The compulsory faith-tester

At about the 5k point of the second lap I knew it was going to really, really suck. Problem was, there was still around two hours to go, I'd made an error just taking a bottle of sports drink and leaving the Camelbak in the car after the first lap and I suspected I was dehydrated...

It all started out well enough - met the leader of our Kokoda Challenge team at around 5am to start a pretty relaxed anticlockwise lap of the Pinnacles course at Gold Creek Reservoir. It was very humid at the start, and it seemed as if heat was radiating from the very earth itself. I was immediately sweaty on the initial climb.

The norwester was very strong along the top of the course, the leaf litter on the trails a testament to how strong the winds have been during the past week - if you're out on the Coo-tha or Brisbane Forest Trails in the next week, I'd be very wary of branches coming down - the breeze was just cooling, but was strong enough to prevent conversation as it blew threw the trees. There is plenty of scorched earth about after burning off in the past fortnight.

We got through the lap in comfortably under three hours. I said farewell to my training partner, dropped my Camelbak at the car and headed out to do an anticlockwise lap (basically the other way). I was strugging after the initial climb, and the legs were as dead as wood. I started wanting water rather than sports drink, and kicked myself for leaving the bladder behind.

At about 4k in saw my first snake for the season - I think it was a black snake, with a black back and around 3 metres long, but had really unusual side markings that were a really bright/yellow green. He was crossing the trail, draped almost completely crossing, and it was with mild interest he watched me run around the back of him.

Black snakes are pretty easy to deal with - just don't go near the pointy end.

It pretty much got worse from there and even the gentle jogs down hill became hard work. Funnily enough, the climbs weren't too bad but I suspect it was the complete lack of attack on my part doing that.

To give some perspective I finished the second lap about a minute quicker than I've walked it in. I was just grateful to get in the car and go.

On the plus side, I've knocked over a hard 54k in less than twenty four hours, so hopefully that'll cap off what I need for Glasshouse.

Cramming...

So begins the last weekend of serious effort before Glasshouse in a fortnight's time. With recovery from Kokoda taking a little longer than it probably needed to [:)] it's been the training equivalent of cramming before final exams.

After a physically hard week of work, which including a full day Wednesday, then backing up from 10pm to 4am packing up a job in Fortitude Valley, a day recovering (in total zombie mode) Thursday and then moving the office on Friday, it's been a weird few days.

Hit the Gold Creek Reservoir at around 3pm in warm conditions and pounded around the clockwise course, as opposed to the usual anticlockwise course we've been doing. I'm of the opinion that the clockwise version is harder than the clockwise, as the longer gentle downhill sections you get going anticlockwise aren't quite runnable (well, in my current state) and I think at my present level of fitness it's 5 to 7 minutes slower.

Pushed reasonably hard for a couple of minutes over 2 hours, which is about 10 minutes slower than my best going anticlockwise.

Pulled up okay, and heading out at sparrow's tomorrow morning to do 36.

Like I said, cramming...

Two wheel commute

As mentioned, no running/hiking today, 'just' the commute to and from work. Left at some ridiculous hour, covered the just over 30k distance in about 1:06 and felt reasonably decent. Roads are reasonably quiet at that time, mostly just buses and tradies, and everyone pretty much keeps to themselves. S'good.

The afternoons, however...gah. After a pretty physically tough day I gave up on alternative routes and just took Sandgate Road, which provided a rolling fest of trucks, buses, Mum's in 4WD's, utes, vans and so on. The added bonus was riding pretty much into a headwind the whole way and it was with much relief that I finally rolled into the driveway.

Still, 60k and 2+ hours on the bike - good base. Problem is, I've got to head out at about 9:30pm to go back to work for a few hours.

Hot Rep

Ducked into Chapel Hill Park, just off the Western Freeway, on the way home for a few 'experimental' shorter reps. Experimental for a few reasons:
- I'd not run there before, so had no idea of the surface condition. It was actually pretty decent, and not too hard despite a near complete absence of rain for a few months
- I had a feeling I could set up reps of around 400 metres in a straight line if I went diagonally across the three rugby/soccer grounds and cricket oval. Went pretty close, think around 360-370 metres
- I wasn't sure if I could get a little session before the soccer kids started practice. They were starting to mass as I left
- I'm not fit, so I knew there wouldn't be many reps, and they would suck.

I did a short warm up, and then four reps. The first and third reps were into a pretty strong wind, and were pretty ordinary, the second and fourth not so bad. Did a little cool down, and went home. Very warm conditions, around 35 according to the car, but at least the humidity was down.

My hip/back was pretty grumpy initially but seemed better after the session, and seems okay right now. Plan is to swap between longer reps up at Bielby Road and this session, and gently build the number of reps up, just to see how the back responds.

The cardio won't go astray in any event.

Tomorrow's challenge - commute across Brisbane by bicycle. Done it before, the tricky bit is working out how to get home without using Sandgate Road or Gympie/Lutwyche Road.

So - a bunch of stuff happened....

Been a lot happening on the home front, so that combined with laziness basically meant the blog fell to the backburner...and then down the back of the stove...where it sat for a while...and I knew it was there the whole time but never quite got around to fishing it out from there...and now I have...

Gah.

Okay - Kokoda was an interesting experience. As per what I put up at Coolrunning:

Yeah, pleased to have got home before the sun came up again! I reckon if I'd been solo, I'd have given 20 hours a big fright, but it's a team event and I think a certain spirit needs to be maintained. As I mentioned above my remaining team member (Claire, who could make a really good ultra-runner if she decided to - she should do around 6 hours at Six Foot if she decides to give it a go) and I made a big effort to help the two members of our 'adopted' team get to the end as a thank you for letting us join them at the environmental centre after the loop. I must admit I got a bit teary when Matt, who had really been struggling, put his hand on my shoulder to say thanks and that there was no way he'd have finished if we hadn't stayed with them.

Long and boring story follows...

We lost two of our team members, one at about midday and the other mid-evening. First to drop out at about 25k or so, our team leader, seemed to get really knocked about by the first couple of big climbs - very pale, and a lot sweatier than you'd have thought in the circumstances. She'd been diagnosed with very low iron levels during the week and said later she hadn't had a great week physically, so whether that was playing on her mind I don't know. She had certainly been doing the training and indeed had completed the event the previous year.

The second to drop out was her husband, mid-evening (at around 55-60km), had been battling with stomach issues for a while. He has had a bit of a battle with stomach dramas since the start of the year, but I suspect he may have made some nutritional errors, using a slightly diluted sports drink in his bladder pack (e.g. Camelback) rather than plain water with sports drink supplementing fluid intake - i.e. I think he may have been oversugared. You could probably make an argument he was underprepared - it had been a concern of mine that he hadn't done enough specific training, even though as a gym owner/fitness instructor he has excellent fitness/endurance and kicks my arse on a road bike.

We'd been on target for something around the 20-21 hour mark, and if it had just been the other girl and I, we would have done it, but you can't have two on a team out in the field, has to be a minimum of three (safety reasons - if something happens, one stays with the person in trouble while the other goes and gets help. Very sensible, and it is worth remembering the background to the event). We managed to join up with another team who had lost their team leader at the point where we lost our second team member, so there was the five of us.

These guys had a similar target but seemed to get slower as the event wore on - suspect they were probably a bit underdone for the time they were targetting. Over the last stage one guy in particular started to get into a bit of strife and we think vomited a couple of times, so we were in a position where we were trying to keep them moving, and also keep on eye on him. He seemed to come good over the last hour or so, and they were very grateful for the assistance.

So, the remaining team member and I finished feeling very strong, indeed I think could have done another 20 or 30 after the finish. I had a couple of wobbly moments out there (as you will over 23 hours!) - the hills were quite a bit steeper and longer than I expected (the first two were a real "holy crap, what have I got myself into?!?"), and I had a moment around mid-race distance between the hall and the environmental centre where I didn't think I could make it to the top of one hill, and felt like I couldn't do another if I'd had to, and another stint at around 3 in the morning where I was almost asleep on my feet and felt quite light headed - took a punt that it was lowish blood sugar, had a muesli bar and was as good as gold almost immediately.

Great experience, though, and a very well run event for a very worth cause. Worth a look for someone looking to dabble in ultras (ahem, uh, yeah...).

Dunno how people can be out there for over 36 hours, though - frak me, that is a long time to be out there. I really didn't want to see the dawn again while we were still on the track. The night does seem to pass quickly, though - I reckon after going all day, the night goes quickly because your world is limited to the extent of your headlamp and there's much less visual information to process. There were some stunning views of the entire Gold Coast suburban strip lit up, though.

So, that was that. The pain in my foot turned out to be strained extensor ligaments, and that took a couple of weeks to come good.

So, next event is the Glasshouse 50k on September 12. I feel underprepared, although I did manage to get a couple of laps of the 18k Pinnacles course at Gold Creek Reservoir, Brookfield in last Thursday and Saturday (including cycling the 40k round trip on Saturday) plus another 14k hike/jog from Gold Creek Reservoir up to Mt Nebo Rd to the lookout, and back via Hell Hole Break (which includes a horrific climb up out of the river...).

Felt a little beaten up today so have given myself a day off. I'll endeavour to get up to the trails, possibly at Bielby Road, Kenmore Hills, and belt out some longer reps. Tried it last week and it seemed to free up some speed without too much drama for my back. Planning to commute to work (about 30k) on the bike on Wednesday, which gives some good impact-free endurance background, and possibly a lap of Pinnacles on Thursday evening. Planning 8k on Saturday (wil probably ride with my cycling group on Saturday morning) and a 36k hike/run (probably two laps of Pinnacles, one clockwise one anticlockwise) as a final smash up ahead of Glasshouse.

I should come clean now and admit a few things:
- my road running career is probably over. I'm finding that if I run more than twice in three days it is murder on my back, and I get bad referred pain into my right hip. I could probably get away with the odd road event here and there, but there's no way I could withstand ongoing road training
- I'm really loving the trail running
- I can feel the lure of ultras calling me (curse you Blue Dog!)

I have a few targets for 2010 - a return to Six Foot Track, the Glasshouse May 80k event, and a 100km TBA. I probably won't be fast, but I must admit the race element isn't particularly important at the moment - it's more about getting out there and taking on challenges.