A strong head wind slows me down
10th November - 16th November
Mon 9.5k 45:09 (HR 140 4:45)
Tue 18k 1:31:50 (HR 133 5:06)
Wed 13k 1:01:17 (HR 144 4:42)
Thu 18k 1:33:58 (HR 132 5:13)
Fri 18k 1:30:41 (HR 137 5:02)
Sat Rest
Sun Abandoned.
Week 76.5k
Because I was going to be on roster at the BRRC on Sunday morning, I reshuffled my runs this week to get a few more Ks in during the week as I thought 25k would all I would want to do Sunday afternoon.
It was a good week and I was glad to see some progression in my training.
I fronted up on Sunday and landed the job of timing the runners in the 5/10K events. There was a good turn out and lots of Coolrunners there as well. Even won a random draw prize of some socks.
It was a stinking hot day on Sunday and I wasn't looking forward to going out at 4:00pm but I knew a second consecutive 100+K week was there for the taking and that was motivation enough for me. What I didn't take into consideration was the enormous storm that developed in the afternoon. Following it on the BOM site, it was headed directly for home, so I delayed taking off till it passed.
Here is what it looked like as it approached.
When it hit at first it was just incredibly heavy rain. The gutters on the house could not cope and the water started running down the walls inside. My Wife and Dory were not home, so Ducky and Delta had the task of trying to sweep the water out the laundry faster than it was coming in. Kewell and I were in my bedroom trying to minimise the amount of water getting on to the carpets soaking it up with towels. After 15 minutes of this, things turned nasty. It started hailing and the wind picked right up. The rain and hail was crashing into the bedroom window and you couldn't even see out and the noise was deafening. At this stage I was worried the window was going to blow in so sent Kewell downstairs and retreated to the hall. It blew like this for about ten minutes and I honestly would not have been surprised if the roof had blown off at any point.
It finally stopped and I took a look outside. A drift of hail had built up by our front door and the garden had just been shredded. There was many branches all over the place and a tree in our backyard had blown over into the neighbour's garden.
We were lucky. Nothing major had hit our house. Many others weren't so lucky. At the bottom of our street three houses in a row all had large trees on their roofs. A few doors up a tree laned on their new car and the house.
Just round the corner, this house had its roof blown off onto the road.
Power lines were down in two place in the street. The creek was flooded and the road blocked. So no run tonight!
It wasn't really until the next day that the full extent of the damage all over The Gap became apparent. I walked with Kewell the 800m up to the school and every street was worse than ours. Tbe school was a complete mess with large trees on building everywhere. A friend of Dory's had their house completed destroyed. At last count 85 houses in The Gap are so badly damaged they will need to be demolished.
So for the next three days we had no power and it wasn't safe to drink the water. I had a lot of cleaning up to do Monday. A full day of physical labour and it was like my upper body had run two marathons. I was stiff and sore for the next couple of days.
On Wednesday night just after midnight, another storm came through. The wind wasn't as bad but it rained heavily for about eighty minutes which resulted in flooding our downstairs area. What the heck the carpet was already damp from Sunday now it was just sodden. So more cleaning up an Thursday.
On Thursday night, I felt recovered to go for a run but yet another storm came along 6:30pm. Again lots of lightning,rain and hail. We had "sand banked" the garage doors in preparation for this one so escaped any further damage.
And no more storms since that.
10th November - 16th November
Mon Cleaning up.
Tue Recovering
Wed Recovering
Thu Storm
Fri 9.5k 45:13 (HR 145 4:45)
Sat Rest
Sun 20k 1:34:39 (HR 143 5:14).
Week 29.5k
On Sunday's run I had to turn back at Ashgrove as the creek was still too high and was over the crossing. I returned back and thought I would go along The Gap bike path but the path was still impassable because of trees down. So I ended just running around the streets before heading home.
Mon 9.5k 45:09 (HR 140 4:45)
Tue 18k 1:31:50 (HR 133 5:06)
Wed 13k 1:01:17 (HR 144 4:42)
Thu 18k 1:33:58 (HR 132 5:13)
Fri 18k 1:30:41 (HR 137 5:02)
Sat Rest
Sun Abandoned.
Week 76.5k
Because I was going to be on roster at the BRRC on Sunday morning, I reshuffled my runs this week to get a few more Ks in during the week as I thought 25k would all I would want to do Sunday afternoon.
It was a good week and I was glad to see some progression in my training.
I fronted up on Sunday and landed the job of timing the runners in the 5/10K events. There was a good turn out and lots of Coolrunners there as well. Even won a random draw prize of some socks.
It was a stinking hot day on Sunday and I wasn't looking forward to going out at 4:00pm but I knew a second consecutive 100+K week was there for the taking and that was motivation enough for me. What I didn't take into consideration was the enormous storm that developed in the afternoon. Following it on the BOM site, it was headed directly for home, so I delayed taking off till it passed.
Here is what it looked like as it approached.
When it hit at first it was just incredibly heavy rain. The gutters on the house could not cope and the water started running down the walls inside. My Wife and Dory were not home, so Ducky and Delta had the task of trying to sweep the water out the laundry faster than it was coming in. Kewell and I were in my bedroom trying to minimise the amount of water getting on to the carpets soaking it up with towels. After 15 minutes of this, things turned nasty. It started hailing and the wind picked right up. The rain and hail was crashing into the bedroom window and you couldn't even see out and the noise was deafening. At this stage I was worried the window was going to blow in so sent Kewell downstairs and retreated to the hall. It blew like this for about ten minutes and I honestly would not have been surprised if the roof had blown off at any point.
It finally stopped and I took a look outside. A drift of hail had built up by our front door and the garden had just been shredded. There was many branches all over the place and a tree in our backyard had blown over into the neighbour's garden.
We were lucky. Nothing major had hit our house. Many others weren't so lucky. At the bottom of our street three houses in a row all had large trees on their roofs. A few doors up a tree laned on their new car and the house.
Just round the corner, this house had its roof blown off onto the road.
Power lines were down in two place in the street. The creek was flooded and the road blocked. So no run tonight!
It wasn't really until the next day that the full extent of the damage all over The Gap became apparent. I walked with Kewell the 800m up to the school and every street was worse than ours. Tbe school was a complete mess with large trees on building everywhere. A friend of Dory's had their house completed destroyed. At last count 85 houses in The Gap are so badly damaged they will need to be demolished.
So for the next three days we had no power and it wasn't safe to drink the water. I had a lot of cleaning up to do Monday. A full day of physical labour and it was like my upper body had run two marathons. I was stiff and sore for the next couple of days.
On Wednesday night just after midnight, another storm came through. The wind wasn't as bad but it rained heavily for about eighty minutes which resulted in flooding our downstairs area. What the heck the carpet was already damp from Sunday now it was just sodden. So more cleaning up an Thursday.
On Thursday night, I felt recovered to go for a run but yet another storm came along 6:30pm. Again lots of lightning,rain and hail. We had "sand banked" the garage doors in preparation for this one so escaped any further damage.
And no more storms since that.
10th November - 16th November
Mon Cleaning up.
Tue Recovering
Wed Recovering
Thu Storm
Fri 9.5k 45:13 (HR 145 4:45)
Sat Rest
Sun 20k 1:34:39 (HR 143 5:14).
Week 29.5k
On Sunday's run I had to turn back at Ashgrove as the creek was still too high and was over the crossing. I returned back and thought I would go along The Gap bike path but the path was still impassable because of trees down. So I ended just running around the streets before heading home.
posted by Robert Song @ 9:51 pm
4 Comments:
At Wed Nov 26, 07:20:00 pm AEST,
Tesso said…
It was one thing to see news reports and read about the storm/s in the paper, but to get a first hand account such as yours really brings home the severity of it and what those affected went through. Those pics are incredible, especially that first one of the storm approaching.
Its good to know that you escaped without too much damage, well, compared to others anyway.
At Wed Nov 26, 08:33:00 pm AEST,
Ewen said…
You were lucky! Well, lucky that you were in the middle of it and your house wasn't destroyed.
That's one scary looking storm!
At Sun Nov 30, 04:16:00 pm AEST,
Samurai Running said…
As above. I saw this news over here and was thinking it would have involved a few of you over there.
Wow, I've seen storms similar but no where near as destructive, glad you are all safe.
At Wed Dec 10, 04:43:00 pm AEST,
Unknown said…
Um, wow (and not in a good way). Bugger about your flooding, but glad your house didn't end up like others in the area!
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