What's Your Frequency Kenneth

I hate the one month’s notice period. It’s always awkward, and at the moment made more so by the fact that we have had four people resign in the space of a month, and in a staff of ten that’s like the co-pilot parachuting out of a A380 – the thing still flies and probably without incident - but that doesn’t stop people reacting just a tad.

The Governor here, has reacted also, primarily by wedging his index fingers as far as they will go into his auditory canal, closing his eyes like a dog with its head out the car window, and humming REM songs until the problem goes away. Or at least his version thereof – which is to go on a three day conference, his second in the two weeks since the resignations started flowing. If he had gone on more conferences earlier, perhaps the departure lounge might currently look more like Mildura Regional than Heathrow, because while he is a decent guy, F&^$!! he’s annoying to be around.

Thursday: Gym in the morning. Rollers tonight. Still chuggin’.

Oh #%+=, we're off to Nannas, f+*^, f<>£,...

Not a great day. Had to shorten and slow my run due to sore, tight calves and the desire to exercise some caution at this point.

Worse still we received an invitation to visit my mother for a BBQ on the weekend. Invitation of course conveying a theoretically optional element that in practice is only the thinnest of veneers. RJ suffers the most, his still-developing jaws are never a match for those sinewy, cheap beef fillets she over-cooks and then slices into strips so tough you could rappel from them, with the gravy accompaniment serving more as a lubricant than a flavor enhancer.

On our last visit RJ made the most valiant of attempts to swallow a piece he had been masticating on for two full ad-breaks of The Voice. The first I knew of his struggle for oxygen was a reddening face and a gurgling sound that I initially mistook for his attempt to mimic one of Delta's show-stopper high notes. She always asks him whether he liked his dinner, and his desire to preserve his Nan's feelings always results in a hearty smile and thumbs up. Which of course perpetuates his discomfort across successive visits.

At least to-date I've been able to shelter him from her famous apricot chicken, which may well have been a contributing factor in the great North African famine of 1998. It wasn't so much a shortage of food as a fundamental unwillingness to ingest the apricot chicken my mother sent in aid packages.

Don't have the heart to tell him we're going back so soon. Tuesday: gym in the morning, 7.5 easy in the evening.

Boring training / good training

13k today(mon). No watch, just trying to find a pulse. 50k very easy km on Sunday 75min MTB + 35min bush run Sat. Nothing spectacular, but finding some much needed consistency.

Thanks Sweetie

3 month gym membership expires this weekend. Think I’ll renew for 6 months to get me through winter, as it seems to help in keeping everything in working order. Not to mention that Brooke would be heart-broken if she didn’t get to see me at least a couple of mornings a week. I know this because when she scans my card, I always get a “thanks sweetie” – obviously a greeting she reserves solely for me. I’m thinking of giving her a ghetto-cool “yo bitch” in return, just to show her that I’m hip to the ways of the young peeps, but won’t do so until I’ve practiced enough to make it look and sound authentic. Wouldn’t want to sound like a middle-aged, pasty-white, try-hard, heaven forbid!

Set to collect my ski from Dale on Sunday – hyper-pumped. Dale said on the phone that we can meet at Manly Beach and he will take me for a paddle to be sure I like it and that it fits properly. After his exploits as reported in the SMH, I do hope he isn’t planning on starting at Manly beach and heading east. Possibly he wants to help me out, or possibly he just doesn’t want some bogan from Penrith coming to his Clontarf home on a casing exercise.

Still hung over from IM I suspect. Every session seems to leave me banged up for a day or so, but will keep chugging away slowly.

Just a short gym session this morning – a quick sweetie then off to work.

First proper dusting of cold for the season

Getting cold in the mornings now for riding. In a perfect world you would:

Ø  Ride in summer

Ø  Run in winter

Ø  Swim in ………………….. the spa.

2.8 degrees on the Garmin when I headed out at 6:00 this morning for an easy roll with Paddy. With the air flowing past at (and fairly leisurely) 28kph, it was damn cold, and the skin on my ankles burned in the shower afterwards.

Burning stinging skin or the mind numbing monotony of the turbo-trainer. It’s a choice that could suck the enthusiasm out of a 6 month old puppy.

Wed: 40 easy k’s banked.

Tick Tock

Tick tock - Getting back into the rhythm of training again. Surprisingly motivated and ticking off the sessions. Have a plan again to try and lock up a bit of structure and deduce the hap-hazard approach to training that I slip into from time to time.

Ø  Running is coming along slowly

Ø  Need to get back into some regular pump on the bike. Still keen to do the PCC TT 17 June.

Monday: Took a rest day due to working late.

Tuesday 40min gym + 12km (31:00 out @5:10, 28:15 back at 4:43).

Brett over tonight to do some body straightening.

Think I might settle for a cheap slow ski. No use buying an F1 that I can’t drive.

Keep drumming in the rules

Need to get to the mindset where getting injured is a mistake and not just an unfortunate turn of luck.

Keep with the rules

1 . Stay healthy

Ø  Gym – keep straightening out the body, range of movement work and strengthening.

Ø  Massage – once every three weeks

Ø  Keep with the fish oil - seems to help keep down the inflammation.

2. Be patient building speed.

Ø  Concentrate on building inherent running speed at rhythm

Ø  No intervals until there is some reasonable distance from last injury.

3. Be patient in building the distance. 1k a week to the long run

4. Be structured – For now

Ø  1 x long run (14 + 1k per week)

Ø  1 x long tempo (12 Tuesday run)

Ø  1 x short tempo (7.2)

Ø  2 x easy (2 x 8 = 16)

Ø  Total baseline = around 50 and growing.

5. Be frequent – at least 5 runs a week

6. Try to keep some of it on softer surfaces.

If ain't coming easy

Solid run last (sunday) night. 7.2 at tempo (around 4:50 at the moment) with 8k (at inherent cadence - around 5:25) tacked on to make up the 15k "long run" in my program. Left em a bit battered and sore, but its done, and will keep building on that.

Everyting slow by around 30 seconds. would like tempo to be around 4:20 and easy to sit around 4:55.

Weekend included a reasonably leisurely trip around Greendale and then a Faulco with Brendan sunday morning. His first road ride. Did OK too - though the Faulco "wall" was a bit nasty for him. Hope he sticks with it.

Still looking at skis. Too many options for my meagre brain.

A bit too soon to jump back in

Suspect I jumped back into trying to train a little quick. Tuesday’s run flattened me. Feel borderline fluey. Even the weights sessions are banging me up a bit.

47 tomorrow. MJ has planned Yum Cha lunch. Looking forward to the whole weekend in fact.

An easy Saturday ride of 70ish.

Sunday is an intro ride for Brendan of around 30 with coffee chaser.

Might top and tail the weekend with a Sunday afternoon kayak paddle with RJ.

W

Day 2 - Project Dennis

Since Monday update; Monday PM 45min on the rollers @ something like 92rpm Tuesday PM 1st week of 12k tempo benchmark. 59:16. Winter training goals locked in: 1. Parra duathlon series 2. A spring Half < 90min 3. A kuna multi

Project Dennis Denuto

I reckon everyone has at some point owned one of those old 1980s Victa mowers with the dodgy rip cord. The ones where every time you wheel it out of the shed you wonder whether today will be “the day”. The day when you rip and rip on the cord with by full Dennis Denuto accompaniment and still nothing but a splutter.

And then, just as you start to calculate whether there is enough head room on the Visa card to get a newy, bang!, she fires up. Smoke fllods into the atmosphere and re-opens the ozone hole, petrol fumes give you a Perkins Paste high, and the backfiring sends the dog scurrying into witness protection. She’s off and running, and in the end, does a pretty tidy job. And then you turn her off again, and wonder. Will next time be “the time”.

I’ve worked out that I am that old Victa. So here marks the commencement of a new project, “Project Dennis Denuto – It’s about the vibe”.

The goal of the project is the make sure the old Victa doesn’t get put back into the shed and neglected over winter just because there isn’t any grass to mow. Pizza and pancake launch is now complete – here we go.

Sat 12 May:  65k easy in the morning with Mango and Paddy.

Sat 12 May:  7k in the afternoon with Luke at something like 5:20s

Sun 13 May: 12k @ 5:25

Mon 14 May: am Gym

Will try and put some structure in place over the remainder of this week, and try to find a goal with sufficient valence to make the plan happen.

Epilogue

The final post for this blog - so will try to choose words carefully.

Firstly race day: I would like to have executed better and gotten the finer points right. It was a clumbsy and poor T1 and then had to dismount in the first 200m of bike to get shoes on properly was collectively a waste of at least 4 minutes - avoidable and stupid. That said, everything else on race day was close to perfect.

Glad I chose to race-it rather than simply try to complete, which had become a consideration in my mind over the last few weeks leading up. But I'm satisfied that I pushed right up against my capability all day, concentrated well, and didn't walk, even though the temptation was overwhelming at times from km 10 onwards in the run. Very very happy with the way I approached the day. It was very uncomfortable physically and mentally, right from the melee of fists and feet when the musket sounds to the end when I was just totalled on the run.

10:47 isn't what it might have been with some good run training, but is hours ahead of what it could have been three weeks out. Feel like I can hang my hat on it with some pride. 26th out of 195 in my group. good enough.

The journey: The whole process is one of compromise. Family, lifestyle, money, work etc. People talk about the limited time they have available to train, but I am not sympathetic to the point as it is always a choice - a trade off. And it is optional where you want to pitch - some sacrifice more along the way, and get more back on race day - some less. I tried to land in the middle somewhere and be as fair as I could be to family, work, finances, lifestyle etc. I probably got more back on race day than I was entitled to.

The only time where there is no compromise is race day. All you can really do is drain every drop out of it, hope for an even hand from luck and brace yourself for the hurt, because it does hurt rather badly.

On the whole, Ironman was an unbelievably rewarding experience for me. 4:30am alarms, chilling morning rides, desperately trying to make up lost time with the family, etc etc., yet through all this not a single temper tantrum among any the boys, good humor and effort the whole journey, great family support from Mez and RJ, and happy included families  for everyone in our group. Couldn't possibly hope for a better bunch of guys - worked hard, at some point everyone spent time suffering the hands of the others, and it drove all of us towards a strong race day - along the way you could just feel a result growing for everyone.

The learning: There are plenty.

I think the most salient is that including your family beats asking them to tolerate your indulgence. The more they are an importnt part, the more they will enjoy the ride.

Its an adventure, and you hould see it as such. There is always a risk of it turning to muck, and those risks are part of the adventure itself. If it all went smoothly, it wouldn;t be as worthwhile.

You can't manufacture an adventure. Everytime you throw out the seeds, some will die in the ground, but some will germinate into life-markers and experiences that you will take to the grave. The essential incredients however are the same - great friends, a goal that is not attainable in the short term but which can be worked towards, with a prize at the end that is valuable. Study, travel, sport, work, family - doesn't matter - good people, meaningful goal, and a journey. It works.

Next: A rest. Some time with Merry and RJ. Find some more seeds, throw em out there, see what grows.

W

Looking forward to the rear view mirror

T-3. Off to Port tonight.

I thought atthe start that getting to the start line would be harder than the bit between start and finish lines, and at least I've (pretty much) established part A of that analysis.

Weighed in at 77.7kg this morning, lowest I’ve been for donkeys. Could have been even better if I had watched my diet a bit more, but it’s good enough in any case, and no time for woulda coulda shoulda's.

Achilles still isn’t playing ball, but I have been able to shuffle a couple of 6-8k’ers at around 6:15/k, so who knows. If I can manage to shuffle out 16-20k over the course of the day, I would be well pleased (all things considered).

Swim has been improving, and 49:16 for 3k in the pool has given me a monster confidence boost that I will at least be able to retrun back to shore in a healthy state – baring kicks, punches, gulps of sea water and sharks. A year ago I was hoping to break 1:16 (2min / 100m pace) but have improved enough so that I’ll be disappointed if I can’t sneak in under 1:08.

My bike is in reasonable shape. Longest ride only 160, but I’m comfortable enough with that. Cross winds are the biggest risk to a decent day for me, as I am a complete pussy and don’t ride them at all well. Equally I don’t want to be too concerned about things I can't control.

Nutrition requirements will need some last minute cramming, as I haven’t really settled this in my mind yet, which I know is somewhat suboptimal.

Have racked up $14.889 of expenditure to date, and that will get blown even further if I decide to embark on a last minute course of stanozolol. Extraordinary really – for such a patently amateur weekend warrior. Professional or amateur, all sports seems to be big business for someone. In professional sport, it’s the athlete, in amateur sports it’s the promoter/bike shop/physio etc. Yet even professional sports is nothing more than folks getting together to play games. Like hop-scotch, only where the best hop-scotch player in the world gets $5m a year, a cocaine habit and an endless supply hookers.

But for some reason it really does matter, this trip to a seaside resort for a swim, ride and shuffle along the shoreline with 1,500 like minded accountants, labourers, tradies etc. It really shouldn’t matter – but it does, and I will bust my ass on Sunday to get the best result possible. I expect that it will hurt so much that if anyone else shaped-up to inflict the same level of discomfort upon me I’d shout for the fuzz. Maybe it’s one of those things that reveals itself more gradually, like those old gelatin/silver photographs developing in the dark room.

Or maybe some things are just clearer in the rear-view mirror.

W