Afternoon into town

Decided to roll over and go back to sleep when the alarm went. Seemed to be pretty tired through the morning and after a massage and some errands grabbed a quick nap before lunch. Good to be on holidays!

After some self-conjoling managed to drag myself out the door a bit before 4pm into a bright and fairly warm afternoon. Rode into town via the Centenary Bike Path and Coro, turned around at the Botanical Gardens end of the Goodwill Bridge and back home again. Didn't push particularly hard, and seemed to catch every single set of lights at the worst possible time. 36.26km in just over 1:24 - would have been stopped a couple of minutes at least.

Still, glad I got out.

A tour of the NSW North Coast

Down to Kingscliff Sunday afternoon. Very easy drive - from our place, quick tour down to the Bogan, sorry Logan Motorway, right at the Pacific Motorway, through the brilliant Tugun Bypass and you're pretty much there. Highlight of the drive was the motorbike copper with the lidar as you went through the first of the tollgates - cruise control plus 60km/h on the GPS = me giving a smile and a wave as I glide past unmolested.

My mate and I hit the road at pretty much spot on 6:30am NSW time and basically rode down the Pacific Highway to Brunswick Heads, had coffee, and then rode back to Kingscliff. Only events of interest were a puncture to my back tyre (who the hell leaves brass staples by the side of the road?) and a self induced 3.9km induced penalty on the return journey as dumb-dumb here, who decided to finish on a bit of a time trial, for some reason decided to ride to Tweed Heads under the impression that it was Kingscliff. As I approached the Tweed River I realised my error, scooted over the roadside barrier and on to the footpath that lead back to Kingscliff.


Funny thing with the puncture - I was looking at the back tyre on Friday as I got the bike ready for Saturday morning and was concerned with the number of nicks in it, and just had a feeling I was going to cop a puncture today. Stupid thing is, the puncture had nothing to do with the nicks, none of which had penetrated the carcass of the tyre - that staple would have gotten into a new tyre and caused a flat anyway.

The ride was pretty even with a few gentle hills along the way (nothing really requiring getting out of the saddle, but you would on occasion just to vary the muscle workload), but quite noisy with a host of trucks and cars flashing past. Ended up doing just short of 100k in a bit under 3 1/2 hours, but to be honest I took it pretty easily, leading my mate most of the way - he's making a bit of a return after a bit of a work induced lull in training.



I'd also had a little fiddle with my seating position, bringing the seat forward a couple of millimetres as I'd felt like I was continuously edging forward into the front of the seat. Seemed to work pretty well, felt a bit more comfortable.

Good to be out somewhere different, and there certainly is excellent scenery with the mountains providing an excellent background. I'll get down there again in the new year - it would be good to do something different and get up into the hills (although I'll no doubt be singing a different tune afterwards).

A couple of guys from the Saturday group were planning to get out tomorrow morning at 6 - I'm hoping to get out and join them for a shortish ride.

I might try and get out for a run at some point before Xmas - I had my third physio session in a week which has helped free my back up quite a bit.

Short Saturday morning

Ah, 9 days in a row off! RDO Monday, and public holidays on Thursday and Friday meant taking Tuesday and Wednesday to give a full week off was a no-brainer, even over Christmas.

Have done nothing this week - combination of being busy and some back trouble, which two physio sessions have helped considerably. Oops - not the ideal lead in to Xmas.

That said, with the week off, have arranged to head down to Kingscliff on Sunday afternoon, stay overnight with friends and get out on the bike early Monday morning and do a bit of an epic. With that in mind, decided to keep it fairly short this morning, got up at 5, cycled to the start of the group ride (a bit over 14.5k), did the group ride of a bit over 21k in 39:02 (I was hoping for a time, but no-one went with me after Highgate Hill and I had to do the last 6.5k on my own! The bulk of which was into the wind!) and a pretty gentle cruise home of a bit over 26.5k to give about 58.2k in around 2 hours. Legs felt fresh throughout, but a week off and doing the group ride not having already done 40k or so helps, I guess.

Oh yeah, and the location's fixed - ta, David.

90k in the morning

Out the door at 4:20am for the usual Saturday activities - ride to meet a mate in Toowong, cruise around for an hour to the start of the group ride, do the group ride, have a coffee, cruise home. Total today was about 90k (good progression from last week) in a little over 3 hours, so the average speed was about half a km/h quicker than last week.

Group ride started from a slightly different place this morning as we went to the aid of a group member who had suffered a flat on the way to the start. So the ride was about 400 meters longer, but only took 2 seconds longer - 21.5km in 38:29, compared to 38:27 for 21.04, so the average speed was 0.6km/h higher, and I probably spent more time in front or leading today as the groups broke into two pretty early and I was the strongest of the second group.

Took Friday off as I was still pretty beaten up. I also weighed myself during the week and was pleased to see weight and body fat % moving in the right directions, albeit slowly.

Beating the storm home

Got home from work and managed to talk myself into getting into my bike gear and going for a ride. It was a warm afternoon in Brisbane with storms closing in from the south, but it looked like they were going to miss Centenary....

Headed west and followed the river about as closely as you can through the Centenary estate, joining the Centenary bike path at Jindalee. Rode into town, and along the river (well, as much as you can with part of the river walk being out of action at the moment in a stupendous piece of civil engineering) through the Botanical Gardens to the Storey Bridge, over to the Goodwill Bridge and back home.

From Toowong onwards it became apparent I was racing the storm home, and it got uglier, greener and more mottled as we went. It had just started with winds and big rain drops when I got home, and about 30 seconds after I got inside it started to rain heavily. Fortunately we missed the worst of it, but I've no doubt someone's getting smashed somewhere.

Still, 50k in a bit under two hours, so well worth the effort of getting out.

Tuesday and Wednesday

Got out for a spectacularly ordinary swim on Tuesday after work. Got some work to do on that front, oh yes. Won't tell you how far I swam or how long it took - far too embarrassing. Still, if memory serves the distance comes up pretty quickly if you keep at it.

Went for a run after work this evening - just a slow plod in the mid-afternoon heat (low to mid 30s - at least there was a breeze) basically up Sumner Road and through some parks and reserves in a hilarious failed attempt to follow the river north from the end of Sumner Road. I had visions of running for a bit longer but finding myself back on Sumner Road heading back home proved too tempting and I just did about 9.5k in just under 50 minutes. It's over 4 hours and a shower later and I'm still sweating.

Bike tomorrow. Probably. Depends on the weather.

Catch up

Quick catch up:
- took an easy week last week, the long ride and the run on Monday seeming to knock me around a bit (well, and probably the heat as well) plus we had a couple of things happening at home. My bike came back from warranty repairs on Thursday, so did about 5k or so doing a system check and a first pass at a set up.
- did about 80k or so on Saturday, including a new 1 minute or so PB for the Saturday group ride that felt pretty easy on my bike compared to the elderly Cannondale I had borrowed whilst mine was being repaired

After seeing the tracks set out in the '09 UBD (or Refidex as it's called up here) in the Mt Cootha Forest (the area west of Mt Cootha and south of the Enoggera Reservoir) I spent a fair chunk of Saturday afternoon wandering around Brookfield and surrounds picking out where the tracks met the main roads and marking points on the Garmin.

Took it easy on Sunday (had a few home tasks to catch up on), but today took advantange of my RDO (gotta love the nine day fortnight) to follow some of the trails.


Started at the Gap Creek Picnic Area and followed the Bellbird Trail to the Kokoda Trail which is very steep (almost can't get up due to lack of traction!) and comes out on the Sir Samuel Griffith Drive near the Channel 9 studios (you can see them at the top right above), then down the Highwood Road trail (I did turn around here and go to the Moggill Road trail, which was almost impassable due to the sheer number of trees brought down in November's storm). Back to the bottom of the Highwood Road trail, up Highwood Road to Gap Creek Road to the Quail Trail which brought me back to the Gap Creek Picnic Area.

Good fun - they're good quality trails, you could probably get a 4WD up them (although they would struggle on the really steep sections due to the slippery surfaces, and some of the bridges have been damaged in the storms). I'd like to check out the trails west of Gap Creek Road in the coming weeks, to get a further feel for the area and see what loops can be made up. The area's surprisingly tight (I was out for less than an hour) but with great variation in elevation and terrain, so a great asset for anyone wanting to dabble in some offroad stuff.

Senator Conroy's Internet Filter

I don't generally do politics, but this is one of the more oppressive and technically stupid proposals I've ever come across.

I actually think it's a ploy to keep Family First Senator Steven Fielding happy, but this can't be allowed to even be credibly evaluated.

Make your voice heard.

Run and a walk

Ended up taking Sunday off. It was warm and I couldn't be bothered - we're not playing for sheep stations here. Caught up with a few Coolrunners at Xmas drinks at Tuttle's place - good to meet some old friends, meet some new people and renew some old acquaintances.

Got out at about 3:30pm after work today (Monday) intending to do around an hour ten or so. Settled into 4:50 pace or so, no real spring in the legs but rolling along okay. Climbing hills was problematic. The sun was hot, but it was fine in the shade, air temp wasn't too bad and humidity was down on what we'd seen in recent days.

Ran up the Centenary Bike Path and along the path from Amazons Park that runs alongside the river, to the park in the middle of Sinnamon Park, looping around to return home.

It started to get a bit ordinary as I felt more fatigued and at 11.24k in 55:24 I just kind of wound down to a walk. I walked/jogged the rest of the course home (more walked) to end up covering 14.38km in 1:24:28. Guess Saturday took a bit more out of me than I realised. I also accept we're at the start of the come-back process, so there's no hurry to suddenly get out there and belt out 2 hours at 4:15 pace.

Massage tomorrow, and I'm thinking of commuting on the bike on Wednesday - we'll see what the weather holds...