Training Log Archive: Bash

Goals for Saturday's Run for the Toad 50 km trail race:

1) This is my first 50K so I'll be satisfied just to finish. Some people's bodies are cut out for ultrarunning and some are not; I don't know which type I am. My longest run in recent months has been 27K but I'm confident that my AR experience will help me run, walk or crawl 50K, barring illness or injury. I'll be surprised and disappointed if I don't finish but I won't be surprised if I learn that my body doesn't respond well to long running races. I hope it does since there are so many awesome trail ultrarunning races around the planet.

2) Negative split for first and second 25K. Very few people did this in last year's Toad; most runners were *way* longer on the 2nd half. I'll consciously try to go out easier at the start and see what happens.

3) Break 6 hrs. In last year's Toad, that would put me right in the middle of the Masters Women (40+) and mid-pack in the race overall. That's a 7:12 min/km pace and if I'm able to keep running most of the time, that should be quite do-able. If I start hurting and have to walk a lot, this goal would quickly become impossible.

4) If I finish under 5 hrs 40 min (6:48 min/km), I'll be super-happy. Last year that would have put me in the top third of Masters Women - and these races don't attract many newbies. I don't think it will happen but if it does, I'll donate $50 to Myeloma Canada - and apparently so will 'Bent and Bender. Thanks, guys!

5) I am expecting to see Bender, Hansel and Gazelle all finished and cheering loudly as I head out for my 4th lap! Bender had better be there at the start of Lap #3 too. ;-)

Nope, didn't think I'd totally escape poison ivy after diving into it arm-first on Sunday - but it's only two bumps on my inner wrist, the body part that hit the ground first. Lucky.

Caledon Navigators training night @ Albion Hills. BulletDog came along to help.

Speight's Coast to Coast requires Grade 2 Kayak Certification. I feel comfortable paddling Class 2 and probably could have found someone to sign off on the checklist of things I'm supposed to know or demonstrate. However, it's been a long time since my last formal whitewater training so I figured this was a great opportunity for a refresher on safety, rescue skills, river reading, etc. I'm glad I did it; it was a good reminder that I mostly just go downstream in fairly easy whitewater so I don't practise a wide range of moving water paddling and rescue skills - and I should.

I didn't want to drive a long way and luckily I could still get instruction on the Grand River in Elora at this time of year. It's beautiful down in the Gorge!



Here's the put-in.





My instructor was Kevin Sampson, owner of Adventure High in Grand Manan, who is working with Equinox Adventures in Ontario this month. He spends 3 months a year guiding kayakers in Antarctica and was the first to paddle over the big falls at Fort Coulonge that adventure racers saw in the events near Esprit Rafting. (Mr. & Mrs. Gally, I learned about this when I was telling him your story about almost going over.) So hanging out with me in the Elora Gorge was definitely slumming but he was very nice about it. Note the awesome whitewater in the background.





It was weird paddling a short whitewater boat that turned 360 degrees if I sneezed, although I think I could learn to love it. I know Urthbuoy would assure me of this. I managed to do an unintentional wet exit in totally flat water! I was practising leans and it turns out that the initial and final stability aren't quite the same as our boats - oops.





Here's the class 2 rapid where I practised defensive swimming. I was having so much fun that I almost forgot to make my way over to the eddy. My drysuit with polypro long underwear was the perfect outfit for today. I felt toasty in the river but didn't overheat. Luxury!



Someone must have opened a dam because the water started rising late in the morning.



We'd planned to do more paddling in the afternoon but didn't get far after lunch. It wasn't clear whether we'd be able to get back upstream with the water continuing to rise. This section becomes Class 4 at high water levels and there are only a few places where you can get up the cliffs. So we called it a day before it became *too* much of an adventure.

Easy trail run in Palgrave East and West. Toad Taper.

Looks like I dodged the poison ivy bullet after Sunday's Superman dive into a patch of the stuff. Phew.

The nice people at the Coast to Coast World Multi-sport Championship have sent me an excellent-looking training program designed by Steve Gurney that I was supposed to have started on Aug. 16.

So today I am setting a new record by neglecting both the Run for the Toad training program (8K run) and the C2C training program (50 min marathon-pace run with hills + 70 min kayak "wind-ups" - paddling repeats where your pace steadily increases until you reach some landmark).

I've never been good at following formal training programs. I love the fact that training for AR gives me the excuse to do fun stuff outdoors most days, sometimes sharing the experience with like-minded friends. If it's too wet to bike on the trails, then I'd rather go for a trail run than bike in the basement.

But I think I might try to follow the C2C program to some extent. I'm going to make room on the schedule for skiing, snowshoeing, yoga and strength training, none of which appear to be part of the program. I've also got some orienteering races, Wilderness Traverse course testing missions and Raid The Hammer on the calendar.

Hmm, sounds like I'm not going to follow the training program at all! Well, I'll try to approximate it. Next week is a "recovery and test" week. After my 50K race this Saturday, I'm all over the "recovery" idea. The "test" part will be interesting - it involves kayak and running time trials. For me, that will be Square One. Should be fun.

Tapering for Saturday's 50K trail race and fighting the first symptoms of a cold. Bad timing.

Know any kids? This Sat. Oct. 2, C3 (the Canadian Cross-Training Club) in Caledon wants to get 1100 kids out to Caledon East to break their own national record for kids doing a 1-mile run/walk. Toddlers, teenagers and even older youth are welcome.

Thanks to sponsors, this event is free but advance registration is needed since each kid gets a free shirt, poster, finisher's medal, post-race food and a chance to meet some great international athletes and coaches.
http://www.c3online.ca/events.shtml

For adults, there is a fast-flat 5km run and an adult rolling 10km run (with an entry fee). This is part of Caledon Day and there will be a car show, artists, food vendors, climbing wall, etc. Autumn is a nice season to visit!

Turkey Trot Long course
Eldred King Forest

Trivia Note: Eldred King's son Jeff and I went to engineering school together at Waterloo. Eldred was the Mayor of Stouffville back then.

Great day to be running in the woods - cool temperature with the autumn leaves turning. Navigation wasn't difficult although the leaves made for low visibility in places, so smaller features were often invisible until I was right on top of them.

I chose trail routes whenever possible to avoid the abundant poison ivy but that wasn't really possible - it was all through the woods. I can often escape a reaction if I just run through the stuff and clean my gear carefully afterward. However, today I did a Superman dive on a sandy trail and landed hard on my right forearm and compass in poison ivy. Argghh. I tried not to touch anything with my right hand after that and washed up with soap at the end. Fingers are crossed but I won't know for sure for 4 days. Hope I'm not running the Toad 50K with a rash on Saturday!

Nice to see the orienteering crowd again - it's been awhile and it was great to chat with friends. TOC had pulled together an amazing prize table. Even though I was ineligible for an event award because I didn't compete yesterday, I came home with a nice buff as a draw prize. I think almost everybody won something! I haven't seen the results but I know Elena Logvina (who won $100 as top Female Elite for the weekend) was 2 minutes ahead of me today so I was in the right ballpark.

Easy trail run to Palgrave East then around the rolling, rooty single track. I tried the closed northeast trail and it is pretty much gone. This meant about 1 km of bushwhacking through a thick meadow with weeds over my head. If I didn't know where the trail was supposed to be, I wouldn't have made it to the other end. BulletDog had an excellent time swimming and playing with various members of the Dog Paddler outdoor club who were out on the trails.

'Bent stayed home with his feet up as per doctor's orders. He's super bored with reading, Internet and TV already! Knee seems to be doing well so far.

'Bent is home after his knee surgery. They let him have spinal anaesthesia so he could watch the whole procedure on the monitor while chatting with the surgeon about it. The radial meniscus tear was a little bigger than it looked on MRI but still not too bad. The doc snipped off the absolute minimum. He walked out of the hospital and is now under strict medical orders to spend the weekend watching TV with his feet up. It's going to be rough!

Hard Core Live with Caron. It's that time of year again.

C3 Class with Caron. Vinyasas tonight.

'Bent's knee surgery is tomorrow. The surgeon expects it to be a simple fix to a common type of meniscus tear followed by a return to light running in two weeks. I sure hope he's right. Tomorrow will be all about sitting around and waiting in the hospital, fuelled by multiple Starbucks beverages, then the challenge for the weekend will be trying to make 'Bent sit still with his feet up. Wish us luck!

For those who thought they'd never see me on a road bike - and I would have included myself in that group - here are a couple of photos from the Centurion 25 to prove it. Noticed another excellent reason to stick to secluded forest trails - I look dorky in cycling shorts. (Maybe everyone does, she said hopefully?) But oh so tough... Andy Schleck, watch out!

Well, the people who think I should gain weight would be pleased with how many calories I've eaten over the past 24 hours. And the ones who voted in favour of increasing my power to weight ratio would be disappointed in me. As for me, I'm feeling kinda oogie.

In honour of World Car-Free Day, I put on a big pack and rode to Inglewood to buy bike gear from Caledon Hills Cycling and food from the weekly farmer's market. To keep it interesting, I left late enough in the day to ensure a little suspense about whether I'd get home before dark. It was a great way to keep the pace up since I hadn't brought lights.

I loved riding a *real* bike again. It's soooo nice to have full suspension and bounce through rough terrain without any worries about whether the bike can handle it. Most of this ride is on rail trail with a few kms each of country road and forest trail. Beautiful evening for touring the countryside!

Just stumbled on the "50K Run for the Toad Training Program" that I dutifully printed out after registering, then promptly ignored.

Excellent news: In a happy coincidence, I was supposed to do a 25K long run on the weekend, which is exactly what Kirikou and I did (even though it meant doing an extra 200 m out and back when we reached the finish line at the 24.6 km mark!)

Bad news: I was supposed to do five runs of 30-40K in the month before that. So we're going to find out whether adventure racing is suitable training for a 50K trail race - or whether 50K will batter my body into submission like my road marathon did.

Kudos to Phatty for getting me out on a day when I wanted to be lazy because my legs were fatigued from the past few days. In fact, I'd considered retiring from road biking completely after hitting the podium on my second ride. There's nowhere to go but down from here! :-)

Phatty took me on a fun tour of the roads north of Bolton, almost as far as our place but turning before the gravel roads started. Light traffic, rolling hills, good conversation and perfect evening temperature - nice. There was one Queen of the Mountain prize awarded and the King won a few too. The light was getting dim by 7 p.m. - there won't be many more evening road rides this year.

The Little Run That Grew! Awhile ago, Kirikou offered to show me the 12.5 km lap I'll be doing around Pinehurst Conservation Area at the Run for the Toad 50K trail run in a couple of weeks. Our idea was so excellent that three more runners signed up - Hansel (doing the Toad 50K), Bender (Toad 25K) and Tiny (who just loves to run).



As our group grew, so did the distance - from one lap of the course to either two or three laps. We attempted to run the first lap all together slowly but after 6 km, I waved the white flag. The guys weren't breaking a sweat while I was running the pace that I should have done (but couldn't) when I tried to qualify for Boston. Kirikou stayed back with me to be sociable while Hansel, Bender and Tiny went ahead. Tiny eventually let the speedsters go too. Even Bender claimed that he was begging Hansel for mercy by the end of their 37.5 km run!

Kirikou dragged me along kicking and screaming much faster than I wanted to go. Actually, we each thought we were just keeping up with the other person and that drove the pace up compared to my usual long runs - but that's a good thing. Based on the GPS track, we managed to navigate around a second lap that was almost identical to our first except for a major blip near the finish line. (The race map is a little hard to match to the terrain.) There are more hills than I'd expected - nothing too crazy or technical but there is some variety in the course, which is nice since I'll be doing four laps of it on Oct. 2.

A training session like this would be incomplete without a hearty pub lunch accompanied by beverages. This was an interesting combination of friends that I'd never spent time with all together before, and it was great to catch up after a sunny morning on the trails.

Here's another pic of the crew. Fortunately, I'm the only one who looks like a dork here.

The Reluctant Road Biker, Chapter 2

Having done my first road bike ride in 15+ years three whole days ago, the obvious next step (in my warped world) was to do a race. Luckily, the Centurion 25-miler in Collingwood was a fairly gentle introduction. Participants included recreational riders, serious racers treating it as a sprint, and riders checking out the terrain for tomorrow's 50 or 100 mile events.

J-Yip and Coach Bill were in the starting corral.



We'd previously been asked to seed ourselves according to racing experience and a coloured dot was placed on our race number. I'd chosen "Casual" which was the 3rd of 4 categories, just above "Beginner". While waiting in the corral, I re-seeded myself according to new criteria, rolling my bike ahead of any rider who:

1) Had a kickstand, particularly if they were *using* it
2) Had a bag on themselves or their bike with any dimension larger than 10"
3) Wasn't using clipless pedals

That seemed to get me in about the right position in the pack. Given my novice road biking skills, today's goals were simple:

1) Keep the rubber side down.
2) Ride predictably.
3) Pedal smoothly.
4) Change gears early since I'm just learning how they work.
5) No drafting since I'm also learning how my brakes work.

For all those people who said that I'd find my road bike fast and fun... well, I have to admit you were right. I realized today that all it takes to make road riding enjoyable is a police officer at every intersection stopping traffic and waving me through red lights. So if you know of other places where I can do that, let me know.

Here's the race course. Click on the pic, then click the magnifying glass to see a larger version.



Although I hadn't planned to "race", of course I couldn't resist. I knew that my plan to avoid drafting was a poor race strategy, especially since the wind was strong, but I didn't feel ready so this was a time trial. About 10 km from the end, a paceline of 3 riders passed me, including two women. Oh well... they'd pushed me down the rankings by riding more confidently - good for them. Two minutes later, they all crashed going around a corner and I got to experience one of those swerve-to-avoid-bodies-on-the-pavement moments that I've seen so often in the Tour de France. Yikes. Sometimes it helps to be a mountain biker.

It was a good day for learning the more aggressive riding position that a road bike demands, since there was considerable incentive to try to be aerodynamic in the wind. On long, flat sections by myself, I tried to imagine Fabian Cancellara's pedaling action. Not that it necessarily made me go any faster but I don't think there's any female cycling fan who doesn't enjoy daydreaming about Fabian's glutes. ;-) There were a couple of big wind gusts that nearly knocked my little flyweight bike over. It's no wonder some riders took almost 3 hours to complete the 40 km course.

Comparing it to mountain biking... for some reason, this was easier on my knees. Not surprisingly, it was more painful for my back (lower right) and, um, chamois. Although there was 356 m (almost 1,200') of elevation gain on the course, I barely noticed it. I never came out of my big ring although I used the full range of my back gears. I'd been warned that if I wore a Camelbak, it would humiliate not just me but legions of my friends, so I put a water bottle on my bike and (as I expected) ate and drank absolutely nothing for the entire ride. Silly roadies.

The top few guys finished 40 km in 1 hr 08 min on a windy day - wow! The main peleton of fast riders finished around 1:16/1:17. I'm accustomed to my friends doing well but here's a results list you won't see very often:



And here's something that hasn't happened yet in my off-road sports... my award was presented by an Olympic gold medalist. I was pretty pumped on my 5th day of owning a road bike!



This wasn't a super-competitive event but my adventure racing background got me through the course in 1:26, 2nd of 27 women in my age group. The 1st rider in my age group was also the top woman overall, placing 9th out of 305 riders. Paula Newby-Fraser was the 2nd woman overall and I was 12th of 135 women. I don't plan to make road riding a habit but now I'm curious to try the 50-miler or 100-miler next year just to see how things would go in a more competitive field. So maybe I won't sell my bike in March after all...

I think the best Simon Whitfield photo was this one with John & Jackson Yip. Simon was clearly missing his kids and chatted away happily with Jackson. He stuck around afterward to shake hands, hand out prizes and pose for photos with every single podium finisher in every age group. What a good guy - and he could have been forgiven for staying home, given the nasty crash that took him out of the Triathlon World Champs two weeks ago.

Tempo run on the rail trail with tunes. This was partly Toad training and partly a test to see if I have any chance of hitting the 5:12 pace required to run a half-marathon that would qualify me for the 2011 New York Marathon along with Super, Bender, Hansel et al.

Garmin says my pace was less than 5:00/km for just over half the distance which is better than I would have guessed, so the NY qualifying time is probably just within the realm of possibility. But then I remembered that I was never going to run another marathon on pavement again in my life, so what the heck am I doing even thinking about this?

As slow as this was by most of your standards, the 10K time was the fastest I've ever been officially clocked at. So there is still hope for improvement!

Today's rain was ridiculously heavy - but what's a girl to do when her new birthday-gift-from-Mom-and-Dad Forerunner 310XT arrives in the mail? I couldn't train indoors - that would just be wrong. BulletDog and I did a short tour of Palgrave West including part of KBash and Wheelie Woods. The 2nd kilometer included a bunch of scrambling over logs and freshly fallen trees but the rest of it was smooth sailing over rolling moraine with the biggest puddles I've ever seen out there.

The 310XT is waterproof to 50 meters which was perfect for today's "build an ark" storm. When you turn it on, it vibrates and buzzes like a spacecraft about to take off with your wrist attached. Given my conversations with 'Bent and Trav about their new Forerunners, I ought to have known that it would automatically take a lap time at each kilometer by default - but when the spacecraft started liftoff at the 1 km mark, I nearly jumped out of my skin and stopped to see what was wrong.

So far so good. I can now do a 20-hr training session without recharging the battery. That probably won't come up a lot but the 10-hr battery time was a little on the low side. (Which only proves how insane my hobbies are.)

My 305 has found a new and happy home with our appreciative young skier friend VO2Max at the Alberta World Cup Academy. We're hoping to see even more medals this season!

Crash generously - and bravely - offered to be the tour guide for my first road bike ride in years. OK, maybe she wasn't 100% brave about it but who could blame her?



My bike is so cute that I want to ride it even though I don't want to ride it. Her nickname is "Princess", chosen by 'Bent - for obvious reasons.



We parked near Hockley village and toured some quiet paved roads in the Adjala/Loretto area. Traffic was fairly light and the drivers were polite. There were a few decent uphills and downhills which gave me a chance to play with the weird roadie gears. Crash rode her cyclocross bike "Jake the Snake" with knobby tires which was a sufficient handicap to enable us to ride together without her getting too bored.

And...? It was fine. It was great being able to chat with Crash while riding, which can be difficult on a twisty trail. (Not that I could stick with Crash on a twisty trail!) There was a headwind but we rode at a decent pace - even hitting 58 kph in a 40 kph speed limit zone, yeehaw!





However, I am definitely a mountain biker at heart and today just reinforced that. I missed bouncing over obstacles, feeling the wind rustling the trees around me and seeing wildlife. Although the views were fantastic on today's ride, pavement is monotonous compared with trails. And I didn't test it but I'm sure that falling would hurt a *heck* of a lot more.





One huge advantage of road riding over mountain biking is the cuisine. Instead of just gulping down gels, we stopped at the Hockley General Store for a latte and a cookie. Yum. Must do this again soon!

In anticipation of my first road bike ride in years... from The Onion.

"10 Million Killed Annually By Stepping Out Of Comfort Zones

WASHINGTON—A new report published this week by the Department of Health and Human Services revealed that more than 10 million Americans are violently killed each year while attempting to break away from their regular everyday routines and try something new. "We found that getting out of your comfort zone and facing your fears resulted in premature death nearly 78 percent of the time," HHS researcher Madeline Hersh said. "People always ask themselves, 'What's the worst that can happen?' Well, according to our research, anything from being bitten by a poisonous snake to dying in a hot-air balloon crash can happen." The report found that the safest individuals were those who surrendered to the soul-crushing monotony of habit and then convinced themselves that they had things pretty good."

Interesting comment on intervals from nordic skier Bjoern Daehlie:

“I only ran uphill intervals. But they don’t need to be super steep. When you’re running uphill, your VOmax is the limiting factor, and your heart rate will go up quickly. That’s just what worked best for me,” Daehlie explains. “But there is another point here too: wear on your body. When you run uphill, you only reach a fraction of the speed you would on flat terrain. Hard running or time trials on easy terrain or a 3,000 meter on the track takes a huge toll on your legs. Uphill terrain is much gentler in this regard,” Daehlie explains.

Over to the Dark Side. I now own a road bike...

Within 5 hours of paying for the road bike (I do not have it yet), I have registered for my first road biking event. It's this Saturday - just the short Centurion (25 miles) in Collingwood, since I'm busy on Sunday during the longer Centurion events. Does this mean that I am embracing my new sport? Not exactly. I just really like the idea of closed roads and police-monitored intersections for my weekend ride. I'm such a pavement wimp!

In theory, I should be doing my last long run before the 50K Toad on Oct. 2 right around now but the unscheduled break from training for Untamed NE has meant that I haven't built up to a decent long run yet. This was the longest in awhile - Bruce Trail Side Trail to Glen Haffy, then some exploring of Glen Haffy to the south and north to Hwy 9, then home through Palgrave West to add some extra distance.

The hills are too big and the trail too technical for this route to be the best choice for a pre-Toad long run, but - ironically - I was too lazy to drive to a place where I could do an easier run.

As suspected, my new hot pink iPod shuffle provides more inspiration than the old silver one. Best songs of the day were all oldies. ("Best" always depends on where they fall in the run - a song can be good in one run and boring in the next.):

- "U Can't Touch This" - in a section of cedar swamp with roots and mud and sections of slippery boardwalk. It was like one of those agility exercises where football players have to lift their feet quickly as they run over obstacles. And it just happened to fit the beat of the music.

- "Born to be Wild" - in a section of sweet single track with a few rocks and roots, but mostly very easy to open up and go as fast as I could.

- "Brick House" - This came on as I approached our house - perfect timing. ThunderDog came outside and stared at me in disbelief as I boogied all over the lawn to celebrate finishing 27 km.

I felt pretty feeble around 10 km then realized that I'd probably started the run dehydrated due to a mild stomach bug. So I stopped the clock for a serious eating/drinking break and that seemed to help.

Ran an indirect route home from Albion Hills after volunteering at the Fall Five trail race. So cool to see little kids running on the 2.5K course with their arms pumping and faces screwed up in intense concentration. The winning 5K racer was in his mid-teens and finished in 17:31, more than 2 minutes ahead of 2nd place. We were impressed with Pops, Goose's Dad, who smoked the course in 24 minutes - not a bad achievement for a guy celebrating his 50th wedding anniversary in a few weeks. 'Bent was an awesome Pied Piper for the racers on his recumbent.

Rodney Yee Yoga for Flexibility. `Tis the season.

Fun dinner with our original Tree Huggers team ('Bent, Hingo, TheMinister and me) and spouses. Adventure racing has given us so many crazy stories and memories - very cool! Awesome food cooked by Luscious and inspired by Jamie Oliver. I won't need another meal till Thursday or so.

Summer's over - time to get back to the basics! Kinda proud of myself for sneaking this into the short break between a big family picnic here and a late afternoon get-together at a friend's place. The only trouble with this crazy week is that I haven't had much time to sleep and now I feel the first whisperings of a cold. NO, go AWAY!!!

Ran trails to Palgrave East for some rolling, rooty single track then back via the Bruce Trail Side Trail. Frankenjack advised that quicker turnover would reduce the chance of re-injuring my ankle so that was today's focus. Quicker turnover is something I should always be working on anyway, but it's easier said than done for those of us who aren't Frankenjack or one of his kind. At least this gave me a useful visualization - lifting my foot off the ground hot potato-style before the ankle had time to go over. It's feeling pretty good so I may be past the riskiest stage.

I didn't feel any leftover fatigue from Logs Rocks & Steel, which may be the only benefit of being too busy this week to train! I ran all the hills and my legs felt lighter than usual. I don't completely trust the Forerunner's distance measurement on single track so I measured that 6.5 km section as a separate lap. The rest of the run was under 6 min/km which is fast for me on trails so things are trending well.

I was thinking today that I should do my longest pre-Toad run about 3 weeks before race day. And then I realized that the Toad is 3 weeks from this Saturday. Gulp!

Met my old boss and his daughter for a fun, fast ride from Newmarket to East Gwillimbury and back, travelling along the Holland River. The first couple of kms were on roads, then we joined a bike trail that was paved at first, then changed to gravel double track and finally became single track. Great to see them again and there is still more exploration to be done!

FAIL! I'd packed running gear to hit the Bruce Trail in Milton in the midst of a road trip with stops in Mississauga, Oakville and North York. Before changing, I phoned to confirm the time for a family dinner. "6:15." Seriously?!? That only gave me 30 minutes to run. So I reluctantly left Milton without running and headed for the city. And then dinner was at 7:15, just as I would have guessed. Sigh. Wonderful evening but I need to get training again with the Toad 50K just 3.5 weeks away!!

LR&S photos added below in Sept. 5 entry.

OK, decision made. I'm going to New Zealand in February to do the 2011 Speight's Coast to Coast World Multisport Championship. Watch out, Frankenjack! :-)

I raced Logs Rocks & Steel without a camera but the talented Luis Moreira got some nice shots.

Here I am crossing the finish line covered with mud after a 45-km mountain bike ride. I was *so* relieved that nobody passed me on that final 3 km stretch of pavement - phew!



At this point, I still had no idea that I'd won the race. So that big smile is entirely because of the beer FB handed me as I crossed the line.



Then someone finally told me the surprising news...



On the podium with some people I admire a lot.



The rest of Luis Moreira's amazing race shots, including some great pics of Attackpointers, can be seen at this link. Nice weather, eh?

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=23806&l=807f...

And preliminary race results are here:
http://www.logsrocksandsteel.com/home.php

Event: Logs Rocks and Steel - A Multisport Adventure
 

Includes TA1

Includes TA2

GUATS Logs Rocks & Steel Championship course, Haliburton

Another well organized event by Getawaystix supported by a team of amazing volunteers including PhattyJR, Funderstorm, Geoff, Amber, etc.

The race consisted of 3 stages totalling 71 km on my Forerunner:
1) Hilly, rocky trail run
2) Kayak paddle with 7 portages ranging from 30 - 800 meters and totalling almost 2.5 km
3) Mountain bike

Last year 'Bent and I raced LR&S as a coed team and had one of the highlights of our AR careers when we beat Bill Trayling and his teammate on a paddle section. (Admittedly, his navigation was a little off...) This year 'Bent has been sitting impatiently on the sidelines waiting for knee surgery which has just been rescheduled for Sept. 24 due to a cancellation - yay! In the meantime, I had to do LR&S on my own.

The weather forecast for race day was wild - more typical of a stormy November day than Labour Day weekend. The temperature hit 18C in the morning then dropped during the day to 12C. Rain showers - sometimes very heavy - swept through at regular intervals, starting a couple of hours before the race. The wind got stronger as the day went on, and some of the gusts were impressive. It was a real contrast to last year's perfect sunny conditions. On days like this, I always tell myself that bad weather favours me in a race. I don't know if it's necessarily true but it sure helps my attitude when conditions deteriorate. And there actually *might* be some truth in it since I'm better at being tough than being fast.

Before the race, we dropped our boats a few kilometers north of the Frost Centre. The run/paddle sections had been redesigned this year to simplify logistics. We would run 16 kms of trails from the Frost Centre to our boats then paddle back via a chain of lakes. Getawaystix and I did a training day on these two sections a couple of months ago, and even though he adjusted the trail run to add some distance, I still had the comfortable feeling of travelling a familiar route. The bike course, which started and ended at the Frost Centre, was the same as last year - the same loop that 'Bent and I rode/ran/walked/crawled in our crazy adventure last week.

There was considerable talent on the starting line including Frankenjack, Benoit L, Dr. Wells, Phatty, LosDobos, FB, Tarno, Ursula & T. Rex, Dan Mallory, The Honz, KT (female points leader in Ontario 5 Peaks Trail Running Series) and more. We headed into single track within the first kilometer and luckily I found myself surrounded by runners who pushed my pace manageably. We did a little passing back and forth as we got into our respective rhythms but there were no bottlenecks. We saw a few people fly past one of the early, well-marked trail turns and we never saw them again! I was with the top male team for much of the first half of the run but didn't see anyone else that I knew. My friends are *way* too fast!

The trail was beautiful, hilly and interesting to run. It was super rocky and a little muddy in places from all the recent rain. I had to place my left foot carefully on each step to avoid re-twisting my ankle which I injured a couple of weeks ago. It's hard to imagine a race course where favouring a bad ankle could have been more difficult, especially in today's slippery conditions, but luckily I made it through the day without incident - phew! I hadn't eaten a big breakfast (banana, slice of pumpkin loaf and two small cans of Starbucks double espresso) but apparently I didn't eat it early enough since I felt too full for the first few hours of racing. Bleaagh!

By the time I hit Sherborne Lake Road for a few kms of gravel road running, I was alone with no one in sight ahead or behind, and that's how it stayed for the rest of the run - except for a sighting of Geoff L. in a passing pick-up truck. It was a good opportunity to focus on my goals for the race. Recently a few friends, including my husband, have encouraged me to give myself more credit and have more confidence in my racing, which for various reasons hasn't been easy to do. You folks know who you are, and I really appreciate your support and your listening. Today I wanted to put that into action. My main mantra was, "Race as if you belong in the fight for the lead." Also, because I knew I'd probably be alone for most of the day, my other mantra was: "Race as if someone is watching." So all day, I tried to push hard and resist the urge to stay in my comfort zone.

After the road, we had a 2 km marked bushwhack along an overgrown trail. As an adventure racer and orienteer, I hoped to gain a little time here and I probably did, but I also managed to take a pine branch in the eye - owww!

After some more trails, we crossed a small river before arriving at TA1 - the run/paddle transition. This was quick. I emptied the bladder from my running pack to save weight because I was going to start drinking from my PFD and I didn't want any extra weight on the portages. The put-in was a short distance down the trail so I flipped my sea kayak onto my shoulders using 'Bent's very cool kayak portaging system, invented specially for this year's LR&S. Most of the time, the PVC pipe frame sits on the back of the kayak.



At a portage, I would flip it over so the frame rested over the cockpit. The foam canoe pad under the deck bungie cord behind the cockpit acted as the hinge point. When I flipped the frame onto the cockpit, I secured it using the front deck bungie cord and attached my paddle to the orange clamp on the side. It was very quick - just a few seconds - and worked incredibly well. Thank you, 'Bent!





I'd also doctored my PFD with Star Trek-style shoulder padding and on the front I attached a laminated, large scale version of the paddle map with lake names, highlighted portages with distances and bold-faced boundaries on the water features so I could check my route with a quick glance. I had tried to memorize the route so this was mostly a back-up.



Within a few minutes of launching on Raven Lake, I started to see other racers again. Paddling was hard work in today's wind - a little harder since we'd removed my kayak's rudder because it made portaging awkward. I passed a bunch of people on this leg, both on the water and around the portages - the only discipline where that happened. With the portage rack, I could do a light run carrying the kayak if the trail was smooth. If only the paddle section could have been twice as long! (Are you listening, GStix? ;-) )

I made a spectacular entrance onto Little Avery Lake when at the end of a portage, I veered around a few boats that were blocking the put-in. I thought I was being clever by heading over to the left and launching my kayak over a log. But what looked like mud turned out to be deep muddy liquid, so my kayak (still on my head) and I suddenly divebombed into thigh-deep swampy water. T. Rex and Ursula, who witnessed this silly performance, seemed to enjoy the entertainment. I think I made a similar stupid move in the same place when GStix and I did this paddle - oops!

After the final portage, as I was heading toward the Frost Centre on St. Nora Lake, the weather got nasty again - wind in my face, choppy waves and lashing rain. I started thinking about how to do the paddle/bike TA as quickly as possible because I was already feeling chilly. I decided to warm up by trying to catch the leading male team's canoe, which I had spotted up ahead. We ended up hitting the beach at the same time.

As I changed shoes, gloves, headwear and pack for the bike leg, my dexterity wasn't great so I knew I was bordering on mild hypothermia. I put a nylon vest over my soaking wet shirt and downed a Boost, hoping that the calories would help warm me up. I headed across Hwy 35 and climbed the first hill - and then I was warm enough for the rest of the ride.

The heavy rain had totally changed the trail conditions from last week when I was able to ride most of the course. Leanimal said there was even a huge change from last night when she rode the Frost Course. Big sections of rideable trail had been transformed into seas of goopy mud. As much as possible, I rode through the mud and puddles but I had to get off my bike a lot more than I did last week. It was exhausting trying to move quickly through that stuff but I knew that riders with more technical experience would do better today than strong road riders, so it was all good. I regretted my choice of semi-slick tires since they glommed up easily. The top male team caught me within the first few kms and passed me briefly playing great tunes from little speakers. I was inspired to try to keep up so I could listen but they broke a chain and I never heard their music after that.

A short distance into the bike course, there is a 2-way stretch of trail leading to/from a small loop. I saw FB and then LosDobos pass by - it was so encouraging to see such strong racers just 5 km ahead of me! After that, I was on my own until the 20-km mark when a solo male racer passed me. I was glad to see him since it was a kick-in-the-butt reminder that I was still in a race and needed to push harder if I didn't want that to happen again. I passed a different solo male shortly before the 40-km mark, so it all came out even. Those were the only riders I saw travelling in my direction for 40 km so I just kept telling myself, "race as if someone is watching" and "race as if you belong in the fight for the lead". I also added a 3rd mantra, "race as if someone is about to catch you", and from what I was told afterward, a few racers were aiming to do exactly that!

My ride was tough but blissfully uneventful compared to last week - no snapped stems or flat tires. The brambles had mostly been knocked down and it was great to ride the beautiful section of ATV trail along the Black River at full speed after crawling along it last Friday. The Pine Springs Road roller coaster is hard work and I was really happy to come over the final rise and see the lake and Hwy 35 ahead of me. There was just 3 km more on pavement to the finish line and I must have looked over my shoulder 20 times! There was no *way* I wanted to be passed right at the end, and my biggest weakness is flat pavement so it was entirely possible. Luckily, the road remained empty and I crossed the finish line after 7 hours and 27 minutes.

Leanimal, Phatty and a few other friends cheered me in and I gratefully accepted another cold Long Trail Ale from my new best friend FB. After a few moments of chatting, I figured I'd better scrub up and clean my bike in the lake before hypothermia set in. While I was in the water about 10 minutes after finishing, someone said "great job, 1st female!" "Oh no, I don't think so," I replied. Leanimal looked at me strangely, "Yes, you won. We didn't tell you because we thought you knew!" "What?!?!? You're kidding!!" I had no idea how that could be possible. For some reason, I'd convinced myself I was racing for 3rd. Getawaystix came over to the beach to congratulate me. Amber told me I was 9th overall behind 8 male solos, ahead of 15 other male and female solos and all of the teams. Holy crap, I needed to finish FB's bottle of beer *right now*.

Inexplicably, the chilled beer failed to warm me up so I dashed off for dry clothes. When I returned, Frankenjack was bursting with ideas for our trip to NZ for the Speight's Coast to Coast World Multisport Championship. He has researched it thoroughly and has a wealth of knowledge and experience that would be of terrific help to anyone wanting to do that race. I hadn't expected to be in the position of considering whether to do C2C and it's mind blowing to have that opportunity. I still don't know whether I'll go but I will need to decide very soon to be fair to GStix.

Congrats to so many friends who had great results. I haven't seen official results but I think the order of the top finishers was: Frankenjack, Benoit L, Dr. Wells, Phatty, LosDobos and FB. T. Rex and Ursula won their category and chicked a lot of guys. Leanimal placed 3rd on the Frost Course well into her pregnancy and Will Hitchon was thrilled to finish a short distance ahead of her after all the trash talking beforehand!

Thanks to Getawaystix for a fun and super-challenging race. My body feels nicely fatigued today, just as it should.

Spent 4-5 hrs at the Logs Rocks & Steel registration table tonight because a key volunteer accidentally ended up in the wrong town and a long list of people needed the very busy Getawaystix. So many first-timers and crossover athletes do this event - it's really fun to chat with them, answer questions and address their concerns. Big thanks to FB for bringing me a cold Long Trail Ale. I wasn't doing my usual pre-race routine (getting my gear ready, eating pasta, getting to bed early, etc.) but at least I got to enjoy a Friday night party!

Heavy rain today and more in the forecast for tomorrow along with gusty winds - yikes!

Seaplane fly-over of part of the beautiful Untamed New England race course.
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jLROGgAbV28&feature...>

How to deal better with sleep deprivation - eat less. Fortunately, this is consistent with the way long adventure races work.
http://www.the-scientist.com/blog/display/57664/

Portaged my kayak half a kilometer around our property just for kicks. Got caught in a few trees - good practice getting untangled. Heading up to Logs Rocks & Steel tomorrow. Looks like it'll be cool and wet - perfect weather for a heat wimp like me.

1st of the month and 2/3 of the way through the year, so it's a good time to check how I'm doing vs. my 2010 goals.

The GOOD:
- Will exceed 450 annual hrs of training by quite a lot, thanks to Untamed New England.
- Weight target achieved BUT my Mom, Dad and brother now think I look too thin and unhealthy. (If you think they're right, please e-mail an opinion. After all, they know me well so I can't disregard totally but I'd rather not have *that* discussion on AP!)
- Mountain marathon and two rogaines - check! Registered for a 50K trail race. Craving expedition AR after Untamed but have no idea how to make that happen.
- Thanks to Crash, I now have a training partner who makes me do speed intervals before breakfast, thus achieving two goals that have always been tough for me. (Yay, Crash!)
- As in 2009, I've had fun racing with lots of different people.

The BAD:
- Strength training hours are 50% of what I was aiming for.

The UGLY:
- Rarely in bed by midnight, let alone 4 nights/week which was the target.
- Very little achieved on my piano and guitar goals. (Not training-related but easiest to remember if I put them here.)

I hadn't ridden my bike since changing front and back tubes, so I figured I'd better go out in Palgrave East and test it by hitting some rocks, roots and logs. It was just a quick outing so I purposely chose bad lines to ensure the bumpiest possible ride!