Training Log Archive: W

To a certain extent, I feel I can now tolerate running on consecutive days, so in an effort to legitimize skipping "misery", Nev and I went and did a course in Queen E park. This was one that Magnus had planned in the winter, a few short days before snowmaggedon, which would have made this training a hell of a lot more difficult. We figured that now, it wouldn't be quite SO green, and maybe if we're lucky, the homeless people hadn't moved in yet. Unfortunately, that was not to be the case.

A few of the corridors had some unexpected forced detours as they went right through someone's pile of garbage. Seriously, though, if you have to camp in the woods, wouldn't you want your little space to at least be a tad clean?

Anyway, I was doing pretty poorly for the first little while, largely due to a lack of focus. Nev noted this was likely because I know the area too well, which almost certainly the case. I got my mojo back a little, but there was certainly too much distracting irrelevant thoughts drifting around in there. Even songs I don't like. I was pleased, though, in the few cases I had need to follow a bearing in a corridor, I stayed fairly close in there, despite the required detours when the green turns to impenetrable. Makes me think I'd like to do some fog training for compass work in our more open maps. And that I need to get better with swinging in and out my magnifier. I think its useful, but I'm not using it very efficiently just yet.

New pair of shoes in the mix! Mizuno Wave Precision. Although I think that going with low drop shoes to lightly stretch my plantar fascia is a good idea, I've settled on the strategy that while running, I should aim to take the strain off as much as possible, hence the Precision, a lightweight trainer with a whopping 13mm drop. Calves, feet, should be happier in these shoes, and I can focus on light stretch when not putting huge amounts of force into the bottoms of my feet.

So, new shoes in tow, busted out for a ladder workout, 4-5-6-7-6-5-4 with 3 minutes rest at rocket pace. Well, not really rocket pace, but, I've learned that there is a really small pace difference between comfortable hard, and pretty damn hard, and that concerns me. Averaged paces like 3:41, 3:49, 3:38, 3:41, 3:53, and 3:50, though the last two had some sustained climbing in it. I'm pleased to know that the long 7 minuter was the fastest, and I think I could have solidly maintained that for another 3 minutes, giving me a relatively comfortable sub-10:00 3000m time. So, not all fitness is lost.

Just, most.

First real mountain bike ride of the season, which is fortuitous because my trainer is back to being fully grind-y. Did a nice loop through McKinnon and then up Mill Creek, hitting some of the fun trails, and once again remembering that I have a bad habit of employing a death grip on the handlebars. At least my arms are loose, fingers, not so much. The ol' two-niner is still tickin' though, despite all the lickin' I give it.

Now, the only conundrum is how much to actually log for biking. My sister would do 1/2 time, but that seems a little extreme. 3/4? 4/5? There's too much rest to match it one to one with running, and you can't realistically call a "15-hour week" a reasonable running training week when 13 of it is biking (just by way of example, haven't quite done that yet).

C • Heart rate 2

Headed out for a nice morning run with Adrian to grab a few flags on the way by. Lovely morning to be out. Foot was a little bit more painful than usual, this was my third consecutive day of running, including Tuesday which was an intensity day. Tuesday was also a morning of active release. I can't quite remember if I went cold turkey during last year's chiro visits, I looked through my Attacklog and couldn't quite find me doing any complaining about how f-ing expensive is or that my chiro had the bedside manner of a cardboard box.

That really seems like something I would say.

So, does hanging controls count as orienteering? I'd already been to most of the control sites, and also knew them off by heart, and just occasionally glanced at my map. But ,I thought i was pressed for time so I went a little faster than usual. So, technically there was a map, and I sometimes read it, and also visited "sites".

This was setting up for my Wednesday event, where I was once again reminded that I really shouldn't put as much effort into these things as I do. There was realistically only one group of three guys who had some enthusiasm to do things a little different and inject a little competition. Many other people had response like "Oh, no no, I'm just going easy" or "Oh, I can't run that fast to be competitive", despite the fact that the point was to run with other people of your own speed.

I think this is what happens when a club fosters a culture of "participation" over "challenge". Our open house, for example, is normally just one super, super easy course, the argument being that this way people can try it and not get frustrated. And, that's all well and good to attract the family and recreational crowd. But I think there should also be difficult courses. Challenging courses for athletes. People who don't try something and quit after 15 minutes if they're not being 100% successful at all times. I think in the long run drawing the athlete crowd will be more beneficial to the club.

Ah well, TBN river valley adventure run come October will be different.

C • Course 4

Managed to get out before kids program to do some intervals. 2 x 20 minutes with 3 minutes rest at aiming for around 4:00. Pretty much hit that dead on, the first one had a climb in it so it was a bit short, but they were ultimately 5k intervals. Then I looked at my watch and holy crap I'm going to be late, and cooled down back to the shelter at 4:30 pace. Made it back just a tad late!