Training Log Archive: AliC

Mild warm up, in light of the length of the impending race...

Oak Openings Stampede 25k

Well, that was fun, and pretty different than any race I've done before. Sooo flat, such a steady effort required! My HR graph is remarkably steady, just creep, creep, creeping up to a max of 176, which is well below actual max of 185 or so, but hey, you can't be going anerobic with this sort of distance!!

The 'stampede' part is right off the start - they start the 25k and 5k back-to-back with the gun going off in the middle, so you have these hordes of people rushing away from the same middle point, kinda cool. I pushed my way (oops, yup, literally) to the front as the start had actually taken me by surprise. I took a quick look at Garmin, 6.15 pace or so, eep! Time to back off, I was intending to do the first mile in 7 or so...

I took splits each mile, but they don't add up well with Garmin distance, I'm guessing mostly the Garmin is in error, because the trial was windy. Although it does look like the mile 12 sign was in the wrong place because the 12th mile split was 5.40 and the 13th 7.07 and my Garmin pace for both was 6.45....

Most of the race I was with guy-in-Green, who turns out is named Kevin. At mile 5, some guy came from back and pulled away from our current pack, Kevin and I went off and followed him. That lasted 2 miles (the 6:06 and 6:18), but then Kevin started dropping off other dude and so did I, could definitely tell it was a bit too fast. Then I just cruised behind Kevin for the next 5 miles or so. He was a polite leader, signaling with hands when we had sharp turns ahead, some of it really was single-track.

Then he pulled away at mile 10 or so, when the trail became wider and more even, although I kept him insight until the end, he finished 45 seconds up. With ~3 miles to go, a train of xc girls doing an interval came at us, whoa! Avoided colliding, but barely. And then some were ahead of me, going the same way, and competitive spirit kicked in - I knew they hadn't already done 13 miles, but I still wanted to pull ahead, which was kind of hard, but managed, eventually. Turns out they are the U of Toledo team, wish I could train with them...

I finished 5th overall, first woman by a bit. They fed us chocolate-chip pancakes after the run, mmmmmm!

C • Contests! 8

Out the door, beautiful early-fall day! Lotsa folks on the bike path, probably most runners, than walkers than bikers than rollerbladers than rollerskiers (me). There are only three or four road crossings the whole way, and they even have bike detector lights that stop cars for you, awesome!

Upper-outer butt muscles were sore at the beginning, maybe from no poles ski two days ago? But that was sooo short, hm. Anyways, alternated no-poles, with-poles, double pole on this one.

Abbity abs + back + side plank.

Tempo, tempo. 2 x 10 min aiming for 6.30ish pace, went a-ok. Bike path is good for a just cruising run. But I totally missed the entrance(s) to Wildwood Park, which should be a good place to do more interesting runs, will have to pay more attention next time!

Woooo! Moved into snazzy new apartment! Well, new to me, has been around since the 50s, I think? Anyways, great to have landed, as wonderful as it was for my boss and family to let me stay with them for a week and a half!

So unloaded my car, and there was just a smidge of daylight out so headed out to the nearly-immediately adjacent bike bath for a little no-pole action. Right wrist needs a bit longer off, I really, really need to find a pole strap... or just some webbing I can sew together at the very least.

10 min abs, 2 min back, 2 min side plank - right elbow is finally feeling better from post-bike crash bruise!

Mosied over to the Uni track, but it was filled with ROTC and yelling, so I headed up to the Ottawa Park loop and did 8 x 80s instead of 8 x 400. No ankle complaints, woo, I can at least run on paved surfaces. Legs felt good, but quads not quite recovered actually from Sunday's long effort.

10min abs+

Could still feel the interior swelling in the joint, so didn't go for a run after my all-day orientation at the University.

Orientation was kind of boring, but not as boring as I would have thought. Many of the presenters were at least dynamic, so although it is totally irrelvant for me to know how to safely dispose of sharps and what I can and can't say at the nursing station to be HIPAA compliant (we're joint with the Hospital campus), eh, it wasn't so bad. At least I understand hospitals better.

And pushups + hammies.

Oh yeah, listened to the Freakonomics podcast on the shadow economy (below the tax-radar, not just illegal) and West Virginia's successful change of policy to sell beer at football games (reduced # of game-related arrests). Both interesting.

Well, boo, ankle doesn't feel that great today. I guess I should have expected that given yesterday's crunch, but it's still a bummer. I have all this energy and just want to get out there and train so I can improve, but it's not the time for that. Bone apparently takes a good long while to heal and I've got to give my ankle more time.

So ok, the plan -
1) For the next month, I'm really not allowed to orienteer properly. If I go orienteering, I should be walking, because I think that's the only real way I can avoid crunching my ankle. Boo.
2) I need to get back to doing my flamingoes.
3) I should probably even take it kinda easier on running this week, go for every-other day and that only if it feels better than today.

The goal is to be able to orienteer at NAOCs. I won't have much good orienteering training in before then, but I'll have to map study and just try to be fit and see if that can pull things together!

There's a good article on FasterSkier today about how Kikkan and Sadie Bjornsen are being smart, taking care of niggling injuries. It's just part of being an athlete, so here goes! Big picture of being 100% for WOC next year is way more important than all the upcoming little races, as much as I'd love to do them!

C • *applause* 10