Training Log Archive: Nadim

From Lake Fairfax Regional Park, VA, to Carpers Farm Way (near Rte. 7) and back. Peggy Max and I were out in the area to visit my parents. On my turn running out, I stuck to the Rails to River Trail but coming back, I used a side trail for a ways just to see where it went. The side trail cut off the portion where the main trail climbs the hillside and stayed on or close to a buried sewer line. It was a nice day and around 60 F. I ran in shorts and a t-shirt. There was plenty of mud and some ice still on the trail. I almost fell a few times but all that happened was that I got muddy. The woods looked nice enough to perhaps extend the QOC Lake Fairfax map into one day.

At my turnaround at Carper's Farm Way, I noticed that the trail had been extended across on the other side of the road but didn't have time to go exploring. I had heard earlier that it had been extended to go up to the W&OD Trail. In 1999, I had tried to follow up along Difficult Run to the W&OD from very near the same place but that old horse trail had long ago disappeared. I'm glad it looks like they've restored it and I will someday have to come back and check it out.

C • CCT 2

Lake Needwood Park, Rockville, MD. With the jury that I was part of having reached a decision this afternoon, I got to head back to Lake Needwood to try to capture more of the trails there. It seems that there are plenty and more than I thought there would be. There are also many more rides and clearings on the west side than I had thought previously. Overall, this should still be easier to map than the Lake Frank areas. It's just that much more open. The trails on the west side are much more in the shade than those I went on on the east side. Therefore, they were fairly icy. It was around 40 F when I was running so the surface was wet and much more slippery than similar trails were earlier in the week.

With jury deliberations running late, I didn't get a chance to get a run in on the way home. I ate dinner and later rode while watching a movie.

Lake Needwood Park, Rockville, MD. With trial testimonies ending late in the afternoon, it was too late to get to judge's instructions, trial closing statements, and jury deliberations. The jury which I'm part of got to go home with daylight left and in my case, that meant hopping over a littel way to the park which in breaks I had been eyeing on the horizon from the 8th floor Montgomery County courthouse lobby.

Preparing for mapping Lake Needwood, I started running the trails on the southwest sides of the lake with my GPS. This was a bit slow since I went up and down some steep hills and did odd loops to trace and sometimes re-trace everything. Areas were icy too but most of the muddy parts were either frozen under or relatively dry. I'd been running here off-trail before several times but mostly at night. The woods looked great and were so much more open than what I've been mapping the last few months (only a mile away as the geese fly) on the north sides of Lake Frank. Together, Lake Frank, Lake Needwood and the Rock Creek valley south of them will make one big continuous but sometimes narrow map. Besides the trails going up and down, the areas covered today had rock, man made and dot knoll features on the low grounds. There weren't many other features on the hilltops or on the sometimes steep sides.

It was around freezing outside but I felt fine. The park is under the same 5:30pm curfew as the Lake Frank areas are for deer culling. I didn't see any wildlife.

Cabin John Regional Park, MD. From the Tennis Pavillion/Nature Center parking lot, Peggy and I went for a run together sort of. Though we came together we ran our own paces. I ran trails mostly along the eastern banks of Cabin John Creek. Running with a GPS, I recorded trail tracks for future mapping use. I often turned around or did loops to capture all I could in the short amount of time available. The trails had ice and mud. I had to go slow and even walk in places. The temperature was right around 40 F. I wasn't at work this early evening because I had been on jury duty in the day--not a lucky thing from my point of view. At least we recessed with just enough daylight left to allow for this.

I figured that after the races the other day, an easier day would be appropriate. Once on my bike I felt good. I spinned with ease at a good cadence and resistance.

Event: QOC: Lake Fairfax, VA
 

QOC: Lake Fairfax. For a warm-up, I walked and jogged a streamer-o course with Alexa Merka. Max was going to go with us but he changed his mind as he is prone to doing. It was Alexa's 5th birthday. Since it was our club's winter meeting, lots of people were around after the activites and we sang "Happy Birthday" to her.

QOC: Lake Fairfax, VA. The format for today was an unusual and fun one. We had a Qualifier sprint to start with. It was a quick course with a lot of open field running. There were a few legs through some woods. I never felt like I was running comfortably. I climbed okay enough but never ran with any speed; it was probably a function of my weight. I made some small baubles but did okay. I've never liked the contours on this map. They seem too generalized to me. They confused me on the one leg where they counted going to #4. Between #5 and #6 there was a huge +30 foot house or larger sized mound beside the road and it was unmapped--perhaps it was added after the initial mapping but it looked like it had ben there a long time. It was nice to be outside. The temperatures were in the mid-50s F. There were some slick icy spots and a little soft old snow in the woods. I think my qualifier time was 4th behind Dave Pruden, a young Norweigan, and Ted Good in that order.

C • Correction 1

QOC: Lake Fairfax Regional Park, VA. For the finals, racers were handicapped by both time like a reverse chase, and by course distances. The idea was that no matter who was running the first person to the finish line would be the winner for the day. I had qualified for the Final C course. The first starter took off 21:11 before me. Starting behind me were Ted Good (9 seconds), a young Norweigan (about +1 minute), and Dave Pruden (about 2 minutes).

Ted nearly caught me at the first control but had overshot on my right when I saw it on my left just into the woods from a field corner. We took separate routes to #2 with Ted climbing and me going around low to save strenghth for later. I got into some traffic from other runners and thought the control on a broad spur was too high. Like many mass start meets where we're both competing, Ted and I were together for a long way after that. Ted's tendancy to start faster and his generally better navigation kept him in front most of the way. When I got ahead going to #9, I made an error and chased him again going to #10. Eventually we got bunched-up with others and chaos ensued. It wasn't a completely mob-orienteering type of scene but there were trains and everyone was reacting to either leader errors or small mapping discrepancies. As we finished the last control in the woods we had a kilometer of open areas to go. I was in a pack with Ted Good leading, Dave Onkst, Dave Pruden and myself chasing. On a climb we were all fairly close to even and Ted faded. Going at threshold pace, I was in the lead but wasn't reading the map very well. Dave Pruden passed and stayed ahead to the end. I would gain on him only to wait at the punches on the last few controls. I'm not sure what my overall place for the day was. One thing to note was my heart rate measurements. Though I've only been measuring for about a year, I hit both the highest maximum and highest average rates that ever recorded. Since my times were not the fastest I've done in the last year, I conclude that I pushed hard while being out of shape. I find that significant because of the mental aspects of training and competing.

It was a fun day. We had nice food and club announcements afterward. Though just a local event, the volunteers for the event did a lot of extra preparations making it memorable.

C • Flag folding 2

Qualifier - Splits

Final C - Splits