Training Log Archive: bigginsIn the 7 days ending Mar 28, 2009:
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Saturday Mar 28, 2009 #
skate ski 30:00 [2] 5.0 km (6:00 / km)
ski up to the start, then a warmup lap around the course loop.
skate ski race 36:51 [5] 10.6 km (3:29 / km)
Mammoth Biathlon.
Greatest sport ever. Skiing is pretty sweet, but skiing and shooting stuff is even sweeter. Conditions were perfect: the snow was just below freezing and iced up solid, and the air was a pleasant t-shirt temperature.
Got in one practice round of shooting before the race started, hit 5/5 standing. Turns out all those people at work were wrong when they said that video games can't train you for real violence. I haven't touched a gun in 15 years, but six years of making sniper games has made me a rockstar with a target rifle. There's a suprising amount of carryover in the technique between the game controller and the real gun. And all the people around that looked new at this were only hitting 1 or 2, except all the juniors who were nailing 5/5. Score one for generation-xbox.
So the race started at 30 second intervals, and I registered late so I was last on the list of the 10k starters, just before all the juniors and old farts. The course went out a big road, up a 100m long hill, out another section of road, then looped back to the start on a winding up and down through the woods. First loop went ok, I passed a couple people on the way out, and didn't die on the icy downhills on the way back. Had to wait 30 seconds or so for a shooting lane, then started prone. Hit the first three fine by holding my breath to steady the aim, but that only works so many times before you start to pass out, so I missed the last two. Also I learned later that the prone targets were smaller (which I knew) but the black circles of the targets were the same size, it just only registered in the middle half of it. You couldn't see the difference between the black that counted and the black that didn't, and since I didn't know that the outside edge didn't count, I was probably firing a little sloppily. Anyway two penalty laps then back out for another lap. Going out was fine, coming back we merged with the 6k junior course about halfway back, so I got stuck behind some slowpokes coming down the last hill. Second time in the shooting range was standing, and there were more people there so I had to wait a little longer this time. I decided the hold-your-breath method wasn't good, so I tried to just breathe really slowly so I'd last all five shots. That didn't work and I missed 2 and 3, so I went back to holding my breath and made the last two. Two more times around the penalty loop (which was full of people this time) and back out for lap three. Pretty empty by this point, and had the hills to myself so it was an ok lap. I even V2ed part of it. No idea where I finished in the results, they weren't posted and I skipped the awards lunch to go skiing in the afternoon.
Splits:
8:57 lap 1
2:18 waiting and shooting prone: 3/5
0:54 penalty lap x2
10:26 lap 2 (a bit longer distance than laps 1 and 3 because of going into+out of the shooting range instead of just in or just out)
3:24 waiting and shooting standing: 3/5
0:54 penalty lap x2
9:55 lap 3
photos
Greatest sport ever. Skiing is pretty sweet, but skiing and shooting stuff is even sweeter. Conditions were perfect: the snow was just below freezing and iced up solid, and the air was a pleasant t-shirt temperature.
Got in one practice round of shooting before the race started, hit 5/5 standing. Turns out all those people at work were wrong when they said that video games can't train you for real violence. I haven't touched a gun in 15 years, but six years of making sniper games has made me a rockstar with a target rifle. There's a suprising amount of carryover in the technique between the game controller and the real gun. And all the people around that looked new at this were only hitting 1 or 2, except all the juniors who were nailing 5/5. Score one for generation-xbox.
So the race started at 30 second intervals, and I registered late so I was last on the list of the 10k starters, just before all the juniors and old farts. The course went out a big road, up a 100m long hill, out another section of road, then looped back to the start on a winding up and down through the woods. First loop went ok, I passed a couple people on the way out, and didn't die on the icy downhills on the way back. Had to wait 30 seconds or so for a shooting lane, then started prone. Hit the first three fine by holding my breath to steady the aim, but that only works so many times before you start to pass out, so I missed the last two. Also I learned later that the prone targets were smaller (which I knew) but the black circles of the targets were the same size, it just only registered in the middle half of it. You couldn't see the difference between the black that counted and the black that didn't, and since I didn't know that the outside edge didn't count, I was probably firing a little sloppily. Anyway two penalty laps then back out for another lap. Going out was fine, coming back we merged with the 6k junior course about halfway back, so I got stuck behind some slowpokes coming down the last hill. Second time in the shooting range was standing, and there were more people there so I had to wait a little longer this time. I decided the hold-your-breath method wasn't good, so I tried to just breathe really slowly so I'd last all five shots. That didn't work and I missed 2 and 3, so I went back to holding my breath and made the last two. Two more times around the penalty loop (which was full of people this time) and back out for lap three. Pretty empty by this point, and had the hills to myself so it was an ok lap. I even V2ed part of it. No idea where I finished in the results, they weren't posted and I skipped the awards lunch to go skiing in the afternoon.
Splits:
8:57 lap 1
2:18 waiting and shooting prone: 3/5
0:54 penalty lap x2
10:26 lap 2 (a bit longer distance than laps 1 and 3 because of going into+out of the shooting range instead of just in or just out)
3:24 waiting and shooting standing: 3/5
0:54 penalty lap x2
9:55 lap 3
photos
skate ski 1:43:00 [2] 20.0 km (5:09 / km)
easy afternoon ski. sunny and hot, down to a t-shirt pretty fast.
Friday Mar 27, 2009 #
run 18:00 [2] 2.0 mi (9:00 / mi)
Thursday Mar 26, 2009 #
soccer 1:00:00 [3]
Wednesday Mar 25, 2009 #
rollerblade 55:00 [2] 16.0 km (3:26 / km)
somehow a bird got in my apartment yesterday while I was at work (probably through the holes in the windows) but couldn't get back out, so it spent the day pecking holes in the screens and crapping all over the place. that was entertainment for the night.
Tuesday Mar 24, 2009 #
soccer 1:00:00 [3]
Monday Mar 23, 2009 #
run 17:00 [2] 2.0 mi (8:30 / mi)
super easy run around the ghetto to loosen up before passing out after work. only wiped the sweat out of my eyes with my tshirt once, but that hurt a lot.
photos from the weekend. some from yosemite, one from royal gorge, and a few of some random 40' women we found in a car shop lot.
photos from the weekend. some from yosemite, one from royal gorge, and a few of some random 40' women we found in a car shop lot.
Sunday Mar 22, 2009 #
Note
gold rush 42k
skate ski 20:00 [2] 2.0 km (10:00 / km)
warmup
skate ski race 3:18:00 [4] 46.5 km (4:15 / km)
Royal Gorge Gold Rush.
The forecast for the weekend was ugly, a foot or so on Saturday and another overnight, then some more during the race. We stayed Saturday night down low in Auburn, so it was just raining a bit when we got there. Still raining when we left sunday morning, and turned to slushing as we got higher. They had chain control on pretty early, but it turned to all snow right after so the drive up actually wasn't that painful.
They did get a foot or so overnight (at least, never really saw how much), and the trails right around the lodge were nice and soft, so I was expecting the race course to be total crap. Fortunately most of the race trail wasn't that bad, and skied down pretty quick, so things went quite a bit better than I was expecting. The weather was still pretty crappy looking, so they shortened the course loop so it was easier to groom, and also dropped the big climb over Castle Pass, which probably would have been super cold and windy. Now instead of two 21km loops we were doing three 15.5km loops, so the race actually got longer...
I started maybe in the middle of the start pack, ahead of everybody in parachute warmups and ski goggles but behind everybody that looked like they lived in Truckee. Worked out ok for 5k or so, things spread out pretty quick and I ended up at the tail end of a long train of about 20 people that was moving pretty good. Whoever was in front started slowing down a lot though, and since the trail was only skied down in one spot, nobody managed to (or wanted to) get around them. So I found a long flat section (good to know the trails), jumped into the classic tracks, and double poled past the whole line. Yea thats right, I actually double poled past people. I'm a little proud of that one. Once I got in front of them I had a couple km of open trail, and nobody from the last pack wanted to tag along so it was just me. Caught up to the next pack of six or seven people and tagged along for a few km. Turns out it was Alex and Jess leading this pack the whole time, but once we started back up towards the lodge they started hurting a bit from the snow or the altitude or both. Jess dropped off first, and looked pretty miserable when I went by her. Alex held on for a little longer, but the posse got by her on a hill and she was looking atypically grumpy. I took off with the tail end of the pack and never saw those two again.
Second lap it got windy and started snowing really hard, so my glasses iced over and I had to take them off. That wasn't really good and I started growing icicles on the top and bottom of my eyelids. I kept trying to clear them off with my hands, which soaked through the gloves and rubbed my face pretty raw. My eyes hurt from all the sweat and blowing snow, which got even worse when I was going fast, so I did most of the downhills with my eyes mostly closed. I guess it kept things interesting. Also I passed some old guy early in the second lap, but then he suddenly found all this random speed and stayed right on my tails for the entire rest of the lap. He was very clearly faster than me, but he wouldn't go around even when I gave him room, which really started pissing me off after 10km of it.
So after we went through the start for the third lap, I grabbed a gu from the feed stop and pulled off to the side to eat it, staring at the guy. He actually came to a stop behind me, and it took a few seconds but he eventually figured it out and kept going. He took off like a shot and was out of sight pretty fast. The long downhill at the start of the lap was still crappy snowy cold weather, but somewhere in the middle of the loop the sun came out and it was almost nice for a couple minutes (still windy and snowing though). There was a couple inches of fresh snow on the trail by this point, but I think all the snow overnight was wet and heavy and packed down well, so it was mostly solid underneath and I wasn't haven't too many problems punching through. Caught up to the annoying old guy towards the very end of the loop, I think he bonked because he kept tripping over his skis and poling between his legs, but I hauled ass past him since I didn't want him to latch onto me again. And it was good motivation to get my miserable self up the last couple hills to the finish. Jess found a second wind somewhere on lap two, caught and passed Alex, and came in a few mins behind me, with Alex a little behind her.
My hands were wet and freezing by the end, and my left eyeball/face hurt a lot from the blowing snow. My eyesocket is turning some funny colors today, so I'm not sure if I froze it or its just rubbed raw from the wind and my gloves. So a pretty fun race, crappy weather but a suprisingly solid trail. And Jon Owens even came up to ski around the course and yell at us from when we went by, which was pretty cool.
results
15.5km Splits: 1:00, 1:05, 1:13
The forecast for the weekend was ugly, a foot or so on Saturday and another overnight, then some more during the race. We stayed Saturday night down low in Auburn, so it was just raining a bit when we got there. Still raining when we left sunday morning, and turned to slushing as we got higher. They had chain control on pretty early, but it turned to all snow right after so the drive up actually wasn't that painful.
They did get a foot or so overnight (at least, never really saw how much), and the trails right around the lodge were nice and soft, so I was expecting the race course to be total crap. Fortunately most of the race trail wasn't that bad, and skied down pretty quick, so things went quite a bit better than I was expecting. The weather was still pretty crappy looking, so they shortened the course loop so it was easier to groom, and also dropped the big climb over Castle Pass, which probably would have been super cold and windy. Now instead of two 21km loops we were doing three 15.5km loops, so the race actually got longer...
I started maybe in the middle of the start pack, ahead of everybody in parachute warmups and ski goggles but behind everybody that looked like they lived in Truckee. Worked out ok for 5k or so, things spread out pretty quick and I ended up at the tail end of a long train of about 20 people that was moving pretty good. Whoever was in front started slowing down a lot though, and since the trail was only skied down in one spot, nobody managed to (or wanted to) get around them. So I found a long flat section (good to know the trails), jumped into the classic tracks, and double poled past the whole line. Yea thats right, I actually double poled past people. I'm a little proud of that one. Once I got in front of them I had a couple km of open trail, and nobody from the last pack wanted to tag along so it was just me. Caught up to the next pack of six or seven people and tagged along for a few km. Turns out it was Alex and Jess leading this pack the whole time, but once we started back up towards the lodge they started hurting a bit from the snow or the altitude or both. Jess dropped off first, and looked pretty miserable when I went by her. Alex held on for a little longer, but the posse got by her on a hill and she was looking atypically grumpy. I took off with the tail end of the pack and never saw those two again.
Second lap it got windy and started snowing really hard, so my glasses iced over and I had to take them off. That wasn't really good and I started growing icicles on the top and bottom of my eyelids. I kept trying to clear them off with my hands, which soaked through the gloves and rubbed my face pretty raw. My eyes hurt from all the sweat and blowing snow, which got even worse when I was going fast, so I did most of the downhills with my eyes mostly closed. I guess it kept things interesting. Also I passed some old guy early in the second lap, but then he suddenly found all this random speed and stayed right on my tails for the entire rest of the lap. He was very clearly faster than me, but he wouldn't go around even when I gave him room, which really started pissing me off after 10km of it.
So after we went through the start for the third lap, I grabbed a gu from the feed stop and pulled off to the side to eat it, staring at the guy. He actually came to a stop behind me, and it took a few seconds but he eventually figured it out and kept going. He took off like a shot and was out of sight pretty fast. The long downhill at the start of the lap was still crappy snowy cold weather, but somewhere in the middle of the loop the sun came out and it was almost nice for a couple minutes (still windy and snowing though). There was a couple inches of fresh snow on the trail by this point, but I think all the snow overnight was wet and heavy and packed down well, so it was mostly solid underneath and I wasn't haven't too many problems punching through. Caught up to the annoying old guy towards the very end of the loop, I think he bonked because he kept tripping over his skis and poling between his legs, but I hauled ass past him since I didn't want him to latch onto me again. And it was good motivation to get my miserable self up the last couple hills to the finish. Jess found a second wind somewhere on lap two, caught and passed Alex, and came in a few mins behind me, with Alex a little behind her.
My hands were wet and freezing by the end, and my left eyeball/face hurt a lot from the blowing snow. My eyesocket is turning some funny colors today, so I'm not sure if I froze it or its just rubbed raw from the wind and my gloves. So a pretty fun race, crappy weather but a suprisingly solid trail. And Jon Owens even came up to ski around the course and yell at us from when we went by, which was pretty cool.
results
15.5km Splits: 1:00, 1:05, 1:13