Training Log Archive: blairtrewin

In two minds about whether to go out after the last couple of days but thought I'd at least give it a go, and the news was positive; right calf was at minor nuisance level throughout but never got worse, unlike the 15-20 minute mark deterioration which has been a feature of the last week. Was thinking initially of 30 minutes but took it out a bit further. Seems a waste at this time of year to miss the chance of using a cool Sunday morning (they're a fairly scarce commodity in summer) for something long, but got more done than I originally expected to. Hopefully things should improve over the coming week.

This is the first time I've been on the converted old road bridge since it was officially opened, and the first time since the building works there that I've been on the track along the river on the south side - nice to get back there.

I wasn't the only person in Melbourne who thought that a cool cloudy (and later rainy) Sunday was a good reason to head for the shops, even if my own shopping activities were fairly minimal (mostly getting a new battery-powered radio to replace the one which gave up the ghost recently - not easy to find them these days). This also served the function of procrastination at a time when I might otherwise have been writing my SEA report for the World Cup.

C • Battery-powered radio 4

Sprint at Ruffey Lake - a rather different venue for this than the last two sprint maps I've been on (in Singapore and China). Normally this would be quite straightforward but a maze section added some challenge, as did a complex picnic/playground area late. Trickiest bit was probably the first control, a tree without a lot of clear features to pinpoint it. Struggled with calf after 15 minutes or so, but both feel similar so it's hopefully just that they haven't fully recovered from last night's needlework. Frederic blew past me at the end.

Those of you who know me will know that I'm partial to a good incompetent/hapless criminal story, and one recently happened close to home in the form of an attempted burglary at my parents' place - the (female) would-be burglar scarpered once they realised people were home, but not before being caught on camera, which revealed (so to speak) that they were wearing, in addition to the gloves and carried screwdriver which would be tools of the trade, a bikini top, a G-string, a towel around the neck and nothing else (perhaps they thought this would make them inconspicuous in a beach area) other than a readily identifiable tattoo. Upon the video being played at the police station (footage which was probably keenly watched by some male members of the local constabulary), the towel was recognised as having been stolen in a previous burglary - it belonged to the local police superintendent (whom the alleged burglar had been staying next door to). Anyway, there was more than enough evidence that she was greeted with a "you're nicked, sunshine" (or the local equivalent thereof) in fairly short order, and will soon be treading the probably well-trodden path to Frankston Magistrates Court.

The first 15 minutes of this were a case of slow and sluggish, but at least the calf is only at minor nuisance level. I was just about thinking that I might be through the worst of it when it started to flare up again (much as it had at a similar stage in Geneva). Not wanting to run it into the ground, I pulled up pretty quickly.

Had a physio session tonight - she doesn't seem too alarmed beyond overall tightness. Some fairly serious needlework which will hopefully do some good (even if it makes walking this evening a bit of a struggle).

This season's fires so far seem to have been pretty good at missing existing orienteering maps. The Black Range one east of Canberra has done so too so far (although I suspect it will eventually get onto the Little Bombay map, which I don't think has been used for 15 years or more?), but it does cover an area I've rogained on a couple of times. There's supposedly some good granite on the Black Range itself (I seem to recall Rob Walter, whose home turf this sort of is, has been up there) but with no proper track access it's not really usable. (I was also wondering how many Black Ranges there are in Australia: the Geoscience Australia placename search turns up 19 though misses the Canberra one, and picks up two in the southeast of South Australia which are possibly stretching the definition of "range").

Update: looking at the latest RFS maps, "eventually" turned out to be "within an hour of my posting that".

Calf improved somewhat on yesterday and was at could-run-on-it-if-I-had-to stage, but given that I didn't have to I left it one more day, and hit the water instead. Not a bad session; felt quite reasonable in the second half.

Changes in the neighbourhood while I've been away: the manchester clearance store in the Station Street shops which, I think, has been holding a closing down sale since I first moved in to the suburb has actually closed down.

C • Worrying trend? 1

Calf a bit worse this morning, meaning I didn't get the chance to go exploring Ararat and surrounds (wouldn't have had time to get into the Ararat Hills, where I've had a couple of very nice runs previously). Feeling rather sleepy in any case. Can't work out why.

The talk went reasonably well, even if there was a lengthy comment disguised as a question from someone who recited a long list of climate sceptic talking points (from subsequent morning tea conversation I don't think he impressed the rest of the crowd greatly). Finally made it home properly this evening, after sleeping a fair bit of the way back - don't think I would have been much company for the person who gave me a lift to Ballarat.

Unusually for me, I got essentially no sleep on the flight so knew I was in for a tough day. Held up OK in the morning, and this session, if a bit mundane, was useful. Obviously a bit of a storm through overnight as there were branches down in various places (including one in my backyard which I think came from next door).

Hit the wall in a fairly significant way in the afternoon - fortunately by then I'd cleared the urgent work tasks which actually required thinking (like preparing my talk for tomorrow) and was down to sorting e-mails.

And I don't get to sleep in my own bed just yet - I'm doing a talk in Horsham tomorrow morning. Fortunately I don't have to drive it, which I would have struggled severely with - I've got the bus/train to Ararat, where I'll stay tonight, and am getting a ride with someone else in the morning. I suggested before leaving work that the probability of my falling asleep on the bus was probably well into the 90s and so it proved.

Looking at the list here of what makes you a suspected religious extremist in Xinjiang, most readers of this would probably be advised to stay well clear. (I'd fail on the second point as well as the first, and will probably fail on the third - surely something must have been lost in translation here - when the time comes).

(It has been suggested, probably not unreasonably, that the fact that this got leaked to the New York Times suggests that someone very senior is not happy about what's going on).

C • List 9

Sprint course in Singapore, at Bishan in the northern suburbs (a course from a training event they ran a few weeks ago). Arrived there and was slightly disconcerted - there were apartment towers everywhere but mostly only small buildings on the map. I quickly realised that most of the apartment towers are open on the ground floor (I guess to help with airflow) and were mapped as canopies, with the lift/stair wells as the "buildings". Seemed a fairly straightforward course at first but a bit more technical in the second half, and I managed the classic sprint thing of getting myself onto the wrong side of a wall at the third-last.

Calf was still not 100% and I probably wouldn't have gone out had I not had a particular reason to, but it didn't get any worse through the run and has come up reasonably afterwards, so hopefully it will be right for my next planned run on Wednesday.

Not sure whether I can count this as a 30th orienteering country or not - it was a course but not an event. (Italy was once in the same category for me but I've competed in a couple of events there since). Also good to get a chance to look at Singapore suburbia - it seemed to be a fairly typical public housing estate (most Singaporeans live in public housing so this doesn't have the social connotations it would in a lot of Western countries).

Now on the way home, after doing a seminar in Singapore this afternoon (at the invitation of a former Bureau colleague who's working here now). Seemed to go OK.

C • It totally counts as orienteering 11