Training Log Archive: barb

Second day of the rogaine.

Adam and I ended up with 1820 points, which got us first place in mixed open. So I'm 3 "wins" for 3 in my little biweekly rogaine series. I'd been thinking about doing the Regaine in 2 weeks, and I might still, but I have some scheduling issues. Then I'd also considered the Georgia rogaine 2 weeks after the Regaine, just to keep the string going, but I've definitely decided against doing that one. I feel in relatively good shape physically. My feet did bother me in a blistery sort of way, but I didn't treat them afterward, and this morning just put my shoes on without thinking about it, and they're fine. I feel fairly alert and only pleasantly sore. I've wondered whether doing rogaines so close together would take a toll. I do have to say that I experienced more of those little blissy highs in the first rogaine (Oregon) than the other two - but maybe that had to do with the smell of sage and the lingering presence of the Bhagwan.


Tim and Dorothy came in a close 2nd. It was nice to meet them. They're from Rochester area.


Vlad and Vadim won overall. We saw them in the woods a few times.

I liked the relatively tough orienteering (for a rogaine) - particularly the controls in the middle of large hillsides (such as on vegetation boundaries or at stream bends). It gives the orienteers a bit of a leg up on the adventure racers. :-) We had a little trouble at some of the controls (notably 803), but found all the controls we looked for without too great a delay.

Adam has a faster metabolism than I, and I have more fat than he does. Lack of calories was an issue for him in our first rogaine together in Arizona (the world champs). (Ah, what a tasty rogaine that was!) This time, we estimated that he packed 7000 calories worth of food, and I packed 2500. He brought 10 sandwiches. I brought 1. He brought 10 granola bars. I brought 1. Then I ate 2 of his; he made them himself, and they were delicious. I bring small portions of a bunch of different things; I learned that from Sharon Crawford. Here is my menu: cheese and meat sandwich on nut/grain bread, potato chips, carrots, Macintosh apple, dried cherries, nuts, crackers, fig newtons, dried peas, dried corn, dried mango, and Adam's homemade granola bar. Yum! Oh, and some vanilla gu and electrolyte tablets.

Adam and I worked well together. We made decent route choices, and had good communication along the way about whether we were sticking to our bearing and what we were seeing. Adam's pace counting was precise. As a result, we were able to do things like move confidently at night on a rather baroque route along broad ridges that curved back and forth and radiated all manner of off-route spurs. On the way home, Adam and I did a post-mortem on our teamwork, and it made me eager to rogaine again and implement some of the ideas we discussed. Next time, I'd work on planning and agreeing on the details of each leg before we start on it. Adam suggested that I train for climbing hills, which would make a big difference, as I am excruciatingly slow going uphill. I just moved to a 7th floor office at work, and should probably start taking the stairs. Adam and I have trouble hearing each other, and have to ask each other to repeat things often - or sometimes I don't bother and I miss what he's said. An obvious problem.

We executed our route nearly as planned, dropping one control, and adding two, but only getting one of the several controls we'd identified along optional extension routes.

We had a lot of short stops, and I didn't keep track of the, so I'm not subtracting those out of our time.

I hope to get a chance to draw in our route on the map and think about how we might have been more efficient.

Eric and Mary did a pack drop, and the pack was gone when they got back. That sucked.

On the way home, I called Dave, who said that everything had gone well while I was away. Isabel's soccer team lost again, but they played well. Everyone went to see "Stolen" about that theft from the Isabella Stuart Gardner museum. And Katia was in an accident! Actually, that happened Thursday evening, but Dave didn't find out until after I'd left for the rogaine. She was hit by a car. She wasn't wearing a helmet. She got thrown, and broke something, and spent a lot of hours in the hospital, and her hand/arm is in a sling. Not surprisingly, she was very upbeat about it, according to Dave. "I got to see what an American ambulance is like!" "I am doing much better now; it hardly hurts at all!" "How lucky I was that I didn't get run over by the car!" Things like that.

Event: North American Rogaine Championships
 

First day of the North American Rogaine Championships in Allegany (Allegheny?) State Park in New York. This was the third time I partnered with Adam Rudner. I very much enjoy rogaining with Adam. We communicated well and avoided the problems we've had at night previously, which was a major goal.

It was perfect weather: cool, and no rain.



I took this photo at a water stop. Two water stops had no water, which is dangerous and unfair. The first water stop had plenty of water jugs - but an animal had clawed into every jug and emptied it. The second one did not have enough water put out for all the competitors, and it was all gone. We got help from another team who gave us some decontamination chemicals.


Here is Jeff Saeger offering me a fig newton before the event, which I knew was an auspicious sign.

Bike fartleks (with some bike yoga during the slow bits) with Dave across bridge to JP Licks, 11:15 pm - 12:15 am. Incidentally, obtained additional evidence that K has an ice cream addiction. When we asked her to save the kids if the house went up in flames, and explained our mission, she rattled off 10 ice cream shops within biking distance, with their closing hours and relative quality of ice cream. And she's been here only 3 months. The other evidence was that the closest thing to a complaint I heard from her during the Pennsylvania rogaine was "I have been daydreaming of ice cream."

Along the river, I approached two attractive pony-tailed young women just rising from a bench and hugging each other, all friendly and happy. As I rode past, I overheard just this: "I'll get you the map." I have no idea what skog nymphs are, but I imagine them to be exactly like these two.

C • Ice cream?! 3

Meant to go just for 10 minutes, but I don't know the streets and got myself onto one that led away and away until it thought I'd put in enough time. Saw, smelled and suckled on sweet honeysuckle.

That's the Representative from Delaware (there's not more than one, is there?) showing us the secret sign for getting into the orienteering supply cabinet in the Hart Congressional Office Building. He's holding a NASA prototype of a PSF10-OS space control; it's got a solar cell in the middle but otherwise has the same basic electronic design as the PSF8.