Training Log Archive: blairtrewin

State Series opener at Hepburn. A steepish area (although it could have been a lot worse), mostly downhill in the first half and uphill in the second.

Felt a bit better running than yesterday but still well below par uphill, and the result showed it - I barely made it into the State Series points (10th). The competition was tight - only 2.40 between 3rd and 10th - but I'm definitely back in the bunch at the moment. I'm not quite sure why my form has been so poor in recent weeks - I know I did myself a fair bit of damage in the heatwave but surely the effects of that wouldn't linger this long? Whatever the cause, I definitely hope I'll have worked through it by Easter.

Dropped a minute or so at 5. I don't think it was quite in the right place (instead being in an unmapped watercourse 20 metres away from the mapped one), but that accounted for at most 5 of the 60 seconds.

Good to see a deep field, including some we haven't seen a lot of at this level for a while, like Schweppes and Hayden Lebbink (both of whom were in the minute ahead of me today). Hayden's spent more time of late in the business of driving another Fox.

Doubling up for a sprint, which was a bit more than a sprint - multiple loops which made for some interesting mix-and-match as far as head-to-head battles were concerned. Probably my best run of the three over the weekend, which may or may not have had something to its being the most technical and least steep of the three courses; only one minor miss at 8, but did have to work hard on the climb to the finish. Caught Kathryn 1 minute fairly early on and spent the rest of the course trying to get away; never quite did (blowing my best chance to do so at 8) but was able to hold her out at the end.

This was definitely a worthwhile racing weekend, but it underlined (more than last week, where illness was an excuse) that I'm currently some way short of my standard from last year. (On the subject of last year, there's a fairly significant question mark as to how much will be left of Hervey Bay by, say, Wednesday).

C • and other queensland towns 2

Multi-loop race at Hepburn. As has often been the case in recent weeks, struggling to handle the hills, which were not in short supply (they never are here). Started to get into my stride more in the last quarter. One mistake of significance, too low on 13 - perhaps 45 seconds or so. A lot further down the field than I was comfortable with, even if two of the places I didn't get were accounted for by running to where everyone was gathered rather than the actual finish 50 metres west.

There was a bit of talk in the news about tourists shunning regional Victoria, but Daylesford is definitely not included in this - there are 20,000 people in town for a gay and lesbian festival and the campgrounds were full (a few of the more luxurious establishments weren't, but places like the Lake House are a bit out of my league). Ended up camping at Slaty Creek and had my best night's sleep for ages (although the competition is not very tough).

A fairly routine session at Richmond. Getting increasingly dark in the early morning - it was well and truly still dark when I stepped inside at 7 (although the low cloud and drizzle had something to do with that).

It was fairly chilly for last night's athletics as well (to the delight of the 5000m runners and the disappointment of everyone else) - sufficiently chilly that the ground announcer said that 'those people who've been telling us about global warming can step into the centre of the arena and see how cold it is', or words to that effect. He presumably didn't know that one of the people principally responsible for telling Australians about global warming was in the crowd. I declined his invitation (if only because there were too many javelins flying around).

C • sigh.... 3

Did well with my switch of plans because this was a struggle; I doubt I would have coped with a tough intervals session. Instead did something longish (although nowhere near what I would normally do on a Thursday) with a view to giving myself a chance to recover before the weekend.

At times this didn't feel a lot better than my last Thursday run in the same general area despite today being 27 degrees cooler. It did, however, pick up in the last quarter; the rain that fell through this section (quite heavy at times) seemed to have a revitalising effect. Spent more time on main roads coming back than I normally would because I'd been out longer than planned and was looking for a fast way back to base, which provided tangible evidence that I can run faster than Kathy Liley drives (at least in the Alphington traffic jam).

A couple of orienteers have been in the news lately for bushfire-related clashes with the constabulary; Madeleine Sevior (now Love) got a bit of press last week for declaring an intention to lead a group of residents into Marysville in defiance of police roadblocks (presumably she'd be able to put her navigation and terrain skills to good use). A less surprising candidate for a run-in with the law was Robin Rishworth (booted off Lake Mountain where he'd gone to take photos), although his notoriety can't have spread as far as we thought because the 'Age's report on the incident referred to Robin as 'she'.

Started from near Scotch, where tonight's street-O is, and headed south - enjoying the cool conditions. Again found it very hard to get going but improved substantially after the first 20 minutes or so, and starting to flow quite nicely by the last quarter.

One intersection I passed had no fewer than four crossing supervisors. It's good to see the commitment of the City of Stonnington to road safety, but I decided to find another option as I didn't think they'd appreciate the ways runners find to get across congested roads.

Timed my ride home nicely last night - left work 5 minutes after the wind change and got home a couple of minutes after the rain started.

Melbourne people will be familiar with the words 'Connex apologises for any inconvenience caused'. They would have been appropriate for my race tonight, not because of trains that didn't run, but because of two that did. Heyington Heights is prone to this type of misadventure (from the orienteering point of view), but losing three minutes at a crossing through two trains going in opposite directions was at the outer edges of frustrating. The one consolation was that I was going to lose anyway.

As with last week I got jumped at the start. The pack split after four controls; I thought Adam had made a bad move but it turned out to be a very good one, on a night when I needed things to go right to have a chance. From there I was with Bryan the rest of the way, moving at about the same pace, which wasn't all that quick - he's recovering from injury. Somewhat lacking in motivation after the railway debacle but getting some sprint-style controls on the Scotch campus at the end added some interest. Beat Bryan at the end, but I don't think he was trying very hard.

A 16-degree evening was definitely a novelty, but you know there's a drought on when even Scotch's ovals are brown. Had a pre-race conversation with one of my fellow Ivanhoe Labor comrades about Scotch's evident need for additional government funds to improve their facilities.

I'm clearly still somewhat off-form; think I'll give the long intervals session a miss this week and try to keep something in hand for the weekend.

A bit of a token gesture - still feeling very sluggish, although a bit better once I was going. Not under 9.45 for any loop. Seem to be taking a long time to wake up at the moment (which may have something to do with not sleeping a lot beforehand).

Quite windy, but not severe enough to have much impact on the run (especially as the section where I head north is quite sheltered). Rode into work on the grounds that if it does get really ugly, the trains probably won't run and it's easier to get around things like fallen trees on a bike than in a car.

Feeling somewhat better after a sleep (albeit one which was far too short) - good enough to be up to a reasonably gentle swim at Hawthorn. No great dramas but it seemed to go on for ever (even by the standards of swimming, where, as noted by others, time seems to elapse at one-quarter the speed it does on the run).

Tomorrow has the potential to be highly interesting, meteorologically speaking. Definitely not a good day to park under a tree in Victoria (or be downwind of a fire). There's a big tree out the front of our place but if it goes it will take out next door before it takes out my house.

C • Equinoxial gales. 5

Monday night from Susannah's place, a nice part of the world. Led the group through various Glen Iris back streets, most of which they wouldn't have seen before (I may have seen them before but am not sure about this), out as far as the railway line - and took a bit of a detour when we couldn't get across the creek in the place I thought we might. Felt better than I expected to, but it wasn't exactly a severe test.