Training Log Archive: Anvil

5 Peaks Trail Running Series, Golden Ears Provincial Park.
Absolute ripper of a race. It was mostly forest trail, had about a km section of dirt road. After a week or overcast/clear days, it pished down. Hard.
So it was cold, puddley, muddy and had lots of creek crossings and it was wicked fun.
The forest was 100% like this http://www.env.gov.bc.ca/bcparks/promo/photo_cont_...
It didn't suck.
Took it pretty conservative at the start, having no one to pace myself against so just comfortably sat in a group of 5. After a few ks I decided they were being a bit woosey on the descents so put the pedal down a bit and broke away.
Reigned in about three guys on the climb section, then had no one to chase on the next descent so slacked off a little. Rejoined the shorter course after 9ks so the rest of the race was just about passing people every 15 seconds (they were all super encouraging which was sweet).
Course was advertised as 14km, so when the finish appeared when Garmin said 12 (I don't think he knew what to do in the sense pine forest) I was pretty surprised when the banner appeared. Had heaps in the tank left, but well, who cares, I'm more glad I just enjoyed it and felt strong the whole race.
6 minutes behind the leader, 8th overall & 2nd in age class. Just like orienteering in that I got a medal!

More about keeping warm, than warming up.
Haven't been this cold, pre-race since England. Used my spare pair of socks as gloves, worked well.

C • spare socks 2

Cruisy run round the streets in prep for tomorrows race. Few strides in the middle for good measure.
Quads a bit heavy, not used to all this pavement.

Managed to score a lift to this race on Sunday (scroll down to Golden Ears video). Praise Craigslist. Win!
http://www.5peaks.com/schedule.asp?p=bc

Attempted tempo run. 6x1k @ 5m/k, 1k @ 4 m/k)
Took a long time to get going, gears just didn't want to shift this morning - for the first half of the session garmin was telling me to slow down on the slow ones and speed up on the fast ones.
Legs a bit sore from yesterday, no warm up and insignificant cool down. I imagine they'll be sore tomorrow as well, probably the longest all pavement run I've done since I was living in Cardiff.
Beaut day though... well it was all sun and blue skies, don't think it cracked 10 degrees though.

Went to an informal Wednesday evening O thing. Premarked map, no punching, just little flags (actual flags, not O flags!) at the control site.
Ripper little area, resi's for UBC, lots of small identical buildings with lots of tiny gaps in between.
Wasn't pushing hard, just enjoying it and cruising round, though high HR says otherwise - think the bug has set me back a little.
Was a bit shit on the forest section at the end of the course - struggled to see the map. Wasn't wearing a headband and never realised how much sweat getting in my eyes affects me.

Crook stomach back with a vengeance today, so just did a little loop to break in some new shoes and to see if I could get things moving.
Felt a little better towards the end but it was short lived. Not happy.

Cruise around the 'Seawall Walk'. Not quite as long as I had estimated off one of those 3-D, from above, tourist maps, but good enough for a bit of an explore. Felt heaps better than yestie and quite sprightly for most of it.
Nice little loop, path is split between pedestrians and those on foot. Lots of well tended to and manicured parks to run through. Heaps of cyclists and runners out and about, lots of targets to chase down.

Finally in Vancouver, so headed out for a bit of an explore and stretch of the legs. Along the edge of English bay and into Stanley Park. Zig zagged around a bit on the trails in there, found Beaver Lake which was fairly nice looking and then back along the north side of central Vancouver.
Felt pretty crap, ate some out of date cheese singles (that had been out of the fridge for + 36hrs) on the train ride from LA and spent most of last night cluthing my stomach in agony. Fortunately whatever I ate came out during the run.
Lots of views of snow capped mountains around the city which I'm looking forward to getting into. Stanley Park is pretty nice too, forested with big old trees and the smaller trails are soft, spongey &
Looks like I may get away without having to work while I'm here. When doing the sums I was using my old Eurosummer budget estimate ($100AU/day). Since I'm just going to stay put, or move around 2 or 3 places the costs go way down. I may try to pick up some hostel work to save living expenses, but I'm happy just to run in the mountains every day for the next couple of months!