pushing through on a day when the quads were reluctant to function from the start (for no obvious reason) - and of course I've had other things to think about this weekend. If one took a glass-half-empty approach, one would focus on the fact that I'd started the weekend hoping (perhaps unrealistically) for three hours and didn't make it, and this means that I'll feel as if I've gone into Six Foot underdone; we'll see how that works out.

This run was a struggle throughout, although it finally got into some sort of rhythm in the last 10 minutes, which is one positive sign.

I've already started the process (along with Mum) of packing things and cleaning things out. No doubt this will turn up a lot of interesting historical artefacts - the best finds so far are two tickets in the fundraising raffle for the 1999 state election campaign (the winners will have wanted to use their prizes quickly - they were Ansett vouchers), and the paperwork for the 2003-2005 Victorian schools teams (Clara, do you want the copy of your birth certificate back?).

C • Packing already! 4

Run on a soon-to-be-former regular Saturday scene, along the Yarra Flats to Wilsons Reserve then back up through Ivanhoe (with some meanderings). Felt like the first more-or-less normal run for a couple of weeks; not ridiculously weak uphill and no coughing outbursts. Still not exactly stellar but I'll take it as another sign of progress.

As most of you will know by now, this was only the prelude to the day's activities, and the news is good: although the price ended up being a bit higher than I would have hoped for, I am now (or rather will be once the settlement happens) the owner of a new abode in Fairfield. It's a terrific place for what I want out of it and I'm definitely looking forward to moving there, especially as I had friendly conversations with more neighbours in five minutes than I think I've managed in five years at my current address. The only slight disappointment expressed was by my local state MP (who will be losing my vote, though probably not my campaigning involvement as I'm not exactly needed in the ultra-safe Batman), and the kids in the street who were hoping that I might bring some of my own with me.

C • Congratulations 7

Pool running at Ivanhoe, where the renovations will certainly not be ready by the end of February as currently advertised. Ended up a fairly routine session.

My mind has been somewhat elsewhere this week; will know a result one way or the other pretty soon. I did manage to get myself into full weather-nerd mode today for long enough to generate assorted (hopefully) interesting stats on cyclones (and the 48 degrees that happened up in the Pilbara while no-one was looking).

C • Pool 2

Two steps forward, one step back, and today was a step back. Feeling flat and struggling most of the way, although perhaps improved slightly in the final third (particularly after a pitstop). Weakish on even small hills; probably not yet ready to back up from a harder run last night.

On a more pleasant note, all systems are go for Saturday (and I'm not referring to anything related to running).

C • Not running related? 1

Street-O at Heyington, for once not starting at Scotch - this time we were on the west side of the river at Kevin Bartlett Reserve. This is a map where the number of barriers makes for quite a bit of macro route choice, but once you realised that it made sense to get all the controls on the Toorak side it simplified things a bit. (My route wasn't bad, but Bruce's was better).

Took another step up on the physical front today - was able to run at a reasonable pace at times, although still weak on the hills. Probably at something like 80% today rather than 60% last week or 70% on the weekend. Thought I might have been set for a decent scrap late in the course when I was 50 metres or so behind Lanita through a stretch in mid-course, but it turned out she was running B. Finished OK.

Today's missive of the day came from someone who described themselves as a retired accountant who had performed an "audit" on the Australian temperature data and had "found" that the observed warming was artificial because we now use more sites in hot places. You will not be at all surprised that we've already thought of that (that's we generally report national or regional averages as degrees above/below normal rather than absolute values - we compare each site to its long-term average and then average those anomalies). The thought did cross my mind that if I did some mucking around with a spreadsheet and announced that the Commonwealth Bank accounts were wrong and they'd actually lost $5 billion last year, at best I would be laughed out of town and at worst I'd receive an invitation for a friendly conversation with the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (or possibly the Federal Police).

We also found that the claim published in a certain national newspaper on Monday (to the effect that southwest WA has been no drier in recent years than it was in the 1890s and 1900s) is clearly false. In a parallel universe this would lead to a retraction of, and apology for, the offending comments, but the only place you'll see flying pigs these days is in footage of greyhound tracks.

A loop which extended from my current place to (possibly) my new one, doing a certain amount of checking out the neighbourhood. (One unsurprising discovery is that the traffic on Grange Road at 7.30 is not nice, but I'll rarely be using that direction at that time, and in any case it should be improved by the new Chandler Highway bridge due to be built at some time in the next four years). Passed through Darebin Parklands, which may become a more familiar location than it already is.

The run was rather slow and seemed a little awkward up hills (including the long climb back up from Darebin Creek), but continuing to feel a bit better, at a rate slower than I would have liked.

Undeterred by the news that a seven-year-old is faster than me, I took to the pool this morning. Not too bad as a session apart from what seems to be the obligatory coughing outburst (this time coming about 30 minutes in). Nice morning to be in the water.

The Tan at lunchtime. Felt a bit tight early on but the run was something of an incremental improvement on recent efforts - still not brilliant, but not terrible either.

The path in front of Crown had been narrowed to next to nothing by temporary fences serving a purpose which was not immediately obvious. It was congested enough with pedestrians at lunchtime; I wouldn't like to have been there once bike commuting was under way in earnest.

Long(ish) mass-start race in Bendigo, at Crusoe, on a fast course even by Crusoe standards (Bryan did 46). I knew I wasn't up to taking off from the mass start - this mass start usually fills the function of providing various unexpected characters the chance to spend a bit of time ahead of me - but even given that (lack of) expectation, the first few minutes were awful - coughing and spluttering and feeling distinctly out of sorts. At that stage I thought I might be lucky to see out a few controls, but settled down and was able to go around at cruise speed, though not beyond - fortunate this was a physically easy course.

Didn't see many people early on (had a long split on the first pivot), but once on the common second half of the course, started to spend a bit of time around others. Caught up to a bunch of John N, Bridget and Lachlan Cherry at 13, and got through them a bit through a lower line to 14. Lachlan was able to stay with me (and made a certain amount of the running), and we were still together at 19 with a few short legs to come. I turned out to be the one who cracked technically with 20-second misses at both 20 and 21; the latter brought Bridget back within striking distance too, but not quite close enough. Lachlan was just ahead at the last but I was never going to win a sprint against him.

Getting a bit frustrated with the slow rate of my recovery, though that was farly similar in 2012.

Bendigo sprint. First attempt to run harder since I've been sick and took a few controls to work out what pace I could sustain - too fast at the beginning (overcooking things a bit trying to drop Charlotte), then slow for a couple of legs. Settled down OK after 5 and was reasonable for the rest of the course, although still below par speed-wise. Picked off a few of the women in the second half, more through efficient control entry/exit than additional speed. Probably about a minute below par and Bryan's time was consistent with this.

Session from the south side of the river near work (location originally prompted by logistics for going out to Monash later in the day, but it turned out I had a headlight globe blow yesterday so needed to get it fixed anyway). Round past Westgate Park (a bit tricky because of roadworks), then along the foreshore as far as Kerferd Road.

This was the longest I've done so far this week. Like Wednesday, it was OK as far as it goes but without a sense that there was an extra level which I was capable of going to; recovery has been a rather slow process (in fact I was probably coughing more today than I have at any stage during the week).

Normally at 6.45 on a Thursday morning, I would long since be out running. Had I been out running, I wouldn't have been spending that time getting into (yet another) argument with the occupant of number 3 (this time because he objects to the fence with next door getting repaired, a decision he has no legal say in because he doesn't own the property, but legalities don't seem to matter too much). This pushed me into thinking something I'd been progressing towards for a while - that I didn't need this sort of intimidatory behaviour any more and it was time to start looking elsewhere. Mum (who thinks I should have done this about 9 months ago) was obviously reading my mind because a couple of hours later (without having heard from me) she sent me an ad for what sounds like potentially a very interesting place in Fairfield, which goes to auction the weekend after next.

(I do wonder sometimes why we bother with teaching people in schools in Australia that bullying is a bad thing, when all the evidence of adult life in modern Australia is that bullies get rewarded....).

The running side of things happened at the end of the day. It was an MFR intervals session at Studley Park but I'm not yet up to running hard, so just circulated while others were going hard for assorted values of "hard".

C • House ad 6

C • bullying is bad 1

Street-O at Nortons Park - first time I've been out here for a while, and quite nice in the park section. More incremental progress; my objective tonight was to get through at a reasonably normal training pace, and this was achieved (despite an ordinary start). Didn't feel as if I would have had an extra gear in me, but this will still do for now. Even hills weren't outrageous.

One of those courses where you never have a lot of confidence that you've done it right (with only two creek crossings there was plenty of potential for disaster), but my route didn't seem too bad.

Made a little progress today along the continuum from totally pathetic to moderately pathetic. Still weak on anything more demanding than a flat path, and think it will be quite a few days before I'm back in shape. (Struggled again to get through the day, too).

Saw it reported today (here) that "Speculation is mounting that there may be a sinister circumstance behind a South African family's axe-murder." This wording has presumably been deployed to distinguish this case from all those multiple axe murders which don't have any sinister circumstances involved.

You have to start somewhere, which is about the best that can be said for this run based in Clifton Hill and taking in some of the Yarra path. More or less OK on the flat but predictably very weak up hills. Met up with another runner at a corner; she said I'd run away from her and I informed her that she was sadly mistaken. At least it was a nice morning (probably the nicest running morning we'll get for at least another week).

I've thought for a couple of days that this illness has close similarities with the one I got before WMOC 2012 and this session felt very similar to the WMOC sprint model. If that's anything to go by, it will probably be the weekend before my running is close to normal again. (In 2012 I ended up just scraping through the sprint qualifier, then had a crack in the final but ran out of energy after the first 6-7 minutes).

Lots of excitement once at work. I think it would be fair to say that Tony Abbott doesn't enjoy a great deal of support in your average Australian climate science establishment, though there were those (myself probably included) who were sort of hoping he might hang on in the name of making eventual election defeat more likely. As I've mentioned on Facebook, once a leader has faced a spill motion, even if they see it off the first time, that's almost always the begnning of the end; of the 13 federal leaders (government or opposition) who have been in this position in the last 50 years, only one made it as far as the next election (and lost).

I presume it's a paragraph which won't apply to our current PM, but readers are invited to guess which Latin American country's president was the subject of the following familiar-sounding sentences in this week's Economist:

"Seven months after stepping down from office, he has left the country on his private jet, amid accusations that his government ran a corruption and political-espionage racket. He denies wrongdoing."

The frustration I've felt this weekend was exacerbated by the morning's conditions; the change was earlier and stronger than expected, and it would have been as close to ideal as it gets in February for a long run.

Felt considerably less sick this morning, but back was the tightest it's been for a very long time - certainly not from overuse (possibly from underuse?). Wasn't sure how it would respond to running (though sometimes the days when it's bad beforehand are fine once running), so headed for the pool instead. Not entirely comfortable in the pool either, though gradually loosened up. Not a lot of room to work in in Ivanhoe on a weekend morning, although didn't have too many bombs in close proximity.

Should be right to do a run of some description tomorrow if things go to plan.

Possibly the least energetic day in my memory which hasn't been spent in a plane. Started to feel somewhat better in the second half of the day but still some way from being in a position to consider doing anything as vigorous as training - going to the Preston Markets was fairly close to my upper limits today.

Felt no better (in fact probably worse) on waking up. Wouldn't have considered running, thought about going to the pool but didn't think I had the energy for that either. Think it's a cold rather than a full-blown flu (not running enough of a temperature for the latter), but at the nasty end of such - last time I was in this sort of condition was in Scotland in 2012 in the run-up to WMOC.

Probably shouldn't have dragged myself in during the day, but taking a sick day on a Friday in summer is potentially asking for trouble (not internally - I hope - but part of the price of working in the field that I do is that anything you do is potentially subject to hostile external scrutiny, and I'm not prepared to rely on "they won't find out" - have seen too many others be the subject of hacks and/or broad-ranging FOI requests). Was in bed within five minutes of getting home, and asleep not much after that.

Was thinking 1.30-1.45 in anticipation of something big on the weekend, from Northcote back towards Ivanhoe and then returning via Darebin Parklands. Didn't sleep much but running more or less OK for the most part, but starting to fade away towards the end - which was a bit of a worry given plans for something twice as long on the weekend.

And then I hit the wall in a big way on the ride into work, and struggled through the day. It might be just tiredness and will be sorted with a good night's sleep, but at the moment it feels like I might have brought back one of the numerous bugs circulating in Geneva - in which case the weekend might be a non-starter. Will await developments.

Summer Series at Blackburn - usually one of my favourite areas (although we were starting at the opposite end to usual tonight).

Calves were a bit swollen today - not sure if it was the flight or running in snow which did it. Decided to see how it went early on before deciding whether or not to race, but they didn't feel comfortable on any sort of hill so I settled for a jog. Perhaps it was as well that I wasn't trying tonight because I managed to make three significant errors (despite having a decent overall route choice) which cost maybe 90 seconds all up - maybe my brain was still frozen. Calves felt better in the second half, so I don't think it's anything long-term (and the masseur will hopefully work their magic on them tomorrow).

The flights both went smoothly and I scored reasonably well on both - an empty seat next door on the first leg and an upgrade to premium economy on the second.

The same cannot be said for getting between those flights in Dubai. The connection was supposed to be 1.30 and we were 20 minutes late, which shouldn't have been too much of a problem even in an airport the size of Dubai. The problem started because we didn't stop at the terminal, but on the tarmac with a bus to the terminal. These are normally pretty quick, but this time the bus seemed to do almost a full lap of the airport, and got stuck for a while at walking pace behind a water-spraying truck.

By the time we actually got to the terminal it was 38 minutes to departure time, during which I had to get through security, get between terminals and cover an unknown distance to the gates. The first bit didn't take up too much time despite being sent back for walking too fast through the metal detector, whereupon I embarked on the first rep, to the inter-terminal train. This normally comes every couple of minutes but none came for about 5 minutes due to a "technical fault" (which then meant it was super-crowded and took a long time to get everyone on). Finally at the other end, I turned this into a hills session too by running up two long escalators, was reasonably relieved that my gate wasn't too far away from the top of them, got to the gate, and thought I was sunk when the person in front of me got turned away, but for some reason I was OK. (My guess here is that they automatically rebook people whose incoming flights arrive within X minutes of the connection departing, but because mine landed 1.10 beforehand - even if it took forever to get to the terminal - that was considered OK). Had quite a sweat up by this stage - hope it didn't cause too much grief to the person I was sitting next to.

(Had I missed this connection, I'm guessing I would have been rebooked on the Emirates flight a couple of hours behind, but would presumably have missed out on the upgrade).

They like their ice hockey in Kloten - there were statues of hockey players on all four sides of the roundabout outside the hotel. The local team, named the Kloten Flyers for its proximity to the airport (another appropriate name I've seen lately is the Tromso Storm, currently leading the Norwegian basketball league), plays in the national league. They're currently in the relegation zone. The Rapperswil/Jona Lakers are deeper in the relegation zone, which may be why there appears to have been what passes in Switzerland for a riot at the weekend's game there (our local correspondent may have more details).

C • Relegation 1

The flight back to Switzerland went a lot more smoothly than that from it. I had a night in a hotel in Kloten (the small town/suburb next to Zurich airport) before getting a morning train to Geneva.

There was time to squeeze a run in this morning, although not to wait for daylight. Once again, it was a process of learning about running in the snow - the optimal areas are either where there's proper snow cover or it's completely clear, the awkward bits are where it's in between (e.g. footpaths which have been scraped but not salted). In the icy areas it's often a matter of avoiding sudden movements (as a Canadian road safety ad put it, "Don't Jerk While Driving").

Enjoyed myself much more once I was outside the town, thinking it takes a certain amount of self-confidence to run on a snow-covered farm road barely distinguishable from the field it was crossing, in the dark (not that it's ever really dark when there's snow on the ground and you're close to a city - the light reflects remarkably). Not as stiff as is often the case on a Monday, probably a reflection of yesterday's relatively short haul.

Now at Geneva airport after Swiss trains were their usual efficient selves. Good news is that it isn't (currently) snowing and the incoming flight was on time, bad news is that some of the luggage handlers are on strike but I think (touch wood) that the company whose handlers are on strike isn't the one that Emirates uses. We'll find out soon enough.

And more from the what-might-have-been file (prompted by reformatting some 2003 results for the website while I was on the train): wonder what might have become of Orla Murray's orienteering career if she'd won the W21E Australian long distance by one second instead of losing it by that margin? (I'd completely forgotten about this, having thought of her as one of those juniors who didn't long outlast their JWOC years; I'd also forgotten how good a year Tooms had in 2003 with several top-five results).

Not the sort of long(ish) Sunday run that I'm used to. Oslo in winter is not completely unexplored territory for me, but today's conditions were somewhat different to the last couple of times I've been here - on both of those occasions, the temperature was well below freezing and had been so for some days, whereas this time, it's been getting close to 0 (or even a little above it at low elevations) for the last few days and so there has been a little melting of the surface - not so good when it refreezes.

I put my trust in Jim to lead me somewhere which wouldn't be too bad on this score, and also avoided running in ski tracks, a very serious social faux pas in Norway (I believe public floggings of people who walk or run in ski tracks take place out the front of the royal palace every Monday lunchtime). For the most part the route succeeded in this aim, although there were a few exceptions - unsurprisingly I was much more tentative on the steep donwhill chutes than Jim was and was going at about one-third his speed (though I only ended up on my backside involuntarily once). The other shock-to-the-system bit was a short stretch across a field which has accumulated thigh-deep windblown snow - my quads were screaming after about 20 metres. The lowest part of the run revealed that the extension of the metro line out this way is finally completed (it was opened at the end of last year after having been under construction, and/or stalled whilst the various governments involved argued over the bill, for more than a decade).

This felt like hard work at times (and kilometre rates are fairly meaningless in such conditions) and both back and Achilles were intermittently troublesome, but things finished off OK. Think I still appreciate these conditions more than I'll appreciate next weekend's back home.

The day continued with the somewhat novel experience of a 4-year-old birthday party, not quite as chaotic as I had imagined. (I don't even have much historic experience of these as the fourth birthdays of both Cassie and myself fell during extended overseas sojourns).

I'm now embarking on the first leg of the long haul home (slightly convoluted because I didn't think I could convince work to book me coming out of anywhere other than Geneva, even though it would probably have been the same price to fly directly Oslo-Dubai). Somewhat annoyingly, the Norwegian Oslo-Geneva flight I've used a couple of times on Sunday nights now goes on Sunday mornings and there wasn't a good alternative option by air, so the route is Oslo-Zurich tonight, then train to Geneva tomorrow morning and onwards from there.