Training Log Archive: PG

Event: US Two-day Classic O Championships
 

Day 1 of the 2-day Classic Champs (the real national championships in my opinion, hope it still exists as long as I'm orienteering, certainly for financial reasons the federation would be foolish to dispense with it).

Fabulous terrain. Real nice course, good orienteering right to the very end. So glad I ran M60 instead of M65, but I wasn't going to be Swiss'ed again.

Good run/walk (a lot of work, but even the slightest uphills required walking). Clean almost all the way, just lost maybe a minute total on the last couple controls.

The map.

And here's my route.

Not the best route to #1, should just have gone straight but wanted to get into the map a bit. Then pretty good all except a little shaky to the last two. Surprised that times weren't a lot faster given how slowly I was moving.

Day 1 Green X - Splits

I note in a few places around AP that there is a lot of chatter about burrito consumption. Which all strikes me as a bit useless, since I'm not a big fan of burritos. I'd guess it's been a decade since I've had one, and I haven't felt deprived.

So imagine my surprise when I happened to see something similar to this a few days ago --



And the question is, how much better off would those folks be if funds spent on burritos had been put in CMG? Ian would certainly be a millionaire (and a lot healthier too?). And what other investment gems might be picked up by a careful monitoring of AP logs?

C • healthy 3

Just a little scouting for the CSU Corn Maze Championships. It will be very cool. Now I think I'll run a course using the permanent controls to see how it feels when going faster.

Anyone interested in coming, it's next Wednesday, late afternoon, social activities to follow, please let me know, and also add your name to the list on the event page.

Set a course in the maze, 26 controls (haven't figured out how far it is beeline), just to see what O' in the maze was like.

And it was fabulous.

All the good parts of orienteering, but no rocks, no thorns, no hills. So cool. Had more fun than I've had orienteering in quite a long time.

Click on the globe for my route.

So now I've got a sense for the place, it's time to come up with a course. One really nice thing is the map was totally sufficient. So I suspect that I will just have to add a north line and a scale (once I figure it out), just to satisfy the purists.

The only pisser is I think this is the 10th year for Mike's Maze (different artistic creations each year), and this is the first time I've thought to go orienteering there. Credit for the inspiration goes to an evening at Bub's Barbecue with the ladies.

Oh, it was so cool. And really good O' training.

And my run, not too bad, 2 or 3 mistakes plus went to the wrong control a couple of times before I realized it. Plus standing still several times. Total lost maybe 3-4 minutes.

C • drunk 2

C • Inspiration 5

On the Montague plain and Willis Hill after dark with Bob Perry from Bikes Unlimited plus 7 others. Interesting experience, felt like a long interval workout. There was a modest range of abilities, with me certainly not the fastest but fortunately not the slowest, so we'd go for a bit and then the fastest would wait to group up. So I'd go as fast as I could to try to keep up, and then stand for a couple of minutes. I suppose I could have just gone at a nice even and modest pace, with no stops, but that didn't really occur to me. :-)

For about the first 4 stops I tried to stop/start the 305, but that got to be too much trouble and I just let it run. I think there's a setting I can put it on so it only goes when you're moving.

Beautiful evening, low 50s, clear, waxing moon. A mix of old jeep roads and narrower stuff, a lot flat, some up and down at the north end.

Quite enjoyed it. Knew a couple of the other riders (clients of mine).

Had my light on the handlebars. Some did that, some had it mounted on their helmet, not sure which is best (well, I suppose best is two lights, one each way).

C • Yup, two lights 1

Out the back way, I got up to the top of the first hill and had no desire to keep heading up, so I turned to go over by the town park and proceeded to have one of my best AOWN experiences in a long time.

My first thought was that it was a cat sitting in the middle of Park Road, but as I got closer I could see it was a barred owl. Stopped as soon as I realized that, I was maybe 15 yards from it. And it was just sitting there looking at me.

It was sitting a little awkwardly, so I thought maybe it had been hit by a car, though cars come by there rarely and slowly. So I started to circle it, getting no closer than about 10 yards (and something in me was wanting to see if the owl would rotate its head a full 360 if I kept going), but I noticed a couple of what looked like twigs sticking out from under the owl.

At some point as I was circling it, it got a little nervous and took off, but it barely got airborne before settling back down a couple of yards from where it started. But it got airborne enough for me to see that the twigs were the rear feet of a rabbit that the owl was hanging on to. Well, it was quite cool, except if you look at it from the rabbit's perspective, I suppose.

Took a last long look at the owl, noting all the field marks, then figured I'd leave him alone. Down the roads a way I looked at a patch of woods I'd never been in, thought why not, it turned out to be the nicest forest for orienteering anywhere in Massachusetts, too bad it's only about 5 or 10 acres and privately owned. Just gorgeous. So twice on this run I regretted that neither my 305 nor my ipod had a camera.

And then back to check out the owl scene. A couple cars had come by before I got there, now instead of the owl/rabbit in the road there was a kid, teenager, very nerdy looking, with binoculars. I stopped, he pointed out where the owl was up in a tree, and where the rabbit was, a couple of yards off the road. I assume the owl will be back to fetch it before long.

C • Birds of prey 5

Decided this morning I should go to the NEOC meet at Wrenthem, even though I was pretty sure the woods are quite unfriendly and the map is suspect. But I've been doing very little O' this year, and wanted another run under my belt before the champs next weekend.

Overall, glad I went, even though my run still left a lot to be desired, a number of mistakes. But I put out a decent effort, ran more than I expected, and tried to remember how to orienteering. So moderately successful, and at least my attitude was improved over its low state after the Highlander.

Oh, the woods were rather crappy, best to stay on the trails as much as possible. And the map was a little suspect, and also hard to read, especially the black. I'm not sure what it is but really hard to read. On the other hand, only one control misplaced and only a couple others where the map in the circle was a little screwy.

Course was advertised as 6.2 km, 330 meters climb.

I'd thought of trying to hook up with Phil, if he was going (the event wasn't listed on AP), but I had in mind that I might manage a round of golf on the way home at someplace I hadn't played before. And in fact that transpired, just snuck in 18 at a decent course near Sturbridge before it got dark. Very enjoyable.

Only down part of the day, and fortunately it wasn't serious, was that I missed my exit to get off I-91, just not paying attention for a moment. It was dark, and there was steady traffic coming south, so trying to do an illegal u-turn seemed foolish, so I headed up to the rotary in Greenfield. Which is where, in the course of about 20 seconds, I almost got nailed by the same car twice. I kid you not. First it made not the slightest effort to yield (as required) when entering the rotary. I hit my brakes, immediately abandoned my plan to exit the rotary and started another loop around. And then, the same car, now in the outside lane of the rotary that gives you no option other than to exit, suddenly tried to take a left turn from the right lane. Would have had me again, but I saw it just in time. Used the horn more than I have in years.

A New Hampshire car, Live Free or Die, they say....

One other thing about the O' meet. It was one of the most unsocial meets I have ever been too. I don't mean unfriendly, the organizers I dealt with were uniformly friendly and competent. It was just that I saw just a couple other orienteers before I started (despite maybe 30-40 cars in the parking area), and just one afterwards (Pia with her kids). I finished, downloaded, looked at the ma a bit, no one around so I walked bak to the car. No one around there, so I changed. Chatted with Pia a little, no one else around, so I left. Quite strange.

Here's the course (the Red course).

And here's my route.

#1. Just didn't feel like running down the road. Nor like going through the woods.
#7. Took a while to find, forest quite thick, map not too useful.
#8. Control was on no feature in particular. Just happened upon it.
#9. Thought I'd gone far enough south to pick up the trail, apparently not. Control was on the SE edge of the circle.
#10. Thick, both on the way and at the control.
#11. Took a while to find the trail on the first hill. An extra hill and wall near the control (reminded me of mapping a long time ago).
#12. Thought I'd skirt the edge of the marsh through the nice forest. Except it was full of greenbrier and pretty much impassable. Beat a retreat, not soon enough.
#14. Feeble.

Thought for a long while I'd be about 70-75 minutes, but then things deteriorated in the second half of the run.

C • unsocial 8