Training Log Archive: W

Kainuun Rasti Viiko - Disaster #1... I mean, Day #1.

I haven't blown it like this in an awful long time, and wow, it does not feel good. What happened? Well, I took my sweet, sweet time finding number 1, and it really comes down to becoming too fixated on reading the vegetation over everything else.

Basically, in this forest, there were different types of white forest. The control I was heading to was up a slope, where down the hill to the right of the control was some rough open with undergrowth. I thought, cool, I'm following along this hill, cross the stream, run along the side of the hill until I see the open in the distance, and head up the hill.

At this point I'm not 100% clear on my thought process, but for the first few moments of that I wasn't really running towards anything, I crossed the stream, and then ran in a forward direction. Why I was doing that and where I was going, I'm not entirely clear. Eventually when I got my head back on straight, I realized I had fully lost contact from the map and had no idea where I was. I tried to relocate, and was incorrect, and eventually made my way back to what SEEMED to be the rough open. The forest was distinctly different, you could see very far because the tress were no taller than me, and the footing was kind of rough. Rough open, right?

But, this rough open was much bigger than what I thought was on the map, like, much bigger, and it went way up this hill. Where the hell was I? I speculated that I was in rough open way, way, west of the control, so I headed back towards the other edge to hopefully spot a large lake and that would make things super obvious and I'd be back on track.

No lake. This open area wasn't shaped anything like the open on the map.

I regrouped again and started piecing small things together. End of stream, walk up hill, spot big rock, cliff, and then.... inexplicable open area??? I tried to stay on my line but veered back and forth because surely I'd gone too far right. I went back to the cliff I was sure I was at, and at long last spotted what was even MORE open than before, which opened my eyes to my problem.

Yes, I noticed there was a distinct vegetation boundary, but I didn't understand that this so called open area I was wandering through was ACTUALLY a different type of white forest. This revelation made me realize exactly where I was (relative to that cliff, I was correct), and where I needed to go. Unfortunately, that was many, many minutes later.

And this was to number 1. What. A. Disaster.

In light of the fact that I had now run myself out of contention for H21A overall in a span of 1 control, I tried to refocus, get my head back on straight, and do some things right. Unfortunately my brain just did not get in the right frame of mind and I was constantly distracted by irrelevant thoughts and occasionally, no thoughts at all. Very Homer Simpson-esque.

Sure, I nailed a few controls when going straight across a featureless flat marsh, but I still could not get a handle on the vegetation boundaries further along the course.

Its races like these that make me quite humiliated to pull on a Terä jersey. I mean, the other guys make mistakes too, sure. But not like this. Not at all like this.

No time to train today, just sit in a caravan and wait at untold number of rest stops for ride changes and coffee stops. Man, Finns drink a lot of coffee.

One more running session around Laajavuori before my month of truth begins. Now featuring a lake at the end of the run! Yep, tomorrow I head off to Kainuu Rasti Vikko to run in not the elite class, which gets to do significantly less distance than the elite class, and no real longs and no 1:15000 maps. That's annoying. But, nothing I can do about it now but to run well and develop good habits. Then its two days back home and off to Sweden and then Scotland! Fun!

And expensive!

Well, what I tried to do was run around the lake and then up into Yliopistonmaki and around the trails, but I took a left when I clearly should have taken a right and ended up right down at the bottom of the hill again. At that point I sort of shrugged, and kept running around the lake and some of the neighbourhood and back to Liikunta to finish off. Not exactly the length of run I was hoping for, but okay nonetheless, I suppose.

Oof, my stomach did not agree with this run one bit.

Not one bit at all.

Canada Day track workout! Featuring new spikes! Did I buy XC spikes for no real reason other than they were 30 dollars? You bet. And now I finally came up with an opportunity to use them!

Ran to Harju (not in the track spikes), and then did a variation of a nice speed workout I've done a few times, 4 x 400m, 6 x 200, 6 x 100m (basically, 4x1min, 30 secs, 15secs). On average they were slightly longer than their time brethren, but it was about the same idea - run fast for around that time. The 400s made my legs nice and jello-y for the 200s, but by the 100s I felt like my legs had found their fast muscles and it was cool to run fast on a track in spikes. Way cool.

A real nice though slightly shorter than normal tempo run around Jyvasjarvi. I didn't feel remarkably fast, but I did feel fairly comfortable at a pace a little slower than usual. Its getting hotter and hotter out there and I was pretty darn sweaty during this workout despite it being cloudy and occasionally rainy. So... perhaps it was the rain. I'm thinking about doing the Finlandia Half Marathon in September, and this loop is the course (twice), so at the rate I ran it today, I'd do a 1:28 half-marathon! Not a PB!

Afternoon light jog around the neighbourhood ski trail. It makes me happy that I have a neighbourhood ski trail. It also rained quite heavily. Kind of like a standard mid-summer Edmonton afternoon warm day storm, but, sadly, no lightning/thunder. That's really what's missing from Mid-Finland on these summer days.

And some hail.

Summer has FINALLY arrived in Jyvaskyla. Lovely warm weather, sunshine, great to head out and do a nice light run with a bunch of hills around Laajavuori. Lungs feel good, legs a little tired from yesterday, but too nice a day to worry about that stuff. Add in "Wait Wait Don't Tell Me" podcasts, and it was a good run. (yes, I now somewhat regularly listen to podcasts while running - so far its 3 - that one, Freakonomics Radio, and Retronauts).