Murray Man

So Murray Man has come and gone! What an epic event. The organisation was flawless, hands down the best event that I have ever been involved in! The course was amazing, the volunteers were awesome, everything worked like clockwork and the competitors were super friendly. The whole vibe of the event was so good!
At the finish line there was a competitors "finish area". This was so rad, it had ice baths, blow up couches, massage, delicious endless food including brownies, fruit, icecream endless drinks etc and also the well used medical tent :-)
Onto the event. I love events like this where it become a road trip and weekend away. It meant that Kate and I finally got away together. We drove up on the Saturday morning. The drive takes you north of Adelaide, throug some very arid looking regions and into the riverland. The drive is about 250kms and you get to see some amazing scenery including vast arid planes, productive farming land and the beautiful Murray River.
The race was held on Lake Bonny in Barmera, but we stayed in Berri, at the main hotel there which happened to be a sponsor and held an info night the night before. The hotel looks totally like a highway 66 budget motel, but the rooms were great. Once we had signed into the race and dropped the bikes in transition, kate knuckled down to study and I wandered the streets of Berri......wow, country towns are DEAD on weekends. It was say 3pm and nothing was open. You could have shot a gun down any road and the bullet would have dropped to the ground before it hit anything. Funnily I was trying to find somewhere to get dinner so I asked some locals..and they had no idea where you could get take out pizza or anything after say lunch time at that. LOL. Don't think I could live in Berri.
Sunday morning came by. Alarms set for 5am allowing me to smash a good coffee and a bowl of museli before we headed to the transition zone in Barmera, a 15 min drive away. The temp was stark in contrast to the day before. Sat was low 30's, sun morning was 9! Needless to say it was chilly in the transition zone! Kate didn't want to take her shoes off until the absolute last minute.
We did get to the transition zone pretty early, but it gave us a lot of time to familiarise ourselves with everything and to organise our gear without rushing (just the way I like it). Anyways the race finally neared, we wandered to the start line and had a quick swim to get acclimatised. Next thing we're lining up to start, a quick hug and kiss to kate and then we were off. The swim was beautiful, the lake was an amazing temp and I felt good. In the end the 2km swim was 34 mins. Pretty stoked.
I was feeling great out of the water and set into a steady ride. The course was beautiful. Long the shores of Lake Bonney, 10km out, 10km back. Unfortunately the back leg was slightly more uphill, and into a decent headwind. Funnily enough, everyone was smashing me with the wind, but I was smashing everyone into it? Strange. It must be all the hill climbing!
Being broken into 4 20km loops, the ride actually felt like it went pretty quick. Nex thing onto the run. Another decent transition, and off for 20kms. The run comprised of 4x5 km laps. This was a really great way to structure the run, once again mentally helping as 5kms is easy right....and I only have to do it 4 times. In the end I was stoked, after needing a toilet break at the end of lap one, I progressively got faster finishing my last lap with an avg pace of 4:24 min/km, placing me 2nd for the run in my age group.
Feeling strong I passed Kate at the end of her first run lap, she was in suffer town and I felt pretty bad for her, but kudos to her she stuck it out.
I ended up crossing the line in 4hrs29mins, and then proceeded to chill out in the race finisher zone, munching some nice food, soaking up some rays and getting a massage. Not to mention meeting some rad crew and hearing some crazy race and training stories.

Kate ended up crossing the line in 6hrs 9mins with a lot of encouragement. She was pooched to say the least. So proud of her.
Now we headed quickly back to Berri for a freshen up in our late checkout hotel room, the shower was amazing. Smashed a coffee and some food and then embarked on the 2.5hr drive home, which was surprisingly good seeming I just did a long distance triathlon. What an amazing weekend. It has filled me with enthusiasm to ramp up my Iron Man training and maybe get a proper TT frame :-)

Colleen's Masters Swim Club

Loving the swimming at the moment. Masters swim club, 5:30am at Immanuel College. 1.5 hrs and 4.2kms later I'm suitably thrashed to start the day. Lifes too short to not push it as hard as you can!

My trusty BMC

I've put a lot of kms on my trusty companion :-) one of my favourite rides being the triple crown in Vancouver. So stoked I did that ride while I was there! Now she has been relegated toy wet weather training and commuting bike, but I still love her. After all she saves me the most cash and I also probable do the most kms on her too.

I can't believe.....

....that I have ended up in the same place again a year down the track! One year ago give or take I recovered from achilles tendonitis. Since then I managed another marathon and have been very smart about not pushing running too fast and easing into higher training loads. 

Anyways, now, literally a week after signing up for IronMan and forking out a good part of 1k for that race entry, my achilles flared up. Now I forsee a good few months of recovery and easing back into running. So lame and disappointing given all the hard work put into preparing myself to be in a good position to start Iron Man training. Oh well. Shit happens and now it'll be a challenge to try and get back on board for Murray man in November and Iron Man in March. :-(

It's funny how shit just flips upside down!

Colleen's Masters Group

When we first moved to Plympton I was struggling because I was in a routine of swimming at Norwood pool. I stressed out that I wouldn't find another pool to use, and hence my swimming would really drop off. Then I discovered Unley Swimming Centre. The most beautiful 50m pool, outdoors, just nestled into Forestville. Sweet, I hit this up for a few months and it was perfect as it was located right on my way to work.
Then I discovered that it is closed over winter :-( I just assumed that being hot old Adelaide it would be open all year, I mean Kitsilano Pool in Vancouver was colder at 5 in the morning in summer than Adelaide is here in winter...I thought, until this winter when I realised Adelaide is bloody freezing and that I would have absolutely no interest in swimming outdoors.
Anyways, I started moping about once Unley Pool closed as I figured I wouldn't be swimming all winter. Then I found iSwim at Immanuel College. A beautiful indoors 25m lap pool. I initially thought 25m pools were lame, but in winter beggars can't be choosers, and I have realised that you just do your training differently. More drills, more shorter high intensity stuff, and it forces you to learn to tumble turn :-)
Anyways, after swimming here for a while I discovered Colleen's Masters Group. A set training 3 days a week at 5:30, that is super similar to the fastlane sessions that I used to go to in Vancouver. It pushes me a lot and I can see I'm going to improve on my swimming quite significantly by swimming at these sessions. There's nothing like getting 4km in the pool done before work to make you hungry all day thats for sure!

Murray Man Half Iron Man

Days after signing up for Iron Man Melbourne, my lovely wife, Kate, tells me that she is also going to do Iron Man. Yeah right. She hates swimming and hasn't tried to swim laps for a long time.
Anyways, a few days later she is still going on about it and has decided that she's going to do Murray Man. I say OK, but you gotta get in the pool first. We head down after work one day and I take her through a drills session at Immanuel College. She smashes out a good hour session.
We hit another swimming session and a few bike rides and she's killing it. Anyways, a week later I'm convinced that she is pretty keen, but expect a bit more training before making a decision. So, I fall asleep one night, totally pooched from training, and wake up to an email that she has signed up for Murray Man after I fell asleep.
So I have now signed up too, and we've been doing some training together, and it is just so awesome to train with my wife. I spend so much time doing sport that it is just amazing to be able to share this passion together. I can't wait for the race in November. It was amazing finishing Victoria, BC, Marathon together; I can't imagine how good it is going to be finishing a half iron man, and potentially a full Iron Man. :-)
Murray Man

Building My Own Tri Bike

I recently bought a used a Lance Armstrong Team Discovery Channel Trek Road bike frame at a super cheap price. At the time that I purchased this frame, I thought it was going to become my training bike with a cheap build kit. However about a month later I signed up for Iron Man Melbourne, and decided that I needed a time trial bike, so this frame now became the basis to my TT bike.
A whole lot of research ensued ionto how to build a TT bike and what is required. I have now ordered a full Ultegra groupset with TT shifters and brakes. Next I need to buy some aero bars, stem, carbon seat post and good saddle, then the most expensive part being new wheels. This is going to be a bit costly, but such a great fun project.
Hopefully the groupset is in next weekend, so I'll be hitting the roads on my TT rig in no time. WIP pictures to come.

Training and Injuries

I know I post on this quite often. But it is something of interest to me, and very close to heart. Over the last few years, endurance sports have taken their toll on my body, but I have also gained tremendous results from them.
The worst thing about injuries is the mental worry that is left behind. I find myself constantly feeling niggles in my right achilles. Anyways, one good thing about injury is that I have finally started to pay attention to my body and what it is telling me. Don't get me wrong, I could be better, but baby steps right.
Anyways, a few weeks back, 1 week after signing up for Iron Man actually, I had a 18km training run, and at 13 kms I got a good old pain in the right achilles. Stupidly I had been feeling something all run which I ignored, but to be fair, it felt more like a "I'm being paranoid pain", rather than anything serious.
Anyways I flagged running straight away. 1 wk off before testing it out again, then physio and a test run to decide whether to continue with the Marathon or not. The physio came up with some good advice, I followed it, and hit out a training run on Sunday the 2nd Aug. The rule was if the run went well, do the Marathon, if it didn't, don't be dumb, and flag the Marathon. Anyways the run went well, but for once common sense kicked in, and I decided to only run 15kms of the 35kms that I wanted to do, thinking it was silly to run so far after an injury scare.
From this run I pulled up fine, and the leg felt fine all run, but I realised that I like running so much, and Iron Man is so important to me that cancelling the Marathon was the smart thing to do.
Nonetheless, I got a solid 8 weeks of training in for the marathon in which I gained some great fitness which will put me in a great place for starting Iron Man training in September.
Now a few weeks on, I am running and loving it. Sometimes it pays to listen to the body ;-)

Iron Man

I finally manned up and signed up for Iron Man. After talking about it for a long time, I committed to Melbourne Iron Man, March 22nd, 2015. I originally wanted to do Lake Taupo or Brussleton, but the logistics of actually getting to these events, and the cost involved made them much less appealing than Melbourne. Maybe for my next Iron Man ;-)
Anyways, training as Marathon training as per usual at the moment, bar a few little niggling injuries, but with my main focus being staying in good health to start Iron Man Training on Sept 22nd, for 6 months of "Game On!" before race day. It's going to be hard, but I am super excite about the challenge.
I am also stoked as I have now got the opportunity to build a time trial bike :-) Kate will be stoked with the prospect of a 3rd bike in the house :-)

24 km training run

Another large sunday training run. 24km from home to brighton then down to semaphore. Beautiful morning for a run, except for the ridiculous downpour about 10 mins into the run that left me soaked to the skin for the rest of the run.

19 kms were ran at marathon pace, 4.22min kms. Still not what i'm after, but ok. 

The rest of the day was awesome with many coffees,  a nice morning at the wayville farmers market with kate.

I then managed a 60 km bike ride on my rad new bike and am now suitably smashed. 

Finally i cooked an amazing fish pie for dinner! Awesome sunday!

Lobethal Run!

So last weekend we went to a mates vineyard in lenswood. It was a rad weekend away! Kate and i camped out in the vineyard, we all cooked up amazing food, and i hit a beautiful morning 20 km run on sunday morning! I headed out along croft road, left onto edwards hill rd, right on fox creek rd to lenswood, left on lobethal rd to lobethal, last left before lobethal out to croft rd, back down fox creek rd then back up the trails to croft rd and back to the vineyard. What an amazing morning! All while this was happening, the sun was rising, the cows and horses were rising. Such a beautiful part of SA. 

Swimming

As the hammy is feeling a bit shit house, my long endurance Saturday morning session became a swim :-( Unfortunately as I was really hoping to hit my 27km trail run today..oh well. Anyways, I dashed down to Immanuel College this morning for a swim. Even though it is only 25m, the pool is really nice and I thoroughly enjoy swimming there. I was feeling really good in the water this morning and ended swimming 4kms, and finished feeling great and putting some of my hardest effort into the last km.
Todays session was one of those great sessions where you clear your mind and manage to just ponder on problems and issues while you are swimming. You kind of get in a rhythm and forget that you are doing that repetitive motion and entertain yourself with problem solving and different trains of thought. When you get in the zone like that it makes endurance sport thoroughly enjoyable.
To top the session off, I happened to bump into a bloke out front of the pool afterwards ho asked me if it was busy and what the pool was like. He was visiting Adelaide and said it was his first time to the pool, but it had been recommended to him. It sounded like he previously came from Adelaide from the way he spoke, but he now lives in Panama and has headed up a running group there which sounded super interesting, and funnily enough this worldwide running crew is home to the founders of Iron Man ;-)
I believe this group is an Aussie started running group called the Hash House Harriers. Check it out.
All up a beautiful morning!

102km Bike Ride

This morning I headed out for an amazing solo bike ride. I headed to the hills where it was a bit wet, but still got some great climbs in. Norton Summit, Little Italy, Forest Range, Lofty Summit, and Ashton from Range Rd. I then headed out to Sheoak Rd behind Belair, over to Cross Rd via Fullarton Rd, down to Anzac Highway, along the coast to Henley Beach and back home. 3hrs 40mins. It was all beautiful, and the sun coming out at the end of the ride while I was hurting and pushing it along the coast was such a bonus.
The whole ride was full of beautiful views. It is crazy how easily you can pass 4 hours on the bike.

26 km Trail Run

As it may have been picked up from my blog, I am now in Marathon Training mode. I am loosely following a training schedule for a 12 week, up to 55miles per week training plan from Fitzingers book "Advanced Marathoning". I say I am loosely following it as I have a tenancy to get injured when I follow plans to the dot, so I am taking the long runs and doing them, and then doing the in between recovery runs when time permits. This way I only end up running 3 times a week, but still getting some good mileage, and because it is from a plan at least the lengths of the run follow some logical progression.
Another alteration I'm making is that I will do some runs on trails. I know this messes up my pacing and that it is completely different to race day simulation, however it is fun! And that's really what it should all be about. Atleast with trail running the same distance takes longer, but the impact is lower so you end up with less fatigue, but longer on your legs.
Yesterdays 26km trail run was a loop I''ve been wanting to do for a while. It started at the base of Chambers Gully, and headed towards Mt Lofty summit. From the summit I traversed just below the Mt Lofty > Crafers road along the Heysen Trail, and then I followed a few trails to get onto the Mileen Trail, then Old Bullock Trail that run just below the old freeway and take you out to Mt Osmond. From Mt Osmond, there is a trail network that weaves down and led straight back to the car. This run let me pretty much circumnavigate all of Clealand National Park and I got to see some amazing scenery that in 30 years of living in Adelaide, I have never seen.
Best bit is, today, legs have pulled up pretty good which I am happy with, hopefully they'll be up for another big run on Tuesday.

24 km training run

So, this is my first ever iPhone blog post! How exciting! Anyways, last sunday i hit an amazing 24 km marathon training run. As we were headed to Gepps Cross market that morning, i got kate to pick me up en route so i could run 24 km point to point and not have to double back to home and run the same path in reverse! This makes it so much more fun! So my run took me from plympton, down the tram tracks to glenelg, out towards brighton and then i pulled a u-turn and headed to Henley Beach. This run was amazing. At least 12 km of running along the ocean as the sun rose. So beautiful. I saw some dolphins and finished my run at the end of Henley Beach jetty. This was then topped off with a coffee at Cibo when kate arrived to pick me up. This was followed by fresh fruit from the market for brekky! What a wholesome way to start the day!

Berri Race Weekend

Last weekend was "The Tour de Riverland". A two day cycling event held by the Norwood Cycling Club at Berri, SA. Kate and I decided to take the weekend to head out for the race, and in doing so booked into some nice accommodation. We booked into these sweet eco villas just out of Berri, near Lyrup, sitting on top of the cliffs of the Murray River.
We got up early on Saturday morning to find some real shitty weather. The drive to Berri is almost 3 hours, and it rained nearly the whole way. It was beautiful to see this part of SA when it was raining, however when you are headed to a 86km road race, rain = shit!
Anyways, we get to Berri nice and early so we can enjoy the farmers market and have a pre race coffee. We poke around for a bit, then I start to warm up and am racing by just after 1:30. I was placed in the 28 minute handicap group, and we smashed it. The group worked really well together and we pushed it hard. I had learned from Milang that I really wanted to hang onto any pack that caught us, and hang on I did. It was an amazing feeling pushing it with the faster groups in the last 30 or so kms, and at times being out front of the whole pack. I was having a blast.
The race came down to the last few kms, and I was feeling pretty good, then in the last Km I got boxed in with shitloads of other riders, making it almost impossible to sprint to the finish. In the end I finished 18th, making myself a sweet $110, but I knew that I could have pushed it way harder had I had some clear road. Oh well, this was a darn sight better than my last handicapped road race, so hopefully I can learn from this and pull a better result next race. My mate Steve killed it pulling 3rd!
That night at the b&b was amazing. We cooked some nice food and relaxed in the hot tub looking over the Murray. We wound the night up watching a movie on the ginormous TV and veging out!
The following morning I was up at 6:30 to get some sunrise photos. It was so beautiful at that time of day watching the sun rise over the Murray. My legs wee toasted from the previous days racing, and the thought of having to race the criterium did not sit well.
I headed back to Berri and prepped for the race with some light warm up riding. I knew straight away that I was in trouble. I could tell that there was nothing left in my legs, and once racing started it really showed. I lagged behind early on, and just managed to tag back onto the group after a few laps, to only mooche around and not really compete with anyone for anything! Oh well, it was a good learning experience. I think it shows that it is not a good idea to run 3 half marathons in the 6 days leading up to a big race.
All in all it was a great weekend away. Our first proper holiday since returning to oz and our first roadtrip in our new Clancy. As a sidenote I paid for the racing for the next few days with absolutely pooched legs!

Lifes to short to sit on your ASS and get FAT AND LAZY.......

Just had to mention that I did 15 HOURS OF EXERCISE last week while working full time :-) GAME ON! Lifes to short to sit on your ass and get fat and lazy. Get out there and enjoy it. No Excuses!

Swimming

The past few weeks I have been swimming at Unley Swimming Pool a few times a week before work. It is such a nice pool and is very conveniently positioned for me to go past on the way to work.
I had forgotten how much I love swimming as I have had a few months off while moving and settling back into a routine. Although swimming is such hard work, once you get into a rhythm with your breathing it becomes really enjoyable and relaxing, just gliding through the water, feeling your body being held up by the force of the water and not having to worry about the high impact that you get from running.
Unfortunately the coming week is the last week the pool is open until spring, but I am glad that I have managed to get a good few sessions in to top off the season. The last week has got me thinking about Iron Man again - it's still not too late to sign up for Iron Man Lake Taupo ;-)

Trail Running

What a f%&king amazing morning! Get up at 5, smash an epic stove top espresso, drive to Chambers Gully, start running by 6:30 just as the suns rising. What a way to start the day!
This mornings run was one of those runs that just makes you stoked to be alive. I smashed out 21kms up Chambers Gully to the top of Mt Lofty, and then all through Clealand Conservation Park back to Waterfall Gully Road. The temperature was perfect, and I was out early enough to be the first trail user so I saw lots of Kangaroos. At one point I had two hopping about 5 meters to my left at the same speed as me for a few hundred meters. It was pretty amazing.
The best bit about this run was the changing environment as the golden sun rose and glimpsed through the trees. It was just so silent and serene, a perfect way to clear the mind and just focus on myself.
By the end of the run, the trail was taking it's toll and I had to pay a lot of attention to not tripping and axing myself like last time.
After a rest week from running, and even longer from trail running it was really nice to get out again. It is amazing how quickly 2 hours passes when trail running!

Victoria Park Criteriums

Today IO raced my first criterium race. It was an event held by the Norwood Cycling Club around a closed loop of Victoria Park Racecourse. The race was so much fun, and as I race more I am meeting and becoming more familiar with some different faces.\
I ended up leading for a lot of the race, I know it's a habit that I need to get out of, but I like pushing it at the front. Anyways, I took the lead again at about 35mins, one lap too early I think as I just didn't have the legs for the final sprint, although I was gaining speed and took a lot of places back; I think with an extra 30metres I could have placed.
Now I look forward to Berri handicapped road race. It's going to be great fun. I'm totally loving road racing at the moment and can't wait to push it a bit and try to get a top 3!