Training Log Archive: Hammer

A little more sleep.

Very tired (sleepless night) and not motivated. Got to Mac and just turned around. COC write-up: http://waddsquad.blogspot.com/2006/08/canadian-ori...

Today totally sucked. :-(

Skipped COC Long. Too bad it looked like an interesting area. Time to rest and strengthen the knee and prepare for the "real O season" - THOMASS. ;-)

C • THOMASS 1

Warming up, waiting, warm-up some more, wait a lot more, warm up again, and **&%^&% wait some more.

COC middle

I've been looking forward to this race for many months as this terrain is challenging with complex contour detail. Unfortunately I am injured so until just a few days ago I didn't even expect to run. There were also some major organizational issues today and my longer than expected warmup caused my knee to get very sore and I considered not running at all. My goal was to run error free and to try for top 5. So I am surprised to have come 2nd and to have been < 2minutes down on winning. Especially since I lost over 2 minutes on a control in poorly mapped terrain (#15).

I had some small issues with the map in this race but others had much more trouble. Perhaps only running at 80-85% of my full speed actually helped. I was able to stay in contact all the time (except for the voodoo at #15) and that probably gave me 'good flow'. This race could have been run in 35-36 minutes.

(mini rant)
Unfortunately today and a few other short/middle distance COC's this century have been plagued with map issues and misplaced controls. People lost a lot of time due to this and it is hard to know if this affected the results order. But like W.S. stated (in the AP discussion) this year the course was amazingly not protested. There were certainly grounds to do this this year and at least two other times in the last 5-6 years. But I'm not sure what that would accomplish. Award no Champion at all?But our National Championships deserves better quality and something needs to be done about it - why else do we have officials certification for?

C • Congrats! 13

COC Sprint

Wasn't supposed to run but it sounded like too much fun to sit out and the hype lived up to it. A great course. Made two mini 3-5 sec. errors but just had no speed (or fitness) to race twice in 6 hours. No idea what the results are and we may never know due to timing / punch issues.

At physio

Same old boring stuff.

Plus LOTS of stretching.

At physio. I got the green light to race either the sprint or middle distance but the long COCs is a no go. So I have decided to give the middle distance a shot.

Leaving Killarney with the WaddSquad. Knee very sore on portages. Had to ditch the canoe and get OldWadd to carry it for me. Saw the same moose Bash and Bent saw.

Great vacation but even the sprint looks unlikely for COC's now.

'Trekking up and down Silver Peak'
Best views ever. We could see (we think) Lion's Head. The climbing and descending was too much for the knee and I forgot my drugs at home and of course there is no ice out there so the knee is very sore again. Doesn't matter cause it was worth it. Check waddsquad.blogspot.com for pics soon.

C • Using ski poles for the trekking? 5

Event: Canadian Orienteering Championships Festival
 

B-day in Killarney. Great fun with a birch bark B-day card. Gotta do this again for the big 4-0 next year. Then the wind and rain came so postponed the B-day smores.

No bugs at all. Swapping campsites and lakes.

Killarney with the WaddSquad. Great to be back here. After 4 months in Europe I realize that the Canadian Shield is still my favourite place to be. All paddling/trekking/portaging times this week are estimates and counted as 50%. Adventure Girl! did all the map reading.

Same old stuff.

Mount Nemo with Sudden. First time on this brand new map. Knee sore at start then OK then very sore from an hour on.

C • Money for Mac 4

Early AM strength (still jet lagged).

At home and at physio.

Strengthening exercises at physio

Setting out SI stands at Rocky Ridge for NAOC middle and long with JC. No humidity, no bugs, no heat = awesome summer orienteering (but apparently last weekend it was brutal heat, humidity and bugs).

First time jogging since the WOC sprint two weeks ago. Better stick with MTB and DWR for a while yet. Knee got sore late in the training despite a very very very easy pace (3.75 hours total) - quite a bit of walking.

C • hot rock technique 6

Westdale-Spring Creek-Dundas-Westdale

Leg strengthening

Westdale-DV-Westdale with Tarno. Awesome morning. Deer count = 11.

Especially working on the left leg.

Mac-Copetown Bog-Westdale with Sudden. Fell off my bike at the turn around and bent Sudden's back wheel.

Super 17 (followed by a hot tub)

C • Retinacular Fibrosis 7

Travel day. 2 hours and 10 minutes after landing in Toronto I was at St. Joe's seeing a specialist about my knee. Good news is I should be back in good form by October. Bad news is I have to stay off it.

Small medial meniscus tear mixed with retinacular fibrosis and something else I can't pronounce. Biggest concern is the loss of strength in the left quad and possible arthritus. Start physio tomorrow and get X-rays as well. The Doc looking at the knee has run the Raid the Hammer so we had a great chat. It was great he was able to see me so quickly...and he cringed when I told him what the Swedish 'doc' had done.

C • docs 13

With AdventureGirl! and Etoile in the AM.

With AdventureGirl! before watching the relays.

Great run by MrPither today.

With AdventureGirl! before the floating disco!

Not how I expected to be spending today a few months ago - had planned to be out racing around Gjern Bakker. Would have been fun to have raced with Etoile and AdventureGirl watching but it was also enjoyable watching the race together with them and the Canadian team. Especially given Holger's great win.

Back to the core strength and DWR training routine... yawn.

A few laps with Adventure Girl! at DanParc.

WOC Sprint. Not a great way to finish my international orienteering (result wise) but it sure was fun. A 66% spike success race at WOC ain't gonna cut it. The knee only bothered me for a short bit on some stairs early in the course so that (I think) didn't hold me back. But I certainly felt once again that I wasn't at the top speed I had back in May at the WC in Estonia where I missed the final by 30 seconds in a much tougher qualifying system.

I have been looking forward to this race since WOC in 2004 when I had to sit out the sprint due to an ankle injury. I really enjoy sprint as I feel I can make quick decisions and orienteer fast and smoothly .... in the forest. BUT today was not the expected forest sprint I had been preparing for. My goal today was to take chances by hammering on the compass straight through the woods because that approach worked really well in the Stockholm City Cup where I ran quite well. But right off the start to #1 I got "trapped" by an uncrossable fence. I swear I saw an opening when running to it but there wasn't. Then to #4 I got trapped again by an out-of-bounds area. Off to #5 I thought we were going to go through the woods and cut into the woods only to look ahead and notice another uncrossable fence - bailed back to the road and that would be the end of the forest orienteering as we entered an amusement park which was mega detailed with many controls very close together (they broke the IOF rules there) and lots of cross over. I never got into the map in the amusement park having trouble distinguishing buildings from shelters (like bumper cars, etc.). Twice I ran towards the wrong control because of the complexity of the cross overs. It will be interesting to see how much time I lost in there. Then I got trapped again leaving the amusement park and promptly swore out loudly followed by a bit of a laugh. The course planner got me again I thought Then a long trail run into the detailed gardens at the end of the race where I made another 45 seconds of mistakes. it will be interesting to look at the splits.

My approach to orienteering is to go straight. I am not a fast runner but I feel I am (at least normally) a strong runner. I noticed in a couple of the sprint races in Sweden this year that I have trouble looking to the side for other routes and for traps. Well that happened over and over again today (especially when my pre-race strategy failed).

So again not the results I was expecting a few months ago. I know I was capable of something much better but 9 weeks now of suboptimal training and a sore knee is impossible to compete at this level with. BUT I am happy I gave it a shot as even just 2.5 weeks ago I was considering skipping WOC completely as I am sick of training and racing with pain. I feel especially bad for Sandy HJ that has been also nursing an injury as she failed to qualify in her heats as well. I know she was also capable of something much much better. But that is part of the sport and I only have myself to blame for not getting my knee looked at back in the winter when it hurt just a bit.

Like the new NHL, the new WOC favours the fast and young and I'm slow and well according to Boris 'really old'. I think that if I am healthy I can still compete with these young guys but I am happy that I have picked up some ideas about how to coach and prepare North Americans better for international sprint orienteering. How? I'll post those ideas on my blog in a few days.

Now to sit back and enjoy the rest of WOC and our time in Europe with Adventure Girl! and Etoile and to take a few months off and get healthy again and then go into coaching like the Wayner.

Good luck to the AP'ers in the sprint.

C • Coach... 5