It went from one extreme to the other in my home town of South Australia this week. My life kind of felt like it went that way a bit this week for a few reasons too. In terms of weather, little ol’ Adelaide did a full 180 in a matter of days.

Pups out enjoying the sunset.

When I’m travelling, not many people know of Adelaide. For foreigners, most of them know the big cities such as Sydney and Melbourne, and have travelled more of the East Coast of Australia than I have. It’s kind of funny how that happens, when Australians travel, we see more of the country than the locals do, and when they come to Australia, they usually see and experience more of Australia than us. It’s a  funny phenomenon that has always puzzled me a little, alas, I’m doing my best to try and see as much of this beautiful country as I can.

Alex having a jump at Second Valley, South Australia.

Adelaide is usually very undersold, I’ll list a few reasons why.

– We have some magnificent beaches, in fact, they are all stunning really. Additionally, we are home to a few hidden gems too.
– Getting around is so easy. You can get from the beach to the city, or city to the hills, or anywhere really in about 20 minutes.
– Adelaide more often than not has ripper sunsets.
– We have good wine?! I don’t drink, so I couldn’t tell you. But I know our reputation is solid.

Overall, I rate our coastline rather highly. The start of this week was on fire and Adelaide sold itself well to the greater audience.

Adelaide, flat as a tack.

Seriously!? How dreamy is this.

Moving back to warm weather was a treat, it was like I was still travelling. This summery weather was delightful, it was an Autumn outlier but the incoming cold snap was inevitable. It certainly arrived as expected, bringing with it some threateningly inauspicious storm clouds and bursts of rain. However, my move back to Adelaide was motivated by my training regime so I can toe the line at The Bali Hope Ultra marathon in 5 weeks. Up until this point, training has been going well, I’ve been progressing nicely and building my mileage proficiently. The task of training for an 84km race is no easy feat, and I really do need everything to go to plan. Unfortunately, this week my first minor injury popped up out of nowhere. With 10 weeks to train for an ultra marathon, I knew the probability of injury was going to be somewhat high. This really knocked my mental game around a bit, I’m currently giving everything I have just so I have a chance of getting through this race. It’s how I like to go about things, dive into the situation, often into the deep end and work things out as I go. Been injured initially seemed to foil my whole training plan. This wasn’t the case.

Just that little bit of glow was enough for me. Moody Somerton Park Beach.

Learn to show up. When it’s easy and when it’s not.

Over the my time as an athlete, I’ve had an array of injuries. This is part of the package that comes with it, you accept it, deal with the situation and learn how to overcome it. I sought treatment from my local guru/lower limb practitioner, and we developed a new plan to get me to Bali hopefully moving swiftly. It was very different to the 10 week plan I wrote out at the beginning, but learning to adapt is an imperative tool to any artillery. This week of training was very difficult, some runs I was nearly in tears with the pain in my knee. It seems counter-intuitive, but keeping load on my legs despite the pain is important, this is so the work I’ve done so far doesn’t go to waste.

A theme to my week became apparent. It was to show up. Show up on the good days, and show up on the days that aren’t so good. This idea can be translated into nearly every facet of life, even (in my case) to the simple act of going to your local sunset spot. I went to every sunset last week, and probably the week before, and so on – even when it was stormy. You never know what mother nature (or life) will bring or what surprises you will be granted. Last week there wasn’t many ‘bangers’, but that’s the beauty in in it, when the sky does light up, it’s sure worth it. You get through the tough days, and when you hit the good ones, you’ll hit them with a bounce in your stride and nearly feel invincible.

Lone roo.

Looking back on the week it was challenging, but taking a step back to look at it from the bigger picture, I know I have learnt things and developed new processes to keep giving my best when life isn’t all that smoother sailing.

My favourite photo of the week. Dog smiling. Lighting. Just the right moment.

As always, I hope you enjoyed my favourite photos from the week. The photo above is certainly my favourite, which is certainly a result of being in the right place at the right time. However, I think you’ll find that those who happen to be ‘in the right place at the right time’, have usually being consistently showing up, day in day out, for a long time. Two amazing examples of this are the photographers Clark Little (IG: @clarklittle) and Eugene Tan (IG: @aquabumps), the consistency they show to their craft is phenomenal and as a result so is their artwork and unique captures.

I hope you have a wonderful week, do your best to bring your A-game to the table every day.

Josh

Be an advocate for burning bright. The sun never quits. – Joshua Lynott & Angus Armstrong.

Sun going down at Rapid Bay. That’s me up there. Photo by Alex Gillett.