Training Log Archive: jennycas

Event: BendiGo ToDay (Boot Hill)
 

Left home before 0730, picked up Toby then Wataru/Remi from Bridgewater, next stop Keith Bakery - we left there just before Simon/Leith (sadly no Bridget) arrived, but both carloads met up at the IGA in Nhill and continued across to St Arnaud through the rain, which had provided our garden at home with 12 mm overnight :) Seemed drier at our destination, although quite humid when we all went for a spiderwebby jog around Neil's fun little goldmining map next to the cemetery in Tarnagulla, getting confused by which basins do or don't currently have water in them compared to how it was when they were mapped...

BendiGo ToDay bush sprint, assembling approximately 3 km down the road from our accommodation at the Dunolly Golden Triangle Motel. Another new map from Neil, and enlarged to 1:3 000 the features came up pretty fast, although I myself was not fast as my ankle was really protesting all the rocks hidden underfoot in the long grass. Enjoyed this, although it gives you an idea of my decrepitude when the winning boys were 17 min faster than me!

Also not fast was the service at the pub where a group of us went for sociable dinner - we'd all ordered by 8:30, being aware that the kitchen closed at 9pm but in fact our meals didn't come out until about 9:30...and I was somewhat perturbed to find that my 'lamb' cutlets came crumbed and fried (I don't even like mutton but lamb cutlets on a bed of risotto weren't bad from the Italian restaurant near us the other week, so I foolishly thought I'd try them tonight); apparently this is normal fare in a country pub?

C • Lamb Cutlets 4

Sprint A 3.0 km and 10 km - Splits

Final race in what's been a really fun sprint series, and Bridget arranged fabulous prizes and created a really good atmosphere each week - the random draw prizes were truly random items, and the series prizes were truly excellent. Knew tonight that all I had to do to wrap up women's vets was not to mispunch; could quite easily have done that when there were two controls on different trees not much more than 20m apart but thankfully I have been trained to check my codes. Felt rather sluggish running and it was quite humid so my ankle tape sweated off in no time, but when I was on a solid concrete path I did try to run harder even though I knew that Fern had already handicapped herself by going the wrong direction out of the start :(

Still undecided about whether to come last in elites or try to get a good result in W40 at SSW, but that's not a decision I need to make until Sunday night. The other decision I will now need to make is which of the (shorter) distances to enter for Five Peaks, since my series prize was a free race entry from Trail Running SA!

C • SSW 10

Sweaty sociable jog along the creek with Zara to Long Gully and return, with plenty of strategic stops at taps and blackberry thickets.

Not a good sleeping night but it was an ok swimming morning.

These were designed as sprintervals with group mass starts but on such a hot evening I just jogged around the lot in sequence - not sure that there was any physiological benefit in doing so but there was hopefully no further harm to my knee and it was mentally still interesting.

Suburban shuffle after a Killer Massage and so that I didn't stiffen up too much while sitting in OSA council meeting later on. To add interest to suburbia, grabbed an Oaklands Park street O map which turned out to be so old that it's from back when the wetlands were still the driving school where I got my P's...and ISSprOM hadn't been invented yet (nor even ISSOM 2007). I stopped to watch the birds on the water, a bunch of plovers were kicking up a fuss flying around and bothering what I think may have been a Nankeen night heron, so that was an exciting sighting (although my bird book does say that the juvenile Nankeens can be confused with Australasian Bitterns, and both of these are on the list of birds which have been sighted at Oaklands Wetlands).

Kinda miss the multistorey Meccano set pedestrian trainline overpass at Marion Station as the new underpass while totally functional lacks the original housing-trust grunge factor. Admittedly, halfway up was always a really annoying place to have a control especially if your planned route didn't include crossing over the railway. And TBH, there's no way in any of the mapping specifications to have shown the elevated zigzag ramp.

In other news, finally got around to getting new passport photos today, first step to renewing my passport which has been expired for nearly 3 years. The photos are decidedly unflattering though, make me look as though I've done a long-haul flight already! Still, don't think this is any excuse for AP thinking that I am so old that the ads alongside my log are advertising Sneeze Weez Absorbant (sic) Underwear :(

Gentle sunset plod along the creek in Sheps, trying to avoid either ups or downs because my tender knee had protested having been made to do so much ascent and descent on the weekend (it hadn't appreciated the bit where I slipped when trying to get in and out of a dry creek channel either).
Then went home to Ice, Ice, Baby.

Hmm, woke up at 0730 but managed to be only 10 min late to Bridgie which was fine because with a big group there's always someone in the toilet until about 0820...everyone headed out via Ambulance Rd towards Beaumont Rd (was nice to chat to Meredith and she was very understanding about how my mum's evolving/undiagnosed dementia means she can't read maps any more) and then, while I was tempted by the left turn option of Tanamerah/Gum Flat route, figured there was no shortcut if my knee gave out, and so a few of us turned right and from Verdun went up Silver Rd and back via the waterhole on Cox Creek then we continued further upstream from Bridgewater Oval until we met the others coming back, so that Liv's friend Laura could do 11km.