Training Log Archive: StijnIn the 31 days ending Oct 31, 2018:
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Wednesday Oct 31, 2018 #
10 AM
Route-setting 3:00:00 [1] +40m
Route-setting course with Kent including stripping and setting one route on the slab. Was aiming for a 19 but ended up with a 21 ;) Pretty hard work this!
2 PM
Climbing 1:00:00 [4] +90m
Fore-running all the routes set today. 18,(21),21,19,15,21.
Tuesday Oct 30, 2018 #
12 PM
Climbing 1:00:00 [3] +80m
At CityRock with Fred, getting into the lead game again. Don't know what I was thinking with the 22, way beyond me at this point! ;) 16,19,17L,17L,(22x),16L.
Monday Oct 29, 2018 #
1 PM
Climbing 1:00:00 [4] +100m
Auto-belays at CityRock. 18,19,(19a),18,21,(19a),16.
Friday Oct 26, 2018 #
10 AM
Climbing 1:00:00 [3] +90m
CityRock with Fred. Keen to get stuck in with the climbing again :) Some muscle atrophy to be addressed... 16,18,20,19,18,17.
Wednesday Oct 24, 2018 #
2 PM
Climbing 1:00:00 [4] +90m
(sick)
At CityRock with Fred, Rob & Anouk. 17,18,19,18,19,17.
Thursday Oct 18, 2018 #
10 PM
Trail Running race 12:00:00 [3] 65.3 km (11:02 / km) +3335m 8:47 / km
shoes: Asics Gel Fuji Trabuco 6 #4
Diagonale des Fous!!! My first 100-miler and went into it very apprehensively with a foot injury that hadn't allowed the best 3-week taper (zero running at all). At least I had had a very good 4 months of training before that with plenty of vert(igo) so was hoping for the best on race day...
The start was even crazier than what everyone had warned me about - first you lie around for 4 hours on a gravelly field with some live music, then fight to avoid getting crushed as they slowly walk the entire 2800-strong field 200m to the start line (legit scared here). Once the race started though, it was just fantastic. 4km of flat road trough town, lined with screaming fans, high-fives, live bands, fireworks and general mayhem - insanely fun :)
As usual, everyone starts waaaay too fast and I started feeling my foot pain within the first km. Kept running and it mostly faded away as long as I didn't land my foot in a certain way... cool, I could work with that. Up through towns and sugar cane plantations, being very strict about keeping the pace eeeeasy, while everyone else seemed to be streaming by, gasping for air, running douche grades. I was pretty confident I'd see most of them again later ;) I had some stomach issues during the first night, nothing too bad, just made the running sections a tad uncomfortable. I made sure I was keeping my aid station stops to a minimum and would pass what felt like 50 people at each one. One annoying thing was I that I started struggling with sleep monsters within 3 hours of the start - easy enough to push through on night 1, but was very concerned about what night 2 would be like...
Dawn brought some beautiful views over the Mare a Boue pastures, after which it got much more technical and would stay that way. Muddy, slippery singletrack through beautiful ancient forests before dropping steeply down into the Cirque de Cilaos - one of 3 collapsed volcanic craters on the island, now forested and inhabited with small villages. I reached Cilaos (65km) ahead of schedule, 12 hours into the race, to be met by our local Reunion support crew who literally drove all around the island and camped on mountain tops to support Andrew and me during the race :)
Still feeling good at this point and on target for my best-case-scenario goal of 40 hours. It was getting really hot now, and with the monster 1200m Col du Taibit climb coming up, I took the opportunity to have a quick dip in the stream at the start of the climb - heaven! This climb set the pattern for the rest of the race - I would get into my climbing rhythm and steadily pass loads of people over the course of a 1-2 hour climb like this. But as the race wore on, my legs were having less and less of the downhills - my foot was starting to hurt again and the knees were complaining plenty (note to self: don't just train uphills and do some strength work next time!). This eventually came to a head at about the 90km mark on an 1100m descent into the Cirque de Mafate, where running downs was just no longer an option :-/
Mentally, this was tough to deal with, since there were still 75km and several thousand meters of descent to come. I resigned myself to the fact that sub-40 hours wasn't going to happen and settled into the long slog, taking a bit longer at aid stations to spoil myself just a little too ;) At least the scenery was just mind-blowing. The Cirque de Mafate is the least accessible on the island, with the tiny villages inside having to get supplies by foot or helicopter as there is no road access. And the ups & downs were becoming a tad ridiculous. Even 100m dips and climbs were relentlessly steep and would surprise you around every corner. E.g. The 14km from Grand Place to the top of Maido (at the crater rim again) has a staggering 2000m of climb and 500m of descent!
I bumped into Darryn Patterson (another SA runner) at Grand Place. He was having stomach issues so we hiked the section to Roche Plat together and decided to take a 2-hour nap there before tackling the Maido climb as the sleep monsters were hitting us hard. When I awoke at 1am, I couldn't find him (turns out he only had a 1h nap) so continued with my own race. The sleep had done wonders and I was feeling quite fresh again, passing loads of people on the 1000m climb. Now at the 115km mark, what follows is a very runnable 2000m descent over the next 14km. If you have the legs. Which I certainly didn't and it was a painful hobble all the way down with runners streaming past me. I was pretty low by the time I reached Sans Souci and on the verge of pulling out. But luckily I've been there many times before and pulled every motivation trick in the book to keep myself moving forward, however slowly. The painkillers probably helped too ;-P
The climbs were still going well, which helped with the motivation (at least I wasn't losing time on them) and there were still some particularly nasty slippery forest singletrack sections to negotiate. It got really hot again on the Chemin des Anglais section, which is an old, ruined cobbled road made of these lovely stones that reflect all the heat right back at you. Made sure I kept the effort under control, using shade spots and spraying water on myself regularly. A few people were evacuated from this section with heat stroke.
3pm, Grande Chaloupe, 14km and just one 800m climb to go. I realised that I could actually finish this thing before dark and pushed pretty hard through this section. Once at the top, there was just a 4km gnarly singletrack descent to the finish. For some silly reason, I tried to run this hard to get just under 44 hours (who cares?) but soon came to my senses when risking a few ankle sprains and other close falls ;) Instead I made sure I was soaking up the experience in the last few kms and was pretty emotional crossing the finish line at the La Redoute stadium.
Easily the hardest thing I've ever done! And an incredible experience with all the local support along the way :) I was pleasantly surprised that the hobbling and slog only affected my time by 4 hours, but I guess that makes sense on such a technical course since most of it isn't runnable anyway (exactly why I chose this 100-miler in the first place).
http://www.movescount.com/moves/move250240102
http://www.movescount.com/moves/move250239992
The start was even crazier than what everyone had warned me about - first you lie around for 4 hours on a gravelly field with some live music, then fight to avoid getting crushed as they slowly walk the entire 2800-strong field 200m to the start line (legit scared here). Once the race started though, it was just fantastic. 4km of flat road trough town, lined with screaming fans, high-fives, live bands, fireworks and general mayhem - insanely fun :)
As usual, everyone starts waaaay too fast and I started feeling my foot pain within the first km. Kept running and it mostly faded away as long as I didn't land my foot in a certain way... cool, I could work with that. Up through towns and sugar cane plantations, being very strict about keeping the pace eeeeasy, while everyone else seemed to be streaming by, gasping for air, running douche grades. I was pretty confident I'd see most of them again later ;) I had some stomach issues during the first night, nothing too bad, just made the running sections a tad uncomfortable. I made sure I was keeping my aid station stops to a minimum and would pass what felt like 50 people at each one. One annoying thing was I that I started struggling with sleep monsters within 3 hours of the start - easy enough to push through on night 1, but was very concerned about what night 2 would be like...
Dawn brought some beautiful views over the Mare a Boue pastures, after which it got much more technical and would stay that way. Muddy, slippery singletrack through beautiful ancient forests before dropping steeply down into the Cirque de Cilaos - one of 3 collapsed volcanic craters on the island, now forested and inhabited with small villages. I reached Cilaos (65km) ahead of schedule, 12 hours into the race, to be met by our local Reunion support crew who literally drove all around the island and camped on mountain tops to support Andrew and me during the race :)
Still feeling good at this point and on target for my best-case-scenario goal of 40 hours. It was getting really hot now, and with the monster 1200m Col du Taibit climb coming up, I took the opportunity to have a quick dip in the stream at the start of the climb - heaven! This climb set the pattern for the rest of the race - I would get into my climbing rhythm and steadily pass loads of people over the course of a 1-2 hour climb like this. But as the race wore on, my legs were having less and less of the downhills - my foot was starting to hurt again and the knees were complaining plenty (note to self: don't just train uphills and do some strength work next time!). This eventually came to a head at about the 90km mark on an 1100m descent into the Cirque de Mafate, where running downs was just no longer an option :-/
Mentally, this was tough to deal with, since there were still 75km and several thousand meters of descent to come. I resigned myself to the fact that sub-40 hours wasn't going to happen and settled into the long slog, taking a bit longer at aid stations to spoil myself just a little too ;) At least the scenery was just mind-blowing. The Cirque de Mafate is the least accessible on the island, with the tiny villages inside having to get supplies by foot or helicopter as there is no road access. And the ups & downs were becoming a tad ridiculous. Even 100m dips and climbs were relentlessly steep and would surprise you around every corner. E.g. The 14km from Grand Place to the top of Maido (at the crater rim again) has a staggering 2000m of climb and 500m of descent!
I bumped into Darryn Patterson (another SA runner) at Grand Place. He was having stomach issues so we hiked the section to Roche Plat together and decided to take a 2-hour nap there before tackling the Maido climb as the sleep monsters were hitting us hard. When I awoke at 1am, I couldn't find him (turns out he only had a 1h nap) so continued with my own race. The sleep had done wonders and I was feeling quite fresh again, passing loads of people on the 1000m climb. Now at the 115km mark, what follows is a very runnable 2000m descent over the next 14km. If you have the legs. Which I certainly didn't and it was a painful hobble all the way down with runners streaming past me. I was pretty low by the time I reached Sans Souci and on the verge of pulling out. But luckily I've been there many times before and pulled every motivation trick in the book to keep myself moving forward, however slowly. The painkillers probably helped too ;-P
The climbs were still going well, which helped with the motivation (at least I wasn't losing time on them) and there were still some particularly nasty slippery forest singletrack sections to negotiate. It got really hot again on the Chemin des Anglais section, which is an old, ruined cobbled road made of these lovely stones that reflect all the heat right back at you. Made sure I kept the effort under control, using shade spots and spraying water on myself regularly. A few people were evacuated from this section with heat stroke.
3pm, Grande Chaloupe, 14km and just one 800m climb to go. I realised that I could actually finish this thing before dark and pushed pretty hard through this section. Once at the top, there was just a 4km gnarly singletrack descent to the finish. For some silly reason, I tried to run this hard to get just under 44 hours (who cares?) but soon came to my senses when risking a few ankle sprains and other close falls ;) Instead I made sure I was soaking up the experience in the last few kms and was pretty emotional crossing the finish line at the La Redoute stadium.
Easily the hardest thing I've ever done! And an incredible experience with all the local support along the way :) I was pleasantly surprised that the hobbling and slog only affected my time by 4 hours, but I guess that makes sense on such a technical course since most of it isn't runnable anyway (exactly why I chose this 100-miler in the first place).
http://www.movescount.com/moves/move250240102
http://www.movescount.com/moves/move250239992
Trail Running race 32:09:03 [3] 99.2 km (19:27 / km) +6241m 14:48 / km
shoes: Asics Gel Fuji Trabuco 6 #3
Logging Cilaos to finish in other shoes.
Friday Oct 5, 2018 #
7 AM
Road Running 44:22 5.6 km (7:55 / km) +357m 6:00 / km
ahr:149 max:183 (injured) shoes: Asics Gel Nimbus 20
Foot started niggling towards the end of Sunday's run so gave it some time off, saw physio, etc. Short run/hike on the stairs (6 laps) with Anouk this morning to test it out and still feeling it :-/ Not a bad pain at all, just awfully close to previous stress fracture experience so being super-cautious. 13 days to go...
TE 3.1 http://www.movescount.com/moves/move246719267
TE 3.1 http://www.movescount.com/moves/move246719267