Training Log Archive: blairtrewin

Staying at the right end of Vancouver this time so couldn't pass up an iconic Vancouver run - Stanley Park. Wouldn't normally do something this long the day after a race week but didn't want to miss the opportunity. Like my last visit, you couldn't really see the mountains, but now it's because of light rain and low cloud (a wind change on Thursday finally cleared out the smoke), which I think the locals are happy about. (They'll be happier if the rain gets to where the fires actually are, but it probably won't in useful quantities).

The run itself wasn't one of my best; a bit of hamstring soreness early (which first showed up in the final controls yesterday), and a bit of Achilles soreness late. Still, plugged away steadily on my longest training run for a while. A reasonable number of people out, although there would undoubtedly be more if the sun was shining (and slightly later in the day).

Headed for the airport after a late breakfast at the Granville Island markets, and am now waiting to head home (via Tokyo). Not sure if I've got a red flag in the system in Canada because every time I've gone through an airport here I've been "randomly" selected for extra searching - in Whitehorse they pulled my bag apart (although, being Canada, they were polite about it).

Canadian Middle Championships, equal 4th. Not a bad way to end the week (and vindicated my decision to pull out early yesterday, rather than push myself into the ground for a bad result and then probably not be able to run today).

Not the ideal preparation for this - I realised when we reached the event that I didn't have my passport (first time I've managed this in 30 years of independent travelling), and decided I'd go back to where I was staying to try to find it rather than have that hanging over me during the race. This mission was accomplished (it had fallen off the bedhead and was under the bed - no wonder I didn't notice it when I checked the room this morning), and I got back to the event site just about in time to do my normal 30-minute pre-race routine (and with enough running to and from the car to make it clear that I was feeling better than yesterday).

Once under way, it was a technical middle with lots of short legs in complex terrain, but the forest was more enjoyable than yesterday and it was a lot of fun. Hit the early controls well but made a silly 30-seconder at 5 (forgetting to look at my description and looking for a gully rather than a spur), and another 30 seconds at 8. Running strongly by my recent standards, though, and hit the flat vague controls at the end reasonably well. Ran hard at the finish in the hope of getting under 30; my watch said I did, the official results said I didn't (the start must have been a little out of sync), but the sprint - in as much as anything I do can be referred to as such - didn't go to waste because I ended up in a dead-heat for 4th. A bit under a minute to 3rd which might have been reachable with a clean run; 1st and 2nd definitely out of reach (Brent did 25).

So ended a fun week with a number of decent runs - just yesterday when it didn't work out - and a lot of interesting areas to be in. (One of the drawbacks of having an IOF responsibility for evaluating major event bids is you find yourself wanting to go to more events than anyone, with the possible exception of Annika Bjork, could possibly manage). On the way home now; Vancouver tonight, and then Melbourne via Tokyo tomorrow afternoon.

C • Always checked but... 1

COC Middle - C-9 - Splits

In the words of a legendary (in the ironic sense) AFL Grand Final pre-match singer, two out of three may not be bad, but five out of six has proven a bridge too far for me on this trip; for the third time of asking, I've failed to come up when attempting a fifth event, with the back playing up (and Achilles not great too). I knew by halfway to the second control that my prospects today were in similar shape to Malcolm Turnbull's career prospects, and with less at stake than on the other two occasions, decided it best to cut my losses early and maximise my chance of being able to come up for a decent run tomorrow (not an option which is available to Mr. Turnbull).

At the rate we're going, five out of six may also be an expression we can use to describe Liberal Party leadership spills in their current term of government.

COC Long - C-9b - Splits

Rest day in the NAOC/COC week today. The forecast was fairly ordinary so I didn't think it was worth going out to Kluane NP (in any case it's hard to get into the best of there without either a multi-day walk or a flight); instead we focused closer to home and a walk up Grey Mountain, the peak on the east side of Whitehorse. This tops out at around 1500m; the top of the road is at about 1300 so it was a reasonably straightforward walk. (The road itself needs a bit of clearance to get up it; the tank I've been driving this week may have the turning circle of the MV Malaspina, but it was useful here). Forecast today was pretty ordinary but the rain ended up holding off all day.

The planned exercise for today (other than spill-watching) was a swim, but the Whitehorse pool was closed for maintenance which scuttled that. Not sure where the nearest alternative is but Fairbanks is probably a reasonable guess.

NAOC sprint, 10th M45 about 3 minutes behind Brian May. A fairly disappointing run both physically and technically. Never really got myself going, having perhaps the run I expected to have yesterday after limited preparation (my warm-up was running to the start after a commentary stint). Achilles, which has been good this week, also a bit iffy at times. Navigation was pretty wayward too; dropped about 30 seconds after ending up on the wrong side of the buildings at 3, then had suboptimal routes to 4 and 6 as well. Still a good sprint area - they did a good job with what they had.

Carcross has also become a bit of a mountain biking mecca (Anna and Marquita did some exploring in the afternoon). A lot of this was built as part of an indigenous development project (as noted on the display in the town, building trails is part of the culture of the local people, situated as they were on the trade route between southeast Alaska and the peoples of the interior) - perhaps something we could learn from in Australia?

NAOC Sprint - C-6b - Splits

NAOC relays. Structure for this for the non-elite teams was a three-person relay in three different categories of which ours was the highest (although we would in fact have been eligible for both the others). I ran the third, longest, leg; Anna and Liggo ran first and second for 2.2km apiece.

Didn't have much of a warm-up after doing commentary early (especially once it became apparent that the leg times were short - Anna and Liggo did 16 apiece), but felt good in such warm-up as I had, a rarity of late. Went out in second but didn't expect to stay there, this leg being where a lot of the good elites not in the US or Canadian national teams ended up.

The course itself was in a ski/biathlon area, with lots of tracks which weaved around a bit, and generally slow forest in between, so the trick was to link the tracks and gaps between them in the most logical way. The first leg was quite long and Nick Barrable burned past me. The running side didn't go quite as well as it promised to beforehand (and there was a bit of a stumble on the start line when Liggo gave me the wrong map before correcting), but hit the controls OK with only one 15-seconder.

Turned around at the finish to see Timo Sild behind me - he'd given me 11 minutes' start and had made up 10 1/2 of them. (I'd actually thought he was in front of me, after seeing him out there and thinking he was on the way to 7 when he was actually on the way to 1). His first runner was Daniel Antonio Pereira from Hong Kong, whose name I remember for mispunching in all four events at a past JWOC. We ended up 5th; a team of the Falck Weber brothers and Annija Bjork won.

Relay - Expert 3 - Splits

North American Middle, 3rd. Made the most of a very technical course, with only one error of any size (about 1.5 minutes on 10) to get probably my best result this year. Wasn't running terribly fast, but this wasn't an area for it - rather it was an area for avoiding disaster, particularly on the flat and scary section from 4 to 9. Apart from 10, I was a little wobbly on the way to 1, but ended up hitting the control OK. Didn't run any of the steep hills, but I'm not sure if too many others did. Definitely a day for the navigator (although astonishingly Timo Sild did under 7 mins/km on this). About 2.30 off the lead - was actually in front before my mistake at 10 (it's been a long time since I've seen a red number against my name on Winsplits).

Very scenic arena with a backdrop of Lewes Lake and the mountains beyond that, although fine dust became more of a nuisance as the day went on.

Yesterday we were sharing a course with the M18s, today it was the W18s. I know the junior fields here are some way below full (North American) strength but the results were still a bit of a shock - fastest time in W18 was 110(!). By way of comparison, I'd probably expect to beat the current crop of Australian junior women in this type of terrain, but would expect at least some to get within a few minutes. (In less technical terrain, some do beat me at least some of the time - Asha gets me every now and again in Melbourne Bush-Os, for instance).

C • Strength 3

NAOC Middle & WRE - C-9 - Splits

NAOC long, 6th M45. Brent (on his home turf, although he hasn't run on this specific area) won with 51 but no-one else was under the high 50s.

Apart from the first control this was a pretty good run. I was wobbly on the first, having a bit of trouble getting into the map initially - didn't actually go too far off the line but had enough hesitations and pulling up short to drop a couple of minutes (according to the split comparisons I've done so far). From there, although I was still finding it hard to hold a bearing in the flatter regions (I wasn't the only person to notice that my compass had trouble settling, presumably due to the proximity of the magnetic pole), it didn't really cost me anything. There were a few controls in vague and greenish terrain (4, 9, 10) where I wasn't confident but was very pleased to hit a flag more or less right on. Also running reasonably well by recent standards, with no injury issues.

Quite a nice area to be in; good running on the higher ground but harder work in the softer lowlands. Reasonably happy with the outcome too, although getting edged out by Nick Duca by 30 seconds was a bit disappointing (we've been crossing paths for more than 20 years - having first met as co-commentators at JWOC 1996 in Romania).

NAOC Long & WRE - C-9b - Splits

Event: NAOC 2018
 

NAOC model event. As usual, a fairly casually-paced attempt to come to grips with the terrain - not so different in its landforms from some of what I've been in in Europe. Main take-home from this was that I'm more used to 2.5m contours in areas with this level of contour detail, so will need to get used to the idea that quite big features are represented with a single contour. Didn't feel great running, but that often happens in model events.

It's quite cool and dry here (although it's forecast to warm up), and it was quite a novelty to finish without being drenched with sweat. Summers are short here; it dropped to -4 in Haines Junction this morning (+3 in Whitehorse).

Walking through the streets of Skagway with my gear at 1am (the place I was staying was a bit over 1km from the dock), I did muse that travel puts you in some slightly oddball situations. It was a fairly quick turnaround, because I thought I was on the 7.30 train out of town. I wasn't - I got to the ticket office to pick up my tickets and saw that they had 12.30 printed on them. This actually worked out OK, as it meant I spent a few hours in Skagway instead of a few hours in Carcross (where I basically wouldn't have been able to leave the bus stop because of the NAOC sprint embargo), and they let me leave my pack at the ticket office. Just would have been nice to know ahead of time so I could have had a bit more sleep...(I probably wouldn't have tried to fit in a run anyway, with orienteering on 7 of the next 8 days).

Skagway, a town which got its start as the port for the late 1890s Klondike gold rush, has its character although it's hard to know how authentic the buildings actually are. Wasn't quite as overwhelmed as I thought it might be with three cruise ships in town. The train trip was scenic, and so was the connecting bus; I was by no means the only Australian here, sighting Liz and Bruce, the Meekings, Jones and Brownlie couples.

Wasn't quite the last of my transport-related misadventures, though - I'd booked to pick a car up from Whitehorse Airport, but have found out that whatever it says on the Budget website, the desk is only open to meet incoming flights. I'm currently sitting around the airport for a couple of hours waiting for the next one.