Living with the Kiwis

Thursday, November 18, 2010

Athletics Day

Today the kids had Athletics day at school where it's pretty much just a school wide competition with running races 70m and 100m and "high" jump and jump rope and various other activities. I was at yoga so I didn't get to go watch, but when they got home they excitedly informed that the Clinton's dominated!! Reuben ran 5 different races and won all of them! Libby ran two and won both of those! There's a photo of her so far ahead winning one race, Julia basically missed her in the shot! Her arm and leg are there and the other girls way behind her, but that came as a surprise to everyone! Even the principle came up to comment on her performance! Perhaps they have a couple of future track stars! Judging by the photos, they didn't seem to even have too much competition for their first place finishes!

I also went for another swim this afternoon. One last stretch of the arms and shoulders to make sure they'll make it on Sunday! I only swam about 2k in the pool today but in the form of some fairly decent-paced 100s. Yoga has stretched my shoulders out pretty well so swimming has felt pretty good, and I haven't been sore yet from either of the three times, not that I've really attempted to swim all that fast, but I would have thought just the distance would be enough to do it.

It's nice living so close to a city as well, and not actually IN it. I love being able to hope on the ferry and be right in the city where so much is always going on, yet we get NONE of the hustle and bustle or traffic or anything city-feeling here in Bayswater and Devonport, it's a really good location as long as the ferry or bus is running when you want it to. But the drive over isn't bad at all either, just parking can get expensive! This weekend for example there is the Grey Lynn Festival, The Taste of Auckland (tempted to try that one out because I love the the Taste of Amherst so much!), showing of The Rocky Horror Picture Show on stage, next weekend there's Santa's Parade, and there are all kind of markets and things all the time as well. I like always having the many possibilities to choose from!

Oh, and since the link to the photo from the Stroke and Stride race decided to go to a different picture a couple times, I'll just add it here. Finishing the 4k...fortunately only the last little bit was on the sand...making it a hard finish!

Wednesday, November 17, 2010

Survived the Swim & Run

Yesterday was a fairly average day. Tessa and I took a walk in the pram to the "orange slide park" as it's referred to by the other two. We had morning tea and played for awhile before coming home for a sleep. It was the hottest day yet, I think, or maybe just sunniest which makes it the hottest. It's crazy how much difference the sun makes! It could be freezing out but if the sun in shining on you, you'll feel warm! At least most of the temperatures this week are predicted to be in the low 70s! Yay!

Last night I managed to survive and complete the Stroke and Stride series race! I was pretty impressed with my 750m swim...having not trained at all, I managed to stay with a pack of people and wasn't straggling behind in the back. The wetsuit worked well, even though I looked a bit out of place not having an actual swimming one...although I wish I'd worn a watch, just so I had an idea of how long it took me to do the swim and how on pace I am for completing the first 900m on Sunday in 30 min (otherwise the boat picks you up!). It was lack of practice/training for an event like this that made the change over from swimming to running so hard! Most people ran out of the water to the changing space, stripping off their wetsuits on the way, throwing on shoes and going! I kind of jogged up but took my time getting out of the wetsuit, initially the thought of running 4k directly after that swim did not sound appealing at all...especially since I'd only done it about 5 times and the last 3 months...but I decided to give it a try and completed it successfully. They make you run the last 100m or so on the beach, which was quite difficult when you were just ready for it to be over! There was this photo of me finishing the race on the website this morning, but the results aren't up yet, so no idea what my time was. I'm not too concerned though, I was just happy with myself for being able to complete the whole thing without really training for it, and not coming completely last! I more did it for the swim anyway, to test the wetsuit out and make sure I could still actually swim at a reasonable pace in the ocean! Needless to say, I had a great night sleep last night!

Today I'll head to yoga and get nice and stretched out again, perfect timing really, so that I don't have time to get too tight!

Tuesday, November 16, 2010

Some More Tennis

Tonight, I went to do some more coaching, since another coach had to leave early, but then turns out one of the groups didn't turn up so I wasn't needed after all. I had already agreed to have a singles hit at 7 a club member, so I just hung out for awhile! Then I had a great hit for about an hour and twenty minutes, played a set and just kept going, was a really good workout and good to get back into the singles, actually started hitting pretty well by the end!

Also, I think the crazy is just taking over me. Was somehow convinced it'd be a good idea to enter the stroke and stride race tomorrow night at Mission Bay, to give the wetsuit a go before Sunday. It's a 750m swim followed by a 4k run...seeing as my first real swim in a few years was just yesterday, and I've only been on about 5 runs in the last 3 months...I'm not aiming to be competitive, mainly just refreshing my memory of what it's like to swim a bit of distance in the ocean, and see how the wetsuit works out! I'm sure a lot of time will also be lost in the change out of the wetsuit, simply for lack of practice! It's not the easiest thing to get in and out of, so if anything it could be a pretty entertaining race!

Monday, November 15, 2010

TRAFFIC!!

Must have been the rainy weather this morning, but I think the whole of Devonport decided to drive to work today! That would be just find, apart from the back that we live on a peninsula with only one road in or out, which is a single lane each way! The normally 5-10 minute drive to and from school became 35 minutes today after I dropped the kids off! And they were even about 17 minutes early today. I didn't get back to Bayswater until after 9:15 and the ferry left at 9:10, so no yoga for me (I figured even driving I wouldn't make it in time, since I'd have to follow all of the traffic out and over the bridge!). Instead, I headed to Takapuna to the newly redone pool (a strange distance of 33.3m) to go for my first training swim before the big race on Sunday...I decided that it'd be good to swim the race distance as a main set just so I have an idea of how out of swimming shape I've become over the last 3 years!

I swam a little warm up and then 14 200s, not on an especially fast pact, just tried to get the whole distance in. Then I did a little warm down at the end. I managed to go about 3.2k including the warm up and down in just over an hour, so hopefully I'm not completely sore tomorrow and can get in a few more loosening up training sessions in before the weekend, maybe even and ocean one to better test out the wetsuit!

Tonight, I did some coaching at the tennis club, mostly feeding balls and running a few drills and games with a group of 14-15 year old girls. Let's just say there isn't a huge cultural difference between Kiwi and American girls that age! They reminded me of my campers in more ways than one! They more thought of their tennis our as social hour and gossip time, while hitting a few balls in between chats, not extremely motivated by the sport! They were also very interested in "Camp America" and working at a summer camp, and just like my girls, one of their major concerns were if lots of hot guys worked there too? They were more thinking for the future and working there themselves I think, but I explained to them usually the kids were very happy with all of the staff!

After the coaching hour I stayed for another "tennis extreme" session and am now officially exhausted. I hadn't really missed the feeling you get at the start of swim season, or just attempting to get back into swimming...unfortunately, I swam at about midday so I could just have dinner and go to sleep like I wanted to! I will definitely be sleeping very well tonight!

Saturday, November 13, 2010

Watersport Weekend

On Friday, when I looked on the "GrabOne" deal of the day, a bunch of us girls decided to buy the half price surf lessons at Muriwai beach. The next thing that popped up was 50% off entry to the Harbour Crossing Auckland, the ocean swim here that is part of the NZ series. It starts literally right down the road from the house, so I can walk down on race day, which just so happens to be next Sunday, the 21st of November! I had wanted to do it when I heard about it before, but then thought it was a bit expensive to enter and then wasn't sure about buying a wetsuit or training...well, I'm going to try to swim at least 3 times before the race...just to loosen up the swimming muscles at least! And as for the wetsuit, I purchased one later on Friday (early xmas gift from Mom and Dad). It's not a swimming specific one, because I intended to do more windsurfing, surfing and kite-surfing than ocean swimming in it, but I should be able to swim pretty well in it anyway. It was a lot of work trying them on too!!

Saturday was Nan's birthday, so the family came here to celebrate, and as usual, planned around the high tide so plenty of sailing could be done as well! It was an absolutely beautiful day and I got to go for a little sail, and learn how to use the spinnaker, also test out the new wetsuit and get used to it for a bit! After I went for a little swim in the bay, and Reuben and Libby got excited and came swimming with me. They went for sails as well and even hung onto the foot straps of the windsurfer while their uncle Richard towed them around. Then I had a turn trying to learn to windsurf. Although, it was rigged up with a fairly large sail (not suitable for learning on) so it was very difficult to pull up and then pretty hard to manage once it was up! I managed to go a few meters at least before tipping over. John reckons once I try a smaller sail and get the feel of it, I'll find it really easy! I hope so, because it looks like lots of fun!! After the Birthday celebrations and afternoon of water sports, I took the ferry and met a group of the girls that went wine tasting that afternoon for dinner. After that we decided to try another district in the city, Ponsonby, to see what the night life was like there. There ended up being 12 of us at the start of the night, our gatherings just keep getting bigger and bigger! However, it is quite difficult to keep that many people together for the entire night so slowly it broke down into smaller groups at different places.

Today, I had a nice lazy morning and then went to play tennis at three. Now I need to schedule in times this week where I'm going to fit my training swims in!