Training Log Archive: blairtrewin

NSW Long Championships. Again a day when I struggled physically, particularly early on (had a bit of a sniffle in the morning, which might or might have been indicative). Big climbs in each of the first three legs (liked the 'here be dragons' label in the unfieldworked steep bit on the other side of the hill), but not so much after that. Blew a minute at 5, coming off the wrong part of a clearing, but otherwise reasonably clean (was feeling good about myself because I won the tricky downhill-into-green 7 amongst the M45s, at least until I found out that Krystal, running the same course, had taken 45 seconds out of that). Greg caught me 6 minutes at 10 and then dropped me on the downhill through 11, but I was feeling better at that stage than in the first half. About a par result for me by recent standards: Jock 64, Greg 68, Scott 70.

While I wasn't that happy with my runs physically, this was a great weekend. Hopefully a big event can come to this part of the world not too many years from now.

Long Hard 3 - Splits

Middle Hard 1 - Splits

Event: NSW Middle Distance Champs SL #3 / Long Distance Champs SL #4
 

NSW Middle at Mount Brown. I came a long way (and spent quite a lot of money) for this and the terrain was worth it - a granite area of substantial quality. There were few opportunities to relax, and plenty of tricky legs downhill into rock. The main disappointment from my perspective was my physical performance - I felt out of sorts throughout and had pretty limited energy for the hills; thought I was starting to get into it in mid-course but faded out again. The other disappointment was losing time on the second-last after an otherwise reasonably clean run; just to show that you can always find a new way to stuff up even after nearly 40 years in the sport, it was the first time that I've ever run a leg different to the one I was supposed to be running (reading 6-24 instead of 23-24). Fortunately it was a short leg so I only lost 1-1.5 minutes. (Perhaps it was contagious, because Toby went through me at 21 and then started heading for 2 instead of 22). Ended up 8th in M21A; Rob Bennett did 40.

Acting my age tomorrow. It's a pretty hot field, although Steve isn't well and only jogged today.

Noticed on the way to dinner (and a visiting appearance at the long and sometimes fractious ONSW AGM) that the former Pizza Hut, plundered by the odd junior camp back in the day, is now the tourist information centre.

My first orienteering trip to Armidale was a junior squad weekend in late 1991, ending my junior years with a memorable race against Grant, which he won by two seconds (as it turned out, a result which symbolised a changing of the guard). Not for the last time, it was a slightly misadventurous trip from Canberra to northern NSW (I imagine BA remembers...); my windscreen wipers failed and the garage in Singleton couldn't fix the substantive electrical problem in a hurry, but installed a bypass switch which meant that each time I wanted to turn the wipers on or off, I had to stop the car, open the bonnet and flick the switch. (Fortunately, it stopped raining an hour later and didn't do it again for the rest of the trip). Also remember spending quite a bit of time that weekend talking with a NSW M14 I hadn't previously come across, one David Shepherd.

I woke up to news of shallow fog in various bits of Melbourne but there was none in my part of town, which is good news when your plans involve outdoor pools. Nice in the water, and a fairly solid session, during the course of which I managed to get numerous thoughts straight about something I'm in the middle of writing (not that I managed to get that much written today thanks to an early departure).

Now on the way to Armidale from NSW Championships weekend. It was perhaps fitting that the last thing I did before leaving work was answer a query from Katie Doyle, because the last time I was in Armidale (2010 5-Days) I was spending quite a bit of time on the first day messaging back and forth with the Doyles as to what options they might have for getting around floodwaters. The connection time in Sydney has shrunk a little more than I'm comfortable with, although as the last flight of the night I'm guessing they'll hold the Armidale flight for connections (within reason). Wonder if I'll have to share the flight with any paparazzi?

IT fail of the day: it was reported that a website for searching the Irish electoral register doesn't allow for apostrophes in names.

Headed out with the intention of 90 minutes and headed northeast. About 30 minutes in, got a briefly sharp pain in my foot and thought I'd better not commit myself to getting too far from home in case it blew up (I'll get to see the new Rosanna bridge someday), and turned west instead. The foot stiffened a bit after a traffic light stop and I thought I'd better come in early, especially with races ahead on the weekend (by then the soreness, though not severe, had become a bit more generalised including the Achilles), but it seems to have pulled up OK afterwards. As the run goes, fairly typical of most recent days.

Does it count as industrial action if you leave at 5pm on a day when there's no specific reason to do so?

Out at Blackburn, a little later than I'd hoped because of the awfulness of Grange Road traffic (even at 6.45 am) - taking advantage of the opportunity provided by the fact that I was setting street-O there tonight. Blackburn is a very nice part of the world to run - both the creek valley in the western part of the suburb, and the lake reserve (and the bushy streets southwest of it) on the eastern side. Ideal running conditions too (coldest April morning for a few years). Despite all that, the run was a bit of a struggle most of the way, with such hills as there were being mostly hard work.

The event seemed to go OK from what I heard, although I had to leave before the end to get to an OA Board meeting. Will be interesting to see if anyone got the lot and if so how they went about it (there was one out-of-the-way control which was intended to force people into an early decision about whether or not they had any realistic chance of getting them all).

C • Blackburn 1

All Nations intervals but from a different start/finish point (off High Street) in the name of later-in-the-day logistics. A bit earlier than usual too, because of forthcoming media commitments, and didn't feel as lively as I did last week. Still a reasonable session, all things considered.

Warm-up and down. Took a while to get going but not too bad in the end.

Came in from this and promptly did a Radio National interview, from a slightly sweaty seat in my car (the ABC were obviously slightly misled because they described it as "crossing to Blair Trewin at the BoM headquarters in Melbourne").

C • How many interviews 4

Thought about trying to reintroduce the run/swim combination but didn't really feel like it this morning (and in any case was tight for time because of an earlyish interview, something I'll have again tomorrow), so headed for the pool after work - always feels a bit strange doing this in the dark. The swim was a bit up and down (figuratively speaking), but overall went off all right.

As for the rest of the day, it was best summed up by the moment when my phone went off with a call from one bit of the ABC when I was in the middle of talking to another bit of the ABC.