Training Log Archive: CleverSky

Walking down to Seeley to pick up Nancy's car, In The Dark. Many would have brought a light along for a stroll of this sort; not I.

C • training 4

Walking home from Seeley after dropping Nancy's car off.

One of those sparkling days that looked like it would have been perfect for some recreational exercise. I instead spent the day on grassy hilltop in Roxbury, CT, getting not so much exercise, but getting a bit tired. Might have had more fun riding a bicycle in that area, but the hang gliding training that we did was at least interesting. And I saw some absolutely incredible foliage from 350 feet above it.

Hanging out at Ratlum Mountain tonight, seemingly by myself -- Charlie and Rhonda are in Texas, and I haven't seen Zack around tonight (he may have gone to sleep early). I looked for Uranus, which was not quite bright enough to make out with just my eyeglasses, but Charlie conveniently left a pair of binoculars on his desk, with which I was able to spot it quite clearly.

C • Zack 2

Burnt Mountain, vetting/waking up controls, and placing one. Slightly earlier than yesterday, so I brought a headlamp to read the map, which I used to various extents all the way through. Fumbled around some finding the last control on my map. Then on my way back, I encountered Steve, who was on his way up the trail. There were a couple of controls used both days, and one of them had inadvertantly been picked up yesterday afternoon, so he was on his way to replace it, but he handed it to me and sent me off to do it. No streamer, so I had to be careful to get the correct small cliff. When I got to the spot where I thought it belonged, I could see that the ground was scuffed up from people punching yesterday, so that gave me confidence.

Burnt Mountain, control retrieval. A bit sloppy going to the first control (on the very edge of my map), and also going to the third one, which I actually navigated right to, but didn't look on the other side of the knoll, and then wandered around a bunch trying to relocate. That one was a water stop, so I had to stop and tidy everything up. Nine water jugs, and six were still full. Although the watch was stiil claiming 100% charge when I started out, it in fact ran out of juice about 10 minutes before I was done (so I adjusted the time). I guess I got about 5.5 hours on the charge.

Burnt Mountain, vetting/waking up controls. Difficulty increased slightly by the fact that the morning light wasn't especially bright.

Burnt Mountain, putting out White/Yellow controls for Sunday.

Burnt Mountain, putting out one control flag. One of the spots I had been to already had a stand and thus needed only an SI box, but it turned out to also be missing the flag, so since it was near the road, I borrowed Jim's bike to ride out and fix the situation. Plain pedals with no toeclips, so when the chain fell off, I nearly wiped out because my foot came off the pedal.

Lake Wampanoag, orange boat, with Nancy. Somewhat breezy, headwind on the way back. I hear that some of the trees were pretty colors.

Walking to Chase Rd. via Holman St., one way.

I wore two GPS watches yesterday because I didn't think that the battery in either one would last long enough to get me through the 5+ hours that I anticipated being out there. I started with the Garmin 405CX, which is my less-preferred choice for a couple of reasons, and was pleasantly surprised that it lasted the whole time, so I never even needed to turn on the Garmin 10. Post-race, the 405CX is still claiming to be 100% charged, and that sure doesn't make any sense. But it worked, so I'm not complaining.

Hudson Highlander XIX, 21st place according to my spllits printout (assuming everyone ahead of me had already downloaded). Jeff and I drove down to Bernie's house last night, stopping for a quite satisfactory dinner at Cold Fusion Pizza (Anthony's in Vernon CT). The race went quite well, with basically perfect weather (cool to start, not too warm at the end, but warm enough to be comfortable hanging arround the finish area, and sparkling blue skies). Nice course set by Joe, and fine organization by Ching-Hua and her crew. The course was actually composed largely of controls taken from the WOC93 Sprint Qualifier, Relay, and Classic Model courses, and was notable for having no water stops in the woods at all, it was strategically designed so that the water was all at the aid stations, and I thought that worked out fine, at least for this weather.

With a group of about a half-dozen for the first loop on Jackie Jones, including Bernie, Peggy, Jeff, and some people I didn't know. Smallish route error on #5 when I headed up diagonally from the pipeline bend to cut the corner, and Jeff just went to the trail and pulled ahead of us. We caught up to him on the way to #7, when we all headed for the dam, but found that it was fenced off with a sign saying to keep off. Jeff was ahead of us and was headed along the base of the dam, but seemed to stop short due to the torrent coming through the spillway, so we detoured to the bridge. Not sure what Jeff did, but he was ahead of us when we got to the beach.

Leaving the aid station, Jeff was ahead and I was with Bernie, Peggy, and Michael Ryskin. We caught David Oxenstierna near #8, and we pulled up a little short and stopped to think, but spotted it to our right soon enough, helped by seeing Nadim leave (I later heard he had been fumbling around there a bit looking for it). My route on #9 wasn't quite perfect, and I ended up in the back of this little pack (which I think also included one or two people I didn't know). Peggy punched just ahead of me, but that was about the last I saw of her. Bernie had planned to stay with her, but I think saw an opportunity to beat me, so he motored on ahead. On #11 we got passed on the trail by Greg Ahlswede, who was on the trail run section and who was leading (moving very fast!). I successfully found the intermittent trail that supposedly went through the green (but it didn't really). We just about caught up to Tyra (who was on the Lowlander) on #13, and the pack was stringing out. Still had a couple of guys I didn't know in my vicinity while picking my way through #13 and #14. I also had to stop to take a thorn out of my shoe.

There were several people at the aid station, but they left ahead of me and I was on my own for a while. Shortly after passing through the tunnel, I saw Peggy on her way in. This was the trail run, and I heard that Bernie stopped to take a leak and Jeff got ahead of him. I caught up some, spotted them ahead of me and almost caught up by the control (#16), then I got ahead of Jeff when he stopped to take a leak. Then I stopped to take a leak, and he got ahead of me again. I finally caught up with them at the power line (which we actually dropped down to a little too soon), and we arrived at the Skannatati aid station together.

After stopping for drinks, I was the first of the group to head across the dam onto Surebridge, and I was mostly out front navigating through here. We caught Nadim, and I was with him and Michael for #18-#20, I think. Then on #21 (a very scenic leg), Nadim was going on the right flank of the ridge with Michael in tow, and I went directly up the centerline. Nadim did pop up where I was, but that was the last I saw of Michael. #22 was also a very nice leg, with a climb up onto a ridge at the end, and I lucked out and spiked it perfectly. Nadim missed slightly and I got ahead for a bit. #24 was a truly fugly-looking leg, requiring a crossing of a rocky canyon. I did it almost perfectly, reading my way along but not looking closely enough at the control location. I was a touch high and overshot slightly, and when I turned and went back, I saw Nadim punching. We arrived at #25 together, and thus also for the revisit to the aid station.

#26 was the last of the three King of the Mountain legs, and I might have had a little less trouble than others did with the vegetation, taking a route a bit to the left, and faring OK except for getting stalled out at one steep bit with some sticks in my way. I took advantage of the yellow up top to get past some of the blueberry, and had Nadim in sight when I punched. The exit from that control was a sea of blueberry, and after a few minutes I just coudn't take it, and dropped off the side of the ridge down to the stony marsh, which was also slow but not as tiring. Straightforward up the reentrant to the trail, and then just a repeat of the last two controls from the second loop, and off to the finish.

Seemed a little easy as Highlanders go, I wasn't expecting to come close to breaking five hours, not like I'm in very good shape right now. But I was ahead of Jeff and just behind Nadim, and that was also unexpected. The course did have some streches of just plain running at the beginnings and ends of loops (in addition to the trail run itself), which probably sped things up. I also managed to drink all of the sports drink that I sent to the aid stations, over a half-gallon in total, which probably helped. Bernie was unsuccessful in his bid to beat me; though he felt that I wasn't going especially fast early on, he thought that I sped way up later. From my perspective, I kept plodding along while he slowed down. I still had decent energy at the end, enough to run slowly, but not enough coordination to do so if the footing was bad. Nothing like previous years when I would be moaning or grunting with every step by the end. Navigationally it went very well, and I suspect that SA will show only minor losses, which may be dominated by things like needing to stop to tie my shoes. Post-race, I feel better than I remember ever feeling after a Highlander, though I think I'll stick with my plan of taking a vacation day Monday. The second toenails on both feet look and feel damaged, and I suspect I may lose them (the result of inadvertantly kicking rocks) -- that hasn't happened for several years. Very nice company driving down with Jeff, and revisited an old NEOC tradition of stopping at Rein's Deli for dinner on the way home.

splits
RouteGadget

C • Almost like being there. 1