Training Log Archive: Ari-o

Ran to NP, decently fast and decently late. With a deck of cards. Give me a deck of cards workout and I well may show up!

The deck returns! I need to do more of these. We went decently fast, and I only dropped twelve push ups behind, and it was so fun. I really wish November Project would get rid of the cutesy morning workouts and do these. It's just much more … fun.

There were burpies at the beginning, but I honored my no burpies policy and did not do them.

And the run home

Event: NEOC: Mt. Tom
 

Event: Urban Adventure Run
 

Out to O with Dean. Lots of traffic for people going to the airshow, but at least they stuck in the breakdown lane and didn't foul the mainline. Quick warm up on the brand new pavement road ROLLERSKII!.

Orienteering is fun! Having done a decent amount recently I'm getting more of the feel of it and not getting hopelessly lost. Time to add speed, but it was very warm today, and pants were a must, and I was hot and dehydrated, lots of mosquitos, so that didn't help. Navigated pretty cleanly (no huge errors, no major contact lost) but a lot of jiggles and niggles. Controls:

1. Run through the woods, find control.
2. Down a bit too close to the swamp, then along the swamp and across the top, but because it's been dry I went to the wrong cliff. To make matters worse, it had a faded permanent control. Too me a while to realize there was another.
3. Around the hill, attacked off the spur.
4. Down to the little swamp and trail junction, down the trail to the curve, above the rocky hill, across a stream. This went well, I was happy.
5. Two streams, then a slog up a steep hill on to a little step, and a couple niggly hills.
6. Tried to contour, this was bad. I spent a lot of time just grasping at rocks and trees and trying not to fall or slide down the hill. Not good. Finally ran down a bit and then up to the trail. The rocks for the controls were very cool! Awesome traprock formations. Not what you normally associate with a black circle. Fun!
7. Easy run over the hill, a little off but spotted well.
8. Tried to contour but got sucked down the reentrant as contouring on these slopes is rough. Not a terrible route but not well executed. Finally found the green and the control.
9. Navigated towards the circle well, but wound up at the dot hill below the control. Realized I was low and ran up to find it. Whoops.
10. Slog up the spur left of the rocky reentrant. Definitely feeling the heat by this point.
11. Navigated this well. Dam. Step. Swamp. Control.
12. Ran down the spur to the stream. Then around the green hill through some rocks. I wasn't sure where I was but decided I was right and went right to the control. Accidental spike!
13. Contoured well and wound up right at the stream junction, but then attacked too far up along the stream and wound up behind the hill, so had to come back over.
14. Brain was shutting down with heat, but I was able to go down along the stream and attack off the big ass rock in the stream. Rock wasn't that big, but was the only rock in the stream, so I assumed it was right. Fumbled to the control.
15. Down to road. Avoid climb and thinking. Saw guy who said "I'm hopelessly lost." Well, dude, at least you're on a road!
16. Up reentrant.
17. So my brain was pretty fried, as was my body. Looked like a choice between contours or green. I didn't like either. So I ran down to the road and then up the trail. Faster? Probably not, but in that state, I was happy just to have some time to turn off the brain. Easy to find the control off the trail.
18. Scooter down the hill, control visible, then finish.

So, a good time. Decent navigation, and some decent running. Didn't do that well in the heat, but I'm just starting to regain the feel for O. Of course with the heat, bugs and foliage, it's nearing the end of spring O season. Well, the trails await!

Quick cool down, good for me. Alex was off playing somewhere. She did two courses and a trail run. So I'm soft.

Then we went out the rollerski road, and then realized that the Pike was jammed so went off on 202. Long stop for lunch mainly because the lunch place forgot my order for a malted, but I got my ice cream, and then ran out of water on Route 2, but that's okay. Took the train from Alewife. Dehydration!

Blue - Splits

didn't log anything today despite spending 3 hours on a bike! I was sweep for the Cambridge Bicycle Committee ride, which plods along at 7 mph or so, then went to Porchfest, then dug holes for tomatoes. The tomatoes were probably the most loggable; we have tall plants and needed deep holes! Also did about 40 more pullups: 1000 this month is possible!

After a week of no pullups with a strained forearm, I'm back! I'm up to 280 this month, so 1000 for the month is within reach if I get to 50 a day (I think I've done that so far today). Sets of 10 are going fine, back-to-back sets of 10 are close (back to back sets are generally 8-7) and I'm thinking of pushing up to sets of 12 or 13 and then 15 and then 20. SOB season is going well.

Got home from work—after a guy tailgated me and then threatened me (yup, got out of the car and yelled at me because I wouldn't pull over to let him by on a one-lane-wide street with packed cars on both sides, but I stood there with a helmet, U-lock and witness and he went back in to his hole)—and wanted to ride bikes!

The 20 mile ride up through Winchvegas and then down the Minuteman is a great ride for May-Aug when it's easy to do even if you don't get out of work until 6. Felt pretty ducky, too, even if I did hit a lot of lights on the way out.

Off to orienteer in Medford. Went mostly the same way as last week except went straight over the hill and then on the narrow sidewalk along the Fellsway. Again, it's a good thing we have three lanes for cars along there. We wouldn't want a bicycle facility. Lots of hills for my bike that rarely shifts between front rings. Need to fix that at some point.

So. Orienteering. I wanted to go fast and not get lost, but the map. Oh, the map.

I did fine to 11, where I though the clue sheet with the X and T meant "at the top of the feature" so I started running up the stairs before I saw the control below. But it would have been fun to have it at the top! Then 12. I decided to go through the white woods to the stream, and then follow the stream. A few issues:

* The green woods the stream goes through are really reedy undergrowth or impassable swamp, and there should be a contour there or at least a form line.
* There's a discernible—especially given 1m contours—dropoff/curve to the hill to the northeast of the inlet, but it is not mapped. Makes it harder to reorient when you're in there.
* There's a noticeable hill at the control. At least a dot hill, but standing there it is at least 1m high, probably higher.
* The control is not really near the stream, despite that being on the clue sheet. More at the base of an unmapped hill. Not sure what the symbol is for that.

Obviously the best attack is to run in the trail and look for the control. But if you're trying to use the map, and the map lacks pretty much any information you need, it's frustrating. As much as I'm not great at orienteering, part of the fun is spiking difficult controls by properly following the land. When the map and the land don't match, it's less fun. And when the boring attack—run in the trail and look around—is the best, it takes the fun out of it.

Ran to 13 and then along the trail to 14, looking for the depression's southeast end. (Also, it didn't help I had a poorly printed map.) But the depression went on. There was no discernible end. I ran too far, turned back, and just started looking in to the woods. There was the control, on a bank on the side of the trail, but not matching the feature at all. Well, okay then. Ran to 15, back along the trail and saw someone else overrun 14. Great.

Then sprinted back to the finish and had a cupcake and complained about the map. I guess it's a park-o, but after last week at the Fells on a WRE-level map, this is a step down.

C • map 9

So I biked home. Over the hills, slightly lost around Ten Hills but I came down one of the roads with a great view of the Mystic—and 93. Then orienteered my way through Somerville, past Demoulas, and on to the Beacon Rattler. There were some cars going slowly because there was a guy with a walker on the other side of the street—facing oncoming traffic, walking down the middle of the traffic lane. I figured he might be memory impaired and I went to assist him (much easier to do on a bike than a car—another win for bikes after yesterday's passing of a $300,000 McLaren on a $300 MTB) and he said "I see the bus and I don't want to miss it.

I assured him I'd hold the bus and he moved to the sidewalk. I went up to the tombstone and waited for the bus, which got there about when he did, and made sure it stopped for him. Great to see independent old folks like this; it would be nice if we funded transit enough so that the buses they depend on come more than once every 45 minutes.

Then I patted myself on the back, rode home, and found $5.

Sprint - Splits

Stadiums! It was cool, but with the sun I got very warm. I decided that since it's been a while since I did a whole stadium I wouldn't go beyond it. I was happier in the shade. And finished sub-30, although I had to push at the end to get there. It's ice water season at NP.

Better run today. Same route as yesterday, but just felt better. Was dialing up to 7s along the river when I ran in to a friend for a couple of minutes. Then ran home and ate food.