Training Log Archive: Forest Demon

Jog around car park and along the in the dunes to East.

Was feeling a bit tired, legs felt heavy.
Alright run, though not the fastest. Technically pretty good, asides from totally daft mistake on 5 - running along the track when I passed a control, which I thought was on the path which led to the finish, so had in my head that I was turning left at the next junction. In reality, control was actually on a ditch or similar, and I was about 100m away from where I thought I was. So when I reached the next path junction (way too soon for the correct one, which was 250m further on from the one before), immediately turned left and along the ride. Swiftly realised that I'd cocked up when the path was covered in green, and the penny dropped when I could see the finish in line with me. As a side note, my planned route wasn't ideal - if I had come off the small knoll through the green, the planted lines were running in the right direction to run through easily, which I could've (should've) checked as I ran past. Not too much time wasted though, perhaps a minute.
Navigation for the rest was good though, not getting bogged down with too much of the detail, trying to keep it relatively simple till I neared the control circles. Bit round patches of light green made things pretty easy in the more technical sections in the beginning, no real problems. Endured the path sections from 11-16, though 3km of dead running isn't exactly my idea of a good time in Roseisle (or anywhere). More interesting after 16 (which was in the wrong place), running against Dave Weir, though he dropped me after a poor route choice to 22. Went up to the dunes, but decided they'd be crap to run across, and the tide was high, so no beach either. Headed back into the forest and across all the broken ground, but lost a minute compared to Dave, who stuck with the dunes. Then running on my lonesome again, lost a few seconds to 26 - failed to check descriptions properly, so came in from the wrong direction. Good in the last technical section, though again, the light green made it easier.

Felt surprisingly cold given I'd just finished, not very warm. Ran around in the same area as warm up, though this time with a LiDAR map, which, given the hype around them, was a bit, well, bollocks. Detail just wasn't anywhere near as good as the actual map, and the general shape of the land was a bit of a mess. Others reckoned that the contour filtering and quality of the map was perhaps a little poor, since other LiDAR maps are generally excellent.

Jog up to the start and along by the lake.
Couple of stretches.

Mass start relay practice on Loch na Bo. Started at the same time as the other 3 guys, though only saw James out there.
3- Came up the hill further right than I thought I was, so went around the wrong side of the thicket
5- Wrong side of some unmarked fallen trees - wasn't looking for the knoll with a hole next to it that it was on, since I was expecting it to be a gully
Apart from that, good run, kept catching back up to James who was a bit scrappy. Got 9 well which was potentially tricky (across the flat heathery forest to a single contour hill).
Only control which I had to physically stop and work out what was going on was 10, when it was in the wrong place

Collected in the last 3 controls from the relay, then jogged back to car park

Ran out across the bridge to peninsula then along the beach for a bit.

Started at the same time as James and Hector, so the idea was for a head to head race around the Sprint. Good at the beginning, they weren't too far in front (yet), though I had a poor route choice to 4 - decided to go past the buildings to main path then along that, rather than go through the buildings, so lost some time. Apart from that, good, very fast in the woods which were really nice, working on compass. Popped out the woods again directly in front of the path I was aiming for to 16, so that was good.

Jog back to car park from finish

Jog to start plus a bit of running in the woods

Courses were planned for compass work, focussing on direction. Nice forest, though the map was a little vague in the far end - since there were no kites out, tough trying to decide which feature was actually marked. Good exercise anyways, though wouldn't want to run on it for anything other than training. Bailed at number 24, the light was failing fast, it'd started hosing it down, and both the map and terrain looked pretty bleh.

No proper warm down after last exercise - got cold and wet running back to car, so just jumped straight in to get changed and dry

Travelling up to Forres for the SEDS weekend.

Same session as Tuesday

Agility stuff: High knees, lateral high knees, fast feet, in/out fast feet, ickey shuffle forwards and backwards

3x6(both leg) Bulgarian squat
2x8 overhead squat (10kg bar)
3x8 dumbbell bench press (9,9,10 kg)

3x3 broad jumps, best was 6.9m
3x3 seated box jumps

3x10 supine row
3x10 weighted sit-ups (5,7,7 kg)

Should have gone for a run, but the weather crapped out and didn't really feel like a run in a downpour. Need to go earlier next week.

Let's try out this attackpoint shenanigans.

Rolling around on the floor, stretching etc

Agility stuff: High knees, lateral high knees, fast feet, in/out fast feet, ickey shuffle forwards and backwards

3x6(both leg) Bulgarian squat
3x8 overhead squat (5kg bar)
3x8 dumbbell bench press (7,8,9 kg)

3x3 double foot jumps along a tape measure, best was 6.5m (better than woman's fencing's best, woohoo)

3x3 seated box jumps
3x10 supine row

Jog to the meadows

5 intervals, starting every 6th minute. Running on Tessa's shoulder for the most part, she's about the same pace as me.

1- 1km: 00:03:39 - Remembering where the heck the kilometre loop went
2- 1km: 00:03:34 - Feeling alright, nice to have people to run with
3- 1.25km: 00:04:26 - Tessa asked if I wanted to do a long loop, decided I would
4- 1.25km: 00:04:28 - Another longer loop, harder to keep up the same pace
5- 1km: 00:03:35 - Final km loop, feeling it in the home straight

Jog back after intervals, chatting with Dave till Lothian Road