Iron Jack

I’ve been for a training run with my Dad. I’ve been for a training run with my sister. And now, finally, I’m proud to say that I have been for a run with my husband!

It’s been many many years since I attempted to run with Mike. He’s quite fit and fast and “springy” when it comes to running. When we used to run in Auckland, well before children, it never used to work. I couldn’t run fast enough to keep up with him, and if he tried to run slower with me, he would either end up walking, or over-heating and with a migraine. So we’ve pretty much just run our own separate ways every since. Until now.

My new job means training has to fit around work - rather than work fitting around training as it has been for the past six months. It also means we have to take every opportunity we can to actually see each other! Hence, a joint running session that would achieve both. With the boys in daycare, it was an opportunity not to be missed.

So on Monday we met on the corner halfway between our offices and drove to the pool. From there we headed out running. The aim was to do 30 minutes easy.

“Woah, this is hard going today,” I managed to gasp.

“That’s probably because you’re going much faster,” says Mike.

Turns out that he was only going a little bit slower than he normally would - not a whole lot slower like he used to.

“Cool,” I gasped back.

So with him just going a little bit slower, and with me actually going quite a bit faster, we got through our 30 minutes and then carried on a bit further. We ended up with a 40 minute run and a 5.2km distance completed. About five minutes faster than usual for me. Fantastic. And it was a good run too. I actually managed to have a conversation most of the way around as well.

We grabbed a quick shower at the pools and then headed back to work. A good run done well. Nice.

“Are you going riding tomorrow?” I asked a colleague at a posh do on Friday night.

“Nope,” he grimaced. “Bad back. You?”

“Yup, tomorrow I’m riding the Tinman course at Mt Maunganui,” I boasted proudly. “Its completely flat, the Mt to Papamoa, really looking forward to it.”

“Oh bugger about the flats,” he said. “You want to ride around the lake here, at least its undulating.”

“I’ve been around the lake here,” I boasted again. “And I’m over the hills and looking forward to the flats.”

After he left the table I leaned over and whispered to my husband, “why on earth wouldn’t you want to do flats?”

He shrugged, agreed he was mad and got on with the show.

Well, aren’t I just eating some humble pie now?

Yesterday Oli and I drove over to Mt Maunganui - its a coastal surf town attached to Tauranga City. I’ve been holidaying there my whole life, as my grandparents retired there when I was about five. Every school holidays was spent at their house, hanging out at the beach and walking up “the Mt”. Now we live in Rotorua its only 45 minutes away. I’m sorry to say that we still don’t get over there often enough, but we try to make the most of it when we do.

My folks were going to visit my Nana for the weekend. So I thought it was the perfect opportunity to ride the bike leg of the Tinman, which I’m racing on December 6. I’m doing the Standard distance - 1500m swim, 40 km ride and 10 km run. It will be the longest distance for me yet, and hopefully good preparation for the Half Ironman almost exactly one month later. According to the Tinman website, www.tinmantriathlon.co.nz its 104 days, 13 hours, 47 minutes and 48 seconds and counting until splash off.

The forecast was perfect, so for the first time all winter I didn’t need to wear my long johns - good bye to the stripes! It was fantastic to get out in shorts and a T-shirt, summer is coming! I planned to ride from my Nana’s house into the Mt - the opposite way to race day - and from there out to the turnaround point at Papamoa and then back to my Nana’s.

I pedalled off, successfully negotiating the traffic lights at the end of the road and managing to unclip my bike clips with plenty of time before the red light. A good start.

After just a short while I ended up on the long straight road into the Mt. Riding along I could see the Mt ahead of me, looming in the distance, and to my right I could see the beautiful blue sea, with crisp white surf banging into the beach. Loving it.

I was managing to keep my cadence up in the late 80s and 90s for most of the way, every now and then breaking over 100. My legs were spinning well and I was loving it. I also thought I was going really fast. Funny how pride always comes before a fall - not a literal fall - but a knock to the pride regardless. I got to the foot of the Mt in what I thought would be record time.

I should know better, turnaround points are always a mental problem for me. I always think I’ve gone further than I actually have, then I realise that I’ve got even further to go, I get despondent, I slow down and it all turns to custard. Need I say more. I’d done the 12km in 33 minutes - just a fraction faster than standard times on undulating roads. Gutted. I thought I had gone a lot further, a lot faster.

So I turned around and started heading out to Papamoa. My legs were starting to get really tired and I was really annoyed with myself. And then I realised what Greg was meaning about the flats. You don’t get any break from them. Your legs need to keep spinning all the time. At least with hills and undulating ground you get to rest on the way down. Not so with flats, major reality check. Something Lawrence said about “hills being my friend” also started to tick away in my mind. Okay, thanks guys, I’ve got it now.

By this time I was feeling thoroughly annoyed with myself and fed up. All of a sudden I came up to the turnaround point.

“This can’t be right,” I thought to myself. “It’s not nearly far enough.”

I suddenly had this sneaky feeling that perhaps the route required two laps. Two laps of the flat, straight, ‘never-get-a-break’ ride. Bugger.

I went a bit further than the turnaround point, mainly to get some more time on the bike, because I knew I didn’t have time to do two laps. The first thing I did when I got home was check the site, yup, two laps.

There are a number of positives to take from this ride - despite the disappointments.

(a) it was a beautiful day and I was out in it, exercising, and lots of other people were just standing in line for ice-cream

(b) I can easily ride 26km just like that, when in January I struggled to ride 10km

(c) I now know what to expect for the Tinman and Half Ironman (same course) so I will be mentally prepared

104 days, 13 hours, 34 minutes and 10 seconds until splash-off…and counting.

My riding shoes are propped up in front of the fire - with a steady stream of water pouring out of them.

You may recall that these are the riding shoes that cost the same as a pair of decent leather high-heeled boots and they symbolise a major turning point in my quest to do Ironman in 2011. And I actually love them as much as I love my red high-heeled boots, which is really saying something.

Back to the water.

Its been raining in Rotorua for six days straight. I realise that’s not a great advertisement for our wonderful town, but hey, its winter and its a fact of life. 

This week’s RATs bunch ride had been arranged out in the Waikite Valley - a gorgeous farming valley only 10 minutes drive from the centre of town. After last week’s ride in the fog on busy main roads, we decided to take it out of town for a while. And I’d been looking forward to it all week! When the alarm went off this morning, (after a really heavy night of rain), it was dry and there were even patches of blue sky. I texted Irene, our camp mother:

“What do you reckon? It’s dry here.”

“Raining here, just moving stock, will decide in 30 minutes.”

Thirty minutes later it had stopped raining out there, and starting raining here, but we were on. I bundled the bike on the car and headed out. It was raining when I left home and it was absolutely pouring down by the time I got to town. It didn’t get any better on the other side or on the drive out to Waikite.

I arrived at the Bluff Sports Club - should have taken a photo, if that wasn’t a typical Kiwi country rugby club I don’t know what is.

It was just sprinkling lightly by this stage so we decided to “just do it”.

Irene, Cheryl and myself headed off. Straight up a hill. I am getting better at the hills but there is no way I can catch Irene, she’s a demon. Before we even reached the top of that first hill it was raining hard. And it didn’t stop.

It was actually a great ride. Very hilly and undulating with a few flats in between. On a nice day it would be absolutely gorgeous. Lush green paddocks, farm animals as far as the eye could see. Shame I couldn’t see anything out of my rain speckled glasses.

It was also a great learning ride for me as it was the first time I had ridden in heavy rain - actually any rain at all come to think of it. I have nightmares about skidding off my bike, so it was great to head down some hills, trust the brakes, and get around some corners. I also spent a bit of time standing up on the pedals today too, and while the hills are still hard work, they are getting easier.

The talking got less and less as we got wetter and wetter. An hour later we got back to the clubhouse and headed off. Cold, wet but happy.

The triathlon community on Twitter is an amazing thing, which has led to some fantastic contacts and connections for me around the world, and also a bit closer to home in New Zealand. Stu, aka @No_More_Shadows on Twitter, just sent me this from the Ironman website - I’m going to post it in front of my computer so I can come back to it every day.

The Ironman will try and psyche you out and wear you down over the course of the year. If you know what to expect then each swing Ironman takes at you will have less effect. The way ironman can beat you is with self doubt. If your self doubt gets to a point where you decide not to take on the challenge then Ironman has beaten you. This is where it beats most people even before they even get close to the start line. The first self doubt weapon is in the form of other people. They will constantly either tell you or imply that “you can’t do it” when they have no idea if you can or not. They will tell you “it is a long way” which is not rocket science. They will tell you they had a friend who has done Ironman and make them out to be much better than you. If they have done it themselves and are really self absorbed they will even imply how much better they are than you. The other even more deadly weapon is Ironman intimidating you directly. This will be you telling yourself you cannot possibly do something like that. What where you thinking? Are you insane? Don’t tell anyone or they will laugh, your not good enough, etc. This is all ironman trickery and not true at all. Be ready for it and know that this is what prevents everyone else from taking on the challenge.

A fantastic piece that I know will provide endless inspiration.

Stu’s on an amazing journey. You can check out his blog here http://no-more-shadows.blogspot.com/2009/01/journey.html He started riding in January 2005 after a health shock when he clocked in at 120kg. He’s now down dozens of major cycling events, including the Round Taupo maxi enduro and he’s on track for his first Ironman on March 6 next year.  And from the photos on his webpage, I’d suggest he’s probably half of his former self.

I can’t wait to be at Ironman to cheer Stu and all the other first-timers on. After all, it will be me exactly 12 months after that!

I can’t believe its been over a week since my last blog post - compounded by the fact that when I eventually did sit down to write I discovered I had forgotten my password. Back on track today. 

Last week was one of the busiest work weeks I’ve had for years - and professionally hugely exciting.

At a client meeting on Monday I was given a tentative timeline of a week (or so) leading up to a major announcement. A phone call halfway through the meeting changed that to a longer timeline of approximately two weeks. Two days later I received a phone call to give me two days notice. I spent the next 48 hours literally hunkered down at Rotorua Airport putting all the pieces in place. At exactly 11am on Friday we went live and the phone hasn’t stopped ringing since.

So what’s all the excitement about? Rotorua Airport will be Trans Tasman by December, with Air New Zealand offering direct flights from Rotorua to Sydney, twice a week, from December 12. This is probably the single most significant development for Rotorua, its residents, its industries and the wider economy for more than a decade.

For those not so familiar with our part of the world, Rotorua is approximately two and a half hours drive from Auckland - New Zealand’s biggest city. Rotorua is traditionally the home of tourism in New Zealand - we are the cultural hub of the country, and we have been hosting tourists for more than 100 years. It is home to most of NZ’s iconic tourism attractions - Maori culture shows and dinners, gondola, Agrodome, trout fishing, a huge variety of accommodation options - the list is literally endless.

But for all Rotorua’s success as a tourism destination, it was missing the one key link that would take the local tourism industry (and thus the supporting economy) to a whole new level - an international air link. Now we have that link, the opportunities to grow and develop as a community, a city and a sector, are massive. It is that significant.

And it’s hugely exciting. Not just for Mike and I professionally, but also for us as a family. We left Auckland nearly four years ago to offer our kids a better lifestyle and environment. We have very quickly embraced everything that Rotorua has to offer and we are very passionate about the region and its potential. The future growth of the region offers even more to our children as they grow and find their own pathways. And the fact that the direct flights offer me a quick route to my best friend in Sydney is an added bonus!

So it was a huge week but massively exciting and it was a privilege to be part of it.

It did impact on training to a point - more about the when and how, as opposed to the what. The highlight of my training week was a great bunch ride on Sunday with the Tri Club - in the fog, where I could barely see the rider in front of me, but that’s a blog post for another time.

So exciting times ahead, in every way.