Training Log Archive: Bash

'Bent, Crash and I hiked over to a Toronto Region Conservation Authority trail work day in Palgrave, planting dogwoods on a couple of closed trails. Afterward, several of us hiked around the trail system with the TRCA rep looking for possible reroutes. Great day to be moving briskly outdoors. It was awesome to see Crash lookin' good after the World Xterra Champs in Hawaii!

The trees are starting to look quite bare, and the ground is multi-coloured and beautiful. The light in the forest and in our house is much brighter. With today's gusty winds, there won't be many leaves left on trees after the weekend.

Tried the first part of Workout #2 on our new Bryon Kest DVD. It would have been worth finishing, but 'Bent had cooked a great dinner!

Great news for single male orienteers... Brainiacs are Babe Magnets!

"The idea of dating or hooking up with a prof is one of those kinky dreams I'm sure many girls have.”

Oh my.

We went out for a team practice for Salomon Dontgetlost.ca Raid The Hammer - with BulletDog acting as the stunt double for Hingo, who was not there. It was a beautiful, surprisingly warm autumn run around Glen Haffy, and 'Bent and the pooch were running well. About 80-90% of the leaves are off the trees now, so they have gently drifted over the ruts, rocks and roots on the trails. This provided a great test for my unbraced ankle, but I didn't want to test it too much, so I took the downhills pretty carefully. We went through all kinds of terrain ranging from steep escarpment trails to wet boggy areas where we balanced on slimy logs to overgrown horse trails where we collected tiny sharp burrs everywhere - ouch! Lots of clean-up work to do while watching TV tonight. It didn't make for the fastest run at times, but it was probably perfect practice for the tough terrain we'll be running through next weekend.

Hard Core class with Caron. She wore some orange tonight, which is always a sign that she plans to make the classes a little harder.

Power Yoga class - just what the doctor ordered.

We have coyotes howling under our bedroom window some nights, and we can see where they sleep nearby. I wouldn't have thought that a pair of coyotes would attack a hiker - although VO2Max's Mom was surrounded by a group of them last year while running in the woods near our place. Very sad story from Cape Breton.

Big "to do" list this week and not much training. Probably just as well, since I'm resting the blister on my heel. BulletDog and I headed out for a quick run around Palgrave West. Finally, that draggin' feeling is gone! I forgot my ankle brace, but things went OK. Nice day except for all the gunshots. I'm pretty sure they were coming from the shooting club about 2 km away, but on some days, the weather conditions make you think that the hunter is right behind you. BulletDog wore her orange vest. I forgot and wore my nice navy STORM tech shirt, which was as good as wearing camo at 5:30 p.m. in the forest. Sorry 'Bent, I know you don't have that life insurance policy on me yet!

Attended the memorial service for Bender's Mom at the Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto - a beautiful and moving tribute to a classy lady. It was nice to see Bender for the first time since he abandoned us to work for some sports event happening in Vancouver this February.

'Bent, Goose and I carpooled to Burlington to do the Peak-2-Peak adventure run training course at Kerncliff Park. Other than the Salomon Dontgetlost.ca adventure runs, I think this might have been the biggest orienteering event in southern Ontario in 2009. The popularity was a pleasant surprise to us as organizers. I think one of the keys to the high attendance was the navigation mini-clinic that Hammer and Backwoods offered to interested attendees before they headed out. 25% of participants signed up for it! I noticed a lot of people navigating in teams in preparation for Raid The Hammer, which was awesome.

Dave Grant did a great job designing an interesting course that included a long Walk The Line section partway through. Nice terrain, beautiful weather, perfect temperature - couldn't have asked for a better day to be running around in the woods.

Following up on Tero's presentation last weekend, I wanted to make it feel more like a race, so I started alone and didn't look at the map until after I'd punched the start control. Throughout the course, I tried to visualize where I'd be in 30-60 seconds, and that sometimes even worked. I didn't make any serious errors out there, although I took a bit longer because I walked the entire line and re-punched #7 since the rules didn't say whether we were permitted to abandon the line after finding the three controls, so I figured I'd be careful (like in a race).

It was great to run into friends around the course - spent a lot of time near Trav and Gally on different parts of the course. I had a sprint from the last control to the finish with AdventureGirl! (that was won by the younger competitor, who made a controversial wrong turn immediately before the end, but recovered nicely). The only negative was that I developed a painful blister on my heel half an hour before the end - probably related to the ankle brace.

Followed up with a fun trip to Starbucks and MEC with 'Bent, Goose, Phatty and Leanimal. How is it possible that I can always find something to buy there?

'Bent and I reviewed our routes and, in most cases, had similar strategies. One thing I noticed in his description was that he was constantly readjusting his routes because, "I didn't want to follow so-and-so, so when he went the direction I'd planned to go, I went the other way". So his assignment for next time is to just run his own race, and if a good runner is in the area, try to ignore them and do whatever he would have done if they weren't around.

Beautiful autumn day! As you can see, 'Bent is truly Canadian at heart.

'Bent and I did a Tour de Palgrave East, mostly on single track to keep it interesting. A difference of opinion on the optimum route resulted in a brief bushwhack where I tore a hole in my nice Salomon Exo capri tights - waahh! But I had to let 'Bent off the hook because I was running soooo slowly today. Not sure what's up, but I had no energy - same as Thursday.

It looked cold but got really warm, and for the first time ever, I pulled a "Mrs. Gally", removing my shirt to run in a sports bra. Palgrave is usually deserted, but as we were coming toward the Duffy's Lane parking lot, I saw a large group of people of all ages gathered in the distance. I quickly pulled my shirt back on, then we ran into the middle of a fungus appreciation society meeting. They had tables set out and mushrooms in bags, and I guess they were getting ready to look at the day's haul. Never a dull moment out here!

First time on roller skis! Goose and Coach LD apparently don't get bored from all that coaching during the school week, so they graciously offered to take 'Bent and me out for a roller ski with Gosling. 'Bent had his first lesson last week, so I was the newbie. We started by learning some basics in the parking lot at Palgrave public school, then graduated to the big leagues by heading to one of the quiet areas in Palgrave Estates. I was impressed at how much roller skiing felt like real skate skiing. I could feel a few of those muscles that I always forget about until ski season starts. However, it feels considerably *different* when you fall on pavement - ouch. Only a couple of splats though, and it was a great workout in a subdivision that has some nice rolling hills.

Gosling had stayed back at the car, and a man came out of his expensive house and said, "There's a lot of room on this road. Could you move your car from in front of my house?" She's 13 years old and said she'd go tell her parents. He's lucky that she's so polite. I would have asked pointed questions regarding the location of the "no parking" signs (none) and the nature of any possible harm it could do him to have a couple of cars about 75m away from his front door for an hour or so. (Note the size of the front yards in the photo below.) Sheesh. Regardless, it was fun.

We're looking at about 100 people for tomorrow's Dontgetlost.ca Peak-2-Peak training event. Wow!!

Philly Cheesesteak dropped by for a visit, and he and 'Bent headed out for a night trail run around Palgrave West in 3C pouring rain. I put my feet up and sat by the fireplace with a glass of red wine because I didn't want to slow them down in such bad weather. Selfless of me, I know.

Ran to the post office and back on a rainy day with spectacular autumn colours. My legs had no zip, so I will take the optimistic view that yesterday's strength workout blasted them a little too thoroughly.

Hard Core Live with Caron

Power Yoga class focusing on a lot of upper body twisting, shoulder blades squeezing together and pulling apart, etc.

ThunderDog had to come to class tonight because 'Bent and I needed to keep an eye on her after she dragged the heavy kitchen garbage pail to the middle of the room, tipped it over to get the lid open, then consumed everything edible after chewing the inedible stuff thoroughly. That was my punishment for going running without her - the message was very clear. She ate a bit of stale chocolate, but not enough to need the full purge from the vet. Sigh, now that she's a senior, I'm torn between being angry and cheering for her when she shows that she can still act like a naughty puppy. She was very good in yoga class at least - lying on her blanket until the relaxation when she decided to stroll up and greet the instructor, who fortunately loves animals.

Interesting info for people who do outdoor activities in Ontario... I've mentioned my neighbour who has the hunting tree stand at the edge of his property pointing into the conservation area where there is a trail along its perimeter.

An MNR enforcement officer told me today that it is perfectly legal for someone to construct hunting stands all along the edge of their property pointing into lands where no hunting is permitted. It doesn't become an offence until he (sorry guys, but I'll bet it's almost always a "he") shoots across the line. There is no law against building a stand that has clearly been put up for the purpose of hunting illegally, as long as the stand is on land where hunting is permitted. So if you live in the country like we do, I guess your neighbours can aim at you with no repercussions, as long as they don't get caught shooting. Nice. Interestingly, this is the 3rd time I've talked with MNR, and this is the first enforcement officer who knew that. Even this guy said, "This is not what ethical hunters do."

It's been 3 years since a senior was killed while hiking in a public forest a few kilometers from our house, and I've had a couple of close calls with hunters in fall adventure races, so I've been trying to learn about hunting regulations. Yes, I know that most hunters are well-trained and careful, but obviously some of them aren't, and I want to understand how to lower my risk and our dogs' risk. I'm still not opposed to hunting in principle, but I'm afraid that the more research I do, the worse it smells.

The home page of the Ontario Federation of Anglers and Hunters describes the organization as "a highly professional and 'devastatingly effective' advocate for Ontario's natural resources and the rights and traditions of anglers and hunters". No kidding - they're obviously *very* good.

Ran around Palgrave West shortly before dark. Cold rain, but nice autumn leaves.

While watching The Daily Show

Ran on trails through Palgrave West on a warm autumn day. My neighbour's hunting blind pointed at the conservation area trail has been dolled up with a camouflage umbrella for those rainy fall days of shooting at protected wildlife and trail runners. :-(

Insects have invaded due to the higher temperatures - cluster flies, ladybugs and stinkbugs. Mostly they're outside clinging to doors and windows, but some are buzzing around in our house, landing on my keyboard and generally being annoying. Oh well, they're better roommates than mice.

I'm usually hit hard by colds, so I'm surprised to feel so much improved today after hitting rock bottom 36 hrs ago. No idea if these things make any difference, but I took some of the new "Cold Doctor" from the Cold FX people, and it's supposed to make your cold less severe. I didn't take nearly as many pills as they recommended, and I was also taking vitamin C, getting 6 hrs of sleep a night and orienteering in cold weather, so my quick recovery could be due to any - or none - of these things. Whatever the reason, I'm feeling 90% better.

Last week's sniffles moved into my lungs over the weekend, and I don't have much of a voice now, so there'll be no aerobic exercise today! At least it will be better than all those sneezes yesterday while I was driving on the 401 surrounded by transport trucks. I really didn't want to close my eyes at that speed, but it sure is hard trying to sneeze with your eyes open! Neither the cold nor the gimpy ankle affected my weekend races much, but I've had a lot of late nights recently while working on a long "to do" list, and I think I could have been sharper with more sleep.

RY's Yoga for Flexibility with 'Bent. Even *that* felt a little ambitious today.

Ottawa Fall Festival Long Course - Lac Philippe

A gorgeous day to be in the Gatineau Hills.







Although a little chilly...



I was happy with yesterday's races - definitely not perfect, but a step in the right direction. One significant error in 26 legs, and it only cost me half a minute. I told 'Bent last night that no matter what happened today, I'd consider it a successful weekend. Well... it's a good thing I meant what I said because today's race was horribly unsuccessful.

I started behind world O champion Tero, who crossed his legs and did a few forward bends in each direction while waiting at the start line. (Immediately copied by me.) I've been working to overcome a history of messing up the first control. In this weekend's races, I won the 1st split in the sprint and was within 20 seconds of the best split in the two other races - a big improvement over past disasters. On my way to today's first control, I was surprised to pass an occupied site in a campground that we'd been told would be closed. I would have been even more surprised if PhattyJR and 2-Min had stepped out of their tent just then! Apparently they heard me run by.

By the 4th control, I was leading the race - and then it all fell apart. I thought I'd chosen a solid attackpoint for #5 - leaving a lakeshore at an obvious point and climbing a steep hill near the little re-entrant where my boulder would be found. It seemed a little less terrific after I'd waded a waist-deep stream with chunks of ice in it (avoidable, but shorter that way). When I got to the top of the hill, neither the hilltop nor the re-entrant were as obvious as I'd hoped, and I wandered for 40 days and 40 nights (or so). I met other wanderers looking for the same control - even The Kempster said it gave her some trouble. (We'd started from the same attackpoint about 30 seconds apart, and I was surprised to see her when I got up there.) The flag was quite low behind a boulder, and I probably passed nearby a few times without seeing it. But I also went lots of places where I had no business going and, unfortunately, kept convincing myself of new and wonderful explanations for where I might be. I found a couple of controls from other courses and located similar features on my map and tried to navigate to my control that way. The terrain was a lot lumpier up there than it looked on the map - I guess the 5m contours hid the smaller stuff. So I wasn't sure exactly which features the mystery controls were on, and I tried a couple of options for each. A highlight was arriving at one of these controls at the same time as Tero. I just took a step back and watched him sail through smoothly. Within a minute, Mike Smith ran up with a wink and asked, "Did you just see a tall Frenchman run by?"

Embarrassingly, it took me about 45 minutes to bail to a major trail to the east to relocate. In hindsight, I should have done that almost immediately when I realized that my original plan hadn't worked. I guess my brain was so focused on the attackpoint that I had chosen on the west side that the eastern boundary of the area seemed really far away. But it wasn't, and once I got out there, I relocated easily and took just a few minutes to find the stoopid control. Yikes, a 54-minute split in a race that took under 2 hrs.

Given that a good result wasn't possible with most of the course still remaining, I treated it as mental toughness training. I ran from #5 to the end pretending that I was still a contender, winning the next 3 splits after my big error. I finished 6th of 9 racers in my category, about 22 minutes off the pace - better than I deserved. A couple of positive takeaways... If I remove the one bad leg from the results and just look at the other 11 legs, I was fastest by almost 12 minutes. I won 4 splits today - much better than either of the races yesterday that went well. So it's not all bad news, but wow, that's one spectacularly bad result! :-) The curse of Barb's Long Races continues, but at least this time it was limited to one big error that I can learn a lot from.

One other positive was meeting up with 2-Min and PhattyJR at the finish line. Nice to see their friendly faces after such a bad blow-up. It was a loooong drive home - what would I do without CBC Radio?

Course 5 Long - Splits

Ottawa Fall Festival A Meet Middle Distance - Lac Beauchamp

Beautiful, sunny, cold day running in autumn colours on the Canadian Shield. It doesn't get much better than this! The Ottawa club organizes a great meet, so we started on time, ran interesting courses through fun terrain and enjoyed yummy snacks at the end.

I was orienteering consistently but felt a little sloppy approaching a few of the controls, finding myself a little too far to one side or another. Thanks to the good visibility, my errors wasted seconds, not minutes. After self-destructing at the ROC meet a few weeks ago, I was thrilled to place 1st of 9 racers in my category, winning by 2 minutes. As is typical for me, I only won 3 of 13 splits, even in a race that I won. It made me want to go out and run the course again, only better!!

A few of the Middle Distance highlights...

World Champ Thierry Gueorgiou was the winner. Francois Gonon of France sped into the finish pretty quickly too.



Dog Runner's Mom cleaned up all the burrs in the forest as a public service to the rest of us.



Hammer scared the crap out of the little kids as he ran up to the finish line. Looks like he should have run Trek or Treat this weekend instead!



Turns out he was also performing a public service by trying (unsuccessfully) to remove sharp branches from the forest with his head. Dr. Mike Smith assessed him and suggested that he might want to get a stitch or two in the next 24 hrs.



It's a good look, no?

Sprint at Carleton University. I love campus sprints and was looking forward to running on this new map. It was loads of fun, although I did lose contact at #4 when I was forced to make a wide detour around a group of people who were taking up a lot of space as they strolled through a complex area of the map. When I got past them, I briefly lost my mind and ran to the train tracks before returning to the control. The fastest split in my category was 49 seconds, and I took 39 seconds more than that - oops. Otherwise, things went fairly smoothly.

I had a moment of panic at the spectator control which was at a multi-level set of stairs that I couldn't see on the map, even with my magnifier glasses. (Not the map's fault - my vision was letting me down.) The control description was "bottom of stairs", but it was necessary to run up a couple of flights to get to the bottom of the correct flight. It was nervewracking when people were watching from above since I was running up there with no clue because I couldn't read the map. Mostly it was a good race, but I felt afterward that I should have pushed to run harder in the "green zone" portions. I finished 2nd of nine, a minute behind the winner and a minute ahead of 3rd place. I tied for the best split to #1, but that was the only win of 13 splits!

The Ottawa Club had arranged for an exciting sprint arena with spectator controls, a long finish chute, and a block of elite runners starting at the end. We cheered loudly for hometown heroine, The Kempster!



And for World Champion, Tero.



Tero seems like a really nice guy. I think he and his French teammates are enjoying their vacation in North America.



I got to hang out with my good buddy, AdventureGirl! :-)



Tero did a presentation afterward. By the time we'd asked all our questions it was 8 p.m., and we hadn't had dinner yet! It was a long day, but well worth it. There are a lot of things that one could take away from Tero's talk, but there are two that I will try to work on:
1) Make your training more like your racing. That way, when you're racing, it will feel as if you've already done it lots of times. In addition to physical training, that could include map study of a particular type of terrain.
2) A lot of orienteers know where they were 30 seconds ago or where they are right now. It's better to be visualizing where you're going to be in 30-60 seconds.

Visibility plays a big part in Tero's planning. He thinks about what he's going to be able to see from where and uses that information to help plan his routes. He had to learn to simplify maps, and now he has a philosophy of running fast and making fewer mistakes by aiming for something near the control that will be visible. (He never used the word "attackpoint".) He runs fast toward it right from the start of the leg, even though he won't necessarily see it until later. Many people wait until they can see something before they start running quickly toward it, but if they had confidence, they could be running quickly much of the time. Good presentation and lots of food for thought, especially for some of the strong juniors in the room.

Course 5 Middle - Splits

Course 2 Sprint - Splits

My running training has been pathetic over the past 4 weeks since I sprained my ankle at the U.S. Orienteering champs, then sprained it again worse a week later. Leanimal has been working it back into shape, and it was nicely on the mend when I caught my Dad's cold last weekend. Hence another week of feeling oogie, and I'm about to catch the train to Ottawa for their big orienteering A meet this weekend - the one that 6-time World Champion Thierry Georgiou is competing in.

Today's run in Palgrave West was just to remind my body of what running feels like, since it seemed like a bad idea to do that during tomorrow's first race. It was a short run on smooth trails, so I left the ankle brace behind to help build strength, but I will certainly be wearing it for the weekend races. Glorious autumn day! When I get home after this cold weekend, a lot of the leaves will be down. BulletDog came with me and had a blast playing in the woods.

Ms. Grumpy reporting in... I didn't want to drive to the Ottawa O meet because I hate the highway to Ottawa, especially on a Friday when the eastern GTA is a parking lot. So I bought a train ticket and was really excited because there would be WiFi onboard, and I had all sorts of things planned that I wanted to do while someone else did the driving. Well, even though I allowed lots of time, the traffic was nasty, and I missed my train from Scarborough by 1 minute. I was running toward the platform when it pulled away - argghh. I got half my money back, but the trip home to Toronto was a special nonrefundable deal. Arggh.

I phoned 'Bent and tried to find a nearby Greyhound bus that he found online, but that proved impossible after 45 minutes of driving around. So after all that, I ended up driving to Ottawa alone - the absolute worst, environmentally nastiest scenario. :-((

When I got there, the magnetic hotel parking card wouldn't swipe when I was parked at a 45 degree angle downhill in a narrow alley in a manual transmission car near midnight. After 6 tries, I exclaimed, "Oh f***!!!" - and apparently that was the magic word to get in. Then I got to the room, and there was no Ethernet cable. I wasn't that thrilled about wired Internet, but at least I expected a wire. When I called Tech Support, they just said I needed a cable, and when I called the Front Desk, they said it was on the desk (duh), and when I said it wasn't, they said they'd send a bellman to show it to me. He agreed it was gone. But then things started to look up. I called the front desk back and used my temporary position of superiority to ask for the passcode to their wireless Internet, which I got. And then I found microwave popcorn in the room. And the room is nicer than the online photos. Yay. Tomorrow will be a better day. (How could it not be?)

Hosted a Caledon Navigators adventure run training night at Albion Hills. Runners went out in pairs, and their exercise was to discuss each leg with one another, choosing an attackpoint, a route to the attackpoint, and a route from the attackpoint to the control. Most teams spent about half their time on the course in the dark. Phatty was an exception, posting the fastest time. Given that he ran entirely in daylight, it's hard to understand how he returned with so many burrs from head to to toe!! Only Gosling brought back more, including some in her hair. Last, but not least, we had a club bonfire with s'mores, Jiffy Pop and hot drinks.

If you go out in the woods today, you're in for a big surprise...!

I went to Albion Hills to hang flags for tomorrow night's adventure run training with the Caledon Navigators. The first control site I visited was in a logged area, and I ended up coated from head to toe with those little round burrs - can't remember their name right now, but ARGGH. So I scouted a different control location.

On my way to the next control, I did a double take when I realized that the trail up ahead was blocked by a... cube van with living room furniture in the back. Huh??? Then I saw a whole row of trucks, vans and cones, and realized that they were making a movie again - but this time, they were well into the woods. For the next 10 minutes as I ran along double track, I would be passed by vans, trucks and cars just driving through the conservation area at close to regular traffic speed - yikes. I feel sorry for any mountain bikers who came around the corners too fast. For locals, the south edge of the new Albion car rally circuit is the beach parking lot, and it extends into the area north and east of there and continues almost to that little downhill connector trail with the concrete/rock steps that takes you down near the main road.

Having survived that, I loved every minute of navigating to the next controls. What a ridiculously perfect autumn day! Then it was time to place a control near the hilltop east of the donation forest. I saw the body of a man stretched out on a tarp with his head covered with something white and his arms crossed on his chest. It was 2 p.m. - a strange time to be sleeping in bright sunshine - but he was wearing a big shiny watch, which I thought might have been removed if he had met with foul play. It was really hard to tell if he was OK, but I sure as heck wasn't going to find out for myself. I was about 20 m away and decided to back away slowly, hightail it for the road and report it to park staff. Oh yeah, and I moved our last control a lot closer to the finish line - don't want anyone running into that guy in the dark tomorrow!

As I was approaching my car, I met a man with a dog. I told him about the movie vehicles on the trails, and the subject of the strange man came up. His ears perked up. Turns out he's Terry Fast from the Caledon Police Advisory Committee, and about 18 months ago, they had a guy who was coming to Albion Hills in broad daylight and lying down across the trails. He would cover his head and cross his arms on his chest, and he wouldn't respond if you spoke to him or even if a dog licked his face. Terry wasn't sure if they'd ever caught the man in the act, but it sounds like he may be back.

So... if you go out in the woods today... :-)

Tried my new Rodney Yee Power Yoga DVD. Mostly it's the same stuff that Rodney does on his shorter DVDs, except you do more of it. That's OK though - I like it. I also like that he describes everything he is doing, making it possible to do almost the entire DVD for the first time without looking at the TV screen. (Although it seems a shame not to sneak a peek at Rodney once in awhile, given that he went to all the trouble of wearing that form-fitting ensemble.)

There are a couple of poses that I'm not great at - bow pose and camel pose, both of which require backbending ability that I don't have much of - and it doesn't feel good for me when I try it. Things will improve with practice, though I'll never be a pro. But I will never, ever, EVER be able to do upward bow. Oh well.

"Dear Grand Canyon Enthusiast:

We are pleased to inform you that your efforts at obtaining a Backcountry Permit have been successful."

Wow, does that *ever* sound like a letter written by a bureaucrat! But anyway, good news. 'Bent and I don't have to hike out of the canyon after dinner, then come back down for 7 a.m. breakfast at Phantom Ranch!

'Bent and I parked at Mountainview Road and rode the rail trail to Inglewood to pick up Knobless. Since it was Thanksgiving Monday, and the autumn colours were beautiful, lots of families and pooches were out on the trail. We took McLaughlin to the Grange, then did my first-ever bottom-to-top ride of the Grange hill. Wow, that hill goes on forEVER, and the grade is ridiculously steep in places. The road goes almost straight up the entire Niagara Escarpment. If I could do that a few times every week, I'd become an awesome rider! But since that'll never happen, I was just grateful that I was carrying my Health Card!

We rode trails to Belfountain where we met Gorgeous at the very-crowded-during-autumn-leaf-season Shed Coffee Bar.



As often happens, a young man asked 'Bent a few questions about his bike. His face looked slightly familiar, and he was obviously *very* fit, so I asked his name. It turned out to be elite triathlete Nat Faulkner who, among other accomplishments was the 2nd Canadian at last year's Ironman World Champs in Hawaii. Because we both train with C3, we know some of the same people. He was super-friendly and stuck around chatting and admiring Knobless' and Gorgeous' dogs for quite awhile.

Ran from my parents' place in Brantford along the waterfront trails, then across the Grand River into the edge of Brant Park, then back again. Beautiful day, great trails. 'Bent and I will need to bring our bikes here some time.

I went to the high school reunion today, and it was better than I'd expected. It's a full weekend deal, but I just spent a couple of hours that included the "Meet the Teacher" session. We could also visit "Decade Rooms" where there were photos of the teachers from each decade, samples of clothing from the era, school jackets, athletic logos, theatre programs, commencement programs, etc. - even three trophies with my name on them. Trivia question: the trophies were all for the same thing. What was it?

The most crowded place in each Decade Room was the large piece of paper where visitors were invited to write down names of graduates from that decade who have died. It was sobering to see names I hadn't known about and to be reminded of three friends I missed very much today.

I met up with about 8 students from my graduating year (of 140), and it wasn't that difficult to recognize them - not that I didn't check their name tags to be safe. I think everyone approached it with the same attitude that I did. Nobody in our class brought their spouse, and everyone was restrained in presenting their life summaries - not a hint of boasting or one-upmanship. By choosing to attend the "Meet The Teacher" afternoon instead of the Pub Night or some other activity, I'm sure I met a particular subset of past classmates - probably sympathetic to the geeky side of life, like me. I didn't see any cheerleaders, football heroes or beauty queens (and there used to be a LOT of beauty contests).

The one disappointment was that there weren't many of my teachers to meet. I talked to exactly two of my nine teachers from senior year. Both of them were people who had made an impression on me, and I was happy to be able to tell them so. This included the biology teacher who led an annual trip where we waded chest-deep into a bog, and I was pleased to inform him that I've been in many bogs since then! Sadly, I learned that several of the teachers I'd hoped to see had passed away. Goose and Coach LD will be pleased to learn that the retired Phys-Ed teachers looked the best for their age. One of them who started teaching in the early 60s still looked like he could whip me in a 10K.

Glad I went, and I'd probably go to another one in 10 years!

As 'Bent and I headed into Caledon East on our way home for Thanksgiving, some idiot high school kid threw something from a bus window that thumped our windshield so hard that we were sure the glass would break - but fortunately it didn't. It was right in front of my face, and it wouldn't have been a good scene if it had shattered. Because I wasn't the one driving (ahem), we weren't able to catch the little punk, but we went to Robert F. Hall and had a pleasant little chat in the principal's office. When I mentioned the purpose of our visit to the receptionist, she said, "Oh, not AGAIN! We keep telling the students not to do that!" So if you're thinking of driving to Caledon East in the mid-afternoon on a week day, I'd recommend avoiding any route that passes by the school. They don't train 'em very well there, apparently.

Got two new power yoga DVDs in the mail today, so 'Bent and I tried workout #1 (of 3) on the Bryan Kest DVD. Supposedly he's the "yoga teacher to the stars", accepts payment for his classes by donation only, then gives most of it to charity. We were a little suspicious of his need to teach the class bare-chested in jean shorts with his long hair flowing... um, sorry, what was I saying again? But in fact, it was a good, stretchy session. He doesn't mention every position change, which means we'll need to sneak a few peeks at the TV until we get familiar with it.

Yes, it's been a bad week for training. I've felt like crapola but still might have gotten out there if I weren't also working toward a writing deadline for tomorrow. Unless it's midnight, in which case it is due today.

BTW, thanks to 'Bent for talking me into the yoga. I felt a lot better afterward!

Harmony Foods called tonight, and their organic Thanksgiving turkeys that everyone ordered a month in advance are arriving a day late. Guess who promised to bring the turkey to our family Thanksgiving dinner on Saturday - and now I am turkeyless!

So... my last major consulting job is in the news again. That should go over well at the high school reunion.

OK, I did it - I waited until 45 minutes before registration closed, then signed up for the high school reunion that I've been waffling on for a year. It's a big event marking 50 years since the school opened, so there will be hundreds of alumni of all ages. I can see the "who's coming" list, and it doesn't include any of the friends I've kept in touch with. Although I look at some names and think, "Oh yes, I liked her back then", there is a part of me - a *big* part - that has been feeling introverted and exhausted at the thought of all those introductions and conversations about what we've done with our lives. If it weren't for the "Meet The Teacher" session to which all teachers in the school's history have been invited, I probably wouldn't have signed up at all. Given my track record from last weekend, I wonder if I'll wimp out and just eat turkey this weekend instead!

I had bigger plans for today, but a house cleaner is coming here tomorrow, so of course I had to clean my house!

Interesting... The common wisdom (meaning my opinion!) is that I'm becoming a slower runner because I'm getting older and not getting better. But Attackpoint cannot tell a lie, and it says I'm on track to do about 2/3 as much running in 2009 as I did in 2008. Hmmm, ya think that might make a difference...? Overall, I'm on track to put in 10-20% more training hours this year - just not as much running, apparently. And a lot less adventure racing too, although I don't count rogaines, mountain marathons and ski marathons as AR, and those were our big events this year.

'Bent and I ran from home via Finnerty and Bruce Trail to Centreville Creek Rd. and back again. It's a nice rolling section of trail with occasional short steep hills where I pushed extra hard since uphill is the safest terrain for my ankle (which was braced). I also did some pick-ups in a few places where the trail was smooth and relatively flat. Tried to push the hips further forward, which seems to help but I forget to do it when I'm tired. I logged some additional level 5 intensity because 'Bent can - and did - chat away happily at my threshold pace, so I occasionally had to respond. "Did you hear about the new solar power incentive programs in China?" "Huffpuff-that'sgreathoney-huffpuff." Quite pleased with this one, aside from the bad ankle.

While watching comedy

Well... for the first time ever, I blew off a race that I'd paid for because I just didn't feel like doing it. It wasn't so much the cold, pelting rain as it was the short night of sleep combined with the realization that I would have to leave for Caledon Day 3.5 hrs earlier than my volunteer duties required. The $38 that I'd paid online (for a 5K road run - what was I thinking?) wasn't a factor in the decision at all.

The pooches were delighted. They watched me bike in front of old Seinfeld episodes, then I took them to Caledon East in a shameless (and highly effective) attempt to get people to visit our booth. What's funny is that my dogs know more people in the community than I do because they work in 'Bent's dental office. So whenever I take them to a public event, they're highly popular, and I get to know their friends better.

First leg workout since the ankle injury - felt good.

Since I'm volunteering at Caledon Day tomorrow, I decided at the last minute to register for the 5K run that is happening shortly before my volunteer shift.

The Positives:
1) I can combine my workout with my volunteer work.
2) My ankle is probably OK to run on the road.
3) Since I've never run a 5K race, I'm guaranteed to get a PB.

The Negatives:
1) When the confirmation list came up, it showed my name along with just 16 other people. Uh oh, there is a risk of placing last in a group that small!
2) Rain, rain, rain, rain - and cold.
3) Pavement - but I knew that.

Dropped by the Salomon Store to see the fall/winter line - it's like a completely different store. Couldn't resist - now I'm all set up for nordic skiing and winter running!

The drive back to Caledon after dinner at my mother-in-law's was *scary*. I thought my defrost had stopped working suddenly, then realized that I was in pea soup fog that lasted for the final 30 minutes of the drive. Good thing I know that road so well, since it would have been easy to miss a stop sign. I watched someone go through a red light across my path. Glad to be home!

I dug my Active Ankle out of the drawer and ran some of the Palgrave West trails with BulletDog. I'd forgotten how secure that brace makes me feel! Eventually I'll need to wean myself off it to gain ankle strength, but the injury is still too fresh for that.

As we approached Wheelie's Woods, we heard a chainsaw and a small crash. Not sure what they're doing in there, but the lumberjacks are probably not expecting folks on the trail, so we'll have to steer clear for awhile. We found trees and branches down on most trails due to the high winds earlier this week.

I'd grabbed a pair of old running shoes without thinking too hard about it, and BOY does it make a difference. I've been using my XT Wings lately, and the difference in support and cushioning between the Wings and my 3-year-old XA Pros was like night and day. Mustn't make that mistake again.

Hard Core with Caron has started for 09/10! Nice to get back with the group. She's got a new trick where we get into plank position with our arms on the mat and our feet on two frisbee-sized disks that slide on the floor. Then we hold the plank while we slide our feet into different positions. Apparently, this is just the beginning - ouch!

Yoga class - all the poses were accompanied by arm positions that stretched the shoulders and back. There was only one position that my ankle couldn't do - and another one that I probably shouldn't have done (upward dog with knees lifted off the ground). Felt good!