Training Log: blairtrewin

Rest day from events, which was fortunate as my ankle was at 'could probably go out if I needed to' level (although it seems to have improved through the day, and was sort of OK when I tested it out briefly jogging in the pool car park after this session).

The plan for today was to spend some time searching archives at the Bureau's observing operations centre in Balcatta, then go for a swim somewhere on the way back to base. There appeared to be two options here - Balga was closest to the straight line, Terry Tyzack (in Inglewood) a bit further away, but I thought going to probably Perth's most disadvantaged suburb during school holidays might be asking for trouble and took the latter option. It still seems a pretty good facility even if the outdoor pool was closed for renovations and Tooms no longer runs it (and gets brownie points for having free lockers).

The swim turned out to be pretty good - felt stronger and smoother in the water than I have for a while. Moving through the water also seems to have helped the ankle a bit.

I returned 'home' to find that it was powerless (it seems the result of some misadventure down the street, listed as 'vehicle accident' on the Western Power website but looked more like a building site mishap), which was all the excuse we needed to spend much of the rest of the afternoon doing some additional exploration in the hills around instead (looks like we might have missed Aislinn at South Ledge by not very much). I haven't seen much of this area before, apart from Kalamunda itself and the Great Eastern Highway corridor.

Australian Relays at Peterdine on a part of the map even faster than yesterday. Got caught a bit off guard because Ricky ran at least 3-4 minutes faster than I was expecting on first leg (and then almost flattened Louise Fairfax at the changeover), and a long uphill first leg was perhaps a suboptimal start for my body too. Settled well navigationally and no time losses other than minor hesitations, but not fast enough for the terrain and got blown away at the front of the field (John Toomey was blowing me away as he passed me, too, but then promptly ran from 5 to 7). Jon was fastest leg time with 29 so about the same gap as yesterday.

We were running M35 (same course as M45), originally entered in the name of scoring more points for Victoria in a weaker class, but when we lost our third runner during the week it became a composite team. Geoff Powell (a Tasmanian M60) actually did a pretty good job on third leg (running 43) and saw us in second overall, which we got the awards for although I think we should have been unofficial.

Some soreness developed at the front of my right ankle between 1 and 2; came on quite sharply and then settled down in the next few minutes, but it's been sore to walk on during the afternoon. I'd be wondering if it would be OK to run on tomorrow if my plans for tomorrow actually involved any running.

C • Fastest leg time 5

Australian Middle Championships at Peterdine, 7th in M50. Probably a slightly better than average run for me at present although not fast enough to match it with Jon, Craig and Andy (all in the low 30s). Took a while to get properly into the map (the contours here are often vague and poorly defined which makes it harder), but got through the early stages with no significant errors and running a bit better than I have been (although the steeper hills were still a bit much to run). Craig (4 minutes) went through me at #9. Small misses at #14 and #15, probably 30 seconds or so apiece which cost me a couple of places in the end, but generally a solid day and one which I can hopefully build on later on (the forecast conditions for next Saturday may be something of a leveller).

It does seem a long time ago (and it is, 30 years to be precise) since I was doing kilometre rates here which started with a 4 (and still almost getting caught 4 minutes by Warren), although Joseph Lynch did manage it today. The Australian elite fields here are very thin - I think because so many people went to Europe this year they've used the money and/or time that might have got them to WA.

C • Holidays 25

Looking at end-of-month numbers I'm about 6 hours behind where I was at the same point in 2022. Probably won't make that up, with at least a couple of days out for a (routine) medical procedure in October and more trips in November and December. (The December one is to the probably less than optimal running environment of Dubai, although it would be a lot less optimal in July than it will be in December).

Middle C5 - Splits

Shaking out some cobwebs after the flight over from Melbourne on an old NavDash course that Jenny had found at Garvey Park, next to the river near the airport - basically flat, mix of open and bush patches with some detail from clay pits, and a map which was showing its age a bit (particularly with respect to small tracks). There were plenty of cobwebs to be shaken out but that was expected after a few hours sitting on the plane; cobwebs of a different sort were also encountered a number of times (which seemed a bit odd because in Victoria spider web encounters in the bush are mostly a late summer/early autumn thing).

The flight across was half-empty, although I have had emptier ones before flying to Perth on Grand Final Friday (in 2006, with the Eagles playing, there were 15 747s flying from Perth to Melbourne on the Friday which all had to go back again, and I flew on a 747 with about 30 people on it).

A fairly relaxed afternoon was spent visiting places such as Mundaring Weir, which I hadn't been to before. The statue of C.Y. O'Connor looks every bit the image of a Federation-era gentleman (with the voluminous moustache), although perhaps it isn't quite as archaic a look as I thought because there's someone with a similar look running for Mundaring council. The Mundaring pub had a sign with a long list of bikie gangs whose colours aren't allowed in, although the Hells Angels didn't seem to make the cut. (On a previous visit I recall seeing a local news article listing WA's bikie gangs and what they were allegedly up to, and one of them was described as 'having only one known member in WA', which rather raises the question of whether it's possible to have a one-person gang?).

C • Archaic councillors 1

C • NavDash course 4

Headed south with the aim of filling in some bits and pieces on the south side of Kew Junction. Again found the hills (and there are a few in this part of the world) pretty hard work, and don't think I'd completely recovered from a Killer Physio session last night. The long downhill coming back also set a few things off, but I made it home, not entirely convincingly. Off to Perth in the morning.

It's the first time for a while that I've done the tracks from the pipe bridge through to Willsmere. There were a couple of mountain bike peletons (one on a track I was on, one on one running parallel), which seemed a slightly perilous spot them but I guess you take the opportunities you can find in the inner city.

Today's chosen Wednesday destination was the block of Heidelberg (extending into Rosanna) north of my old place, pursued with the intention of progressing towards filling in the last remaining corner of map 31. Parts of this were back on very familiar territory, particularly the stretch along Hawdon Street from Rosanna which was the last seven minutes of many a 1998-2015 run (these days it's more like eight). In the light of yesterday's news, it was also perhaps fitting that my route took in a former level crossing.

This is reasonably hilly country (at least by comparison with home), with lots of short sharp climbs which are probably good preparation for orienteering. I didn't handle these as well as I would have hoped but at least that was a fitness thing rather than an injury thing.

My computer's calendar alerted me to a public holiday in the Cocos Islands. This reminded me of the Howard government's attempt to shorten the time allowed to enrol to vote after an election was called (with the aim of making it harder for young people to enrol), which came partially unstuck because the two working days allowed in the legislation didn't include days which were a public holiday anywhere in Australia, and one of the days in question was Flinders Island Show Day.

And the British Museum has asked for public help in recovering stolen artefacts. I imagine they may get some interesting responses from Greece and various parts of Africa.

Had some left hip soreness last night (riding seems to be a bit of a trigger for this) and wasn't quite sure what to expect here after a bit of a struggle of a warm-up, but actually ended up getting going nicely after the first rep (and even the first rep wasn't too bad) - first set of these I've got through in a few weeks. Getting under 60 by the end; the bone-dry surface helps (in what will probably be Melbourne's driest September on record, and almost certainly its driest July-September).

As noted previously here on numerous occasions, the dog-illegally-off-leash percentage is usually well north of 50 here, but I think this is the first time that I've seen it in three figures (with a reasonable sample size).

C • I complained to the council... 1

Warm-up and down. Hard going heading out, rather less so coming back.

Stories today about the efforts of the Trump team to get rid of potential evidence reminded me of the hapless late 1980s 'entrepeneur' from the WA Inc crowd, who managed to start a bushfire while trying to dispose of the company records. If I recall correctly they got 17 years - 3 for fraud and 14 for arson.