Training Archive: blairtrewinIn the 7 days ending 2008-01-27:
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| M | T | W | H | F | S | S | |||||||
Sunday Jan 27 | ||
| Run 2:01:00 [3] 26 km (4:39 / km) | |
| When I originally planned to shift my long run to Friday to take advantage of the fact that I didn't need to be anywhere early on Friday (in a city where you need to be careful about where you go between sunset and sunrise), it hadn't occurred to me that the time change would mean that I would, in essence, be doing 2 hour-plus runs on successive days (I already knew that much of the time in between would be spent in the air).
I slept OK on the plane and it wasn't excessively hot for summer (although a reasonably humid 23-24 is still hard work when your previous run was in +5), but I expected this to be tough and it was - felt uncomfortable almost throughout, and weak on even the slightest hills (hills not being something I've had too much practice on in the last week, unless you count going up the sides of a couple of levees). Also discovered, not for the first time, that my internal plumbing doesn't adjust to new time zones as well as my sleep patterns. Picked up a little in the last half-hour after a toilet stop. Definitely a run which was mostly useful for building HTFU reserves. The American food has taken its toll - 2-3 kilos over par when I checked after the run. | ||
Saturday Jan 26 | ||
| Note | |
| (rest day) | ||
| This day essentially disappeared thanks to the Date Line.
I alluded in yesterday's entry to some somewhat irregular goings-on that had been known to happen in Louisiana politics. In the process of reading two local papers, the Times-Picayune and the somewhat more irreverent New Orleans Levee (slogan: "we don't hold anything back"), the scoreboard was one state Agriculture Commissioner who had just been re-indicted after an earlier raft of charges had been dropped, a New Orleans councillor who was appealing against his 3-year sentence for taking bribes, the Governor fined after pleading guilty to (fairly minor) campaign finance irregularities, former Governor Edwards seeking early release, an official of the previous mayor being indicted for alleged tax fraud (the third such official to suffer such a fate in recent months), a conservative Christian Senator (why does this always happen to conservative Christian politicians?) who got sprung emerging from a Canal Street brothel, the Orleans Parish District Attorney who got kicked sideways to another job after it turned out that a frend of his girlfriend's had used his place as a hideout after robbing a petrol station, and the local member of Congress who is currently facing trial after $90,000 in alleged bribe money was allegedly found in plastic bags in his freezer. (You may have noticed that Mayor Nagin is missing from this list: as far as I can tell he's honest but useless). LA Airport was even more of a dive than usual. New renovations will supposedly bring it up to a standard which wouldn't embarrass Bangladesh by 2010 or thereabouts. | ||
| C • Attorney General's hideouts 1 | ||
Friday Jan 25 | ||
| Run 2:10:00 [3] 28 km (4:39 / km) | |
| A nice note to finish the US trip on with a good long run, including an excellent second half. Headed out west again past Audubon Park, then picking up a bike path along the Mississippi River levee, which is paralleled by the unfortunately-named Leake Avenue (although this was the one levee that actually did its job). Got as far as Metairie, a place which had a couple of black marks against it - it was David Duke's electorate (he was the former KKK Grand Wizard who made something of an impact in local politics) and was mentioned in today's paper because of a new law which bans its motels from renting rooms by the hour (just as well I didn't pick that strip for my first night). Didn't see any of that in the riverside parklands. Turned around a bit before the Huey Long Bridge, named for another colourful Louisiana political identity of a somewhat earlier vintage. For a lot of the last quarter was in the floating mode where one becomes increasingly detached from one's surroundings, which can be a dangerous thing in a city. Tired a little in the last few minutes. Again a chilly wind.
A sign early on in the run announced that Governor Edwin Edwards had proclaimed the street a Drug Free Zone. (Former) Governor Edwards has the opportunity now to ask drug dealers whether they take any notice of such signs, in his current capacity as a guest of one of America's many fine federal correctional institutions. (A pre-Katrina New Orleans ritual was that, at 3 p.m. every Wednesday, with a jazz band playing to the assembled onlookers, someone would emerge on the steps of the Louisiana Supreme Court building to announce which politicians or other notable public identities had been indicted that week). The police may occupy nice buildings but they don't appear to be especially efficient. Yesterday's local paper gave an impressively detailed rundown of all the city's crimes of the day in a page of smallish print, everything from shootings (only one, and they missed) to purse snatchings, but there was only one entry under the 'Solved' heading. It's been an interesting week here in New Orleans. The city obviously has massive problems still, but it also has a great deal of character and it's not difficult to understand why so many people are determined to stay. And, to illustrate that we are two countries divided by a common language, I brought a poster along to the conference on behalf of somebody from the Queensland DPI (or whatever it calls itself these days) about wet-season rainfall forecasts for northern Australian graziers. Most people didn't understand what we were talking about - the word "grazier" doesn't exist in American English (over here they're ranchers). | ||
Thursday Jan 24 | ||
| Run 1:01:00 [3] 13 km (4:42 / km) | |
| Another session which showed more potential than it turned out to produce, although still a reasonable run. Steady rain throughout but not really enough to cause problems (although the local drainage system struggled to cope with what I would guess is 1mm/hour).
Headed to the French Quarter and then northwest - this area got bad reviews in my guidebook but seemed fine when we went through it on a bus yesterday, and was. This area flooded but now seems to have been reasonably fully restored, although there are still some signs of what has happened, like the (abandoned) school with the sign outside 'Dance 2 Sept' (presumably 2005, especially as 2 September 2005 was a Friday). | ||
Wednesday Jan 23 | ||
| Run 1:08:00 [3] 15 km (4:32 / km) | |
| Headed out west this morning into the Garden District, out along Magazine and back along St. Charles - didn't quite get as far as Audubon Park (will save that for a longer run on Friday). This is a (generally) quite wealthy area and wasn't badly affected by the floods, and has the feel of a reasonably normal community - most businesses are functioning, and the schools appear to be operating (unlike 80% of the city). A few of the side streets have a pothole density similar to rural Kazakhstan or the Boulevard in East Ivanhoe, but the locals tell me that was the case before 2005 so I won't blame it all on the hurricane.
The run felt very promising early on but didn't turn out as well as I'd hoped, felt a bit flat later. No sign of the foot twinge from yesterday but Achilles and calf a bit tight. Cool and misty. | ||
| C • Infrastructure renewals 2 | ||
| Run 41:00 [3] 9 km (4:33 / km) | |
| Headed in the same direction - west - as this morning, but this time along some of the back streets. Didn't always feel entirely comfortable in some of the places I was going, but that was probably more the feel of the area than any real threat. Even in this part of town, which didn't flood, there are a lot of abandoned buildings (both residential and commercial), some of which still have the markings you see more of in more hard-hit parts, showing who searched the building, on what date, and what they found (one wonders what state the animals were in in the house marked '9-30, SPCA, 2 CATS').
Felt reasonably good on the run - definitely better than this morning - despite a long day at the conference. Also spotted something I haven't seen anywhere else - an architecturally interesting police station (occupying one of the old mansions in the Garden District). | ||
Tuesday Jan 22 | ||
| Run intervals 39:00 [4] 9 km (4:20 / km) | |
| Had to improvise a bit on this one given the lack of good venues for an interval or fartlek session in the inner city - normally I'd search out a park but most of the parks here are fenced off and not open in the early morning (one indicator of the problems that exist here behind the scenes). Found a large enough patch of ground in Lafayette Square for three-quarters of a lap of it to be 1 minute, although I was a bit uncomfortable (given my NZ experiences three years ago) to be going hard around corners on recently-watered pavement.
10x1 min, 1 min recovery (doing the fourth side of the square). Not as good as the equivalent session last week with a hint of a stitch at times. Twinge in my left foot pushing off for the start of the third rep; got through the session OK but a little sore afterwards. Will need watching. With a conference in New Orleans, and specifically in the New Orleans Convention Center (which, as the 'Economist' memorably said, "became internationally infamous as a monument to misery"), it's difficult not to have Katrina at the back of one's mind, and there have been plenty of relevant talks to reinforce that. The most striking thing I've heard was that there was a fleet of 400 buses waiting to come in, but they couldn't - because legally someone had to be found to inspect the depth of their tyre treads before they could be used. | ||
Monday Jan 21 | ||
| Run 43:00 [3] 9 km (4:47 / km) | |
| Couldn't come to New Orleans without starting out through the French Quarter, which is as attractive as I thought it might be - the west end of Bourbon Street is tacky but the rest looks great. Very quiet at 7.30 in the morning; like Rod Laver Arena, Bourbon Street is somewhere where most people to be seen at sunrise are still finishing the night before. Finished by side-stepping grandstands being built for the Mardi Gras parade (only two weeks away, with Easter being so early).
The run was reasonably pleasant and smooth. Again a biting cold wind with temperatures just above freezing, but it should warm up from here. As expected, the conference is reasonably full-on (today's highlight being a couple of stand-up arguments in the tropical cyclones session). Tomorrow will be more full-on - if it were possible to do so I would be wanting to replicate myself 9 times for the 2.15 session, because that's how many places I want to be in simultaneously. | ||