Training Log Archive: blairtrewin

Melbourne Bush-O at Plenty River. Not an area on the same technical level as yesterday to put it mildly, but still a nice place to run in the bush, especially with the rain clearing before the start. Still struggling for pace and strength but didn't miss a lot, and picked up a bit later on (although I still couldn't run Janine Steer down in the finish chute). Time wasn't really competitive - Robbie did about 35, not sure what Bruce ended up with. (Fredrik beat me by 4 seconds after a big 180 coming out of 9).

Speaking of the Steer household, Asha, who will have benefited from the Czech experience, had a pretty respectable run and achieved a career milestone for any junior - first win over Dad.

Quite an orienteering collection at the Essendon-Bulldogs game this afternoon - with me were Jenny, Gareth and Kelly, and Rob and Clare Baker (being educated in the finer points of the game). Further orienteering connections were provided by virtue of one of the boundary umpires being one-time Tasmanian schools team member Mitch Le Fevre - you won't be surprised that the ground announcer made a complete hash of pronouncing his name.

Bendigo event at Kooyoora on a day with steady rain throughout. The course was out the west end, with some very fast bits at the start and the end but also some picking through very big rock in the middle. Not terribly aggressive in the terrain but not running too badly, and good fine navigation - just slightly wide on 15 and 17, maybe 10 seconds apiece? Didn't get a good line on the top-of-mountain 8-9 but I'm not sure if there was any such thing as a good line on that leg which didn't involve a helicopter - would be interesting to see a WOC field let loose on that sort of country. Toph 44 and Bruce 45, which is about what I would have expected from my run.

A fairly standard session brought to a slightly early halt when a lifeguard we could see perfectly well decided there was too much mist to see our lane and closed it down. One-way fog is a phenomenon I haven't previously seen documented in the meteorological literature but maybe I've been looking in the wrong places.

It's a reflection of the same mentality that has closed the main bike path along the Yarra indefinitely because a few people slipped on frost on the pontoons one morning - apparently after someone from Parks sprayed the path with water thinking that would clear the frost. (Those of you who live, or have lived, in Scandinavia or North America are invited to stop laughing now).

A late-night teleconference did provide licence to be in at work later than usual this morning so this wasn't quite as early a start as Thursday long runs often are. A loop with its most distant point being the northeast corner of Greensborough, with some solid hills in the middle. Steady without sparkle for a lot of the way, but various muscles refused to go up hills towards the end, much as they had last Saturday, although I lasted a bit longer this time (it started to fall apart about 1.45) and was able to just about hang on. Starting to put a few longer runs together but not in the most convincing manner, and 2.30 still seems a long way away.

Another frosty morning, but it should be the last in this sequence. The next midweek morning long run will definitely be significantly warmer (and would be even if I wasn't going to be doing it in Darwin).

Streets bagged: Adeline Street, Greensborough, and a couple of Adiles - one at the top corner of Greensborough, the other in Yallambie. Will be a while before I make more headway on this, as the next one is at almost the most distant point possible (St. Helena) and probably only reachable on a weekend long run (unless I drive somewhere to start the run, which seems like cheating).

The election is getting closer, and a letter lobbed in the letterbox from a "concerned neighbour", one Michelle Penson, about how wonderful Liberal candidate Nick McGowan was and how she was going to be voting for him this time. It would be a bit of a worry if Ms. Penson wasn't going to be voting for him - she's chair of his campaign committee, as well as being a past Liberal candidate here (something she mysteriously failed to mention in the letter). At least she didn't claim to be a swinging voter.

And it's probably as well no-one else was around at my end of the office when the green GPS dot marked "Uppill" entered the finish circle with the clock ticking 31.32, 31.33, 31.34...

10x1 minute on the south side of the Yarra at lunchtime, having decided that I can't burn the candle at both ends too much this week and therefore that a midnight finish last night warranted a sleep-in of sorts. (The WOC rest day tonight doesn't help - I've got a 10pm teleconference, non-orienteering this time).

A bit unsure at the start but working nicely by the second half. Perfect conditions. A bit sore pushing off but not bad once up at speed.

Warm-up and down.

Got up around 1am for the women's sprint final (and a bit more technological frustration). I decided not to stay up for the men's but might as well have because it took ages to get back to sleep, meaning that my alertness was less than optimal when it came to running in the morning. Plodded through it, more or less, but not an effort I'm particularly pleased with. Still some soreness on the rear end - is only a nuisance-level issue but doesn't seem to be getting any better, which makes me wonder if I did break something?

Not really the usual later part of the day today; left work early for an IOF Foot Commission hookup from 3.30-7 (mostly discussing JWOC 2016 bids, but you'll have to wait until the Council meeting to find out a result from that), then a Labor branch meeting (with computer in tow) after that - as you might imagine there's been quite a lot in the last month to talk about. Back at home now watching the men's long final.

Definitely felt older (as well as cold) this morning - took quite a while to get going this morning and was never completely on top of things.

Heard something on the news this morning about a smoking ceremony outside Royal Melbourne Hospital this morning and had visions of hordes ducking outside the hospital doors for a quick ciggie. (It was actually the launch of what seems like a worthy initiative to encourage more Aboriginal people to enter the medical profession).

Interested to see the slogan linking to the WOC coverage on the Orienteering USA webpage, 'See The World's Smartest Athletes in Action' (a team which has Ali Crocker as its lead runner has more grounds for saying this than some). Part of me thinks this is so accurate, another part of me is thinking that promoting that angle too much might be limiting our potential market. Still think there's unexplored potential in the "nerds who can run" market, though. (Interestingly, at my school - no idea if this is typical - the distance runners came disproportionately from that demographic, too; the highest-level maths class pretty much closed down on inter-school cross-country day).

Around the Tan at the end of the day (after spending the later part of the afternoon with one eye on a paper I was translating from Chinglish into English and the other eye on the WOC sprint qualification GPS tracks, once I actually got the website to work). A run which felt like it wanted to take off at times but never did, with a few somewhat stubborn sore spots. Slow but more traffic than usual, plus a bit of a U-turn to link up with Liggo whom I saw in the later part of the run. (Some of the traffic could be blamed on the combination of a vehicle with hazard lights flashing stopped in the middle of Alexandra Avenue, and the pink stretch limo which I assume had something to do with the Pink concert at Rod Laver Arena). Had some good thinking time to come up with refined WOC starting order proposals.

I was reminded in the early stages how much of a waste of energy the Crown fireballs are; I was feeling hot when they went up, even at ground level.

C • Happy birthday! 1