Training Log Archive: Dooby

Seefin (Nagles)

Start was ok, direction not too good to 1 but got it ok after a slight hesitation short of the control. 2 was fine and to 3 stayed along the road before cutting up along an earthwall, to go straight at the control, ended up to the left, slightly. Got 4 ok. Didn't get back out to the road as quickly as i'd have liked, got a bit confused by a fence, ran along it for a bit, then felt I needed to cross and cut down, worked out ok though. Ran down the track and then followed the stream. Ducked into some green but no control. Came back out and found myself at a road, was too low, so a short detour up the hill to get 5, some time lost.

6 was tough, down and across the stream then back up a steep hill through green. More climb to 7. Took the upper (right) route to 8. Was looking at my watch along here, trying to get ensure my HR didn't drop, was just over 170. Felt Ger would fly this road so didn't want to lose too much time. Took a bearing from the turning circle, but going around the green I think I ended up too high when I hit the stream, turned right, and found a stream junction, with the one to the left having a clearing similar to where 8 was on the map. No control so reckoned I was too high so had to run back down the hill. It's entirely possible I was off the map here, just off!

9 was nice, lovely running straight down the hill, but then had a climb back up to 10. 11 was again downhill and then across some open forest. Same to 12, and 13 was down again. Went right to the upper track for 14. This track was fairly crap, lots of mud and puddles, scramblers have made a mess of it. 15 was uphill, used the track to the left rather than a straighter route. To 16 I gained height and went around the top of the hill looking for the track to the right of 16. Got the track and used it to cut in from to 16. Could see the clearing based as trees were greener from a distance. Nice leg then downhill to 17, spotted the knoll from a good bit off. 18 was more downhill. Then out along a rough track before crossing the river to climb to 19.

Knew that from 19 on, that it was uphill, had looked ahead! Probably cut in too early for 19, would have been less steep if i'd continued on the (mapped) track for a small bit longer. Contoured a bit to 20 then then next 2 controls were uphill. Then out to the road to 23, with some climb towards the end. There was a right or left option to 24, with left back along the track i'd just come up. Went this way as I felt it'd be an easier way into the control. I think that was proved right as the way out of 24 was rough, so that'd have been a slower approach to 24. 25 was ok and then back across to 26. And out to the road to the finish.

Definitely took a bit out of me, lots of climb and physical forest, but good fun. What you need for this time of the year. Was happy with my effort, didn't die too badly towards the end, but room for lots of improvement.

Then the prodigal son returned home to a fantastic dinner of ham & cabbage.

Results

Splitsbrowser makes for good viewing, apart from 4-5.

Garmin distance was 11.55 with 297m climb.

Very short warm-up.

Short warm-down afterwards.

Collected some controls after the event. Got dropped at the bottom of the hill and then collected controls going uphill. Felt ok at the start but the longer I was going (walking) the worse I felt, energy gone!

Also found carrying the controls was annoying, didn't help how I was feeling. Did lose time collecting the cairn (not on Brown course), tricky feature to find in the green but cut in too soon.

Event: Irish Squad - Munster Training
 

Put out 2 controls for the afternoon training.

Stopped at the higher control to take a couple of photos, had my camera in my pocket. That made my pocket a bit heavier jogging back down the hill.

Maps for tomorrow are printed.
Controls to sort out tonight, Crohane bunch and Ross Island bunch.
Competitions in Ór are set-up, so just need competitors to add...

Muckross

Bit later than i'd hoped but not too far behind schedule. Nice evening, not cold. Good start to the weekend.

Blister on my left foot is still not healed, so that hurt/let itself be known for first 20mins. No other parts of my legs were hurting or tired:-)

Felt alright throughout and was what I needed to wake up.

Saw 3 deer chewing grass outside Bluepool as I ran down the road, thought i'd see more, but didn't. Forest was quiet, met no one or nothing.

Avg Cadence = 82rpm

2 episodes of the Big Bang Theory. Thought about finishing with an episode of Modern Family but bit on the tired side so didn't feel like facing another 20mins.

Got off the bike thinking i'll enjoy a rest day tomorrow, but soon realised plan is to run. Sort of a rest on Saturday and a proper rest next Monday.

Usual 3 laps of the outside.

6 * c800m (lanes 1&2 closed, so starting on line my Garmin says 2 laps was around 860m)

2.45
2.44
2.42
2.42
2.43
2.45

Only 4 lads tonight and 2 of them were crocked. Rob has a swollen ankle, but still I couldn't stick with him for last 2 reps. And George is suffering after Ballycotton and he's also got an iron defficiency to make matters worse.

Stuck with Rob for the first 4 reps, they went quite fast. Then on the 2nd lap of the 5th rep my lungs and breathing took a turn for the worse, couldn't get oxygen in. Didn't realise that Rob had upped the pace and my time was only 1 second slower than the 2 before. In the last 800 I let Rob go away as he was putting another faster one in, my legs were tired now so did what I could but was still not any slower than the 1st.

A short session tonight since the lads weren't 100% but I was happy to do that since i'd missed a few weeks. Mentally the 2nd 800 was tough as I was half expecting my hamstring to go on the back straight, but thankfully it survived that 800 and all the rest of them, no problems:-)

3 laps with Rob to finish off.

Castleisland and some of its bypass

Gerry wasn't able to run in the woods so I joined him and Gerry 2 in Castleisland for a short run. Body felt tired again during the day but was ok once I started running. Had compeed and lukotape on my foot to mitigate against the blister, think I won, but have a sore heel too, vaseline was used on that.

Didn't have the attire for running this late and on roads, as i'd expected to be in the forest tonight. All black and dusk/night time running around a town aren't ideal! But the Gerry's had reflective gear on so I tucked in behind them when needed.

Back to Castleisland for intervals tomorrow...

Going to be a busy week. Lots of things to do but not sure where i'm going to find the time to do them.

For example this evening i've to collect O gear for next weekend, then go to Ross Island to tag sites (before it gets dark), go home and train on the turbo trainer, have dinner, and then maybe send out final details for next weekend. And i'm probably forgetting things i've to do too.

Monday - Ross Island, tagging sites + Turbo Trainer afterwards
Tuesday - Run, Glanageenty
Wednesday - Run, track intervals
Thursday - Turbo Trainer
Friday - Run, Muckross
Saturday - Whatever needs doing for training, i.e collecting controls, etc.
Sunday - Orienteering

Ross Island

Gone on moving time, total time was 49.30.

Tagged sites for night relays. Made a couple of small changes to control sites, biggest problem was figuring out where 2 depressions and a knoll were, should have been straight forward. But will still use a feature here, very obvious anyways.

Think i'll do a tiny bit of map fixing too, but so many more could be made!

Blister wasn't too bad early on, but think it may have burst as it started to hurt a lot more. Need to put something on for tomorrow nights run. It's on the arch of my foot, so hard to mind.

Avg Cadence = 79rpm

Surprised with avg cadence as when I checked my watch I tried to keep it over 80. Dropped gears a bit for easier pedalling since this was supposed to be a recovery ride.

Watched 1 of Big Bang Theory and 1 of Modern Family.