Thomas "The Tank" Dade

Blog Update #14

Well that was a quick turn around, I went from coming off Mount Kosciuszko in New South Wales and going out for dinner with the team with little COVID-19 restrictions to driving overnight to Victoria and going straight back to work with no sleep and strict COVID-19 restrictions that even required I wear a mask. Then quickly I became overloaded with work leaving me little time to even unpack and digest the epic three week journey I just came back from. Now only a little over a week later not am I only wearing a mask but the overload of work that was stressing me out has come to a dramatic halt with the new Stage 4 COVID-19 restrictions. A challenging but necessary step, that I dare say isn’t strict enough to stop the outbreak in Victoria. Let me recap that; one second I pretty much had zero COVID-19 restrictions then 8 hours later I went from that situation to restrictions so strict that I had to wear a mask and couldn’t travel to go for a run on a local trail. One second I had no work then 8 hours later I was back into 10+ hour days and now all of a sudden pretty much 0 hour days. Its crazy to wrap my head around, one week I was going out for dinner and now I can’t even run for longer than 1 hour a day, once a day. Don’t get me wrong I’m not winging there’s people out there with much bigger problems to worry about but I can’t deny its a crazy quick turn around to change the way you live and to limit certain freedoms. To be honest I’m in a fortunate enough situation where I’m kind of looking forward to being forced to not work. I’m tired, I’m exhausted, for years now I haven’t given myself a break and properly reflected on the things I’ve done and achieved. If I came back from an expedition I was straight back to working numerous jobs to save for the next one, when I finished an ultramarathon I was straight back to full on training for the next one. I’ve been waking up exhausted before the day even begins for so long now. The crazy part is the most relaxed I’ve been for years is when I should be the most exhausted, for example summit day on Aconcagua or waking up the morning of my recent Mount Kosciuszko summit. These expeditions have actually allowed my body rest in comparison to my work and training schedule. However now I’m forced to relax properly, which deep down I’ve known I should of done for a while now. I look forward to still training hard (running for that 1 hour everyday, push ups, pull ups, ab training, etc) but then having the time to properly recover with adequate amount of sleep and relaxing time. I look forward to writing more and reflecting on this epic 3 week journey I just had in New South Wales. I look forward to training with knots and crevasse rescue in my backyard for my guiding aspirations. I look forward to investigating other income streams and ideas that will get me to the top of the seven summits. I look forward to changing up my running a little and prioritising speed over distance. Theres so much to look forward too that comes with the anxieties of Stage 4 lockdown and restrictions.