Castles on the Sand

I’ve spent the last two weeks in Naples, Florida. In case you aren’t familiar with Naples, it is in the south west corner of the state. The old part of the city is beautiful and there are long white sand beaches on the Gulf Coast side.

This morning, I went for a spin around the best part of town, riding past what must have been $2 Billion of real estate assets. Beautiful landscaping and meticulously kept gardens made it a serene setting for an easy ride.

Having done a little market research on the top end of the local real estate market, I have noticed a large implied land premium that is built into high end properties down here. This struck me as risky given:

** Most of the properties lie between 3-7 feet above mean sea level;
** Naples is in the hurricane belt;
** Many of the best properties are built on sand bars and surrounded by water;
** Annual property overheads in a moist, warm, salty climate like Naples (air con, insurance, taxes, maintenance, gardening…) run between 1.5-2.25% of capital values;
** The local climate alternates between very dry and very wet – challenging conditions when you are built on sand with limited fresh water resources; and
** The medium term impact of global warming could make environmental factors more challenging over the next 15-25 years.

While the governor’s brother is in the White House, I imagine that the state has a get-out-of-jail free card. However, that’s not always going to be the case and I can see a scenario where federal taxpayers get “re-building fatigue” for folks that want to live in low lying lands on the Gulf Coast.

I didn’t look into property yields but imagine that this is a situation where the “rent or buy” equation swings towards rent. The exception probably being a condo purchase if I was going to use the place extensively and it was a small part of my portfolio.

Of course, I am willing to fly to New Zealand or Australia for weeks at a time. From a property investment point of view, I like the markets of Tasmania and the South Island of NZ over the next 10-25 years.

If you live in the Northeast USA then you can’t exactly fly to Nelson, NZ for your Easter vacation. So, I can see the attractions down here in Florida. It’s a very beautiful part of the world.

Anyhow, I plan on using the US Gulf Coast as a leading indicator on how global warming might impact property values. If you are in your sixties then this probably doesn’t impact you all that much. As an investor under 40, it is a consideration for me.

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Last week was seriously hot and humid here. It was an excellent reminder of the challenges of tropical training. I slipped back into the lessons that I learned in Hong Kong.

I’ve been reflecting on the training program that I subjected Baron to in late 2004 before Hawaii – his in-race meltdown was completely my fault (sorry buddy). It is a good reminder that coaches must continue to “do” in order to be able to successfully advise their athletes. I’ve spent thousands of hours in hot weather training and failed to remember what I’d learned. By writing it down now, I hope to do better next time.

To know, but not to do, is not to know.

My hydration rate is creeping up to 1.5L per hour now and that is for training prior to 10am. I’m still losing weight through the workouts even at those intake levels.

Reflecting on my personal hydration challenges as well as my Kona training camp, it amazes me how Molina was able to go 8:31 in Hawaii. He doesn’t do well in the heat at all. I think he told me once that his secret was to get in 8:11 shape.

Personally, I have another theory – fatigue management. Many coaches and most athletes think that endurance sports are about over-coming pain – believing that the magic elixir lies in developing superior pain management. Articles, and training programs, that are built on pain are highly popular because they appeal to athletes’ (misplaced) biases.

Pain management is likely a factor for traditional endurance sports of 2-120 minutes duration. Beyond six hours, I think it swings greatly towards fatigue management.

In my experience, we are fatigue limited, not pain limited. When we slow, our brains are shutting us down because they are tired of being tired. Well paced ultra-events simply grind the psyche down. Certain athletes learn how to cope with, and train their ability to endure, extreme fatigue.

The goal of fatigue management being to completely remove the emotive brain from the decision process of whether to stop, go, speed up or slow. That is my experience of “athletic flow” and a key component of the bigger picture that lies behind my preferred approach.

More on that, perhaps, at a later date.

Back to Florida… between 10am and 5pm, we can only do light cycling or swimming. The local pool at the Y is geared towards aqua-jogging so real swimming isn’t an option there. M made friends with the head swim coach so we now have two hours of long course swimming available 4x per week. That’s a big bonus because that pool has a reasonable temperature.

I have a half finished piece of behavioral psychology / decision making. I have another easy day on Sunday so, perhaps, I’ll get a chance to finish it off.

Right now, it’s back to work.