jo - day 7

Day 7 – St Arnaud

My first surprise of the day was waking naturally and in near daylight. Something was not right! It wasn’t – I had forgotten what day it was (that happens when you don’t have a day-job ;o)) and set my alarm for yesterday…almost rolled over to sleep in until breakfast, but a quick calculation realized that if I went immediately I’d get 50min run done and have time to run around for a 7.30 departure. Glad I did, as I was treated to (another) awesome sunrise over the water with misty blue mountains as a back drop during my run, which necessitated several laps of the housing block on the Monaco point to make up 50 min.

The profile of the ride up to the Lake at St Arnaud was a bit daunting – 50miles continuously rising, with a few more acute gradients on the way. There was a strange vibe on the morning of our last ‘big day’ – tired and fearful of a hard ride to a glacial lake where we would swim in waters at 12 degrees, and then run a 10 km race - all the while being bitten by sand flies. Yes, John had really given this excursion a good sell! The group headed out at an ‘easy’ pace which meant that I was constantly working hard to stay in the line – though today I was gratified to see that I was not the only one suffering. There was a noticeable head wind which meant staying tight on a wheel was crucial – so every change in pace had to be chased after and then care taken not to get sucked into the wheel by freewheeling thus loosing momentum again. With everyone being so tired this concentration was wearing and we had a minor incident as Russ and Bevan clashed wheels on a sharp rise taking Dave down with them. Once the gradient really picked up, I found my legs screaming that they were unable to hang on any longer, so plugged in the tunes and set to work at my own pace. It was a fantastic ride; gorgeous day and her were some nice sweeping descents to make up for all the slogging! I caught up with Russ, Mike, Del and Dave on the long climb but lost sight of them again on the way down into St Araund and the lake.

The lake was incredible – surrounded by huge forested mountains, their tops skirted in cloud but otherwise bright blue skies. We’d been told that the lake was extremely cold, so most of us wore our freebie blue seventy booties and a few of us had neoprene swim hats. Due to the extreme conditions the daily swim minimum was reduced to 20min.or 4 laps of the 3 marker bouys (around 400m). To our surprise it was a very bearable temperature and I enjoyed a very relaxed 30 min swim for fear of over heating in my neoprene bonnet!
Due to the ‘high injury count’ on this camp, the 19 km race was substituted for a 50 min run through the forest trail. Another treat! It was lovely underfoot – well tramped forest carpet with lots of gnarled roots to hop over. If I had not been so puckish for lunch, I’d have run further.

The ride back was all down hill – except for those ‘bumps’! And much with a tail wind – except for the bits with a headwind! I rode alone again, just enjoying the day. The return trip was just over 100miles, so I ‘tagged on’ to 112 to get 180km bonus point, having to crank it in order to get back, drop bike and set off on my 3rd run of the day 50 min before my 12 hour cut –off. A very fast transition followed by a very slow run. But that is it done for the camp really – except for the small matter of swimming events and a Triathlon race tomorrow!