Training Log Archive: W

Okay! I'm going to double up on the setup/chase entry to keep this brief.

The setup was a nice mix of some urban and forested stuff. Regardless of what the IOF claims about sprinting in forest not being suitable, whenever there is a brief moment of sprinting through awesome white Vancouver forest, I think its fun. 1-2 had a little bit of that, which was great. I botched 3 a bit since there were multiple gaps in the green which might have lead to my control, and I picked the wrong one and ended up too low. After that I felt that I wheeled pretty well, though definitely got a little behind my navigation while freely running on a slightly downhill trail. Going fast is just too much fun, unfortunately. I definitely tried to push the pace when I had the chance and still keep on top of my navigation after that, which worked out fairly well.

Then, it was the chase. This was not, in fact, my biggest chase lead ever at Sprint Camp, but pretty close. That doesn't mean I'd take it any easier, though. Obviously I didn't feel hurried, but I still wanted to use it as an opportunity to practice and etc. I think although I got lucky from 4-5, that was another opportunity to do some good planning, perhaps sort out 5-6 more effectively. I suppose I'm always a little afraid to plan too too far ahead since I don't want to skip a control, but I still often think I have to much dead running time. I suppose I should just accept that there are times when there's kind of sort of nothing to think about. But, its not always like that, especially not in Europe.

Anyway, good weekend, good running. Calves, ruined. Hamstrings, not bad at all!

Okay, big Saturday! I'm going to lump these into doubles because I don't have the wherewithal to make six different sessions.

The first one was a race at a dog park. I HATE dog parks. But I'm not going to go into why, just pick a random week of logging and I'm sure you'll see it. A bit of open parkland, and a bit of forest, and some extremely frozen hands.

I lost quite a bit of time on the way to 3, since I didn't really read enough to know I could just jump straight across the creek. I went around, and lost a good 10-15 seconds. I feel that I probably left the start a little too fast, which is not my way any more. I like [need] to stay at an easy pace until I get settled and sort out my first minute or so. In this case I didn't do that. Afterwards, though, it was definitely better, I took some gambles where I hadn't read enough which were fortunate enough to work out okay.

But, again, my dexterity was extremely lacking since I couldn't feel my fingers. At some points I was running with one hand down my pants.

I apologize to Vancouver for making already weird-looking orienteering also kind of creepy.

The second session was an easier jog around a dogbones exercise, which simply suffered from not strong planning at the start. I think to do it really effectively I needed to plan where I was going to be about 15 minutes in the future, which obviously I don't do too, too often. I didn't use a compass so I missed out on a small gap that would have saved a bit of double-backing. I think it would be better if I could still spot those things without a magnifier, so that makes me feel a little like I'm relying on it too heavily. Its just so handy to swing it in and swing it out again. So handy!

Hamstring update: still sore. Calf update: Also still tight.

As you can see, I'm lumping these sessions into about an hour and 10k. That's fairly reasonable given each race is about 15 minutes and 3k, plus a little bit of warm up and cool down.

Next up was the sprint relay at Blue Mountain. I told Gra-eme that I was going to take this easy. Ha HA! Its a race. Are you kidding? Nev went lead on my team and put us in the thick of things, and I took off and kept the legs turning over as much as they'd let me. No major difficulties except for the little cave control. Again with no compass I saw it'd be somewhere weird but I'll be darned if I knew what it was going to be on/in. It was a cute control location though, but it may have smelled funny....

Ultimately Nevin and I placed 4th, which was good! Sprint relays are fun. I want to do more of them. And against those hotshot Euros.

Next was a o-terval session. Its a shame we couldn't race around this map! I can figure some reasons why, but, still, cool and kind of difficult, with lots of sidewalks, buildings, stairs, change in altitude, etc. But no one wanted to go in a group with me! YOU'RE ALL JERKS. Eventually Adam and Gerald went with me, and that was good. I made a dumb mistake on number 3 when I stopped paying attention to my compass and was pretty much running at a 90 degre angle from the way I wanted to go. I've been really lax with using my compass as anything more than a platform to rest my map on, so that was another rude reminder.

Hamstring update: getting better! Calf update: getting way worse!

"Farstas are fun. Thank goodness we don't do them more often."

So, this started off a bit stupidly for me, when I picked up my map and started doing course 2 first before doing course 1. I got to number 1 when I realized this and had to turn around, and immediately get in line while I waited for the masses to punch the real number 1. I apologize for all the people I may have mildly elbowed and jumped in front of. For most of the people I just used my naturally intimidating stature and personality to get them to move. You know how I am, all gruff and whatnot.

There was still quite a few mistakes after that, most especially figuring out which spur I was on and which trail I Wanted to get on. Definitely some wasted time there. But, I also saved some times by skipping stairs every now and then, as well as picking up where the wall to the sidewalk on the last loop was crossable and jumping over it, rather than going down to the trail. And then there was all the running around the playground, which I felt I stayed on top of, punched quickly, and always knew my exit direction. Good job, me!

Hamstrings: Charly Horse. Calf: Get me a foam roller, stat.

Event: GVOC Sprint Camp 2014
 

Okay! Time to catch up on sprint camp! First up is the Friday event, a warm-up event followed by race #1. I've been concerned. Last week was not a good one for training - estimated training hours: zero. There's was just too much going on, for better or for worse, and it was cold as hell. It wasn't too, too bad though, because I played a really competitive game of indoor soccer on Saturday and my hamstrings were in bad shape. I did a lot of things that my muscles are really not used to doing.

So it was good there was a warm-up event where I was able to at least warm things up and try and loosen those hammys out. It didn't work. Yoikes, quite sore. The upside is that I find that racing makes most pain disappear, especially muscle soreness. I find if I have something else to think about, and I want to hammer, then all that nagging stuff goes away. And it sure did. And then came back with a vengeance.

Anyway, the race was a nice urban sprint around downtown Vancouver. By #3 I had finally gotten my head on straight and started to more actively plan. I certainly missed a better route to 3, so I just didn't get going soon enough. I suppose in retrospect I should have used the warm-up course to activate all the cue words I need to use to get my brain at functional capacity.

So, fortunately for me, on my way to 3 I had spotted that 5 would be a sneaky one, and noted it was inside corner, and planned accordingly. 6 was a result of keeping my head up and spotting my exit, and 10-11 was good planning while dead running and quickly using my magnifier to spot gaps. So, definitely some strong things in there that I can stay focused on. Good for my first navigation session in four months!

And wow, then my left calf got crazy tight. So now I'm hobbling around like an old man at all times. Nothing a whole lot of compression can't take care of!

Ugh. Birkie week. Busier than usual. Waxing for 9 hours straight.

Let's say that I'll be very... "rested" for sprint camp.