Training Log Archive: blairtrewin

The objective today was to finish, and whether or not it was achieved depends a bit by what you define as "finished" - on the one hand, I did indeed get to the finish line, on the other hand, at times this could barely be described as a run.

The start was promising enough - felt OK in the warm-up, and unlike last year ran all of the Ravenswood hill. After that, congestion means you can't run much on the climb up Arthurs Seat, and what I was watching out for was how I felt on the descent off it at around 6k. The shin (which was hardly heard from all day) was fine on this, the quads weren't great - no real hill running in recent weeks may explain that - but I was still feeling at least passably settled at 8.5k when the Achilles flared up again.

Walking up that hill seemed to settle it again for a bit, but it started hurting again soon afterwards, and from there I had two options - either bail out (a logistically challenging option) or keep going and try to manage it as best I could. The plan from there was to walk all hills and jog level/downhills. A decent time was out the window at that stage, but I hoped to at least salvage a sub-3 hour. That gradually slipped away, and the last part made me think that even if the Achilles hadn't pulled me up, other issues would have done; despite the lower intensity, my quads were pretty shot by the last 3k, and calves were threatening to cramp at the end too.

I guess it's a positive to make it to the finish line, but this was a pretty terrible time. Obviously under-prepared but I didn't expect to fall off the back quite so badly. There was tangible evidence of a hard day's work in that my calves cramped while I was driving back (a freeway interchange isn't really the place you want this to happen; fortunately not much traffic the way I was going).

Story of the day was that the organisers enforced the rule that competitors had to carry a container capable of holding at least 500ml of water and disqualified a number of violators (Tash being one of them, whilst on the other side of the coin, Will inherited the win after the first runner across the line also fell foul of this). Peter was third and Pat was just over 2 hours; other orienteers I know of were something in the 2.20s for Liis, 2.43 for Nicola (about where I was hoping to be), 2.52 for Dion and just under 3 for Kirsten, who I was in sight of for most of the middle part of the run.

C • Pat? 5

Not 100% but enough for me to make the call to start tomorrow. As with yesterday, didn't get any worse as it went on, and seemed to be most troubled by downhills on pavement, a combination which does not exist on the Two Bays course. (The few paved sections are flat or uphill). Felt somewhat better as a run than yesterday did, too. Won't go in exactly full of confidence, but if I can get through the first 7k (which contains most of the steep hills, both up and down), I'm hopeful that I'll be able to manage the rest.

Not the most convincing run I'll ever have, but at least the shin was in an acceptable condition, showed no signs of getting worse on the run and seemed to be better on trails than on concrete. Will still leave it for tomorrow to make a final call on Sunday (and I'll certainly want to feel stronger running than this if it's not to be a struggle), but quite encouraged. It should also be about 15 degrees cooler on Sunday morning than it was this morning...

Comment of the day goes to the person who remarked that before today, if you googled "Trump" and "shithole", all you got were hotel reviews.

A little bit better again than yesterday, but still enough soreness to be a concern once on a slope. It feels like the sort of thing I could push through if I really wanted to, but I'll still want to get through a run without much trouble either tomorrow or Saturday before taking the plunge for 27k on Sunday.

Spotted an ageing sticker on a car during this run "Is that the truth or did you read it in the Herald-Sun?". At the moment, it's not so much that what they're reporting isn't the truth, it's that it's not the whole truth, and that relatively minor crimes are being given saturation coverage if they fit a certain narrative (of the four incidents that have been on high rotation, only one of them is serious enough for the perpetators to be likely to get jail time if convicted). At least the Herald-Sun, unlike the Daily Fail Mail, has not yet tried to incite a riot themselves as far as I know.

Interesting discussion at the end of the day at work which I came in on, on the subject of whether people orientated their maps when navigating (on street/road maps or the like). Most of them do, but the one who doesn't is the one who was trained as an operational forecaster (and hence used to thinking spatially).

(I guess most people here know that I'm one of the handful of serious orienteers who doesn't orientate their map - by the time I knew any different, I already had a technique I was comfortable with. I've done some testing which indicates I have an unusually high capacity to rotate images mentally, although there may be some chicken-and-egg in that).

C • rotating the map 13

Annual climate statement day. This involved leaving the house at 6.15 for multiple engagements at Southbank - by the time that was over, I felt as if I'd spoken to every bit of the ABC except for Play School - and then numerous more interviews through the rest of the day, including the first time I've done something approximating to a press conference (half a dozen cameras and a forest of microphones in a fairly small room). Seemed to go pretty well on the day, although the last couple of days have definitely put me in mind of the old saying about watching sausages being made.

I had had vague thoughts of having my first go at starting to run again but didn't get out of the office in time. Given how tired I was - more tired than I can remember being on any work day which didn't start with either a 2+ hour run or an international flight - I suspect attempting to do so wouldn't have ended well in any case.

A bit improved today but still not quite ready to go back out on. Not sure where I would have found time for it today, anyway, on a second-successive 12-hour day (although others fared worse: one of my colleagues worked overnight until 4am and then fronted up again at 8.30).

At least I got a decent ride into work (and a better one home, with the tailwind). Expected Queens Parade to be cactus (even at this time of year) with Hoddle Street closed for works, but everyone seemed to have been scared off.

Today's prize for remaining inconspicuous goes to one Karl "Bang Bang" Holt, an alleged drug trafficker who was arrested (in association with the raid on Mark "Bomber" Thompson's house) - he drives a black Merc with the number plate "ONBA1L". No idea why the police might take an interest in such a person.

Still felt too sore to run on in an initial trial, so once again in the water today. As with the last couple of swims, felt OK in the water but slow - not totally obvious to me why?

On the way back from the pool I found myself listening to a familiar voice on the radio - my own. This is always slightly disconcerting.

C • Disconcerting 4