Damn laptop.

Well I have worked in IT for 18 years now and do I listen to my own crap? obviously not! On Wednesday night my laptop died, totally and utterly dead. It is kinda pointing towards a power related failure rather than hard drive, which is good as I had quite a bit of stuff on my hard drive, all my new photos, and a whole bunch of music files. Sadly most of my work related stuff had been back up fairly recently and I had been working files off the server. My training log will be the worse loss as I haven’t copied that over to my data stick for weeks. I also had a half written post from Wednesday to upload as well.

I am working on some POS spare laptop from work, that has a dodgy network connection and the damn wireless seems not like my home wireless set up very much which sucks.

Tuesday night my wife went walking with a friend so I get a ride to the friends house and indirectly ran home from there. The run went up Konini Drive, Scenic Drive to Shaw Rd, along Exhibition Drive to the end then back along the full length of Exe. Through Titirangi and home. I was planning on an 8km ride but it ended up being closer to 10. I kept a nice rhythm on the climb up Konini Drive and the put the pace down on the return leg of Exe and then cruised home. It was not a bad run, very warm again though.

Wednesday I left work early to take my wife and youngest to the airport as they are off to the Gold Coast for a week or four. My father-in-law has terminal cancer and has been given four weeks so my wife has gone over to see him with youngest, leaving me and number one son at home. They have not fixed any time for coming back yet so I will be fending for myself for a while I guess, though youngest starts high school on 7 Feb so her will have to be home by then. I will go over to the Gold coast for the funeral, though that may well depend on when I guess.

After dropping them for their flight I got home in time to pack up the Cindercone and head up to Woodhill for a ride. My early riding buddy was late so I shot out for a quick trip up Powerball, half of Big Mama, down the side of Cookie, down Race face and back to the car park. Early riding buddy was late enough that we only had 30 minutes before the other two riders were coming so we shot up Powerball again and did the first half of Spaghetti and down the road to the top of Raceface and back to the carpark to meet the other two who arrived on time at 7. For me it was back up Powerball for the third time in the evening, each time I was riding more smoothly and getting the gear changes in the right place. It is strange riding a geared hardtail again after 9 months of mostly single speeding. I think I was slower on the climbs than I would have been on the single, as I did try and spin up them rather than standing and hammering away. This was supposed to be a gentle cross training spin ride, but as usual with the guys I was with we got a bit carried away at times and go a bit of pace going. We had a newish guy with us and I kinda forgot about him as we thundered through stage two of Big Mama before realizing we had lost him completely. Fortunately he took a short cut and met us at the end. I do have to realise that not everyone can ride at the same pace as me - please note – I am not that fast….

We then had a quick run down SPCA, I have never ridden this trail on a geared hardtail before, so was interested to see ho fast I could go, I was slower than expected on the AC but I was sure I would get a quick run on the Cindercone, sadly there was a bit of traffic and I got stuck behind slower guys twice, they both kindly gave way and let me pass, but it would have been nice to flow the entire trail. Next time maybe. On the climb out I snapped my chain, I then remembered that I had snapped the chain on its last ride in April last year. My new chain tool was a piece of crap and I couldn’t remove a link with it (now replaced) but one of the guys had one so I was back on the bike for the ride up Link. A ferocious pace was set by our single speeder and in the end I gave up trying to keep up, this was supposed to be a relaxing cross training ride. Just before the top of Link the chain snapped again so I gave up after that. The boys short cutted Cookie and did Race face down and I rolled and pushed he road back to the car. A great ride. I hung round for a chat with some of the other riders for a while and then went home for a lonely meal of left overs as Number 1 son had eaten at his GF’s house.

Thursday was a stunning day, after work and a few house hold chores I headed out for a scheduled 10km run. I got about half way round and I really started to suffer with the heat and with the after affects of last nights ride. I took a short cut and ended up doing a very slow 8km or so. It took quite a while to cool down.

Friday was a rest day – yay….had two good feeds of rice, egg fried rice for lunch at Number 1 BBQ restaurant with the boys from work and a nice chicken korma for dinner courtesy of my riding buddy. Carbo loading for the run on Saturday.

Saturday was a perfect day for running, light cloud, not hot and little wind. I was up at 7.15 and drove to the waterfront after a light breakfast. Todays run was a slow 16km and I was a bit nervous after the bad run on Thursday night. I took 50 minutes to cover slightly over the first 8km, close to six minute KM’s which is my target for the marathon. I kept my HR under 140 for the whole way which was pleasing. On the return 8km I planned on a fast km followed by a slow. I got two reps in before needing to stop for a pee, my HR took a while to get back to normal so I did a 2km slow rep then finished with a fast – HR of around 170 KM a slow and a fast. The return took four minutes less at 46 minutes which I was really pleased with. It was a good run. I finished off with fifteen minutes in the sea to cool down, it was very nice and 8 hours later I am not really feeling much muscle soreness even though I have hardly sat down all day.

After I got home and got the housework done, I purchased a new chain, and replaced the chain tool with a better one and got the Cindercone back up and running for the Vorb ride at Waharau tomorrow. I am really looking forward to that ride and am hoping the weather is going to stay reasonable.

I amstill not sleeping that well, which is really annoying me, hopefully with clean sheets a long run, not much coffee, an early dinner and a bath tonight I can break the cycle.

I really hope I can get my laptop back from the shop early next week. I cannot seem to get the wireless working on this one, I am going to have move the network gear into the lounge so I can surf the net while watching Starship Troopers tonight.


Rock on.