Training Log Archive: jennycas

The water was almost as comfortable as my own bed this morning. Then spent far more of the day than I had intended on taking my parents to an open garden https://www.facebook.com/tickletank/ in Mt Barker and to the cemetery up there of course - and thereafter on some random back roads on a day when it was sometimes raining and 10 degrees outside, but they had a lovely time exploring via chauffeur.

This little piggy went for a run, rather full of cake from the boss' farewell. Actually felt bouncier than usual, because of either new shoes or too much sugar.

Slow plod to the redwoods, because I wanted to see the cherry blossom, but there wasn't very much - maybe the winter hasn't been cold enough up the hill either, like down on the plains where there wasn't enough (any) frost for our apple and pear trees in bud from last autumn, to properly burst into springtime flowering. Then I decided to go up the singletrack in search of forget-me-nots but these too were disappointingly non-prevalent in their usual valley. I did, however, nearly step on a bandicoot which hastily scooted away. Not sure which of us was more startled!

Legs a bit stiff from sitting at a desk all day, but this is my life now. Some slightly unsettling staffing news in terms of changes of management etc, so it was good to get out for some fresh air and sunlight - and humidity as it turned out, after last night's storms which meant the creek was still flowing.

Arms a bit stiff from holding on to the steering wheel for so much of yesterday.

Just a short jog along the bikepath to the national park visitors' centre, around their wetlands and back again. Then I decided to drive up & over the Mt Victory Road, so stopped for short walks at the lovely Grand Canyon and to Splitters' Falls - more water than I've previously seen in this creek system but then again, I've usually been to the Grampians in summer/autumn - plus the steep stairs down/up to/from Mackenzie Falls of course, before heading down to Zumsteins and out to the plains beyond, past Mt Zero. Lunched at Dimboola which is a town I've only once before been into (on a V-Line bus from Bendigo to Adelaide in 1995) because the highway bypasses it, thought about camping by the Wimmera River but I had no tent and need to be at work tomorrow, so sadly headed for home although Geoff did offer to come and meet me and bring camping gear...

First leg runner in a W45 team for SA with Patsy Burley and Sandra Afnan, and boy, was the mass start a schemozzle. With 200-odd teams packed tightly into the graveyard we were all looking at each other presuming that the start would be done row by row (i.e. each course a few seconds apart) but when the countdown began, it was clear that everyone would be taking off together. Which lasted all of about 30 seconds and then we came to a screeching halt in the bottleneck, because nearly 200 first-leg-runners cannot simultaneously race 150m down a narrow singletrack to the start triangle, and in fact there were kids getting tripped and falling in the crush. When the queue of people jogging on the spot finally began to move (probably not even a minute but it felt longer), not everyone even realised when they'd passed the actual start flag, and about 50% kept going on the singletrack all the way east to the road while the rest of us confusedly followed pink tapes through the green thicket until they spat us out in a vague flat area and we eventually bounced off the road anyway.

After this I had completely lost sight of any other W45s, not that I would have been able to keep up with the likes of Clare Hawthorne, Jenny Enderby and Jo Allison anyway. My foot wasn't super-happy and my navigation a bit scrappy but it didn't really matter since both of my team-mates were each anticipated to take more than an hour anyway. Had originally thought of leaving the arena at midday and driving straight home but figured it would be rude not to wait for Patsy and then Sandra to finish, and in any case tomorrow's a public holiday in SA so there's no sense of urgency.

Plus, I'd been awake for about 3 hours in the night and thought undertaking a 7-hour drive would be unwise, so instead I chatted some more to friends I hadn't seen for 2 1/2 years in some cases, before reluctantly leaving the event and heading for Halls Gap, where I got a room at the Mountain Grand which has definitely seen better days, and certainly it's a lot more rundown than when Geoff & I stayed here in the early 2000s, but for $100/night I'm not complaining unless there are bedbugs. And I had time for a couple of hours' wandering around to Venus Baths and Clematis Falls before sunset which is now an hour later than it was yesterday.