I played (indoor) soccer for the first time in many years last Friday. I was a little apprehensive re: my knee exploding, but it turned out okay. Soccer used to be my main athletic interest, while orienteering was always an afterthought. I was a pretty decent player but not close to good enough to play beyond high school, so my career died with intramurals in college, and I've never been enamored with the idea of playing in some men's league with a bunch of clumsy, disproportionately intense dudes with more beer gut than skill.
Anyway, my left hamstring has reacted poorly to the unfamiliar movements. Feels like a strain or slight pull, but is already feeling progressively better over the last 2-3 days. Biking doesn't seem to annoy it but jogging/running definitely does. Hopefully I'll be okay for Deschutes Daze - though the great thing about Deschutes Daze is that it's more about pure enjoyment than competition. Deschutes Daze is the Ideal Type (in the popular sense, not the Weber sense) of orienteering.
Cycling28:44 9.0 mi (18.8 mph) +15m ahr:136 max:157
4 PM
Cycling28:19 9.0 mi (19.1 mph) +15m ahr:114 max:153
Hit a squirrel today. As I approached it bolted onto the trail from my left, moving perpendicular to me, but then when it got to the middle it presumably got spooked by sudden and immediate danger and turned directly away, but still in the line of fire, like in the classic cartoon bit where someone tries to escape a train by running down the railroad tracks the other way. Definitely felt a solid bump under my front tire and also felt something contact the toe of my left shoe, presumably as a result of the squirrel flailing about. Difficult to say if it technically got "run over" i.e. if it absorbed the maximum force of the front tire, or just took a glancing blow. With a half-glance backward I didn't see it on the trail anymore, so presumably it survived and ran off.