Training Log Archive: PG

Feeling a little battered, the usual post-O' situation. Primary ailment this time is a rib job. Crashed going down to the next last control on Sunday, head first, moving pretty quickly (for me), felt like I'd just strained my back afterwards but that was just a side effect. I've got the key symptom of a rib job -- sneezing is a definite no-no.

I hope it is a less serious rib job than usual, though that may just be wishful thinking.

Other than that, not too bad. A few thorns to pick out, a little stiff. Clearly my incredible tapering plan worked.

My routes from Saturday and Sunday.

C • I witnessed that crash 2

Time for a lengthy story....

On the plane trip home from Wisconsin a pleasant memory, not thought of for many years, suddenly resurfaced. I have no idea why. Before it disappears again, I need to write it down. As is often the case on this page, it has nothing to do with orienteering. Though in a way it does.

This was in the early 1990s. I was living then just where I am living now, Sunderland, MA, a small town right along the Connecticut River in western Massachusetts. The population was about 3,000. An old farming community that over the years had slowly shifted in the direction of a bedroom community, with the major employer being the nearby University of Massachusetts.

We moved there in 1984. At some point thereafter I felt I should get involved in town affairs, most of which were handled on a volunteer basis, and after looking around a bit as to what might suit me, and what I might be suited for, I got myself appointed to the town's finance committee. The finance committee's role in town was to develop the annual town budget, monitor it throughout the year, and in general ensure that the town's finances were handled in a proper manner. We had a treasurer and an accountant, both paid, who did the daily work, so we didn't have to do that, but we did have overall responsibility for the public monies.

I got on the committee in 1989, I think there were 7 members. Either I had a knack for it, or just more interest, but by the following year I was chair, and that lasted for 6 more years. The annual budget was about $4 million, plus there was debt, plus some enterprise funds, overall some reasonably complicated stuff. The fiscal year started July 1 each year. We would start budget hearings in January, bring in all the various parts of town government and the schools and go over what they were asking for, then come up with a plan by late March. Then go sell it to the town, the final step of which was annual town meeting. That was like defending a thesis. Stand up in front of a couple hundred people, explain, they could ask anything they wanted, they could offer amendments. And maybe at the end of a couple of hours of debate you had the budget you started with. Or maybe there were some changes, though usually not much. Because we had put a lot of work into it and done it well.

It was always interesting. Even when times were good we were going over every part of the town's operations, looking for efficiencies or for better ways of doing things. Decided to privatize the sewer plant. Decided not to privatize the highway department. Decided to set up a special fund to deal with deferred maintenance. Convinced the volunteer firemen to accept billing for their ambulance services, with the income to fund replacement of the ambulance.

Some things were tough. One year money was real tight and the school got less than it wanted and when the school year started, the fourth grade teacher had 34 kids in her class. I scheduled a hearing, went to visit the class beforehand, there is nothing like seeing something with your own eyes. We clearly needed to allocate more money from reserves. The hearing was contentious, parents on one side, old folks and conservatives on the other, we passed it 4-3 in the committee and then by a narrow margin at a special town meeting. The right decision. And it taught me a good lesson -- go to the source, talk to the people involved, don't just rely on hearsay. I got in the habit of visiting the town garage, the fire station, town hall, just to make sure I knew what was going on.

There were at least a couple of really tough years, the state's finances were bad so they reduced the amount of aid they gave us. We cut, and then we cut some more. And we had a problem collecting some of our taxes. There were four large apartment complexes in town, and one of them in particular was delinquent on its taxes. A classic slum landlord. We filed liens and took him to court and at the last minute, just before the court would seize the property he would pay just enough to hang on. He owed us close to $500,000. Meanwhile we were looking at laying off teachers.

The case was back in court, down in Springfield. I went down just to see what would happen. Smallish courtroom. Judge, no jury, lawyers for both sides, a couple of court officers. I think I was the only one in the spectator seats. Both sides had their say, lots of dry stuff, technicalities of the law. It seemed like it was likely to just end up in more delay. At some point I stood up and asked the judge if I could say something. He looked quite surprised, who was I? And I told him, and then said I just thought he ought to know how this non-payment was affecting the lives of real people, and I told him what it was doing to our town. Maybe 5 minutes. Sat down. The process ended shortly thereafter with the judge deferring a decision.

The judge ruled a few days later, and he decided it was time to get serious. Within a month we had a check for not quite $500,000. I wish I remembered more of the details, but I won't ever forget the results.

=================

Perhaps I was reminded of this by the thoughts of the USOF budget that was voted on this past weekend. There are obviously differences between USOF's budget and Sunderland's budget. But there should be similarities in the process, in how the budget is developed, and reviewed, and presented, and justified, and finally voted on.

So far USOF's process seems to leave a lot of room for improvement. Perhaps next year it will go better.

C • Great story 22

Warm-up, feeling a little stiff.

Day 2 in Wisconsin. Not a championship event but still everything was first-class again. What a fine meet.

Good run, better than yesterday. Ran a little harder, though my conditioning still sucks. But I certainly put out more effort. Navigating was mostly excellent, just a little diddling around several times in the latter part of the course, not getting lost, just not being very efficient. But still very pleased with both the effort and the result.

Will said at some point that it seemed like yesterday's AP post indicated quite a bit of displeasure with my orienteering. That wasn't intended. I was just remembering how much I have loved this kind of negative terrain, and how over the last 30 years I have had some wonderful runs in such stuff. But obviously I can't move as well as I used to (by a long shot) nor see as well, so it's not quite the same feeling (although there were a couple of legs yesterday and maybe 3 or 4 today that had that good feeling) -- but it was still really fun.

Stopped on the way to the Milwaukee airport at the Milwaukee Art Museum. Beautiful. No time to visit the Andy Warhol exhibit but just seeing the building was a real treat.

And then a quick tour of the lakefront and downtown. Lovely afternoon, lots of people out, beautiful. As opposed to Friday when we arrived, rainy, dismal, looked like the last place in the world you would want to live.

C • Art Museum 5

Green Day 2 - Splits

US Classic (or Individual?) Champs at Greenbush, Wisconsin.

Our traditional original championships, except this year it was only one day. (It's been one day a couple of times in the past, but that was because the other day got tossed out.) I've always been a big fan of the 2-day event -- if you're leading after the first day you have to sleep on it and then go do it again the next day. If you're behind, you still have hopes. In either case, the event lasts for 24+ hours instead of being over in just an hour or two.

Hopefully next year it will go back to two days. And I think one other benefit of that will be to draw a bigger field. The field today was good, a lot of the best folks here, but not deep.

I had low expectations. Partly because my body has been complaining a bunch since I did the 50-miler, and partly because my focus for the year in orienteering was this summer in Europe, so any orienteering I might do this fall has seemed not so important. Seems silly to say that about our national championship, but it is what it is.

But low expectations didn't mean not trying. The pre-race plan was just two items -- simplify the orienteering, and go to all the controls. The latter seems to be a necessary concern these days. The former was just an extension of what I was doing in Europe -- simplify, simplify, simplify -- so that you can go both more safely and also faster.

And there was also the concern that my left calf would crap out....

But it turned out to be a good day. The leg felt OK all the way to the end. My orienteering was so-so. Actually, I seemed to start out quite tentatively, and it wasn't until halfway through the course that I felt like I got moving a little. The motivation was that I had just screwed up #6, and just as I got back in touch with reality Ethan Childs and Tim Parson came by, both moving faster than I had been moving.

We punched 6 together, and then took slightly different routes to 7, and I never saw either again. And was quite pleased to get in before them, though Ethan still got me by three minutes on the day.

But the rest of the way I felt that I was moving better, and also more in touch with the map, and reading it better on the run. Just a little bit of the feeling like I used have much more often. Terrain like this is so sweet, and I used to feel totally comfortable in it while running as fast as I could (such as WMOC up at Camp Ripley in 1997), but now it seems that my ability has deteriorated significantly. Can't run so well, can't read the map when running very well, can't remember what I've seen on the map, and therefore just generally much less sure of myself.

So it was a lot of fun today to have at least a few legs where it felt a little bit like old times.

I think I ended up 3rd on the Green X, Ethan was 47, Ernst 49. I think I was first M60, Walter Siegenthaler next in 58, Jeff Saeger next at 60, roughly.

And as far as the pre-race plan, most of the time I simplified pretty well. And I did go to all the controls. :-)

Course is here. I'll post my routes later.

C • Nice job 8

C • calf stuff 7

Decent warm-up, also well timed, got to the start just as I was being called up.

Elevatoring with Sandy and Valerie.

Green X Day 1 US Champs - Splits

Event: US Individual Champs 2009
 

To Milwaukee. Bouncy, but survived. Did get to see Air Force One at Logan.

One last day to taper. Not wanting to risk not tapering enough, I blew off the model event. It was raining....

Feel totally unprepared to orienteer tomorrow.

Continuing my taper for this weekend.... :-)

Back from Maine this evening after two different stops for more walking. Very fine.

Seems like a lot of venom around AP. I've heard it said that most relationships that founder do so around the issues of money and sex. So far just the former seems to be sufficient.

AOWN moment -- So it was about 5:45, starting to get a little dark, I had one more hole to go. I'd just played a hole with a couple of ponds and a nice flock of geese feeding and pooping on the fairway, maybe 30 or 40 of them. I noticed a guy heading my way in a golf cart.

Are you chasing me off? (Maybe he wanted to close the gate to the parking and there were only a couple of cars left.)

Nope, going after them, he said, pointing towards the geese.

They seem to be enjoying themselves, I said, for lack of anything else to say.

Well, he said, don't be surprised if you hear a shotgun go off. Just giving you a warning.

And he drove off in the direction of the geese. And a minute later I hear a Boom, and then two more, Boom, Boom. And a minute later, one more Boom.

Another guy was in the parking lot, looked like he might work there.

Is he trying to scare them or hit them, I asked.

Hit them, I hope.

================

Aren't there laws about this? Though he may just have been trying to scare them. I was too far from the scene by then to get a body count, if there was one.

C • laws 1

C • Money and sex 5

Time for a road trip.

Drove to Belgrade Lakes, Maine, for a round of golf. Of course it's silly. But it was nevertheless a totally fine way to spend the day, as long as one excuses the waste of some gasoline.

Got a note from Mike Fritz a couple of days ago, he was heading there with a friend, with a friend of the friend coming up from Portland to join them. Was I interested?

Of course. We were going here, Mike had been before and said it was his all-time favorite place. And the late-season half-price rates were in effect.

Had a wonderful time. Fabulous course. Good company, the friend, and the friend of the friend, both very friendly. Regular ventures into the woods to look for balls, mostly theirs. The usual mix of shots from all of us, some appalling, many undistinguished, a few brilliant. Mike and I had a battle as to who could behave better (you got extra points the more challenges your golf game threw at you), I'm not sure what the final tally was but we both scored pretty high. Had an 86, better than expected, included a 9, but there is always a bad hole or two, or more. Totally satisfied. And then a stop a local tavern for a little food and drink and more good company before going our separate ways.

Didn't think about orienteering, or training, all day.... :-)

Gary has sent out the following. Note in particular items 1 and 3. I think these are good ideas. First, remember that money is tight. Second, the Junior team is in tougher shape financially right now, therefore the 2K direct to them. Third, the deal on the sanctioning fees gives the possibility of a reasonable amount of team support. Fourth, given that money is tight, this may not be that much, won't know for a year, but it feels a lot better than the goose eggs that were in the first pass at the budget.

I am sure some will think it insufficient (and others maybe too much?). I think it's a good step in the right direction.

The latest budget proposal is here.

Things are changing. It will be interesting to see what develops. And also a challenge to keep adapting....

===================================

Here is version 3 of the 2010 USOF proposed budgets. This will be the final version before the Board meeting. Any changes to the budget proposal will need to be made at the Board meeting.

Some substantive changes:
1. $2000 is being transferred to the Junior Team Fund from the Operating
Fund
2. The starting balance of the Sponsorship & Marketing Fund has been
reduced by $3400, to reflect 2009 planned spending for the fund, and USOF Rebranding has also been reduced by $3400.
3. An agreement with the U.S. Teams has been reached, to transfer any 2010 A meet sanctioning fees in excess of $33,000 directly to the Junior Team Fund (50%) and the Team Fund (50%). This is in lieu of direct support from the Operating Fund. It is hoped that many USOF clubs will choose to host A meets and many people will choose to participate in A meets, thereby directly helping our teams.

Gary Kraght
Chair - USOF Finance Committee