Training Log Archive: blairtrewin

Felt pretty drained yesterday afternoon after the run, considering it was some way short of an elite long distance. While I hadn't noticed anything in the sickness department, Mum thought I sounded croaky when we spoke yesterday morning, and mums are always right about these things, aren't they?

Whatever the cause, I had the sense when I got up this morning that it wasn't going to be a great running morning, and settled for something on the flat (I'd originally had thoughts today of taking to the hillier country up past the UN headquarters). Was still pretty awful.

The Spanish heatwave really got down to business today - as the tweet about Seville's 44.8 (a September record by more than 2 degrees) said, "record anterior pulverizado". I'm not too upset that it's not going to find its way here, although high 20s (as it has been every day in Geneva up until today, and will be again later this week) is still warm for this time of year.

Event: 6. Nationaler Langdistanz / Jugendcup
 

I'd had a few options this weekend (particularly as Geneva is a hub for Easyjet, which means it has a lot of flights to southern European destinations). One I seriously considered, if only because I haven't orienteered in Spain before, was a weekend based in Malaga, but perhaps it's as well I gave that one a miss - away from the immediate coastal fringe it was over 40 both days of the weekend.

Swiss national event at Irchel near Winterthur, an area which I'd thought of as classic Swiss Mittelland terrain but in fact had a bit more interest to it, particularly in areas where rocks had fallen off the slopes, but it was still basically continental - a plateau on top with slopes off the side which ranged from moderate to OMG!

First leg accounted for nearly a quarter of the course (in distance at least) - seemed to be basically a transport leg which didn't seem to have much route choice (at least to me), but a good way to get into things after not always feeling great in the warm-up. Into fairly steep stuff then for a few controls before flattening out again. Then it was a plunge into the steeper stuff - I thought I'd taken a route to 11 which would miss the very worst of this, but there were still sections of it where the only way I could find down was to slide on my backside. (I think to be good at going down the really steep hills you need to start out as a fearless teenager). Unsurprisingly I lost a couple of minutes on this leg (relative to my standard % behind the fastest on the other legs). Finished off with a leg back over the hill where I at least got the route choice right.

Reasonably happy with my navigation (only two non-spikes were where I ran to another flag on the way through being not 100% sure where I was, not more than 15 seconds apiece). Couldn't run the steeper climbs but reasonable in the terrain otherwise (certainly better than Sweden), just couldn't handle the extreme stuff. A couple of former national team runners were up the top with Daniel Hotz doing 52.

Slept through my alarm this morning (first time I can remember doing this) so went out sooner after getting out of bed than I normally would. Perhaps it wasn't surprising that I wasn't very awake for this run and only in the later stages did it start to feel reasonable, although one positive was handling the climb through the old town without too much trouble. I'll have plenty of hills to handle tomorrow so it's encouraging to see some evidence of still being able to function on them.

The rest of the day was devoted to travelling to tomorrow's event area (near Winterthur) via an indirect route with the principal purpose of looking at mountains - Geneva-Brig-Andermatt-Zurich. Some of this was unexplored territory for me (Andermatt and the valley downstream from there), some of it was taking me back to the scene of the 1994 World University Championships (Fiesch, which we successfully ate out of bananas) and the notorious 1996 World Cup race (Leuk). There were plenty of paragliders out at Fiesch - I think it's a local claim to fame because the opening ceremony flag at WUOC 1994 was delivered by one. That opening ceremony had a few flag-related issues, because they gave us New Zealand's flag to march behind, and somewhat more undiplomatically, gave China Taiwan's.

I didn't take any pictures of the Rhone Glacier in 1994 so I wouldn't have been able to tell you how far it's retreated now even if I'd been able to see it from the train. I think this was the glacier which was involved in the story a couple of years ago about the village which had prayed in the 17th century or thereabouts for the then-advancing glacier not to destroy their town, and have now written to the Pope formally asking for their prayer to be rescinded.

One of the less attractive features spotted was a kilometres-long traffic jam at the entrance to the Gotthard Tunnel, something which I gather is a regular occurrence (especially on weekends). I was glad to be on the train. The Swiss transport system didn't quite live up to its clockwork reputation (five of seven legs were late, and one section was replaced by a bus because of a derailment which, if I understand the local paper correctly, involved a runaway train with no driver), but I made every connection, finishing up with a 6pm Saturday bus which you might have expected to be quiet but instead was full to bursting point with kids on their way home from what I presume was a sport event of some description (don't think it was today's orienteering, although I could be wrong).

C • Public transport 4

C • We drove thru the Gotthard 3

As long-time readers will know I've never been a particular fan of the Piscine de Varembe - too many people and too high a proportion of those people who have a substantial sense of entitlement (rather like Kew in that respect). It reached new heights (or possibly depths) this morning in the form of someone, probably one of Geneva's Masters of the Universe during the day, whose way of sending a get-out-of-the-f***ing-way message to those who were slower than he was was to go straight over the top of them. At home I'd probably have had words with those supervising, but I'm not on home turf here.

Assuming the weather's good (and it looks like it will be), the lake looks a much better option for this time next week. I went down this evening and wasn't exactly the only one there (the over-water climbing wall was a particular hit), but it should be good in the mornings.

C • Time for tood old fashioned Australian squirrel grip? 1

Never much pace in this but a reasonably solid morning's work. Headed out initially to the Le Lignon footbridge (after a couple of false starts finding my way down to it), then on tracks along the river for a while before climbing back out - nice to see the forest in its summer mode (although it wouldn't be so nice to run through). Got a bit confused coming back because I'd come out of the valley a bit earlier than I originally planned and didn't see a main road I was expecting to see (turns out it goes through a tunnel which I'd gone over the top of), but eventually relocated. By then I was running later than I'd planned and headed straight back into the city along a main road before finishing up along the lake.

Felt better starting than I have on other days this week; started to lack energy in the last 20 minutes which may have been through not drinking en route (not as easy to get water mid-run here as it is at home). Longest I've done since June.

Early start because of an early media interview, for what's become a standard set of intervals along the lake. Was never very awake and never got very fast, but at least nothing went bang so that's progress of a sort.

Warm-up and down. Definitely needed the former.

One of the local papers had a headline the other day "Les escapades genevoises de John Kerry". I'm not sure if this is a historical overview of his soon-to-be-completed term (the best-known local bit of which was his breaking a leg in a bike crash) or if he's been up to something new. I also suspect that the Geneva papers have reporters regularly on the lookout for Significant International People getting involved in nightclub incidents or turning up in houses of ill repute (although those more familiar with such scenes than I am say that most of Geneva's clubbing actually happens in Lausanne).

(Another headline today made reference to "La Guerre Fiscale", which I presume is a reference to Apple - a rather bizarre situation where the EU has said that Apple owes Ireland 13 billion euros in back taxes and the Irish government has said they don't want it).

Steady but unspectacular effort along the Lake Geneva shoreline, partly in the name of a fact-finding mission - to be specific, the facilities/hours at the various shoreline aquatic facilities (it hasn't exactly been outdoor swimming weather on my previous visits here but I'll probably go in at some stage this time). Certainly felt better than my previous run of comparable length, and continuing to feel as if I'm settling in. A bit less humid than yesterday.

Did a certain amount of sprinkler-dodging on this run; there's only been 5mm of rain in the last 3 1/2 weeks (and none in the last 10 days) and there's a definite yellowing tinge to unwatered areas of grass. There's somewhat less concern about wasting water here than we're used to at home, which manifests itself as a lot of water being sprayed over concrete paths rather than the grass.

C • Lake Geneva shoreline.. 8

C • water waste 2