Training Log Archive: CleverSky

At Ascutney. Out to launch with my harness and battens (jogging briskly for much of it, though I had to slow down to pass people) in 7:55, running back in 6:53, and trudging out again with the glider in 19:49. Fairly warm out (probably hit 90 F on the ground later on), so my shirt was drenched when I started setting up the glider. All that for a 12 minute sled ride.

Found five more ticks in the car on the way up, that had presumably been lurking since the previous afternoon, but I didn't pick up any new ones in Vermont.

Midstate Trail from Watatic south for an hour, then back by the same route, temperature in the low 80s. Sometimes the GPS track comes out all jaggedy and not credible, but today it looks pretty good. Ran the first part helf, then walked the steeper uphills on the way back. Turned around at a spot where the trail makes a sharp left turn immediately after crossing a stone wall, rather than go into a rough semi-open area. Felt pretty spent by the time I was near the end.
AOWN moments:
1) Nice snake lying across the trail on the way back, about 2-3 feet long, didn't seem particularly interested in slithering away (but looked healthy enough).
2) I encountered some very pretty flowers that I don't know the name of. They grow on a bush about the size of mountain laurel, and are pink flowers with five petals. The flowers point horizontally, and have five long stamens that protrude and curve upward.
3) Set a PR that I hope to never break: when I got home and sat down, I thought I felt something crawling on my leg, and sure enough, it was a tick. In the next couple of minutes I removed a total of 13 from my body and clothing (and one on the chair). I hope I got them all. None had bitten yet.

C • 13 5

Shuttling back and forth between the Mohawk Trail parking area and launch five times, carrying various stuff.

Hiking back up to get Tom's car after a five-minute flight. More or less straight up through the woods. Kind of warm out.

If Ian can log this, so can I, With Nancy, who clobbered me (though I dd edge her out on the first game).

Game 1: 7/ 16 X 08 9- 8- 5/ 71 X X9/ = 135
Game 2: X 07 1- 9- 44 71 81 9/ 71 06 = 90
Game 3: 6/ 9- 6- X 33 5- 41 52 61 72 = 89

Strike rate: 5/31 = 16.1%
Spare rate: 5/26 = 19.2%
First-ball pins: 6.12
1-pin spares: 2/5 = 40.0%

It's possible that I was hampered by my choice of ball. I picked on that had pretty good holes and felt about right, but didn't have the weight marked on it. Afterwards I asked the guy at the counter, and he said it felt like a 16 to him. I usually use a 15, and it seemed like my biggest problem was that the ball too often hit the floor too soon, before I had swung through. Makes sense taht this problem would get worse as I got more tired. That's my excuse, and I'm sticking with it. (Either that or it's because I bowl like a doofus.)

Nancy's three games, bowled with her own ball with her initials on it, were 129, 145, 140. Nice.

Mystery Blazes loop, not that motivated, and it almost felt like an easy jog, but the time was still not that bad. The down vest that I found a month ago was still hanging on the branch, so I brought it home with me, need to find someone who it will fit.

Billygoat at Huntington. The drizzle was not a problem, as I had a hat that worked well (though it blocked my vision when I had to duck through laurel) and I had Rain-Xed my glasses well in the morning. It's been a long time since I've sustained this level of effort for this long, and it worked out well. I was in a crowd for a few controls, then tucked in behind Peter for a few, then leading a pack for a few more. Eventually I wound up trading off the front position with people like Ernst, Tim and Ben Parson, Alex, Becky, Nadim, and Zac Barker. Took the extra minute to drink Ethan-All at the aid station, which probably helped my ability to keep moving. I went with the popular skip of 33, which seems to have worked out in a curious manner. I didn't know whether the people around me had skipped yet or not (about half of them had), but I somehow got the notion in my head that I should go at the leg as aggressively as possible, meaning straight overland through the woods, passing very close to controls 6 and 2. This was, on the surface, just outright dumb. The trail route is hardly any longer (probably shorter once you consider the weaving one has to do in the woods) as well as flatter, and those who took that route were about 2.5 minutes faster than me. But what happened was that I still got ahead of most of my companions who still had to go to 33, and although I was now a couple of minutes down on those who skipped it, they had a groupthinkfart and blew 35. I spiked it and at the end I was racing mostly people who I had caught up to who had skipped earlier. There was no chance of keeping up with Ben, and I didn't think I could catch Hannah or Ernst, but once in the chute I was inspired to see if I had any adrenalin kick available, and ran down a cramping Linder. Don't know if Hannah would have been in reach if I had started earlier, or if I would have burned out.

Pretty good race for me, ahead of a number of people who I would not be surprised to be trailing these days. I kept pretty good map contact, no big errors other than the one mentioned above (which worked out in my favor), though there are a couple of legs that will require some serious head-scratching to remember exactly what the pack did. I also did something that I've never managed before: I beat everybody who is older than me. This is something that gets a bit easier as you get older, but having a few folks somewhat older than you who are faster and tend to show up every year makes it challenging. This year everybody ahead of me was at least six years younger. It also means that I was the first Master (if we define that as O-age 50 and up).

No problem staying awake on the drive home, and the following morning I feel pretty good, maybe just a little stiffness in my legs. I guess I'm not completely washed up yet.

C • Beating older guys 4

10 pullups on Charlie's yard rings.

Speedy Goat sprint relay at Tarrywile, mass start (partnered with Charlie). No real errors of more than a couple of seconds, a lot of frantic running along with the crowd.

Speedy Goat sprint relay at Tarrywile, leg 3 (partnered with Charlie). Mostly not too bad, I did lose a little time on one leg because I got thrown by the unmapped cars in the parking lot, and apparently my swell route to the last control wasn't that great after all.

Pine Banks Park-O. Not putting out the level of effort that I probably ought to on a course like this, and also made (small) errors on a few controls. Pretty brief effort nevertheless, but it increases my streak of exercise days (which may come to an end right here).

Mystery Blazes loop. Getting out to Northampton for Phil's meet didn't work out today (I guess people as starting right now, as I write this), so I decided to just scoot out the front door. For some reason I was motivated to try running this faster. Usually, I just run it, but I thought maybe it would be a good idea to try and be speedy. I kept the effort at a sustainable level, so it wasn't exactly that I was trying to push hard, and it more like I was trying to run in a higher gear, increasing my stride length rather than my turnover rate. As I was approaching the end, I started wondering if this would be enough to break 40 minutes for the first time ever (PR was 40:55). Yep.

AOWN: I even wasted a few moments at the start when I spotted a hen turkey just off the trail, who skittered off to join a tom. I ventured in their direction, and got surprisingly close (3-4 meters?) before they initiated evasive maneuvers.

Wow, eight consecutive days of exercise!

C • Yeah, some serious training... 1

Going for a run -- well, a hike -- up Lincoln Hill in Hinesburg, VT. Except I was actually on Mason Hill in Starksboro, one hill too far south. King of the wrong mountain. Didn't bother to summit when I realized where I actually was. Distance and climb are a guess.

Climbing Lincoln Hill in Hinesburg, VT, to check out the (rarely used) hang glider launch. Didn't have a map with me, and I was pretty much winging it, figuring how hard could it be to find a big cliff with a small clearing on top? Did a bit of fumbling around, but I did manage to locate it, and came back down by a reasonably sane trail, as opposed to the nutty route with briars that I took on the way up. Then finished up on the road to get back to the car. I ran some of this, though not the stumbling uphill through the vegetation part. Distance and climb are again a guess.

Back to get the Vibe, but by a different route. Since yesterday was basically my first ride in a while, my ischial tuberosities were pretty uncomfortable for the first couple of miles, enough so that I really couldn't sit down, but it got somewhat better after a while. This despite the fancy WaveFlo saddle that's supposed to prevent such problems. I guess there must have just been a hatch of blackflies, because I rode through a few clouds of them.

Riding the Incubus from Piper's Garage to Mom's house after dropping off the Vibe for minor work, to pick up her car.

College Woods, Red course. After working start for a while, I managed to get around the course just before the thunderstorm hit. Apres moi, le deluge. No results up yet, but based on who was there, I'm guessing there's a good chance that I had the fastest time, although I think the courses were reused from April 2010, when Alar ran Red in 67:14. Navigation was mostly not bad, a few small errors that were not surprising given the weak map and sometimes low visibility, but there was one very bad leg wherein I lost contact, bailed out, found a control, saw that it was my next control, and headed back toward my intended one, but it still took me a while to find it.

Willard Brook SE, with an extra excursion northward when I hit the power line, down to Bayberry Hill "Road", westward to the pavement, and back. I wanted to see if I could recognize it when I reached it, and I could. West of the power line, I could drive my car on it, and it looks like somebody must be occasionally picking up branches that fall on it. East of the power line, it's an eroded stream bed with several fallen trees blocking it. I think 35 years ago my mother might have driven down this once and decided it wasn't a very good idea. Now it would be a silly thing to do on a mountain bike.

I felt tired and unmotivated from the first step, but at least I got out and did it.

I was asked to look for a pair of shoes tonight (located at my house, but not belonging to me), which I believe I have located. I had some idea where to look, because I recently did an inventory of my shoes, and came up with:
6 pairs of sneakers/running shoes
8 pairs of O-shoes, representing most of the spectrum of decrepitude
7 pairs of sandals, of which maybe only one or two are really interesting
10 pairs of specialized sports footwear (ski boots, skates, etc.)
9 other pairs (dress shoes, slippers, work boots)
total 30 pairs

There are probably dozens more pairs that don't belong to me (many of which have likely been outgrown by their owners). But I'm nowhere near Imelda Marcos's 1060 (2700? 3000?) pairs.

Cat Rock Park-O. I'm counting this as all spikes, even though I lost a bit of time at #3, but I believe I was in the right place, and the control was not (after giving up on the mapped cairn, I headed uphill and found it on some unmapped rock). Other than that, there were a few legs where the route could probably have been better in some subtle way, but I don't feel particularly bad about any of my choices. I thought I had run here a couple of times before, but seems to have been only once (maybe I came another time and shadowed one of Nancy's kids?). I also remembered that the previous time I had some moments where I did not successfully keep track of what trail I was on, and I kept that together this time. The previous map was printed at 1:5000, but this time it was 1:7500, with proportionately smaller symbols, which didn't help the readability any.

Mystery Blazes loop, before breakfast, gray overcast and a little under 60 F, nice conditions for running. Didn't know how motivated I'd be when I started, and my lower legs felt funny (wobbly, uncertain) after the strain of West Point, but once I got rolling I felt okay so I kept up a sprightly pace. The older log was available again for the Mulpus crossing. Felt like the time might be pretty good, except that when I looked at my watch when I finished, I couldn't remember whether that was good or not. Turns out I knocked nearly a minute off of my best.

The vest that I found was still hanging on a branch -- I should do this loop at a more leisurely pace sometime, bring the vest home, and remove some branches here and there that are in the way of the path.

I forgot to mention my AOWN moment from Sunday: I saw I lizard. I've seen them out west before, but I don't recall ever having seen one in the northeast. It was scampering around on the edge of a bare rock area near the end of the course, and he was a cute little guy, black with three yellow stripes, maybe six inches from nose to tip of tail. I'm going to guess it was a skink, maybe a five-lined skink, though I didn't notice a blue tail.

Deep Hollow, Blue long. Held things together and had a basically competent run, though of course it would have been nice if it had been even cleaner. Confused a bit by undermapped rock on the way to #7, then just really screwed up #9, failing to competently read my way down a gentle slope, and when I corrected, I got into the right area and checked a bunch of rocks before deducing which one was the right one -- turned a leg that should have been 3 minutes into 6 minutes. On #14, I just followed the crowd, but realized when I checked the code that it wasn't my crowd, and I had to find my own control on my own. I lost a bit of time on #18 because I was looking at the spur (the control was hidden behind it, and the description didn't indicate that) but didn't think it was the right spur because the shape was pretty wrong. On #19, it probably would have been faster to go straight instead of diverting to the road to do the climb, but I was tired enough that I couldn't muster the mental energy. Both shoes came untied during the race -- I wonder if I spaced out and tied them with ordinary knots.

The first time I orienteered at West Point was on this same map (then known as Lake Stilwell) 24 years ago, when I managed to get around a 6.9 km Red course in 101 minutes despite one utterly appalling leg. And control #6 in 1987 was in the same place as control #18 in 2011. Not that I realized that when I was out there.