Training Log Archive: BigWillyStyle

Rocky Mountain O Fest, Day 1 (or Day 3). RG

Had the speed to match the Bonesaw and was in the lead at 10, but I was way too sloppy. Hooked 3 for 10s, took a totally wrong exit from 10 for about 45s. Dumbest one - 15-18 was a butterfly loop, and out of 15 I headed for 17 instead of 16 (i.e. started going around the triangle the wrong way) which cost me a minute. Also lost 30s at 19 when I was a bit confused by the rocks, 30s at 22 for being lazy, and 20s at 23 when I was too low. Pretty poor orienteering - to wit, Bonesaw covered 5.9k, I covered 6.6 - but really fun. The terrain here is, as always, glorious.

Middle Blue - Splits

Me -> Denver -> Laramie!

Event: 2018 Rocky Mountain Orienteering Festival
 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1rF5SSa29O8

REI contacted us a while back about doing a feature on orienteering for their "REI Trailheads" video series, which eventually resulted in them sending a crew to one of our events last month. Pretty gimmicky and over-produced but still kinda cool. Cameos from Bob Forgrave and (I think) the Jonesaw.

Surprisingly, their video already has substantially more views than all of my Willvision series videos combined. I will have to retool my marketing strategy, and possibly rebrand.

C • Get your views up 5

Ye olde Bridle Trails loope.

COC Middle. My splits are pretty comical for this race; I went from 20th place at 6 to 10th place at 14 and had like the fourth or fifth best time on that section of the course. Why? Leaving 7 I caught sight of Nick Barrable, who had started 2min ahead, so I took off like a dingbat after him. He also saw me, and much to my surprise I soon realized that in the course of trying to lose me he also miraculously happened to be stumbling across all the right controls in the right order, and doing it faster than he had any right to. It thus became harder to catch him that I had previously surmised, and I was forced to redouble my efforts while also resolving to punch the odd control that I came across in my quest. The situation befuddled me, as I wondered why he had suddenly decided to go from orienteering poorly enough to let me catch him, to orienteering awesomely. I also later learned that in my determination to close the gap I had inadvertently beaten Timo Sild in a split by one second. This is good to know, because now I know how to beat a world-class orienteer: you just take off at a full sprint from your previous control, run directly at the next control, disregard everything in between, and never hesitate or deviate even for a split second until you reach it. Then, repeat.

Anyway, Barrable hesitated near 14 and I finally punched one ahead of him, having slowly ground him down like the strength of the pack inexorably runs down the caribou. Naturally, I then imploded on the way to 15 when a strange and dramatic one-contour shelf appeared in the forest when I had been expecting nothing of note. This caused me much consternation and by the time I figured it out I had given back all the time I had undeservedly gained, and thus did I duly finish the course in about the right time as if none of it had occurred at all.

C • Drama 2

COC Middle - C-11 - Splits

COC Long. Nice course. I was feeling ok and actually navigating pretty well early on, but the week's fatigue soon showed that I was not up to a task this tough. I was physically and mentally not having fun anymore and ready to be done by about number 13.

COC Long - C-11 - Splits

Instead of resting on the rest day, Ian and I decided to undertake an epic journey around the Mount Lorne loop. Things went well until on the way down we made a parallel error and went down the wrong spur; this caused us to soon be wading through increasingly high and dense brush instead of finding the ATV trail we were promised.

Eventually after much discussion and hand-wringing, and several false starts, we figured out what we had done and decided simply to trudge back up to the top of the ridge to correct our mistake. Each step upward drilled the shame of our folly into us further, but we soon righted our course (after wasting more than an hour) and galloped down the mountain in a vain attempt to meet our 3pm deadline. We missed it by some 20 minutes. If only we knew how to read a map.

C • There's nothing 2

NAOC Sprint. I had a relatively clean race despite taking suboptimal routes on the long legs, and finished a very surprising 6th NA - on the podium! That's my best NAOC finish ever, and I earned individual points for the first time ever as well.

NAOC Relay. Got to be on Team Cascade/USA with Bonesaw and Peteris, which was very cool. I ran the second leg and didn't have a very good race but did manage to keep us ahead of the second Canadian team.

Relay - Senior Men Leg 2 - Splits

NAOC Middle. This was not good.

NAOC Middle & WRE - C-11 - Splits

NAOC Long! I had very low expectations but ended up having a decent race and finished 10th NA, which was funny because my stretch goal was to be in the top ten.

NAOC Long & WRE - C-11 - Splits

Event: NAOC 2018
 

C • If there was 2

Event: CascadeOC Wednesday Evening Series #5
 

My best #trailsfordinner imitation up Mailbox Peak. Nearly killed me. Embarrassingly, I had never been up Mailbox before and was thinking 4.5 miles to the top so was confused when I hit 4.5 miles and was instead at the bottom of a steep scree slope with maybe another quarter or third of a mile to go. Ended up hiking that last bit instead of running.

Back down. Quads took a real pounding.

Thou shalt register now. I offer food and shelter for those pure of heart who make the journey and pass the test.

C • Registration 4

Cougar Mountain run. Did not see any cougars, but they saw me. There's a lot going on in Cougar Mountain, including open mine shafts, signs that warn of fatal gases, and 50s/60s-era missile sites which I assume were emplaced to protect the cougars from dastardly Soviet attack.

C • How can you know that? 2

Patrick's semi-annual Street-Scramble-esque "Adventure Run" with his running group. I had to hustle to get there on time and arrived just as the start was about to happen and successfully snagged the last map. Didn't have time to plan a route so I had to wing it and accidentally skipped one and had to do a suboptimal out-and-back.