Discussion: events in training log

I've noticed many of you have upcoming events listed in your training logs. I know that Attackpoint listed events will show up there, but many of you have non-attackpoint events as well - or even your birthdays listed...

Its probably really obvious, but I seem to be missing something here - how do you enter that sort of upcoming event?

Use the "Add Note" feaure. When you enter the note/comment with a future date it will show up on your calendar as an upcoming event.

thats one thing I hadn't tried.. thanks..

And how does Ken set training targets in his calendar? Ken?

I think he is alpha testing it so not yet available to the masses. Check the Beta menu option.

Not everybody sees the Beta menu option, Tim - only those that either train a lot or waste a lot of time on Attackpoint or both...

this is part of the "planning" feature-set which isn't yet ready for public consumption. I need to re-work a few things, which I haven't had time for recently. I may pick it back up again soon though. Tom H deserves credit for suggesting a lot of this.

to give you a quick overview, the two main components are volume/distance summary targets for arbitary time periods (e.g. "for these 14 days I want to train 15 hrs") and individual session plans (e.g. on "friday I will run 6 miles"). then for example, it's telling me now that if I follow the plan for the rest of this week, I'm still going to miss my target :-( You can also break out the goals by intensity ranges or activity. you can look back at my calendar in feb-march to see some of that.

I played with this for most of the winter, and found it helped me build/keep my mileage up. one of my main problems is that I'm busy enough that if I don't plan ahead, I usually end up short for the week. the last-7-day total on the log is slightly helpful in that sense, but this is much more powerful.

speaking of more training, I see that Sergey is "putting his money where his mouth is", and attempting a significant increase in training over the summer. I'm planning something similar, although more gradual since I break easily. anyone else?

I'm trying to claw my way up as well, but I'm not sure it would qualify as "significant." It would be great to reach 8 hr/wk this summer, but as of right now a consistent 7 would be nice. The monthly total calendar has been very useful for comparing past training plateaus with O-performance. Summer 2000 was a good one. Not sure how I managed that, but I keep looking back at it. Staring at me. I know its laughing at me now...

Trying to keep the real goal in mind though: Improved O performance. I'm trying to use A-meet results against strong fields as a metric rather than plain volume. Quality is an important adjective to have in front of the word Volume. However it is likely that more volume will help me. Dunno.

I plan on higher volumes with a higher proportion of running for a while after I feel recovered from Sage Stomp but I haven't set any precise target for time or mileage as Sergey has. God willing, my body won't break.

Trying to seriously train for skiing next winter, and adventure racing and orienteering now make my training schedule complicated. I've started using a calendar with colored sticky dots to plan out the type of workout and intensity for about 2 weeks in advance. This has definitely helped fit together multiple daily workouts and keep track of what I'm trying to accomplish. Find I push much harder than if I just let the workouts "happen".

I trained fairly well last fall and had some good results (for me). Since then I've been aiming for 1hr/day average, but not quite hitting that, due to illness/injury/travel. Still, I've averaged some pretty decent training levels (for me) for the last 8 months or so, and I think I'm getting a little faster (5% vs a year ago?). And that's really just going from ~4-5 hr/wk to ~6 hr/wk, trying to include at least one ~2hr terrain/trail run in the week. If I can ramp toward 7 this summer, 8 next fall, and 9 next Spring, without breaking, I might actually get some decent (US-standards) speed. It would surprise me a bit, but it seems more possible to me than it did a year ago, so I think I'll keep it up. I think WOC 2007 is in Ukraine, and it would be fun to go there with Angelica...

I guess I'm in the club, too. I "broke" in January at the Alabama meet, and now that I'm "fixed" (as in "healthy", not "spayed") I'm trying to put in some real effort. Without any maps near here, that just means running and, well...lots of Catching Features. ;-) In the past two years I've gone from total orienteering noob to someone who can actually orienteer (though not exceedingly well). I figure I can get to moderately good orienteer within a year or two...especially if I can actually get some real practice in. The next year will have me in Little Rock, Albuquerque, and finally Tucson, all of which should serve me better than San Antonio...

This is like some kind of support group confessional. Only, I'm still alone. Snif.

I'll do my usual increase in summer (up to around 12hrs/wk from 8-10. It's not really an increase since the extra time is on the bike (which is less value per hour, but allows for more hours without "breaking").

Since everyone is confessing their undertraining sins, i'll join the club...
With a long-ass work commute and always longer-than-expected work hours, as well as stupid hated part-time tutoring jobs to supplement the income of a New York City public school teacher, i find that i have real trouble keeping up training volume during the school year, especially since my body never feels recovered on 5 hours of sleep. The solution so far has been trying to make up for quantity with quality and trying to, more or less consistently, get in at least one, but preferably two, track workouts per week along with hitting the woods on weekend.... It seems to have worked ok, as I think i am in better shape than I was before WOC 2003. Certainly, having the summer off will help.

However, if i am to make any significant improvements, i will need to center my life around O, which will hopefully happen starting this fall in Uppsala. We'll see.....

Cristina wrote: Without any maps near here, that just means running and, well...lots of Catching Features. ;-)

This isn't as outrageous as it seems (the reference to CF). On his website, Tero (Thierry Gueorgiou) writes, in answer to the question "How does one practise technique when there are no maps in the vicinity? Can training technique only at the races be sufficient?":

"I think that to work on technique during competitions is a huge mistake, unless you run 100 races per year... It is a little as if a pianist played his peice for the first time at the time of a concert. Unimaginable... In orienteering, I think that it is the same thing. You cannot hope to do things in competition that you never did during training.

Of course, the difficulty of our sport (and what makes its specificity) is that you need a map and a forest to be able to work on technique, therefore you must travel. Travelling is a part of our sport and to improve, the effort should be made to spend time travelling.
If it is not possible to travel as often as one would like, one can use the very good orienteering simulation, Catching Features. This game is really excellent and makes it possible to practise the same habits (leave control by compass for example) as in real orienteering, without the physical effort. Jogging with maps is also a good means of continuing to practise despite the absence of mapped terrain. The simplest but also best simulation exercise is to trace a course and to run it mentally. For this session to be really effective, it is necessary to associate the technique used to the selected route.

But warning, because if nothing replaces practise in the terrain, nothing is worse either than to run with your head (and your hands) empty."

Hmmm, I wonder if a monetary contribution would get me into the Beta group...since I don't think I'll ever be ranked high enough to achieve that status... Or maybe visits to AP per day should be a ranking category - with my tendency to treat AP like a video game, I am guessing I would probably rank first in daily visits. ;)

My primary training focus has been to improve the quality of my training, not the volume. I also play tons of catching features that I don't log.

My commute will be getting longer starting on June 9, so I'm considering choosing that as a time to increase my training from zero to something. Makes no sense, which is as good as any reason to do it, I guess.

If I started logging how much Catching Features I play...

I did think that it might be interesting to at least note when I was playing a lot, just as one might jot down how often one is doing general map study. But since I don't get the chance to orienteer very often, I'm not sure it would provide any valuable information.

One thing I've noticed from looking over my (real) splits is that I tend to do extra piss-poor on long legs. I used to think that was because I'm slow, but now I think it's a map thing (+slowness). If I get nothing else from CF, I think I'm at least gaining an ability to quickly evaluate a long leg, simplify the route, and execute (albeit with a mouse).

re: performance on long legs - I find that short legs allow me to stay focused better, on longer legs I focus on fewer details and try to run harder to eat up the distance, and by not staying as focused I drift and then go BOOM...

although its not easy with crazy schedules - getting into the woods with a map in hand, even one you know very well, is the best training. Even rerunning the same legs for the umpteenth time, the map forces you to get off trails and pushing yourself hard in uneven terrain builds needed strength as well as terrain speed - but practice staying focussed and planning ahead - you need real O on courses you haven't seen before.

I've mananaged to get more O in this spring than in past years and it has certainly helped - particularly doing sprints - my hope is to continue doing sprint distance training through the summer to be in decent shape for Pawtuckaway....

I haven't had enough time for CF. As regards physical training, I have races the next couple of weeks, will then try to fall into 5-6 hours a week of running (plus stretching, toning etc.) for a few weeks, not too hard, then french 5. afterwards don't know, but two or three weeks of stress-free bog-trotting in the west of ireland might be a nice way to lead up to the french champs in mid-august. In any case, an easier summer than last year... hope to be strong for the WC in Italy if I go. And then there's a couple of weeks of orienteering at Boris' in Uppsala.

Neil, no WOC for you this year? :( Who is going from Ireland? Niall?

Notice that I am not jumping from 5 hour week to 10 hour week. It took me almost 2 years to ramp from 4-5 to 7-8 hours. Natural addition of couple hours at summer time is a must :)

I try to include stretching before and after training and some massage as well to keep me healthy.
The course of plan is to add one speed training next week then take brake during long weekend at the end of May. Then start with two speed trainings per week until end of July. Looks like I will have oportunity to get enough orienteering each weekend during June-July :)

After "resting" for the last couple of weeks I am planning to run a lot more mileage. Probably will be somewhat more then in the past as I plan to run another ultra in the fall.