Training Log Archive: AliC

Event: WCOC Tarrywile Park
 

WCOC Meet at Tarrywile

Hilly! Def felt the legs out there. But race was smooth other than #1, where I panicked about the green ending up ahead, so dived into the green to look for a control on a stream bend. Splashed around in the stream both up and down for a bit, then decided there was no control around, came back out to see Brendan doing much better just walking up to #1.

Other than that, felt pretty in control if not a super-speed demon. The woods had very good visibility, so could pick off useful stuff from far away. Some bobbles/hesitations/thoughts:

#7- hesitant adding everything up, could have been more confident if I noticed stone wall almost at control earlier
#14- reentrant seemed like the trail, way confused for a smidge, before figuring out what happened
#15- had not planned to be at upper swamp, brief pause to realize I was there anyways
#17- bad route? good route? think it was the lazy route, legs didn't feel like extra up... splits should tell
#25- again, was I just being lazy, not wanting to contour on the rocky stuff, or might that have been faster??
#29- nasty yellow, and then I stopped too early, didn't really was really beyond high wall above

Thanks to Becky and WCOC for a great meet, sorry to not have stayed around, zero extra time to get Brendan+Andrew to bus at 1.15!

QuickRoute

264/2000

C • That looks like a nice run.... 3

Red - Splits

Event: NEOC: Nobscot Night-O
 

Ouchie! Humid + double poling = blister central. Quit the dp after 28 min, had intended 40... from then on in no poles. Lotsa pups out on the bike trail today, only one, 'Curly' came over to check out the rollerskiing.

Also, the mini-ants staged a re-invasion while I was in France. Pretty impressive, they got inside a ziploc freezer bag holding my cereal, and into an *unopened* bag of cereal too. They can apparently chew threw plastic, sturdier defenses needed!!

C • sturdier defense 14

NEOC Nobscot Night-o

Surprise! Brendan found an Oxford orienteering friend, Jen, running the streets of Cambridge (wearing Oxford O shirt, so recognized!) and she ended up coming to night-o. Very cool to see her and catch up a bit, she's now finished school, moved to London, and psyched to orienteer more than she was able in final year at Oxford, which was unsurpisingly dominated by, uh, finals.

Night-o itself went pretty well, a 2 min error on #8, otherwise nothing big. It was much more easily hand-raily than Pawtuckaway though, trails and stone walls and such. And the woods was more open, which is nice at night especially, no getting hopelessly tangled.

Used Ken's light again, since I still have it, but I maybe failed to have it connected firmly enough or it didn't like the humidity? It flicked off fairly randomly, turned back on by just pressing button, still disconcerting to have a few steps in total dark, but your brain does amazingly remember where to put feet for that amount of time....

3- silly route to stay on more trails, totally zigged too much
5- attempted to fix light, Andrew passed
8- whoops, wasn't 100% sure where I crossed wall, thought I was lower, so ended up going up upper hillside, did a little loop, went back down to correct hill after realizing the hill I was on went too far up
10- too far up hill to east before deciding I didn't need to go up that far, and there was not a likely marsh, should have realized it was only a form line I needed to go up, really

QuickRoute

233/2000

C • Smokin 2

Long - Splits

Foiled!!!! I had this awesome plan of orienteering on two different continents today, which was going to rock, but was thwarted by the RER. Or the fact that the carnet of tickets Severine had and gave me one of seemed to all be demagnitized...

So ran down to the station from Frederic+Severine's, kept jogging waiting the 5 min for the train, then try to validate the ticket, but 'illisible', uh-oh! Had two minutes to try to buy another, but I don't have a chip-and-pin card or any change, bummer!! That takes away the time needed to both O at Cite Internationale and get into meeting on time, so end up just running up to the plateau again, doing some drills.

Normal drills, R knee kinda hurt in the weird way when I did drills that made me raise it far-ish, but didn't super cramp up and hurt.

Flew back to Boston, in perfect time for CSU Thurs eve training, woo! Line-o out to Tufts.

Tufts Sprint thanks to Brendan!

Dark does make things different, much harder to read the map and to look far ahead for things. Thus felt not so super-speedy and had to full stop a few times to read a cap in a hedge or something. Was really puzzled to #2 with a bonus building complicating things. Fun times, really enjoyed it, maybe the second night sprint I've ever done, other was training with Karen in G-burg.

QuickRoute

220/2000

C • Splits plz 4

Headed off after finishing, but quad had a niggle so stopped to stretch at which point Ian and SGB thundered by, Ian explaining he had to stay infront and I should distract SGB, made a bit of an attempt =)

Then headed off, and was surprised to catch Ian some bit later, no sign of SGB. He def started going faster with me right behind, and then SGB popped out of some off-route road and race on! Ok, up to L4 for sure, and up steep hill right at the end L5, wowzer, not so much a warm-down! Passed Ian on the up, but lost a bit to SGB, who then actually flew down the back side, ready legs, go!

Tufts Sprint - Splits

Wow, so was running up on the plateau above Frederic's in Gif-sur-Yvette, and right at the end of our run, a girl stopped and asked me where the orienteers where! What?? Turns out weekly club training was training just there, bummer I missed, should have tried to tune in... good run, hill up to plateau is steep!

C • oi 5

Around Parc Montsouris again, a few laps, was closed when I first arrived, but found an open gate shortly thereafter. Quite a few others jogging again!

Super low-tech run, no Garmin, not even a watch, checked the time on my computer before and after run. Headed over to le Parc Montsouris, there was actually a hill in it, nice! And a bunch of other people out for their lunchtime jog. Did some speedwork: 8 x 60 double-strides, felt pretty good.