Training Log Archive: iansmith

After a somewhat unproductive day at work, I ambled down to the gym. I have found that I enjoy the elliptical much more if I don't use the arm levers and instead either let them hang freely or grip the heart rate sensors. My leg felt acceptable, with infrequent moments of discomfort. I read The Greatest Show on Earth for a time. To add a little variety, I reversed the direction of rotation for the last two minutes.

A hodgepodge, including:
- calf raises
- squats
- dead lifts
- Oblique side bends
- crunches
- pushups
- supine chest fly
- curls

I will weigh myself tomorrow after imbibing a few liters of water for the 10 kg weight loss challenge.

The end of the 30 km women's nordic skiing race at the 2010 Olympics. Marit Bjoergen is my hero, but props to Justyna Kowalczyk. Both of them were double poling for their lives at the end. Phenomenal. I'm not sure why Bjoergen switched from dp to striding or whatever seconds before the finish; maybe the lactate was getting to be too much.

I'm not sure why the mens' and womens' events at the Olympics are of different length. A quick examination of the results will show that the winning times are similar (though men are about 10% faster). Women do compete in longer races, e.g. the Vasaloppet. I feel the same way about orienteering races at the world championships; the women's long final winning time in 2010 was 72 minutes; the men's was 92. I would like to see Marit Bjoergen ski 50 km instead of 30 at the Olympics.

An interesting discussion on religious education in Britain:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-214007174...#

In the discussion, an implicit requirement for religious education is that it be compatible with integration into the society. It also seemed that the proponents of religious schools asserted that religious schools do not prohibit open discussion on the various issues.

A stronger requirement is that the religious schools do not impart their social teachings on the pupils. Ignoring the backgrounds of the students, this would mean that the distribution of social conclusions among graduates would be independent of the school.

I assume the associated religion of a school does impact the social conclusions of its students (otherwise what would be the point of such a school). It would be very difficult to disentangle the effect of the religious affiliation of a student's family from the religious affiliation of the school, particularly since they are likely to be the same.

C • Family vs school 6

What would Marit Bjoergen do?

An interesting article: State Disparities in Teenage Birth Rates in the United States: pdf

The two obvious followups are abortion rates (which are probably not collected) and the distribution of sex education (abstinence only, contraceptives, etc).

On an unrelated note, even though I'm dying of the plague and not eating, my weight seems to have increased over the past few weeks. I guess this should set up the lose 10 kg challenge well, but it's mystifying.

C • Water 2

Some rehabilitation exercises and general strength. I am concerned that my lower left tibia has a stress fracture, so I'm taking it easy for a while. Whatever the nature of the pain I felt, the logical course is to strengthen my muscles. Biking may be a suitably low impact activity to train, though I am concerned that I might start to develop biking related muscle injuries.

C • bike muscle injuries? 4

Senate ratifies nuclear arms treaty with Russia

Excerpts:

The Senate voted 71-26 in favor of the treaty after a contentious debate with Republican leaders that threatened traditional bipartisanship on national security affairs.

Passage of the treaty on a bipartisan vote that included 13 Republicans was a big victory for Obama just weeks after he was crippled in November congressional elections.

I find this particularly troubling:

Senator Jeff Sessions said Obama's goal of a nuclear-free world was "cockamamie" and called for a rejection of the treaty.

"I think the whole world would see the Senate action (rejection of the treaty) as a resurgence of America's historical policy of peace through strength and a rejection of a leftist vision of a world without nuclear weapons," Sessions said.

C • "leftist" nuclear free world 4

Tired by the end. Also, my lower left leg seems to be hurting; I will RICE it and NSAID it.

C • Yes you WILL 1

After a somewhat productive afternoon at my office, I went to the gym for another mixed fitness session. I kept the resistance settings on the bike low - 8/20 as opposed to my usual 10 or 11/20 - to emphasize moving my legs quickly and lightly. I felt good on the bike, though after I got off, my right hamstring started hurting. After some stretching, I hopped on the treadmill for a ginger running session, focusing on form and running easily. I started at 5 mph and drifted up to 8 by the end of the session.

One lingering effect of my injury on my running form is that I don't lift my left foot as high as my right foot on the recovery. There's a mirror in front of the treadmills, so I monitored my form closely on this relaxed session (most of which was at 6.5 mph). I read Fallen Giants on my Kindle while on the bike, and watched the Patriots beat the Jets while running on the treadmill. American football is too intermittent to hold my attention usually, but with a loud treadmill and a hypoxic euphoria, it seems adequate.

Tonight, a posse of Ross + Sam, Ed, Caroline, and I went bowling at Lanes and Games. We played two games of ten pin and had a grand time. I set another PR, with a 161; my full scores:

1: 9- 7- 8/ 7/ 6/ X X 62 X 7/X = 161
2: X 8- 7/ 71 X 7- 31 71 8- 81 = 104

As at the CSU Superstars event, I had a great first game followed by a tremendous plunge. Again, Sam lost to me in the first game, but beat me with consistent play in the second (116, 110). Ed beat me overall, with (142, 135). There are odd parallels between my bowling and my O'ing; on days with two races, I tend to perform poorly on the second race. I guess I lack the stamina for two races, and my right forearm weakens after one game. I bowled with a 16 pound ball.

There were many amusing quirks in our delivery methods. Sam lines up, then shifts her body 30 cm to the left and swings the ball where she once stood. Caroline has a really strong, pendular wind up; she experimented with left handed shots for a few frames in the second game. Ed charges forward, releases the ball in a very straight, accurate trajectory, and slams on his brakes with both feet down, sliding to a halt just before the foul line. Ross releases the ball precisely and smoothly low to the ground, and compensated nicely in his first game for a right tendency. I tend to kick my right foot behind my left leg when I release the ball, I guess to compensate for the angular momentum. It's like my squirrel tail; it helps to stabilize. Ross took some videos, which may or may not appear on AP.

It is clear that we need to train more often. In the first game, we had 17 spares and 8 strikes. In the second, we had only 7 spares and 7 strikes. Interestingly, avg first shot pins (the number of pins knocked down from the first ball in each frame) was 6.36 in the first game and 6.08 in the second; our scores suffered from our poor accuracy on the second ball and a bad spare conversion rate. My first shot pin average was 8 in the first round and 7.5 in the second. I also had two humiliating falls on my releases in the second game.

On the omnibus appropriations bill currently in Congress right now:

http://thinkprogress.org/2010/12/16/omnibus-hypocr...
http://thehill.com/blogs/on-the-money/appropriatio...

One of the central points of the rhetoric against government spending is that earmarks are necessarily wasteful. Congress can allocate funds either generally to executive branch agencies - which then distribute the funds to projects according to their determination - or explicitly assign federal funds to particular projects in appropriations bills. Earmarks are widely criticized because they are piggybacked on appropriations legislation without review or public hearing.

It seems clear that the process for earmarks should be reformed, but the notion that removing earmarks will make a significant impact on federal spending is a myth. An often cited statistic in the media is that there are 6700 earmarks in this bill. Without context, this is a meaningless statistic (of course, we can infer the average number of earmarks per senator is 67...). According to Senator Tom Coburn's database, those constitute $8.3 billion of appropriations.

The FY11 Appropriations bill, according to CBO, will constitute $1.106 trillion of non-emergency budget authority (BA). (I'm not sure I understand the terminology, but I think the difference between outlays and BA is that outlays can include money allocated to pay for spending from previous years, whereas BA is stuff spent this FY). Also, note that $520 billion of the non-emergency BA spending is defense related.

While I think the earmark process should be reexamined, note that the earmarks in this bill from BOTH parties constitute 0.75% of the proposed spending bill. Everyone in the US should read this comic.

I hope the above puts commentary like that below in a new context.

http://www.redstate.com/brian_d/2010/12/15/omnibus...
http://www.patriotactionnetwork.com/forum/topics/t...
http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/demint-lets-re...

I went to the gym in my office for an "easy" pace training session, though I think my heart rate was a bit too high. In the future, I might cover up the statistics screens on the machines so I don't push for arbitrary goals (like 10 min/mile on the elliptical). As with last time, I used two machines in the hope that this will better distribute the stress of my muscles and bone while increasing the cardiovascular stress.

My left leg felt a bit stiff, and while the fracture site seemed unperturbed, I had some discomfort in my lower leg on the anterior of my tibia. I don't know if this is because of muscular atrophy, some secondary injury, or typical running discomfort.

"We took risks, we knew we took them; things have come out against us, and therefore we have no cause for complaint, but bow to the will of Providence, determined still to do our best to the last [...] Had we lived, I should have had a tale to tell of the hardihood, endurance, and courage of my companions which would have stirred the heart of every Englishman. These rough notes and our dead bodies must tell the tale, but surely, surely, a great rich country like ours will see that those who are dependent on us are properly provided for."

C • A great man. 2

Warmup.

Distance doesn't mean much. I read Fallen Giants: A History of Himalayan Mountaineering on my Kindle. The tibia felt good, but the knees were discomforted by the end of the workout.

I followed up with about 10 minutes of stretching.

Apparently British English uses the transitive verb "to post" in lieu of American "to mail."

C • Yes, but 1

Temperature -10 C. I wore jeans, my big green jacket, and the standard black gloves. I was comfortable except that I couldn't feel my face by the end of the trip. My ears were screaming in protest, as if to say "it's -10C outside; what the bloody hell are you doing on a bike?"

I guess I should by some ear muffs or a face mask.

C • or a buff 5

After work, I ambled down to the gym in our building and did the following:

22 minute warmup on stationary bike
5x 1 minute on/1 minute off intervals, stationary bike

3 weight circuits:
- 15 x bicep curls, 25 lbs
- 15 x overhead press, 50 lbs
- 25 x leg curls (machine), 80 lbs
- 25 x chest press (machine), 80 lbs
- 50 x bicycle crunches
- 25 x tuck ups
- 15 x squats, 80 lbs
- 25 x toe raises, 80 lbs
- 20 x single arm clean and press, 35 lbs

20 minute easy elliptical
1 burrito (Anna's)

I am reluctant to do plyometrics because I expect that explosive muscle action will put much more stress on my legs than distributed effort. However, I will rely increasingly more on body weight.

Some provocative articles I read today:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/artic...
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/artic...
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/artic...

http://www.ted.com/talks/julian_assange_why_the_wo...

Three essential components for a multi-day training camp (assuming a map and permissions exist):

1. Course setter(s)
2. Support personnel to set and retrieve controls or streamers
3. Housing

In practice, 1 and 2 can be combined, or even assigned to the training group. For instance, at CSU Pawtuckaway camps, either a volunteer participating in the event has stepped up (e.g. Brendan, Clem, Ross), or the responsibility is rotated among the attendees.

People will be willing to travel farther if the event is a multi-day camp instead of one day. Housing is therefore necessary. Camping is adequate in sufficiently warm conditions, but hot showers are helpful. A hotel can work, but the social setting and company are not as good as when a private residence or gathering place is available.

Therefore, the logistics of setting up a training camp open to sufficiently competent people (i.e. those who can extricate themselves from the woods without difficulty) require someone to design some number of training exercises (probably 2-4 per day), a support crew, and housing.

C • Yes 10

My legs, obliques, and even arms are sore from the weekend's escapades. I scrapped my plans for a weights session in favor of rest.

Jumping in wing suits (flying squirrel suits) looks amazing, but it appears to have an unacceptably high probability of death, particularly that which is featured in the first link below.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ttz5oPpF1Js (I love the group launch at 1:05)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=duToigOKAqw&feature...


Control Count: 104/2000
Burrito Count: 44
Anna's, Anna's

C • amazing 3

Event: US Team Official 3K time trial (the second of two trials in 2010)
 

The second day of the weekend's events consisted of actual orienteering. While I had intended to run lightly, I was feeling good from Saturday's events, and my competitive drive kicked in on the sprint. Alex set an excellent course on a solid map of UMass Amherst's campus. The edges of the map weren't quite complete, and the course barely fit on the page, but the detail was accurate.

I started by running the wrong way out of the start; for some foolish reason, I thought I was starting at control 1. I corrected after about ten seconds, for a net loss of twenty seconds. Giovanni started a minute behind me, and I pushed hard at the beginning to try to stay ahead of him. He caught up to me by control 7, and passed me before 8. The hill climb to 9 was brutal and taxing.

I bounced about with Katia until control 14, when Sam cruised past me. I put on a burst of speed to try to pull away from her, but I only gained ten or so meters before my effort failed. Sam and Katia then passed me, and I struggled to chug along at the end. The spirit was willing, but the body was weak. It was a struggle with each step, particularly near the end, and my breathing was ragged. I remember being able to go faster than I am. Nevertheless, I was ecstatic to find myself stronger than I expected; I was at times able to run faster than 4:00 /km.

After relaxing indoors at Alex's office at U Mass for a time, we set off for the second event at Quabbin. This race was a mass start with courses customized for each individual by PG. The courses were devised such that each individual was expected to be out for about the same length of time. The map was at 1:15k scale, and the vegetation in general had thickened since the map was made. In particular, there were numerous fallen trees with logs and scattered underbrush.

The mass start didn't cause me problems. It took me some time to get adjusted to the scale, and I was wheezing and out of breath throughout the run. I felt very weak, and it seemed that insufficient oxygen was the limiting factor for me. I guess that's the general feeling that emerges from poor fitness (i.e. low VO2).

The map was very good, though the detail was limited by the scale. The most interesting part of the race was running into other people who were not necessarily attacking the same control I was. Boris, JJ and I had a particularly harrowing experience running up a trail just before the road crossing that was laden with numerous fallen trees. The climb up the hill after the road was exhausting, and curiously, while I had enough energy, I had very little power. Once I reached the top of the hill, I was able to run through the clear woods, but I could not push up the hill faster. I was quite tired near the end of the course, but the pressure of a mass finish drove me on.

The last control was up a non-trivial hill, and I slowly trudged up the slope. Just as I approached the streamer, I heard crashing through the vegetation behind me. I reasoned that I was in danger of being passed, so I started my charge to the finish with over 300 meters to go. The trail around the lake bed had poor footing, and my worst fears were realized when Ali cruised past me. I tucked in behind her until the trail leveled out, then I spent everything I had left on the final sprint. I was undoubtedly helped by the fact that the finish was downhill, and I just managed to get ahead of her before we tagged Peter. She did run a much longer course, but I will take my victories where I can. The speed plot from the gps track has a nice rise where I noted Ali's approach.

Tonight was an inconvenient time to realize I didn't have any naproxen in my apartment.

Control Count: 104/2000
Burrito Count: 42

UMass Sprint - Splits

Event: CSU Orienteering Superstars
 

CSU Superstars Bowling. I need to retrieve my explicit scores from Peter, but I had a PR 146 in the first game and an unremarkable 109? in the second game. It should noted that Sam (scores: 126, 122) obliterated me in the second game, more due to her proficiency than my failure. A score of 109 is not outside of my typical probability distribution, so clearly I need to train more.

After watching and cheering during the 3 km time trial, I decided to tootle around the track thrice to see how my legs felt. I didn't time my escapade, but my legs were comfortable and without pain.

As is well known, I really like mountains. I lack mountaineering experience, though I may one day try to surmount a peak like Denali. Hiking in the Whites, the Rockies, and even little guys like the Franklin Mountains in my hometown of El Paso is very satisfying. I'm not as intrepid as some, but I might consider a trek to a basecamp of one of the 8,000 meter peaks or something.

Anyway, with Google maps, I can indulge my thirst for data on these peaks. My favorite mountain by many measures is K2; it is a sublime behemoth of great beauty, power, and majesty. Consider K2's contour profile: K2's contour profile

The contours are nearly circular; the mountain is very nearly a cone. It rises over 3,000 meters above the great Baltoro Glacier to the south. Along its steepest grades - to the north, southeast and southwest, it ascends over three vertical kilometers in less than three horizontal kilometers. On its north side, it rises 3 km in 2.5 horizontal kilometers, for an average angle of fifty degrees. The mountain itself is so remote that it was not given a native name, unlike Everest (Sagarmatha) or Mt. McKinley (Denali).

Compare K2's exquisite pyramid to Everest and Denali, at approximately the same scale:
Everest (Sagarmatha)
Denali (zoom in to get higher contour resolution)

It's a little hard to appreciate how massive these mountains really are. Here are some other famous mountains at similar magnification to K2:
Matterhorn (Mt. Cervino)
The Eiger, with its formidable North face
Rainier, an impressively wide and intricate volcano, with a peak average grade of about 25 degrees.
The Presidentials
Aconcagua

The magnitude of these mountains overwhelms me (particularly K2).



Control Count: 73/2000
Burrito Count: 42
Anna's Th, Star Market Fr

C • Nice list 2

A difficult, slow run. I paused at about 27:00 to stretch and breathe. My muscles were weak and very tight, particularly my entire right leg, my lower left calf, and both hamstrings. I stretched thoroughly after the run.

Consider the majesty that is Mt. Foraker, the third highest peak in the United States:





Control Count: 73/2000
Burrito Count: 40
Chipotle

C • PT 2

C • Consider the hotness that is Mt. Foraker 5