glad no offense, tpcb.....nothing more to report here.....very busy week (state championships, etc) so no time to get on the elliptical.....leg feels good, but I plan to give it more time......and treatment (bengay + heating pad).....maybe next week?....
AM walk to school 2k, bike commute to work
no rain,
can't complain...
yesterday PM: bike comute home
today:
AM bike commute to work
PM bike commute to work plus striders and exercise in the park
tomorrow: gotta half, we'll c how it goes
-370 days to The MOARG, The Mother Of All Running Gatherings, in Gimmelwald, Switzerland, in 2011.
In 5 daysm the one year countdown starts...
Ran in Oxford, Mississippi's inaugural half marathon this morning. Shaved 21 minutes (yes 21 minutes) off my previous half marathon time, which was the St. Jude in Memphis 2 years ago. This course was MUCH hillier than the memphis one too.
85 minute hilly trail run from home up over the McIvor Range.
2 weeks of no running behind me while in Tasmania- that's really going south.
We had a wonderful week on the Overland Track. This is a magical place in World Heritage areas.
I was very envious of the two young rangers we met. They have a job I would have loved back in my twenties. They work 8 days on 6 days off. They hike 4 days along the trail then 4 days back.
I shall give a day by day report on our adventure over the next few days.
Hey mopak, good to hear ya.
Re. being a Ranger at the dawn of 50s, maybe you could combine activities and take some of your subjects (if i have understood correctly what yo do) for therapeutic trailn walks. Isnt there some literature on these kind of activities "helping"? Not on all cases but in some...?
Anyway
Today: Roma Ostia half, just over 1h28. So as it wasn't anything i set my eyes on, i suppose i can call it 13 miles at MP -20s. Which is fine, as I finished strong and considering a very strong headwind in the last 2, i also finished pretty fluid and pain free.
As we all know, in a race, even if it is training the tendency is always to try to go faster. What really worked this Sunday, is that the instict to stay healthy prevailed big time. Ran in my Vibram FFs which performed just splendidly.
AM: 2k walk to school, bike commute to work. Some muscle soreness, biking is king!
PM: bike commute home
AM 4k walk school and back
a pair of moderate (3K-ish) walks over the weekend....no major isssues....come residual tightness, but mostly good.....still trying to do daily treatments of BG and heat.....got my eye on the weekend for a possible return......keeping fingers crossed....
today: unplanned rest day. gotta love it.
-366 days to The MOARG, The Mother Of All Running Gatherings, in Gimmelwald, Switzerland, in 2011.
AM:
7am 4k walk to in-laws and back for errand
8am 4k walk to school and back with kids
lunch 4.5k walk at the track with aduld group
-365 days, that's a year finally, to The MOARG, The Mother Of All Running Gatherings, in Gimmelwald, Switzerland, in 2011.
AM:
4K walk to school and back. Helped my buddy RobertoM change a punctured tire.
nothing substantial to report.....continuing treatment but still some residual tightness.....improving weather making me antsy......may try a short one this weekend.....keeping fingers crossed...
72 minutes recovery 9 miles.
early PM
diagonals on grass barefoot, about 22 "laps", which = 44 diagonals, a bit chilly, and then it poured.
Including some milf socializing and wu, about 55 mins total.
Have a good weekend.
A quick catchup. (My wife has assignments for Uni)
Monday and Wednesday were 80+ min mtn bike sessions. Tue and thu were 80+ min trail runs. Also paddled 40mins on the lake on wed.
Nothing on friday, today 90mins mtn bike through the forests and 80mins trail running.
Hoping to run the Harcourt Applefest 7k tomorrow morning.
Tasmanian trip.
Day one. Flew into Launceston then a long trip in a minibus to Cradle Mtn National Park. Went out for a packless hike in the late afternoon up to Marions Lookout.
This was a steady climb most of the way finishing with a section of pulling oneself from rock to rock with the assistance of a chain. Great view of Dove Lake, Crater Lake and Cradle Mountain.
Spent the night back at Waldheim huts, our last night with hot water and electricity.
We entertained ourselves with red wine and wombat, wallaby andpademelon spottingin the evenig.
Day two. The hike proper begins.
We headed out to Dove Lake and then started a steep and often narrow exposed climb up to Hansens Peak. This is on the opposite side of the lake to the main track.
At Hansens we reviewed our options. We'd already done some pack ferrying with the girls packs and from where we stoodthe track looked potentially more difficult.
We retraced our steps, a few bum slides included, back to Dove Lake. We then picked up the main track to Marions.
Linda was starting to struggle on the climbs. Much of this section is boardwalk steps (to protect delicate groundcover plants).
Greg and Gary had pudshed on to ward Marions. I decided to push ahead while Phil and the girls had a breather. I dropped my pack off at a junction 15mins uphill then ran back to meet them 10mins down the track. I then took Linda's pack and charged up to the junction. I left her pack there and took mine up past the chain section. Greg met me there having left his pack at the top. He took mine up while I scurried back and grabbed the other pack and headed back up. Gary came down and took Amy's pack up the chain section.
Eventually all of us and all our packs were up on top of Marions Lookout enjoying the stunning views of Dove Lake and Crater Lake and the peaks of Cradle Mountain while stuffing our faces with food.
From here it was a steady climb up to the Cradle plateau.
This area is treeless Alpine country. Views of Barn Bluff greeted us once we reached the plateau. The sun was hot and our water supplies pretty much spent. After an hour we reached Kitchen Hut, an old emergency shelter where the Cradle summit track meets the main tarck. Greg headed to the summit (a 90 min round trip). Gary was pretty much spent as were Phil, Amy and Linda. I went off through some rocky, scrubby terrain down the other side to a small tarn to fill the water bottles.
Phil and thegirls rehydrated and headed off while Gary and I waited for Greg. Our zoom lenses managed to pick up a tiny figure waving from the top of Cradle.
Once Greg got back we headed off to catch the other 3.
The terrain became extremely rough and rocky as we followed the Cradle Cirque. Plenty of streams to keep our water supplies up.
We caught up just before the track leaves the cirque and heads down to Waterfall Valley, our campsite for the night.
Half way down the track returns to the trees and in particular stands of Pandani, a wonderful local tree that looks a bit like a tall yucca.
We reached the hut at Waterfall around 5.30pm. We headed up behind the hut on a hill with a nice fast stream to pitch our tents.
The area was crowded with Benetts Wallabies and Pademelons (a stocky dark brown Tassie wallaby). Also spotted a few wombats.
Before bed we took our food to the hut to store it. We'd been warned that the possums and quolls sometimes rip open tents to access food.
Sure enough during the night a huge wombat sized possum woke me as he scavanged about the campsite. He just looked at me and I'm sure he smiled before wandering off.
to be continued...
Good'ay mopak!
Got quite a thrill from following your trip on googlemaps and imagining all the sherpa-ing you are sweating out. Good training for Gimmelwald, that's for sure. Honestly, I was missing your Flora&Fauna accounts.
today: kids athletics. Themes was "throws". Played a lot of variations on throw-and-fetch type drills; then obstacle course; tugofwar: few big athletes vs many small ones; then it was snack time, Merenda.
But i offered a last "loop" on the track as a treat to anybody who so desired because the session had gone so well. About 12 kids put their hands up. We ran single file in lane 3 for 300m controlled, and then as they wished both lanewise and speedwise for the last 100m. Then I asked again who wanted to have one more fun 400 before snacktime, and 7 kids stayed on. Again single file in lane 2 with some position switching in-lane for 300m and the final "free" 100 finish. Then it went like: have you had enough? 4 kids yelled: Noooo! And so we went around one last time, in lane 1 this time, in pairs, side by side, taking turns to lead until the last 100m sprint to snack. Two of the kids, stopped for maybe 5 seconds once they crossed the finish, and when I yelled "snack" (Merenda) they sprinted again. I think it helped on the 300m to run backwards facing them to chat and closely observe how they were running and reacting.
One Year -2 days to The MOARG, The Mother Of All Running Gatherings, in Gimmelwald, Switzerland, in 2011.
2k kids roadrace plus an easy 10K in 44mins
45mins on the windtrainer this morning, thunderstorms galore last 3 days.
Yesterday, an interrupted paddle on the lake, had to dash into shore and sit under a cliff for 40mins as some pretty hairy hail, wind, thunder and lightning came in across the lake. Finished with a flat out 20 min paddle into the wind and surfing across the chop. Finished the day with a 12.5km run in 56mins.
Tasmania continued...
From Waterfall Valley we hiked up through some forest then onto open buttongrass moorlands dotted with lakes. At a track junction we came across the packs of another group. 2 of the packs didn't have covers and despite being upside down the currawongs (a crow like bird)had opened the zips and pulled out some food. We tidied up the mess and rearranged the packs leacving them a note as to what had happened. The ranger had warned us that this often occurs.
High on the moors we could see our destination, Lake Windermere surrounded by pencil pine.
After a couple of downhill kms we reached the Windermere hut. We dumped our gear and headed down to the lake for a refreshing swim in it's cold waters.
About 30metres off shore was an island with a metal pot on a rock. We opened the pot to find a log book and a pen so signed our names -nice to see a previous visitor was Ian Thorpe.
We were first to the roomy hut so set down our bedding on the wooden platforms.
The night was spent chatting to people of various nationalities. Around the hut fearless pademelons and wallabies grazed.
As it got dark a huge brush tail possum wandered into our midst patrolling for food. He walked between 8 people barely bothering to glance at us.