Training Log Archive: Nadim

Event: QOC Cabin John
 

Cabin John Regional Park. From the playground area off Tuckerman Ln., I jogged around the parking and picnic areas with a winter coat on.

QOC: Cabin John Regional Park, MD. Michael Dickey did the heavy lifting taking on his first attempt at course setting. I had helped by consulting and making various map updates, so I was very familiar with things before going out. The first thing I'd noticed when I started doing map updates (Michael identified most of these), was how much greener the park had become. Especially in the lowlands, a plague of thorny/woody vines had sprouted, along with low bushes and deadfall. The rest of the race, I didn't feel like I was navigating so much as just running from place to place--this was due to having too much map memory and it wasn't a good feeling. I did also have to stop about 8 times to try to tie my shoes with my gloves on. I'd forgotten to tape them as I usually do and the laces were just too long for the thorny/bush terrain that kept pulling them apart.

S-1 - Gavin Wies was nearby getting ready to go out so he probably saw me fumbling with getting oriented. I knew the location of #1 in my head so From consulting, I'd already known what direction I'd need to go in. However, it took me about 20 seconds of fumbling to get the map oriented. I went left around the fence and into the field where the White course control was. I took trails to get near but wasn't sure how I should cross the creek. I went off trail toward it, kind of on line but it didn't look good--it was both green on the land in the area, and deep in the water. I backed out went further south and crossed near the tree trunk that spanned it. A woman was on the tree crossing so I ran across splashing a foot in the water, getting my toes a little wet. The cliff seemed high to me and there were two--I'd only mapped one. I got there a little before the woman even though I'd walked most of the way up the steep slope.

1-2 - Leaving #1, I climbed but was closer to the contour than straight. I came down on a deer trail more directly. A way in the stream bed looked open but to cross the stream dry, I had to skirt some green that I hadn't planned on. I had updated this point feature boulder after Michael had informed me it was mapped wrong previously--basically, I knew where to go from having been out there not long ago.

2-3 - I had debated staying low or going over the hill. I hadn't been along either when out earlier, except for the part under the power lines. I knew that was nastily overgrown (mapped updated for it), so I climbed. Fortunately, the green on the high route, near the fence for the private property off the power lines, was easily passable. I attacked from there.

3-4 - I stayed high by going left and coming down the ridge. I got to the bottom and could see the control, but it looked too slow to go through some deadfall. I went around only to get stuck in thorns a few feet from the control.

4-5 - I exited #4 by climbing through the deadfall--better than the thorns. I ran along the maintenance shed to the road.

5-6 - Road crossing; off the clock, but I didn't wait any more than needed.

6-7 - Around this point, I realized that I'd forgotten to tape my shoes. Sure enough, somewhere on this leg they came undone. I went up the road but thought about backing around south over the bridge to the road (too long). I got across without much trouble. I wasn't navigating that carefully (a bad habit) so I went toward an unmapped rootstock on the way, forgetting that the control was on a ditch.

7-8 - I stayed high on the west side of the stream mostly. It was greener on the east side than mapped and I went around it. I crossed the creek dry, but it took me a while to get to a spot due west of the control, where I could. The control was a little hidden between the deadfall but I still saw it from below.

8-9 - I dropped immediately and ran the valley trail until due east of the control. I hit the bed perfectly but didn't see it. I ran upstream a way then returned to see it tucked down. Michael told me after the race that he'd not had anything else in the right place to hang it on.

9-10 - I ran south and crossed on stones. Going up the reentrant along the ditch, I saw Francis H. and another person. The control was low and not very visible again but I knew about where it be based off of the bamboo that was a little past the depression.

10-11- I ran high, planning to stay out of the development grounds--technically not out of bounds from the way the map was portrayed but I thought it better to do. I did angle for the trail that comes out of those grounds so I had a few steps on the grass before getting on the trail. I dropped down as the terrain opened a little. I did get across dry but it felt slow hopping stones. I stayed on the road as long as possible and followed the edge of the marsh east to the control.

11-12, I went on the right of the hilltop, on trails. From the pavilion, I had it in my mind that I knew where the control was but not seeing it, I realized I was in the reentrant north of the control, not the ditch on the hillside. The funny thing is that I suggested to Michael Dickey that this leg might be too easy. I only lost a few seconds. Michael Stasiowski was coming to it from another direction.

12-13 - I got out and ahead of Michael S. while running down the hill to the trail. I was only on the trail until it seemed to start rising again. I ran the flat ground from there and hit the control well.

13-14 - I stopped at #13 to tie my show again--about 6-7 times by this point. Michael S. passed me but when he hit the hillside and started climbing I stayed left and low to get ahead.

14-15 I should have tied my show here, off the clock. It took me a while to realize which control I was going to after #15, even though I'd seen the course before.

15-16 - I ran the trail well left of the line, up to the White course control that I'd passed at the edge of the power lines earlier on the way to #1. Once across the power lines I ran across the white hillside to between the 2 trail intersections. From there I ran in.

16-17 - I mostly took trails for a way, passing Craig Sheldon when I was off trail and dropping to the creek. I got across the creek on new erosion control rock that'd been put in just above 2 reentrants. I stayed on the trail until just east of the control.

17-18 - I walked up the leaving #17, and cut a bit to the right to get above the green. There were several people going to and leaving the control but I was pretty much on track the whole way. A few people thought the ruin the control was on might be mis-mapped, but I don't think so. Michael Dickey had picked-up the control after the event and confirmed that the feature appeared to be in the correct location. The stream below does sometimes seem to have different bends, but I think that's just a perspective problem where things nearer look more pronounced than those farther away. The stream was mapped from aerial photos so at worst, the sands could have shifted around.

18-19 - I went to the required creek crossing and lost a little time to Lydia who'd started down before me and went a more direct route, still staying dry. I had been temped to go straighter but wasn't sure about it being dry. I hadn't read the notes before going out so it wasn't registering to me that the way I went was a required crossing either. Once across, I got on the trail, passed Lydia, and left the trail at the bend after the intersection. I hesitated a little on the attack.

19-20 - I started out but once on the trail, I stopped yet again to tie my shoes again. This time I took extra time and looped the right laces around the looped parts. It stayed a little better that way. I passed Lydia after getting across the parking lot and past the garden. I attacked from the top.

20-21 - I don't know if I was the most efficient on my route. With the trail on a index contour, I couldn't read it. I did however, get to the bridge and take the trail down, rather than go through the green on a direct route. In retrospect, going up to the apartment parking lot to the right would have been most efficient. I had to walk the climb to the saddle at the end of my route.

21-22 - I angled down on a deer trail and stayed low along the creek to the next major reentrant. I was able to keep a slow jog to just about the top of the next hill, running on a trail, and closing in on another person. After passing her, I saw a guy running off across the white woods. I didn't see where he'd left from but attacked without being very careful. I went right to it.

22-23 - I closed in on the other guy I'd seen near #22, but once across the trail I got a little confused. Without reading the map because I was bashing through vegetation, I was thinking I'd need to run between the 2 ballfields. I cut left toward the space between them. In the field where I could read the map, I realized I need to go around on the right side. of the eastern field and did. Because of this snafu, I was chasing the other guy again. I closed in after crossing the road, by taking a straighter line to the trail. In the powerlines, I stayed on the trail, to avoid getting too close and into the out-of-bounds area. The other guy left the trail and did what I chose not to. My choice was on memory, not from what was on the map. Going the way the other guy did was fine. He got ahead since I ran longer and made it to the control a little ahead of me.

23-F - I chose to go right, rather than straight or left along the train tracks. My way was longer but seemingly more open. As I got off the tracks and passed the train station, the other guy popped out just ahead. I didn't have much kick left so I stayed about the same distance behind him to finish.

We had a nice lunch at Corner Bakery, where Peggy had some coupons. The Hession's and a new first-time family whom I'd met when updating the map a few weeks back, had joined us. I was a bit scratched-up in my forearms and that stung for a while until I got washed-up.

Blue - Splits