Training Log Archive: iansmith

Event: Pawtuckaway Camping Weekend
 

A little jogging before running the Blue course at Pawtuckaway.

Day 1 Blue course, listed length 8.4ish. It was quite warm and humid in the early afternoon - around 30 C. I was drenched with sweat about halfway in, and I overlooked the water on the trail between 5 and 6; by the end, I was really suffering.

Technically, I made a big mistake (4:00?) at 3 when I doubted myself, didn't go far enough on my line, and doubled back. The control wasn't difficult, and it would have been straightforward if I had had the confidence to continue. Leaving 2, I vacillated on two approaches to the control, and Misha noted this may have contributed to my lack of confidence. I bobbled 5 when I made a 100m parallel error and ran down the wrong spur. I had a small mistake at 6 in the circle, in an area which has always confused me.

I guzzled three cups of water when I finally reached the water stop at control 12. Overall, this was a death slog. Someone of US caliber running well could probably have done 1:15 - 1:20.

2014 WHNO set by Ernst. I won! I think this is my first non-Corn mass start victory, preceded by many blown opportunities. The first half of the course was back-and-forth pack running. Leg 8 was decisive - it split everyone up, and while my route was not optimal, I grabbed the lead there and held it for the rest of the course.

Ernst's mass start was abrupt - it caught Brendan in the bathroom and Ben getting dressed. I jumped into the lead in the parking lot and led the way on the road run to Big Island. On the road, I turned around at one point and saw 30 or 40 headlamps bouncing in the darkness. Magnificent.

I drifted a bit high on 1, but led a small pack into the control cleanly. To 2, a handful of us ran together along a clear linear feature (compass + marsh + hills), but I didn't know where exactly we were for much of the leg. Finally, the contours starting dropping off, and we hit the control ok. Ethan and I started to run away from the pack, but apparently not by much - Brendan got to 3 first, with Ethan and I a second or two back. Gheorge Fala, the Moldovan, was also running well in the lead pack. Ethan and Brendan pulled away from me on the rise to 4, and I was probably 15s back with Gheorge at the punch. Both of them missed 5 to the left, and I punched first with 10-15s margin.

Ethan, Gheorge and I hit 6 and 7 together, but the two of them left 7 running north. I thought they were going to the beaver dam in the middle of the big lake, but Ethan intended to run around the left side of the lake and pick up the trail. I set off on my own and vacillated between the two beaver dams; based on the green, I decided to take the eastern dam. I think this was a mistake, as the western one afforded a long trail run into the control. Still, I executed my route fine; as I was climbing into 8, I saw some lights behind me and concluded that I was in the lead.

To 9, I punched through the forest to the big trail and hit it exactly where I planned - just south of the trail junction. I think I ran further on the trail than intended, and wandered a bit in the vague terrain before 9. I drifted south, bounced off the wall, figured out what had happened, and ran into the control for perhaps a 2 minute mistake. As I punched, I saw lights start to appear in the distance. I nailed the execution on 10, and while I wasn't fast, I was very confident in the rocky minefield. I was also very careful on 11 - willing to lose some speed in favor of precision and avoiding big mistakes. Ethan finished about a minute behind me, so my margin of comfort was smaller than I thought.

C • Congrats! 2

WHNO - Splits

Saturday Blue - Splits

I'm writing off this week's training as a total loss.

C • Total loss? 1

Easy morning run.