Relocating (again :-) )

Long time I didn't post anything here... :-)
So after 4.5yo with a very happy life @ Melbourne, we have decided to move further north..
Mid January we will start new adventures in Brisbane. Very exciting time for us (well kids a bit sad to leave friends but happy to try something different).
Some have asking us why if you're happy here :-)
Well a bit difficult to answer....
Maybe tired of the so famous Melbourne weather....
Yes the Brisbane weather looks so great: short pans and thongs all the year :-)
Housing is ridiculous expensive @ Melbourne so time to stop paying the someone else mortgage
After long time, it's maybe a good idea to leave the comfort zone and try something different.

Cya soon up north :-)

Ultra Trail Australia 2016

So 14th May 2016, I managed to finish the Ultra Trail Australia 2016 in the Blue Mountains (NSW) It's 100km with 4500m elevation and down.
Well few months later, I won't really write a race report but only post a link to the video I made.

Ultra Trail Australia 2016 100km from olamy on Vimeo.

I really enjoyed it!! Hard training make it "easy" except few kilometers with stomach pain (from 35km mark to 56km mark).
And I'm crazy enough to register again for 2017.
Goal: improve my time!!

Two Bays trail run 2016

So I just started the year with a mid distance trail running.
Last year I did the 28km but decided to go for the 56km this year.
Training during summer and xmas period is a bit complicated and need some real motivation. But I finally managed to do a decent training.
The race was a bit complicated with the weather. I had some hard time with the hot (33° in some country bush part!!)
Bad eating strategy at the start. (eat too much...)
But so I did it. I would expect better time but the temperature really kills me on the way back. So I must be happy with this 7H for 56km and +1600m/-1600m.
I managed to build a video. So enjoy how is to run in Australia :-)
Strava activity here (Some GPS issues but I really did 56km :-) )
Next race is the rollercoaster 44km 27th February.
Then the big one of the year Ultra Trail Australia 100km in the Blue mountains.
And maybe the Surf coast century for a second time with a sub 12h goal (depends how the body will be in Jun :-) )

SurfCoastCentury 100km the video

So I finally found a bit of time to make a movie (please be indulgent I'm not a professional :-) )

If you have read the run report, here the video:

Yes I enjoyed a LOT :-)

I hope after watching this, you will want to come here down under for a little run :-)

SurfCoastCentury 100km (my first ultra trail)

I will try to tell you my journey to achieve this 100km trail called SurfcoatCentury because it happen on the surfcoast trails with some beach runs!
So I wanted to run this race maybe more than a year ago (even before my first marathon which I ran 12 october last year!).
But I have to train a lot first! Especially because I restarted doing sport seriously since around January 2013 (yup only for 18 months :-) ) after many years of very limited sport....
So during this year I managed to train a lot and do various long race bitumen and off road:

• 17 May 2015: Great Ocean Road Marathon (44km )
• 21 March 2015: RollerCoaster run (44km trail)
• 11 January 2015: Two bays run (28km trail)
• 12 Oct 2014: Melbourne Marathon

I remember someone saying: "your body must recover so you normally cannot run more than one or two marathons per year".
My answer was: "As my goal is to run 100km, those marathons are just training :-)"
Looking at the training log, I have 2000km running since 1st January 2015.

The hardest part was the 3 months before the big run. Despite a travel to France early July, I managed to run around 1200km from early June to the race (with a big August peak 470km). The France trip was not too bad as I ran a lot of off road compare to the city style suburb we live in Melbourne.

So here we are the big day!!!. Some stress coming!!! As I never ran more than 44km race (longest training was 48km) I don't know what will happen :-)
This start with the bag packing what to get what to wear etc... What to ask my great support crew to carry for various checkpoints...
The race start at 6.30am. We managed to find a house just 10 minutes walking from the start. For some reasons, I didn't want to ask my wife to drive me to a race start at 6.30am :-).
Obviously I didn't sleep a lot!
The program for today.

So here we are race start on a beach with an amazing sunrise!!! (for some reasons my wife prefer sunset over sunrise so she missed that one :P)

The first leg of the run is 21km of beach run: sand, cliff climbing and sometimes water until the knees (yup really wet shoes). Hopefully the sand is a bit humide so it's not soft sand.
The scenery is just amazing!!



After 21km we arrived at Torquay after passing trough beaches as Bells Beach, Point Addis (If you surf you know those mythics names). I managed to run those 21km in 2H30. Then I stopped 12 minutes. Yup that's too long as I didn't even change shoes but those long stops are the big mistake of this long run (but it was the first one so I didn't want to burn myself which I didn't for sure :-) ).

Now we are going back to Anglesea using the SurfCoast trails/walk (a mix of trail on the top of the cliff and a bit of bush) Again amazing scenery.

I'm happy as the family is here at Checkpoint3 so I got smiles and plenty of "Allez Papa!!" (Go Dad!!)






This leg2 is a bit more hilly: 28km with 520m elevation gain. I managed to run the first 11km with a good pace 6.22m/km then the last 17km at 7.20m/km.
I arrived at checkpoint 4 (mid race 50km) after 6h. Now time to change shoes/socks/t-shirt and got a lunch. I think here I made a BIG mistake as I stopped 35minutes!! Again I don't have the experience of such race so I did everything (eating/changing stuff) in a totally wrong order and do it bad. Next time: just have a printed TODO list with everything in a correct order. Other mistake I eat too much and too fast (sandwich and a banana) so my stomach was not really happy the next 15km :-(.



So now we start the leg 3 which is most difficult part of the race: 28km / 760 m elevation gain.

Here an other completely different scenery with a real bush part!! You know the famous red/orange Australian ground and a bush forest!! And here I start to run long distance alone (the 50km runners are not here anymore) and runners are more streched after such distance.



But that's ok plenty of crazy birds!!. The first 20km are really good I managed a good 7.26m/km for this hilly part. But the next 7km are bad (really hard time in this last hard up hill): 9.13m/km during 7km (yup really slow!! especially I stopped too long at CP5 water point). I'm happy to finish this 3rd leg but a bit tired :-). I got help from Nicolas who is biking with me during the last part.

So now an other smile time with the family at checkpoint 6. 77km done!! almost finished :-). An other mistake as I stopped too long again :-( (19minutes!!) but I was happy to have a chat with wife and kids.


So now time for the last leg, I still feel well (honestly you cannot give up after have done 77% of the race :-) ). The program is: 23km. Elevation gain / loss: 426m / 466m.

The first 9km are still a bit up/dow bush single track but then you are back to the ocean (you start thinking the finish line is not far anymore!!).

Last checkpoint (CP7) (time to change for long sleeve and get head torch) wife/kids are here again for a last smile! See you "soon" at the finish line :-)

This sunset really worth such a long run!! :-)





Now time to finish. But it's dark. I mean really dark as you are a middle nowhere without any lights from any cities.

And especially with the last beach run part around 4km (yup again beach run after 92km!!! Sacrebleu!!). So I do not see anything I just want to avoid running in the ocean :-).

Finally I can see lights wife/kids are here I can cross the line with the kids. That's it that's finished!! (yup you can't believe you only realise days after).





I believe I was crazy when I was thinking running this race more than a year ago. But now it's done and it was such an AMAZING experience.

It really worth all the hard training (wake up at 5am 5days/week during 2.5 months really need devotion/motivation the race is finally very easy compare to all the training).

I want to THANKS a lot wife and kids for all the support during this special and before when I was not here because training somewhere!!!

More details on my race here and the original race description (in a real good english :-) ).


My result. I'm happy to have finished (and with dignity). I think I could have made a better time especially with shorter break (but I'm French so I need long lunch break). It was my first experience on 100km so next one will be better :-)

And I already have some ideas for the next one. I'm pretty sure the family will be happy to visit the Blue mountains :-) ( see The north face 100 ).

I ran the race with a gopro so I have plenty of video materials to show you how Australia is such a beautiful country (but I need a bit of time to do it)

Messieurs les contrôleurs de la SNCF vous faites un beau métier

Pour nos vacances en France, nous avons choisi de passer une semaine en Bretagne (cela tombe à point c'est la canicule à Paris).
En fait non, il n'y a rien d'improvisé et les billets ont été réservés et PAYES il y a près de deux mois par internet (ce point est important dans la suite du post).
Le train part donc de Paris Montparnasse à 10:04 ce mardi 30 Juin 2015. Depuis le début de nos vacances, nous avions prévu de rendre notre voiture de location puis de prendre notre train pour nous rendre dans la belle et fraîche Bretagne.
Bonne idée n'est-ce pas? Oui nous le pensions mais c'était sans compter sur quelques petits détails que nous avions oubliés...
Nous étions jusqu'ici en banlieue Essonne sud. Nous pensions mettre environ 1H30 pour nous rendre à la gare. Grosse Erreur!! Cela nous a pris 2H.
Donc nous finissons le trajet en catastrophe, regardant constamment notre montre, énervés, faisons face à la grande incivilité (je dirais même l'égoïsme) des français au volant.... Un ensemble de sentiments que nous ne connaissions plus.
Donc arrivée à 10h et le train est dans 4 minutes!!
Le retour de la voiture chez le loueur s'effectue dans la plus grande des cohue possible.
Là la course commence. Petit rappel sur le contexte, nous sommes une famille avec 4 enfants avec un petit de 3 ans (qui ne marche pas tout le temps donc nous avons une poussette), deux autres filles de 7 et 12 ans et un garçon de 14 ans. Donc oui nous sommes chargés et nous n'avons à ce moment là plus que 3 minutes pour aller du parking Avis jusqu'au quai.
Les enfants comprennent la situation et se chargent de valises (pour une petite de 7 ans une valise cela peut-être très lourd mais elle nous aide bien).
Là avec ma poussette et mes deux valises à tirer, je comprends la difficulté des handicapés dans des lieux publics!!! Mais tant bien que mal nous y arrivons, montons dans le wagon de queue au moment de la sonnerie.
Un grand merci à ces passagers qui nous ont aidés à monter nos valises, poussettes et sacs. En plus il fait bien chaud en ce jour de canicule!!
Donc nous sommes dans le train. Enfin presque car le train se sépare à Rennes et nous allons devoir remonter les dix wagons pour nous mettre le plus près possible de la locomotive afin de changer de train en moins de 4 minutes. Encore de grand moments de sueur nous attendent!!
Dans toute cette course pas eu le temps de retirer les billets DEJA payés il y a plus de 2 mois. (oui je sais j'insiste un peu sur ce point) Donc un de mes premières préocupations est de trouver un contrôleur pour lui expliquer que bloqués dans les bouchons nous n'avons pas eu le temps de retirer nos billets mais que j'ai bien le numéro de dossier etc...
Sa réponse froide et sur un ton très ironique voire moqueur: "ne vous inquiétez pas monsieur nous allons bien nous occuper de votre cas". Je vous rappelle lecteurs que nous venons de courir dans la canicule parisienne chargés de sacs, valises et autres poussettes et que monsieur se permet de faire un humour très ironique....
Très naïevement, je pense un très court instant que ce contrôleur est en fait très sympathique et va arranger notre souci.
Donc nous commençons notre remontée de nos dix wagons. je vous assure que remonter dix wagons avec une poussette et les bagages pour une famille de 6 personnes ce n'est vraiment pas simple surtout lorsque le train est chargé et bon nombre de personne ne se donne même pas la peine de déplacer même légèrement les bagages qu'ils laissent au sol à moitié dans le chemin (oui c'est un peu dur de mettre son sac en hauteur pour ne pas gêner les autres...)
A mi chemin de notre remontée, nous croisons les contrôleurs (ceux que nous avions déjà prévenus à notre montée dans le train) qui nous demandent: "titre de transport s'il vous plait".
Donc je tente de discuter en expliquant de nouveau notre cas, donne mon numéro de dossier pour vérification (mais apparemment en 2015 les contrôleurs n'auraient pas de moyens nécessaires pour vérifier les billets associés à mon numéro de dossier). Je n'ai apparemment pas bien saisi la nuance entre e-billet et billets à retirer.
Soit mais mon billet je l'ai déjà payé et nous avons simplement eu de la malchance à cause des bouchons.
Le contrôleur m'explique qu'en fait je peux frauder et vouloir me faire rembourser mon billet mais quand même prendre le train!!!
J'avoue que pour un père de famille de 4 enfants c'est toujours un peu dur de se faire traiter de voleur devant ses enfants.
Je lui montre donc ma commande avec le mention "non échangeable, non remboursable". Donc là franchement, je ne vois pas comment je pourrais faire cela.
Mais non ces messieurs se montrent intransigeants et nous mettent 5 amendes de 122 euros.
Là j'avoue ne pas comprendre. Nos billets ont été payés et réservés plus de 2 mois à l'avance.
Je me calme, j'essaie de faire comprendre à mes enfants que non nous ne sommes pas des voleurs. Qu'il s'agit simplement de malchance.
Nous parvenons enfin à regagner la locomotive de tête. Et oui il nous reste encore à changer de train en moins de 4 minutes. Le tout en transférant une poussette et des bagages pour une famille de 6 et sans oublier que c'est la canicule en France...
Finalement nous y parvenons....
Je ne comprends toujours pas aujourd'hui comment ces contrôleurs ont pu nous mettre de telles amendes. Le prétexte de la non possibilité de vérifier l'état de notre dossier me semble un peu gros. Nous sommes tout de même en 2015 dans un pays civilisé doté de matériel technologique souvent de pointe.
Donc oui messieurs les contrôleurs je trouve que vous faites un bien beau métier en mettant des amendes à une famille de 4 enfants (qui a déjà payé ses billets!!). La cible est évidemment bien facile, il y a tellement d'autres endroits en France mais les cibles sont peut-être plus compliquées et demandent un peu plus de courage....

Aussie Hackergarten

The idea is to organize a Hackergarten in Melbourne and/or Sydney (maybe later in those wild north regions!)
The idea of such meeting is the ability for Open Source users to meet the Open Source contributors.

To do what?
Not only have beers!
Users/curious developers will be able to finally meet those bloody/lazy Open Source who never fix the issues but only think about implementing new non backward compatible features.
So now you will be able to navigate through the source code of a project, you want to fix an issue or implement a new feature and with the help of the developers.
Please provide your ideas and/or start discussions here: Google Groups or add a comment in this blog entry.
You can propose a project you want to see in those Hackergarten.
All languages/projects accepted!