Training Log Archive: Ari-o

After getting home after midnight and then the tail end of a birthday party, I wasn't exactly up on time or warmed up for O today. I got there maybe ten minutes ahead of the start. Checked in, paid up, and go.

I started somewhat back in the mass start and ran down most of the field before making a "mistake" to 1. I picked a perfect route: run until I can see the boulder, run to the control, except this route, rather than being on the edge of greenbriar, was through the middle of the greenbriar. So, -15 on the leaders.

A bit peeved, I spiked 2 and 3, but then got paralleled to 4, and took a circuitous route culminating in running along a stone wall through green. -1:15 there, or so. But I was feeling better for the bash to the trail and the run to 5, good navigating to 6, mostly avoiding greenbriar to 7 and 8.

I took a high trail route to 9 and then overran the control, going low through white would have been better. Spiked 10, 11 and 12 and had some help to 13. Led on to 14 and 15 (14 a good spike, 15 decent navigation via the rocky ground) and then messed up 16. Stayed on the trail far too long, had to backtrack. Right to the control, but that was mostly luck.

17 was nice since I recognized it would be a Forest-X control on a trail so rather than a straight route over the feature-filled hill I just ran the trail (put some time on people here) and took an okay route to 18 and spiked 19 using the stream bed. Then took the trails to the finish, quite a bit faster than a slightly straighter bash.

5th overall. Not bad for barely any orienteering this year. Looking forward to the Traverse in a couple of weeks!

NE Challenge - Splits

Went out to set the course for the inaugural Hall's Hutmen's Hustle, a 10k trail race on trails maintained by the OH (Old Hutmen) Association. I slept in at the OH cabin/finish line and went to blaze a path through the woods we could use to get from the Hutmen's Trail to the cabin.

It went somewhat slowly and took quite a bit of orange tape and I was about halfway along when I kicked a branch out of my way and in to my face. And by in to my face I mean up my nose. I impaled a nose blood vessel on a beech bud and blood came pouring out of my nostril. I ran about 300m back to the OH and lay back and the bleeding stopped (bloody noses are weird) but I was covered in blood on my face and it was … interesting.

Then I felt fine and decided eff it, let's just blaze the trail to the road, so I got a ride up top, blazed the trails there, and ran back to the OH. Boy can you crank coming down the Wildcat Valley Trail!

10k, 500m of elevation. A very fun race. This was mostly to work out kinks before we open this much past hut kids next year (and encourage more OH to do it, too). Worked mostly well. One person got lost, and if we had a permit I'd probably put out more flagging (that might have to happen next year) but otherwise good reviews all around. The other suggestions: the bottom of Hutmen's kind of sucks (it turns out it's actually an old ski slope), so build a trail to the OH (I'd like to do that) and better markings or at least a clearer trail up Hall's Ledge. But a great combination of super steep climbing, wicked fast downhills, singletrack and ski trails. I swept to pull down markings, of course someone went off-course and then there were no markings for them to follow, but they found their way out.

Mark your calendars for the Hutmen's Hustle next year!

Long day on Thursday (out of the house from basically 7:30 to 9 at meetings and events the whole time) and feeling like I was getting a cold so I decided to #justsleepin and skip hills. 9.5 hours later, I felt much better, but it was too nice a day to not run, so I managed a run during lunch hour.

Along the river I passed my TA for my 2:00 class (and classmate in other classes) and ran with her for a few hundred yards. Then I threw down on a wind-assisted mile: 6:23. Then I didn't trip over the sidewalk on the way home.

39 sections of the Second Borough at NP, laboring a bit from yesterday's shenanigans, plus, it was warmer today than last week. Felt better as time went on.

Very silly and just as fun O exercise down in Dana Park with Dave and Ethan. Spin a wheel, get a number of bases (world series!) and run that many bases (controls). Then download and see how many runs you score.

After two double days in a row, my legs were tired. Good thing tomorrow is an almost-required day off (busy from 8-8, after the game tonight).

But! Realized that this sort of thing might just work for a Harvard Stadium NP-O. Start with a whole pile of maps with several variations (1, 2, 3, 4, 5) with each starting at Section 37 and making its way up and down and around the stadium. Generally top-bottom-top to get the stairs in, but with some potential for route choice in the stadium (go around the steps on the level or make a straight line across the circular part) and especially at the end (section 1 to 37 in the stadium, or run out the gate and around the end and back in the other side).

Figure to try this out with a select group some time this fall or early spring, then pitch it to the NPowers that be.

Cool downs and between intervals.

5x800s with Fenspeed. Felt pretty good in the pre-dawn chill. This group is great to train with, sort of an old school November Project feel: small group, fast people. Fun and supportive. Two main issues:

1. The track is … weird. It's not 400m or 1/4 mile but something sort of in the middle, we think? So an 800 is twice around the track minus two lines. Just kind of annoying. Otherwise it works, but Harvard and MIT are closer and betterer.

2. At the end of each interval, everyone stops. For a minute or two. I keep running but then sort of angle across for the next start. It's nice to wait for everyone but the people who are going slower get shorter and shorter rests. And I've never understood just stopping and starting. My strava looks weird with lines diagonally across the field several times.

But fun, won't complain. Ran 800s in (estimating) 2:55, :50, :50, :50, :40. Speed work is fun; I need to do it more.

Then we do Nick's Abs, which are super hard and give me 6 minutes of feeling like I'm on a football team, except way weaker.

I effed this up. After bombing a midterm I got a beer and was late to meet Harry for a recreation of the door-to-door November Project workout. But I was late, and couldn't catch him, so just ran to his house with a singlet he'd left in my car and which I'd found months later. Ran pretty hard, though. Garmin wouldn't find satellites, so moving time is estimated (fucking traffic lights).

And a much slower run home.

So in October I did 31-32 pullups a day. What should my challenge be for November?

Went on run to North Station to see the carnage of people going up to Hallowe'en in Salem but it was disappointingly orderly. Ran across the dam, around Paul Revere Park a bit, then back up Main Street. Just shy of Lafayette Square I tripped over a crack in the sidewalk and ate shit on the concrete. Fell on big areas so nothing broken (toe may be unhappy for a few days) then limped to the grocery store. Boo.

C • dude 1