Training Log Archive: blairtrewin

Day 2 of the 3-day, on Hedley Dunes (WMOC final from last year). Expected today to be reasonably physical (tomorrow should be faster), and in the first few controls thought I might not be up to it; back was a bit on the edge and walked up the steeper dunes, of which there were a reasonable number in the first half. Got through without any mistakes, though (the one which Winsplits thinks I made at 4 was a route choice), and was in amongst the people 2 and 6 minutes ahead of me. Dropped a minute or so on 14, in a low-visibility flat area - a bit annoyed about this one - and then a bit of a slog along the coastal strip, which seems to have more junk around than it did last year (possibly the result of an April storm). Still, a reasonably steady run. 5 minutes down on Carsten, but the juniors but the times into more perspective with several going well into the 40s.

Perhaps today was more of a triumph for my weather forecasting than my orienteering, with the steady morning rain clearing out around 10 for a mostly dry race (although the vegetation was still wet of course). The eastern side of the island got it a lot worse than we did (reports are that eastern suburbs of Auckland got 70mm in 6 hours; I'd guess we got about 20). Tomorrow's forecast is for the rain to resume around lunchtime, hopefully in time for us to get our runs in before departing.

The double middle distance has become almost a thing of the past in my experience (the last one I can remember internationally was at WOC 2008 in the Czech Republic, a not-very-good idea which resulted in the last women starters finishing in semi-darkness), but they still exist in NZ, and this was one.

Today's event was on the map from the Oceania Long - sand dunes, but fairly big and often green and low visibility. It's a tough area and there weren't the track options there were at times at Oceania, so it was quite a challenge. Didn't feel as if I really nailed anything much (but most of it was 5-seconders worth of just not seeing controls), but managed to avoid disaster, with the major time losses being about a minute (perhaps a bit more) apiece at 5 and 8. At Oceania, after a hitherto decent run, I came horribly unstuck in the manuka section and thought after 8 (my first control in there) "here we go again", but it was OK after that (my splits in that section were still not as good as in the green early on, though).

Carsten did 29, Dennis Wakefield 33, Nick Harris was just ahead of me (not that I knew that until tonight - his start time must have been changed, probably as an organiser).

The format here was a reverse chasing start, which suggested plenty of pack potential (it means that if people replicated their morning runs, everyone would finish at the same time and the download queue would look like the Northwestern Motorway at 4.30ish yesterday afternoon). The M40s were pretty spread out in the morning after several big blowouts, but we were running the same course as the senior boys in the schools trial; their big field meant there would be plenty around me.

Felt like I was plodding for much of this, particularly on the long runs back and forth to 11-12 in the eastern part of the map, but must have been dragged along a bit by the general mayhem. The first few controls were on a tricky low-visibility section which went reasonably well, including the proud moment of the day when a pack of boys went through me at 3, then I hit 4 right on (my one split win of the day, as it turned out) and went back through all of them. It turned out I was actually in front at 6, but Carsten pulled away from me over the second half of the course as it opened out - about 45 seconds apiece on the two long legs. No time losses bigger than 10-15 seconds (at 2 and 8). Ended up about 2.40 behind him but in second place both in the afternoon and on combined time (just ahead of Nick) which I was pretty happy with.

We were pretty lucky with the weather; there's a big easterly storm but we were just too far south of it, and on the right side of the island to get some shelter, too. Kerikeri got 92mm in 10 hours; we would have got about 91.8 less than that.

Third leg of the trifecta - the 3-days in Woodhill. That starts tomorrow, but we flew in at lunchtime today. Jenny's suggestion was to do some sprint training at the University of Auckland, which sounded like a good idea to me (even if it did subsequently give us the dubious pleasures of Auckland's peak-hour traffic). Ran the course from the NZ Sprint Championships this year, at a fairly easy pace (at least that's my excuse for doing it 9 minutes slower than Cameron de L'Isle on the day), and managed not to flatten any students. Hard to read gaps on a home-printed version of the map, and managed to miss one.

Going to/from the map from our parking spot on the far side of the Domain. Wasn't feeling that great at the start but ended up OK, and handled the climb back better than I thought I would. Probably just a slightly mixed-up day schedule - flew into Melbourne at 10.30pm last night and out again at 7.45 this morning. (I stayed at the airport, but did take advantage of my car being parked there to swap some work clothes and papers for my orienteering shoes).

The annual Ivanhoe Labor quiz night happened this evening. For the first time in many years, I wasn't MC'ing, but my questions were there in my absence. For a sample, the "True or Fake News" round - without googling or Wikipediaing, which of the following statements are true and which are fake news?

1. 1980s Victorian Liberal MP Roger Shipton is the godfather of Van Halen singer David Lee Roth
2. England has lost more matches in the World Cup football finals than any other country
3. The sun still never sets on the British Empire
4. There is a street in Victoria called James Hird Drive
5. There were no bank robberies in Victoria in 2017
6. There were no fatal commercial passenger jet crashes anywhere in the world in 2017
7. Swaziland recently announced that it would change its name to iSwaziland as part of a deal with Apple to set up manufacturing in the country
8. Pamela Anderson got her first media coverage at birth by being one of the first babies born in Canada on the day of Canada’s centenary of Confederation
9. Donald Trump’s first encounter with the law came in 1963 when he was cautioned by New Jersey police for running an illegal bookmaking operation at high school
10. There are now more cows than sheep in New Zealand

Struggling this week - perhaps dehydration in the humidity, although today was a bit less humid? - and definitely in maintenance mode. At least back was in better shape today.

Today's spotting of out-of-place Australian clothes involved an Essendon beanie and a Maribyrnong Primary School T-shirt. A lot of clothes placed in Australian (and other Western) charity bins end up being sold in developing countries, something which is worth remembering the next time you hear the Peter Duttons of this world sounding off about refugees wearing designer labels.

The workshop finished up today and I'm heading home tonight (very briefly).

Realised after a few minutes this morning that it was going to be no good - had felt a bit on the edge yesterday so this didn't surprise me greatly. Still struggling to feel awake at 7am or thereabouts.

Today was the day of the workshop which didn't involve me quite so much, so I got things done like writing up (not especially flattering) reviews of a couple of papers. Slipped out of the dinner before the kava ceremony - apart from anything else, I don't know if kava contains anything on the WADA prohibited list (although I suspect not, otherwise Fijian rugby teams would fail drug tests en masse). Was sitting at dinner with a very large Fijian (even by local standards) and I remarked that he'd be hard to stop on the rugby field; he said he used to play "a bit". It wasn't until somewhat later in the conversation that I found out that "a bit" translated as being good enough to play for the ACT Under-21s (alongside Ricky Stuart) while he was studying at ANU in the 1980s.

And one of the workshop participants from Nauru goes by the name of Thorndon Captain Scotty. I would speculate that at least one of his parents had an interest in Star Trek. (Nauruans seem to find slightly unusual things to name their children after; I gather that numerous Nauruans of a certain age are named after Gary Ablett).

C • Names 1

Readjusting to the tropics, which was a bit of a shock to the system, and in the end just managed to hold it together for long enough for something which could respectably be called a "session". Enjoyed the exploration, though, taking in a small town/outer suburb of Nadi (largely dominated by people commuting to Nadi if the heavily laden buses - most of them several decades past their prime - and traffic jams on the road into Nadi were anything to go by), and a bit of the countryside beyond. Had thoughts of doing a loop but the relevant road on Google Maps turned out to be a farm track.

Lots of hellos/bulas from the locals, both adults and kids (not something you get much of at home these days). Lots of dogs too, but none were aggressive or even particularly inquisitive. Saw one local wearing the colours of the Greater Western Sydney Giants, which is one more than I've seen on the streets of Greater Western Sydney (not that I've spent an awful lot of time on the streets of Greater Western Sydney).

Spotted a real estate sign bearing the name of Swastika Investments. I'm guessing they aren't chasing the German market.

A reminder of the reason I'm here came in today's Fiji Times, which gave almost as much space to the effects of sea level rise (in two stories about a coastal village being flooded by high seas on the weekend, and the planned relocation of a coastal school) as it did to rugby.

Don't think I've previously done a flight like that - 5-ish hours, eastward, overnight. Not a combination that's conducive to sleep, and I only got a couple of hours of it.

With that I didn't think it would be the best of days for a run (and in any case it was pouring rain in the morning). Instead, I took to the hotel pool after workshop proceedings were over for the day. Hotel pools can be a bit dizzying but this one didn't work out too badly, although 80 laps gets a little hard to keep track of. It was getting dark and at times I had trouble holding a straight line.

Most of the workshop participants are from the Pacific but there are some UN people who are from all over the place. One I was talking with at afternoon coffee break (coffees were certainly welcome today) was from Pakistan. You'll probably be surprised to learn that it took as long as two or three minutes for the subject of conversation to turn to cricket, especially after their big win at Lord's.

The surrounding area looks at first glance as if it will be OK for running (apart from humidity); not too urban but not too rural (the problem with 'too rural' is that turning up in villages unannounced is frowned on in these parts, although not as much as it was 150 years ago when an unfortunate missionary ended up in the cooking pot). I'll find out more tomorrow.