Training Log Archive: Anvil

Left knee pulled up fairly tight from Sunday, that'll learn me not to stretch. Went out for a super easy jog to feel it out. It was that easy I use the word jog, which I hate. Felt better after about 5 minutes, but had to be back in 20 so tries out an untested loop back past the running track. Note to self, never try new loop when you've got an appointment to keep. Got stuck in some big field with a locked gate and had to go about 5 mins back around to where I came in to get out. Should have just got my feet wet and crossed Beverly Brook. Slowly got faster and faster as it became obvious I was getting later and later. At least I wasn't jogging anymore.

Local 'Frolic' Race at Putney Heath (whoever came up with the name needs a stern talking to). Aim of the day was to focus on control flow and mainly have an exit direction before planned which actually came off quite well once I settled down after the first control. As the place is quite overgrown with bracken and blackberries, the best choice was always to go round the tracks - my only real time loss was when I tried to short cut through the green - going into 6 and to the highway underpass on the way to 7. Also came unstuck for a minute or 2 on the way to 10, miscounting how many track junctions I had to pass before heading in to a ditch.
Was still feeling the effects of the cold, speed was good, but I felt terrible.
Total length was 5.4km, 2nd/~80. Matthias had 3 mins on me, but he organised the loop race there last month and admitted he knew all the least scrubby entrances to the controls.

Sprint Race at same place.
Better than the first - I think being a little fatigued is the best way to start a sprint cause you're not running off faster than you can read. Really good flow for the first 12 except for almost running down the wrong track on the way to 6. In fact I think my punch at #10 was the best dib I've done in my O career, barely even slowed down! Also went straight on #3 and picked up a wallaby track (what would you call a wallaby track here, squirrel track?) which was faster than going round.
Finally lost it at #13, was going to pick off 2 track junctions before heading in, but didn't see the first one and mistook the elephant trail into the control as the second one and was tramping round some virgin blackberries before coming to my senses. Then went down the wrong track on the way to #17 even though I recognised that as an obvious mistake to make...
3rd for this one, a minute down on the new bloke who joined LOK (ew) despite living deep in SLOWland, and 20 secs behind Matthias - I got 30 secs on him at 3, he got a minute on me at 13 and we were within 5 secs of each other for every other control. 3.6km total.
Fun couple of races, I can't believe they use SportIdent for a minor event like this - for those reading back home (Ryan and Emma) it'd be like using sportident at Knocklofty or Mt. Nelson.

C • bogans 3

Going to and from the start and collecting controls.

Just looking over my courses from today again and I just had the most startling epiphany. When I concentrate, I'm actually a really good orienteer - I know, groundbreaking ;)
Problem is, I think after so many years in Tassie on the same maps over and over again I've become really lazy.
Thats all, just thought I'd share that with y'all.

C • i concur 1

Long run. Out through Barnes Common to Rihmond Park. Programmed a 5km course throught the park into the GPS that involved no tracks in an attempt to do some terrain work. Just plugged in some random points and then tried to stay as straight on the arrow as possible. Worked out pretty well, but had to go around some fenced off parts, wide creeks and some head high bracken - blew the course out to about 6km.
Will try to do this weekly, it's much more enjoyable than just grinding out the ks.
Today was definately the day for pudgy, pasty blokes taking off thier shirts - congratulations UK, another stereotype reinforced.

Hills with the running club. 6 x Gravelly Hill long then 6 x Gravelly Hill short. Aim for the day was to do each one slightly faster than the previous.
Splits were 1:11, 1:08, 1:08, 1:02, 1:06, 1:01 then 0:38, 0:37, 0:35, 0:34, 0:34, 0:31. 3 gold stars and a smiley face for me.
Also tries to keep my uphill and downhill times as close as possible. Seemed to go OK, was about 5 seconds slower on the downs.

Warm up and down and recoveries.

Got the email today that my entry for this has gone through. Pumped, but a little concerned its the week before the French 6. No injuries here.

To and from the club house

Still feeling under the weather and should be taking it easy, but you've got to take advantage of a warm, sunny evening in these parts.
Very easy cruise round the 2 bridges loop, my left quaddie was pretty tight after yesterday and took a while to get going.
Stitch made another appearance, but not as bad so just pushed through it.

10k trail challenge - Ham Riverside

Definately a race of 2 halves. As I'm still a bit under the weather, I was going to start off slowly and increase the pace slowly as the race went on.
After we started it all felt like it was going to plan, felt good, HR around 150, letting the 'runners' go off ahead to make mistakes. First k split about 3:40. Oops. But was feeling good so kept going at that pace.
Starting to feel a bit tired on the uphill pinch to #5. Spotted a aneaky route to 6 and headed off straight back down the steep hill. Then out of nowhere it hit with the most crippling stitch I've ever had. So bad I lose concentration and run off down the wrong track, negating my brilliant route and am eventually reduced to a walk. Stop, wait for it to go and start running again. It comes back worse that before, so I lie down on a felled tree and stretch my torso right out with seems to help.
Then all the people I pulled away from start hurtling past. I start running agin but can't do much more that an unattractive hobble and stumble my way round the rest of the course being continually overtaken.
Wasn't all bad, I got to laugh at all the non orienteers who kept making mistakes - best was a guy running into #6 and asked if it was #5!
A bit miffed on the last leg where I took a convoluted route cause I couldn't be arsed ruinning back along the main road and had to cross an unmapped 2.5m high fence.

I'm of 2 minds about the course, it was quite well set in that it had heaps of route choice - everyone was continually diverging and merging back together, but on the other hand, it was mainly road running and dodged most of the forested/park sections of the map. The section along the river to #5 was ace though - I'll be building that section of path into my long runs.
http://www.slow.routegadget.co.uk/cgi-bin/reitti.c...

Ride to the event from my place to the start of the event. Went through Richmond Park - I love that place!

Warm down jog afterwards

Pretty easy usual run around the towpath. Felt good, but tired and HR seemed high - guess I'm a little still a little sick.

The continental O-bug has bit after Jukola, I spent a large portion of the day at work planning next summers trip through Europe picking off the countries left for me to head to and going to the choice multi day events in between. .

Back from Russia. Got a bit of a head cold and couldn't be arsed running, but a break was due anyway. Gonna get my act together for the French 6 now - I think Elites was a little ambitious, ownage is expected.

Route for Jukola. Overlaying with other GPS tracks shows how useful the elephant trails were!

http://www.jukola.com/jukola/kartat/reittiharveli/...

Easy hit out through the streets of St. Petersburg. Nothing too special - lots of people to run around and lots of traffic to wait for.
The city is not as I expected - seems like a big mish mash of lots of other cities I've been to, Copenhagen, Rome & Cairo all come to mind.
Hot too - sweated like a pig.

C • travels 2

That. Was. Cool.
3rd leg, night long, as they call it. Started just as the sun was hinting on appearing but headed out with the headtorch anyway cause it was still pretty dark in the forest. Already there were elephant trails everywhere - found them very useful.
It was a good, strong run - nothing outstanding, was probably too hesitant on a lot of the controls, remembering many confused minutes at ORingen 06 and super cautious of checking codes. Only one mistake of note, about 5 minutes at number 4, just stopped reading the detail in the circle and searching the wrong hillside for a little rock encased gully. Apart from that, it was just picking the trail that headed in the right direction and constantly run around the slower runners.
Was really happy with how I felt physically, I never once felt like slowing down or walking which is the first time for me on a course of that lenght.
Great boost for the ego wo pick up 244 places for the team. Was placed 377th (1331 total) for the leg and 32 minutes behind the leader, which Im really happy with. Team came 683rd overall, it was pretty solid runs all round.
Absolute highlight of the year for me (O wise), pretty sure will be back next year - but not the 3AM start leg!

Lots of warm up required at 3 in the morning after crawling out of a cosy sleeping bag. Had lots of fun tracking Simons progress on the fancy emit computers.

Event: Jukola 2008
 

Went for an easy evening ride around Clapham Common. Lots of people out and about - it definately is little Australia over there, heaps of people playing AFL and touch.

Intervals with the running club. 4x5 mins on the grass track with 2 mins recovery.
Splits:
1.44km, (137/171)
1.46km, (167/179)
1.46km, (173/181)
1.51km, (179/188)

Surprised with how I felt. Long crap day at work, tired, bad food all day and rushed to the club rooms and lashing of hay fever to boot - was going to go straight home but forced myself off the train at the right stop.
Then all came good. Pretty tired now, might take it easy for the rest of the week. Pumped for Jukola - Friday can't come soon enough.

C • jukola team 2

C • Lost 6

Warm up, cool down and recovery.

To and from the club rooms. Was a bit early so went exploring a bit, went back through Wimbledon Common cause it was such a cracker evening.

Just saw there was an event on Pittwater back home this weekend. Boo.
Good to see women are running course 1 again... or do the organisers have something to do with that????

C • Women 2

After work recovery run with Muzz. Took him on the Towpath-Barnes Bridge-Barnes Common loop. Got a bit lost in the common which lost me some cred. Good to have someone to run with and talk shit to make the kms fly by.

Event: HOC National Event, Brown Clee
 

First DNF in a while. Started off OK, planned my route - follow ditch that becomes watercourse, follow track and cross the fenceat a marked crossing. Rough compass up the open hill using the green blob as an attackpoint to the pit in a small blob of forest. All good, spot the control.... not mine. Relocate, spy another likely white blob head in and spy the control. 156, punch. Check code as I run out, needed 159 - did I misread the code, back in, no 156. Check map again and totall confused. Nothing fitted, marsh, contours and veg changes everywhere and nothing was right. Decide to run to catching feature, start off, cursing the marshy and uneven ground, going, going, no fence in sight. Lot's of other confused people round running to random controls then checking map and looking disappointed.. at least I'm not the only one. Spy a big lake below me and finally work out where I am, only 50m from the control. Run in and punch it to have the guy starting 9 mintes behind me follow me in. Demoralised but keep going. Sloppy on next 2. Twist my ankle down the hill to 4 and now have to walk the downhills. OK to 5-7. Great views at 6, realise if admiring the view I'm not in the course. Back down the hill (walking) to 8 and end up back in the twilight zone, now with even more confused people. Relocate better this time and find 8 only to realise that was the bloody first control I found. Unfold the map and realise it's taken me 45 mins to do about 15% of the course. Decide it was time to put it to bed, but walked to 11 since it went back up the hill and I could expore a bit since there was no chance I was going back there.
This is the sad part - even walking I was confused, couldn't even read the map standing still in parts from 8-9.
Back down the hill and picked up the last couple of controls before the finish - the pine forest was amazing down there - nothing but low bracken underfoot and massive old trees. Glad I was fresh enough to enjoy it.
Got back to see I wasn't the only one to struggle out there - about 15 DNFs out 50 or so entrants.
In retrospect I didn't respect the map or the fact that it was a long course. My only thoughts were, 14.5km, I should be able to crack 2 hours for this.
Oh and that first control. The ditch I planned on following was actually a veg boundary (brown dots vs black). I actually followed a watercourse that started at the same place as the boundary but then bent off at 45 degrees, which then hit a very track like ride which came out at *another* marked fence crossing. I don't know if the course setter planned it like that, but I fell for it hook line and sinker.

Warm up/run to the start. Was running late and a bit flustered, didn't really bode well for the rest of the day.

C • Weekend maps 1

C • long 1

Cause I can't be stuffed working today, a few weekend thoughts.
I still need to consciously force myself to run faster when I can/safe to do so. I'm guessing the habits of 15 years oing fatty boom bah pace are hard to break. You can see on my chart of the sprint my HR slowly drops over the course of a couple of minutes until I realise I can go faster and it jumps back up again.
If I'm doing it tough, chances are everyone else is. Suck it up and push through it. The faster you do it the sooner it'll be over!
The mapping in Brown Clee Hill where I gave up was crap. Vegetation, point and eath features were assigned symbols as if by random (I wasn't sure if it was just me, but after reading a few other trogs of yesterday confirms it for me)

Shrewsbury Old Town. 30th/124. 4.3km actual.
Probably one of the best races I've run, definately the best sprint. Realised when there were only 14 controls it was going to be a route choice race and it was, so just went out hard without hesitating to make decisions.
Only real problem was at #3, there was an marshalled, but unmarked out of bounds area right next to the contol. Problem was, for some reason one of the marshals had a control flag sitting next to him (about 10 m away from the actual flag and punch). So of course, as soon as I saw the fake flag I ran to it, only to be told I could go through. I thought it meant I had to go round the gate he was guarding, so I went round to the other entrance only to be told I couldn't go through there. Quick glance at the map, looked around and saw the flag - 20 secs wasted according to GPS. I did tell him to hide the flag as I ran off, but others had the same problem so for some reason he didn't heed my advice.
No real worries over the rest of it, I think I made a couple of inferior route choices, but I think it would have only been seconds.
Nice little town, really fun running through the little covered alleyways linking the main streets. Killer sandwich from one of the little stores afterwards as well.

Weston Heath. 37th/80. 7.7km total.
Not quite so good as the morning. Would have been a great course, if it had been winter and the forest wasn't entirely head high bracken. Having the organisers cutting paths for a lot of legs sort of negates the concept of orienteering and I got in a farily negative headspace for most of the course.
Only major error was at #2, picked the down then up route, but got half way to the down and hit a scarily steep slope covered in bracken and couldn't even really see the ground. Turned around and headed up and around and since it was such a convoluted route it was all through virgin bracken - very slow and hard work, got cracnky with myself and the terrain. Followed the tracks for the next couple but the damage was done - was hesitating and reading the map when I knew exactly where I was and where to go. Walked up the slopes even when I could have run them and just generally wasn't aggressive like you need to on these courses - considering it was just a steep hillside intersected with massive gullies lined with cliffs, it wasn't really that difficult.
The last section through the paddock baffles me. Considering the course was a little long as it was, why not just maybe have a little bit more in the forest and then finish on the edge and make people walk back? Wouldn't be the first time.
Surprised to come back and be announced as the leader of the course (about 30th starter). Didn't last long though. Really annoyed at myself to see my final placing as I'd decided I was going to place towards the back - when I think now of all the time I wasted out there......

Total warm ups and downs for the day. Quite liked having warm up maps - should be of it! Had an enjoyable post race whinge with Grace about how we'll never complain again about running on Tassie maps, even ones in Buckland.

Event: GBR WOC Selection Races (Middle and Sprint)
 

Hills session with the Windmilers. 5x1min up Gravelly Hill with about 1:20 back down recovery, then 6x30secs with 40 recovery. Never felt great, feeling a bit tired. Well named hill, soft, sandy and gravelly - very hard to get good traction and kept you working hard.
Some of the guys do these sessions a lot differently than I'm used to, going easier on the uphill, but keeping the same pace on the downhill. Next time I'm going to try this more threshold type of session and see how it gos.

To and from Gravelly Hill. Haven't seen today's coach before, he had us do a very different warm up - the sight of 20 or so blokes (and one lady) hopping up a random track in Wimbledon Common isn't something you see everyday.

TO and from the Rugby Club. Went a new way straight through the guts on the Common. Had to deal with some single track, which ment brushing through multitudes of nettles. Not happy.

Easy lunchtime run around the common. Slothly at the start, no warm down or stretch yesterday being the likely offenders. Got better, but not great for most of it - last days rain made it muddy, todays sun made it humid and buggy.
Been a while since I've been on the Common, been transformed to a jungle in places. Kept expecting to see monkeys and stuff.

That was fun. First "summer" evening race of the season (pissing with rain). Proof you can set a competetive, tricky course on the simplest area if you choose the right format. Course was 3 easy loops with controls on or visible from tracks. It should have been a running race, it wasn't. I'm pretty sure everyone made significant mistakes.
Loop C:
1:30 on #2; missed the track junction
Loop A:
0:25 on #1; missed the bitumen turn off
0:20 on #3; bashed through the scrub to get to the road, go turned around and confused by the yellow and assorted tracks. Still ran well, just way to far.
0:20 on #6; missed the junction
Loop B;
1:20 on #2; totally confused by the tracks and green. Just got lucky I saw the pond out of the corner of my eye.
0:20 on #3; so disoriented from the previous leg did a 180 and had to go the long way round.
4:15 mistakes on a 5km course, how embarassment! And that was using the GPS track so I'm not overestimating. First pin punch event since I've been here - still on pre-marked maps though!

C • maps 1

Up to Putney Heath from my place. Less that 15 mins from home by foot - can't beat that.

Got home at 9:30. Go for run, or watch season finale of Lost....
No choice.