Training Log Archive: Nadim

Event: QOC Smokey Glen
 

For my warmup, I hiked from Smokey Glen Barbequers to the start of the 2022 QOC Bumble with course setter David Onkst, and Peggy. It was cold but sunny.

QOC Bumble in the Smokey Glen Barbequers property, and in Seneca Creek State Park, MD. David Onkst set a very similar course to a previous Bumble event held here. By design controls were in very similar locations. David wanted to give past runners a chance to improve themselves and to see if they would. I was hurting early but eventually I felt better.

S-1 - I got moving early and was near the front as we started. I chose my windows and decided most of what my course orders would be before getting 200m down the road.

For the first window I ran O, N, K, L, M. I doglegged toward the start, but being impatient, I jumped in the woods early. Others had gone in right away but since they were just running faster, they were just ahead of me going to O. Bushy growth that I'd mapped earlier had definitely grown taller and thus was thicker. People ahead of me gave away the location but I knew I was close on my own (I made the map). Leaving O, it seemed that a new trail had gotten made, but it joined the older mapped trail quickly. I dropped to the Seneca Ridge Trail and crossed the creek on it. After climbing above some low vegetation, I left the trail and dropped to control N. About this time, my right ankle started hurting--a new pain :(. I don't recall rolling it. It hurt most when the ground slope was higher on the right side. I started dropping off the pace a lot, slow though it already was. I stayed low and in between the hillside and the creek; a place I enjoy running, but I wasn't feeling good. I thought I might have to quit. With occasional walking in the yellow ride, I hit control K right on. Going to L, I could again tell that the vegetation had grown-up beyond how I'd mapped it. I came around some vegetation on the left side just before spiking L With my right ankle still hurting, I hit M perfectly, having gone straight. Elliot Hamilton passed me just before I got there.

Leaving M, Elliot started to go high but later passed me again as I went low and parallel to the creek. I walked more occasionally. After getting onto ground that was more firm, I moved better and went straight along the old road to the marshy area. I passed Diana Aleksieva, but pulled-up a little short while looking for the depression that I knew from memory to be on the left side of the trail. It wasn't visible because the control was actually on a formline shown as an earthbank in the clue description--with so many controls I didn't take the time to correlate the letter on the map with the clue description. I didn't lose much time getting to U--10-15 seconds at most. Heading to V next, I decided it to be faster using the trails along Long Draught Branch rather than the more up and down way with more vegetation and no trails, crossing under the highway at Seneca Creek. I had to stop along the way for a pit stop. By this time, I was feeling slightly better--my ankle was not hurting much any more--weird. I hit V perfectly but it would have been hard to miss being right next to the pavilion. I doubled back heading towards W next. I crossed the marsh on the boardwalk for the Mink Hollow Trail. I was only on it for 100m before making my way up past the rootstocks to the road. W was again too easy, being a distinct tree right off the road in an open area. I ran the road until just past the bridge over the highway. Once approaching the end of the disc golf area, I could see control X, over 100m away. Leaving control X, I doubled back across the stream to the west of X, to avoid expected growth in green vegetation. As I did this, I wondered if it was a faster route because I didn't see as much growth of the vegetation as I had earlier. I eventually crossed the stream and got up onto the plateau. At the top of the mapped gullies, I recognized which gully I needed, and found the little knoll between the gullies, with control Y.

Leaving Y, to go to T, I saw two men apparently running as a team. I was able to catch them after the creek crossing, and I spike it--that rootstock was too small), I kept moving heading to S next to that I'd have a short distance exiting this window. I went straight and spked it, but I wasn't reading the terrain very well. I read my way to T better, and used the telephone poles to attack and spike R next. I used the trail going to Q--it was too easy being right on the trail. For P, I figured I was moving slowly so going straight over the ridge that I was already half way up, was best. I passed Suzanne Izzo (oldest QOC member?) going the other direction, up the steep ridge. I went past the depressions and spiked P.

I went straight again going to #27. I spiked it wih the help of some rootstocks along the way.

I went through the mini-golf and horseshoe pits goin to the finish. I went through an open building that I'd mapped as a canopy.

Overall, finishing-up the Green course was not bad. I was slow and finished just after Ted Good, who'd run Red.

From Northfield Rd., Greenwich Park, to Old Georgetown Rd. to Johnson Ave./Hempstead Ave. to McKinley St. to Garfield St., to Roosevelt St., to the trail at Jefferson St. to Northfield Rd. My ankles were again feeling the stress of walking fast. I was able to get out between rains and temperatures were in the mid-50s F.

QOC: Wheaton Regional Park, MD. I ran the Green course and was able to keep up a slow jog most of the way. There was about an inch of soft snow today. Because of it sometimes there were long elephant trails between controls. I ran 7.6K on the 6.2K course, and climbed 169.6m; optimal was rated at 155m.

S-1 I should have takent the trail, but after zig-zagging across the parked cars in the lot, I was low enough, and not reading the map well enough at that point, that I passed the control ending up closer to where the old totem pole used to be. I came back and found a guy in orange, with his dog having just punched.

1-2 - I shot the gap in the green by the train tracks and hit the south side of the lake. Approaching the dam, I could see the guy in orange (from control 1) going straight into the forest. I took trails past #10, and caught up to the guy in orange west of #2. I passed him and he followed me in.

2-3 I crossed the creek a little downstream of #2, and got on trails. I was running rather weakly so I stayed on trails to the second bridge NW of #3. I went up from there. The guy in orange with his dog got there just ahead of me by going directy from #2.

3-4 - I went straight while the guy in orange appeared to head SE to the trail. I think I got there ahead of him, if he was going there.

4-5 - I started going straight, but soon I though it'd be better to use the bridge south of #5 and come up through what was mapped as open forest. Cross the forest hillside, I made a bad turn and ended up close to #2. I took the trail from there to the bridge I'd aimed for earlier. I lost at least 75 seconds ending up by #2. At the bridge, I saw the guy in orange coming more directly from #4. I used the 2 rootstocks to attack from, and I got there just ahead of the guy in orange.

5-6 - I took the unmapped elephant trail to #6. The guy in orange followed.
It was visible from the trampled snow and vegetation and easy to run. It stayed high and a little left initially, but it curved right to the gully system. I saw the gully, then the control. The elephant trail went around the gully system to get there the most energy efficient way.

6-7 - This was a major route choice leg. I got on trails climbing just east of #3 and #4, then broke off at a trail bend that got me around where there used to be a mapped earth bank crossing a reentrant. Approaching the road, I saw Sylvia ahead. Though I closed in on her going over some of thge spur on the other side of the road, she started running on the down hill and go there just after her. I didn't see the guy in orange anywhere.

7-8 - I recall hearing that the vegetation going up the reentrant that #8 was in, was okay. It was more like I'd mapped it in that it was slow for about 100m. I got to the dirt road and then at the paved loop trail, I went left of straight. On the other side, I used the trails to get close before attacking and spiking it.

8-9 - I intended to get back to the trail I'd attacked from, but further north. I may have set out on a bad bearing. I didn't get to the trail until near a trail intersection. I moved better passing the next 2 intersections, and left the trail before the 3 prominent rootstocks on the left. Going on bearing, I got to the spur and followed it across a trail to the control. As I got close, I'd seen it but started going left a little bit when I lost sight of the control and saw a guy in an orange jacket (not the same guy I'd seen earlier).

9-10 - I went straight but weaved around the rootstocks. 3 people (one with the orang jacket) were going there too. When the vegetation got thicker, I went right to avoid it. When I got to the reentrant (I saw Celia Landers there and she said she didn't want to break my concentration), I had to turn left up it, but I got there ahead of others.

10-11 - I took trails to the lake, then came up the reentrants. When I punched, I saw the guy in orange whom I'd seen early in the course--he was coming from the opposite direction so I figure he must have been on the Red course (that had a lot of common legs with Green). I didn't realize that the old trail was still there paralleling the mapped one along the lake. It stood out with snow on the ground and was clear. Perhaps it was blocked from rejoining the lakeside trail but I left it before then.

10-11 - I went south to the paved trail, then left past a bend NE of the control. I never found the old intermittent trail leaving #10, and it was thick there. I spiked the control, seeing the rootstock long before seeing the control.

11-12 - I took the elephant trail to the paved trail. It wasn't so trampled after that because some probably opted to go around on the paved trail. I went straight past the 2 prominent rootstocks, then to the rootstock with the control.

12-F - Straight to the bridge, onto the trail, then across the dirt parking lot--basically straight as one can. I'm moving so slowly that AP will probably show this as an error leg for me.

It was a pretty fun course. It was about 32 F when finished--warmer than when I started.

Green - Splits