Training Log Archive: Swampfox

Finished up the Scottish 6 Day with a decent run, though not exactly error free! The mistakes I made cost me very little time--but could have cost major amounts of time--while in another place a mistake I *didn't* make cost me more time in aggregate than the mistakes made did.

In the latter case, I ran right by one of my controls, which was on a tiny knoll in a very hummocky area. I knew where I was, I was watching everything as I slowed down and was running by, and it had never occurred to me that I had seen anything mappable as a full line knoll. But swing back around when I had gone 40 or so meters too far, and knew something was off.

In the former cases (mitakes made but not costing much in time), I headed out of the start for about 10m 180 degrees out of direction--and no reason why I couldn't have just rushed on off for that way for a long while (ouch!). And on another control, I jumped ahead to the next control for which I had already planned my exit, and when after 100m or so I wasn't seeing what I thought I should be, I rechecked my map and saw my mistake. As it happened, the unintended line I had started out on probably cost me no time at all and well might have been better than what I would have otherwise taken.

Did most everything else well and thought I pushed along fairl well, too, so in all a satisfactory way to end an enjoyable week of racing in Scotland.

S6D - Day 6 Glen Affric - C34 - Splits

Had no problem with the lighting in the forest today (thank you rain gods!) and was able to read the map just fine. Though to say I read the map "on the run" just fine might be a stretch, as in many parts of the forest running was more up and down motion in place over various felled objects (windblown trees being especially popular!) and very hummocky underfooting (that often proved to be false underfooting with the real ground surface being down another 1-2 feet) with occasional brief bits of forward progress. I heard one fellow competitor describe the area as "a right proper tough forest", which I suppose it was.

I hit all the controls. The thing I could have done better was to pick faster lines on 3 sections of the longer leg we had, and then push along harder--though that was hard due to the afore mentioned tough, heavy forest.

The first control might well have been the hardest of all. It was a straight shot out of the start, contouring through open forest for all of 150m, to a 3m cliff. When I came to where I thought the cliff might be, there was a deeply incised ravine dead ahead, and I stopped at the very edge of a precipitous, vertical dropoff. I looked down, and I couldn't see any rock at all, and I definitely couldn't see a control or any reason to head down. On the other hand, I had no idea whether to turn left or right to search for the cliff. And 3m at that! It had looked so easy on the map, and I hadn't rushed the leg, so it immediately felt a little discouraging to already not know which way to turn so early in the race. So rather than head off without a plan, I looked at the map again, I took a good look around in all directions, , and concluded there was a slim chance that just maybe the cliff really was below me. With map in teeth I worked my way straight down, and plopped/slipped to the bottom about 2m to one side of the control just as some other runners were getting there, having advanced into the control along the narrow ravine bottom. Happiness.

Another control was well bunkered by strategically placed patches of dense forest in a bland area with diffuse contours, and looking at it, I had the thought that "they are picking on me". But I walked in the last 90m, dodging or ducking under the occasional windblown tree, and then forcing my way through the last patch of dense young trees with 0 visibility, and what do you know--there was the effin' control! Double helpings of happiness.

My calf was 100% fine again today, so the week continues to be a successful one. Just hold up one last day, and I can put it in the books.

S6D - Day 5 Glen Affric - C34 - Splits

Day 4 Scottish 6 Day, Darnaway Forest. I missed the first 2 controls and that was today's race right there--oh, well! However, while I didn't miss anything after that, the rest of it really wasn't much better. I struggled to read the map most of the way, and with clouds and a dense forest canopy, I was rarely able to read the map on the run. Though I kept on trying. What worked best was to come to a full stop and read/memorize what should be coming up ahead, but that sort of stop-and-go pattern doesn't feel very satisfying. Still fun, just not a good race for me, and at least I did my part (as an early starter) of breaking down some of the stuff on the ground for the later runners, as the early runners have done for me earlier in the week. The best part was my calf was 100% good, without even a twinge of anything wrong.

S6D - Day 4 Darnaway - C34 - Splits

Day 3 Scottish 6 Day. Today at Darnaway Forest at the Estate of Moray. A fine estate, and wish I had one like this back in Laramie. The mixed, mostly very open forest over moraine terrain would make for a nice variation from the sage and granite.

I ran essentially mistake free, with a few stops to be extra sure of what I was about to do, and took one route which may or may not have been optimum time-wise, but which made the control very easy to take.

Watching the relays afterwards was really fun! Very impressive to see how easily the Danish women made it all look.

And then after that we drove down to Aviemore (sp?) for dinner with Ingrid and Goran Ohlund and friends of theirs, which was quite nice and special.

S6D - Day 3 Darnaway - C34 - Splits

Day 2 Scottish 6 Day. Today's area was more familiar feeling in the sense that it featured much bigger terrain/hillsides and better visibility than yesterday, mostly rough open, and lots of marshes of varying size. It also featured a lot of bracken, the major effects of which were to reduce runnability (going out earlier would have been a substantial disadvantage) and to wholly obscure many objects and more subtle contour features in the terrain.

Overall, the day felt a good bit better to me than yesterday, largely because I never had any places where I had no real idea of where I was or concept of what to do next (as happened with 2 controls in yesterday's archery maze), and because I had better flow for the most part during the race.

I went at #1 quite deliberately and not rushing things, and got to the bottom of an open slope, about 100m or less from the control--a boulder--and 5 contours down. I thought I was where I wanted to be, but there was a small stream gushing away beside me where the map just showed a short line of blue dots, so that made me double check the map, plus I couldn't see any sign of a stone up the slope--just a sea of unpromising looking bracken. I checked the map again before heading up, because I really didn't want to break bracken unless I had to, and since I couldn't see where else I could possibly be, I headed on up, and, sure enough, there was a stone up there which wasn't possible to see from below (because of the bracken) until you were practically on top of it. I was happy to see the boulder.

I managed the next few okay, and then misread my way to the wrong cliff in another area of open bracken. I could see both of the possibilities on the way in and it was easy to correct.

The next few were fine, and then I navigated to the very edge of the control circle where I could be sure where I was, and needed to proceed to a small spur. It looked like it should be easy from the map, but here again there was a sea of bracken ready to obscure, and I had another miss. I swung back, stopped at what seemed to be about the right distance from the feature at the edge of the ring I had gone off of the first time, and it reaslly looked like I should be in the right place--except for the fact that there was neither spur or flag in sight, just bracken. I wasn't sure what to do next, so I did a mental coin flip, moved down just a tiny bit in the bracken, and I caught site of the flag.

I bobbled one other control a tiny bit, with the rest of the race basically going fine. I could have run faster, but it's hard to do so without more confidence that you're going to see what you need to see at the end, and with some of these controls a miss could have meant a lot of time.

The second best thing about the day was my calf felt 100%--never even had to think about it for so much as a step during the race, and I was very happy about that!

Not long after I finished, there was an announcement that because of problems at the car park, no cars would be allowed to begin leaving until an hour after the originally scheduled departure time. And not too long after that it was announced there would be another one half hour delay (all this because of developing muddy conditions int he car park).

By about then, Peter had finished, got his stuff, and had found us. He appraised the situation, and made it pretty clear that what we really ought to do was to immediately start heading back for the car park, even if we couldn't leave yet by the time we go there. So we did. And it turned out to be exactly the right decision, because by then the mud situation was a) extremely unlikely to improve and b) highly likely to get much, much worse as the day progressed and once traffic started trying to leave. There ahd already been massive delays for late arrivals trying to get *in* to the car park, and many people were still walking in to the assembly area as we were walking along the route back to the cars. As in many hundreds of people, nearly all of whom had surely missed their original starts.

We got back to the car, piled in, backed out of our spot, and within a few minutes were on asphalt and speeding off and clear of any heavy traffic--the best thing of the day!

It's possible there are still cars trying to get out now, now being past 8 pm.

S6D - Day 2 Strathfarrar - C34 - Splits