Summer Training Competition

As background, this is a portion of what I posted on my blog on Thursday 27 January:

I've been having some good conversations with runners, sharing our "war stories" of brutal training runs in the WA heat. This sharing has provided a motivation for my own running. I'm wondering if it helps others as well. So, I'm thinking, people should email me with their best training stories for January and February and at the end of February I'll pick a winner. Can't say how at this point. Maybe I'll do a random draw or maybe we'll go by vote. I'll post the stories on a page on my website on an ongoing basis.

The prize? Well, it should be cold, that's a given:

a 4 pack of chilled Hopman's Premium Pale de-alcoholised "beer"
a Cobber cooling neck wrap (you might like this at the WA Track Race in March)
a 6 pack of 1.5 ltr water (to use as caches for those long runs??)
a 1.5 ltr garden mister (like they recommend for Badwater)
a single serve packet of Hammer Heed Electrolyte drink, Recoverite drink, and Perpetuem.

So, send me your training stories from January and keep 'em coming for February

The 20km was broken into a pyramid of 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,6,5,4,3,2,1 laps with 1 extra lap thrown in to give me 50 laps. The pace for each interval was 3m45s. I had a cooler bag with 4 x 750m of ice water and after each interval I doused myself with ice water which lasted the first lap and then I was fried for the rest of each interval.

A very tough session, thanks mostly to the heat.

Stupid running at that time but it was the only time I had available to run.

I recently got transferred from one mining operation in the Pilbara to another. The previous minesite had a few treadmills and a dirt road to the airstrip, either option (mainly the dirt track to the airstrip) enabled me to get my daily running fix either really early before work or in the dark after work.

My transfer was to a mine that is in the very early stages of operation, which means next to no facilities at our camp (no treadmills amongst other things) and not really any tracks to run on at all - it is in the middle of nowhere (approx 1800km north east of Perth). Combined with the very limited options for running is the standard Pilbara summer weather conditions - average maximum temp for Nov - Apr is about 41 degrees. All of my running after work is done in 35+ degrees.

With a couple of events down the track that I am working towards and finding it extremely difficult to get any quality running in while away at work, I decided to buy a treadmill in Perth and have it trucked up to the camp at work. Everything was going smoothly, I was happy with my purchase, the drop off at the trucking depot went well, I had made some room for the treadmill in a tiny room with airconditioning - anticipation was building! I don't actually like running on treadmills, but to say that I was looking forward to the arrival of the treadmill at work was an understatement!

Three days after the drop off at the depot I contacted the trucking company to see how things were looking for the arrival. Signs were not good, the treadmill was yet to leave Perth. I called again three days later and it had left Perth but the truck had to turn around and come back to Perth due to heavy rain washing out roads and looking like being inaccessible for a week or so. To cut a long story short, four weeks after drop off and while I was in Perth on break, my treadmill eventually arrived. I returned to work with the knowledge of the treadmill having arrived and looking forward to finally being able to clock up some decent kilometres again while at work. I expected the box containing my brand new treadmill to be under cover or at least have some sort of rain protection on it as it had been raining solidly for the past four days with substantial afternoon thunderstorms coming through. This was not the case, it had been left on the dirt next to sea container (which was empty!) and absolutely soaked.

With most of my enthusiasm gone, I set up the treadmill - it looked fantastic, brand new and ready for action. Unfortunately it looked a whole lot better than it performed. I suppose 400+mm of rain over four days is not conducive to electrical equipment functioning well.

To say that the whole saga has provided my workmates with regular laughter is definitely an understatement - they are still laughing about it! I think it will take me a little longer to feel the same.

72km, 5h55min of running. Started at 2:30am finished at 8:30am. Did 10kms at a time each time ending up back at my house to eat and drink. Aimed to run as close to 4m30s pkm. So that's 10km in 45-46min then 4 min rest, leaving on each 50min.... it was as much a mental challenge as a physical. No one around, dark, lonely, middle of the night, back at home each 10km provides that temptation to stop. Yet I pushed through.

... a solo 35km trail run.

Carried 4 litres of drinks (hydration pack AND handhelds), as I knew I’d be out there for 4 hours or more, and in the end probably could have done with another 600ml. The weight of all the drinks was slowing me down a bit for the first 30-60minutes.... On these fairly tough terrain trails (with ... a few hills and gates, soft sand in a few places).

Then I took it easy as fat burning kicked in in a big way, I ran out of carbs, got mildly dehydrated, the temperature headed for 28degrees+, the UV started tanning my legs, and the rabbits,kangaroos, sheep, and reptiles in the bushes refused to respond to my shouts of Aussie,Aussie,Aussie, as I celebrated Australia Day mostly with no humans in earshot or sight…

With a couple of km to go and getting pretty dehydrated ... I came across a couple of young teens/early 20’s blokes playing cricket in the park. I did a streaker run (without removing any clothes) through their pitch which pleased them greatly, and they offered me a beer (beers seemed to be the primary activity, while cricket was the secondary activity) which I didn’t take of course ... but I yelled Aussie,Aussie, Aussie, which pleased them greatly again, and they responded Oi,Oi,Oi, which pleased me greatly as finally I had found someone to share Australia Day with, after the sheep ignored me, the rabbits did a runner, and the kangaroos and reptiles hid in the bush.

Plans for three of us to head to the Serpentine hills were quashed due to the cyclone warning, extreme fire warning, and closure of all trails from Saturday mid-morning. In a flurry of text messages, two of us adjusted plans to head to the Lesmurdie Falls/Forrestfield area so that we'd be close to the relative safety of civilisation. Up at 5 AM. My gear included a 2 ltr hydration pack, 6 x 1.5 ltr bottles of water, an esky of post-run food, and a pressurizable water sprayer/mister like they use at Badwater.

Continuing my efforts to find the toughest set of hills in the Perth area, we set off to conduct another elevation test. Starting temperature was 26 degrees with 78% humidity. It wasn't pretty, but that's the kind of dedicated scientists we are. We sorted out a 15 km loop, which we did once before returning to the car to restock. The second 15k loop required a pit stop back at the car mid-loop, as Dan's water was not going to last 15k this time. Somehow we managed to force ourselves back out again for another 2.5 kms to reach a total of 33k. 1201 mtrs elevation gain. 4 hrs of running (plus ~30 mins of rehydration stops at the car). Finish temperature was 34 (but equivalent to 36 with humidity). Turned into the hottest day of the month.

Water consumed for the two of us: approx 8 ltrs. Turned the water mister on each other and experienced a transcendental moment. If you thought there was a "runner's high" try a water mister after running at 36 degrees. Then turned the a/c on full blast in the car and drove directly to the beach, where we hit the water in our running gear (sans shoes, of course).