Training Log Archive: cmorse

A group of about 10 for the weekly Traprock training run - 4 weeks to race day. Original plan was to run two loops but decided not to push it and scaled back to just a single loop. Felt fine, but 20 seemed too much after yesterday.

Mileage starting to pick up, just shy of 350 for the year, 140 for March so far.

Early trail run with Bruce, Mark, Scott & John. About 46F at the start, but temp dropped around dawn. Bit chilly toward the end. I cut out a bit short of the others as I somehow got the notion to run a 5k race after doing a long slow training run just to see how stupid an idea that might be.

The 5k was less than a mile from the long run meeting place so got a bit chilled waiting almost an hour before race time. Changed shoes & shirts, had some hammer gel & topped up electrolytes. Warmed up for about 15 minutes beforehand and actually felt good on the line. A crowd of about 225 and a lot of young high school XC types. Going to be fast.

{edit} - apparently the total of 225 included the shorter kids races, looks like 172 official finishers in the 5K

Course starts & finishes on road, but goes onto trails @ Porter & Howard reservoirs within 100m. Very fast start, felt like I was in a slipstream behind all the younger runners. The course was extremely runnable, but had it's share of muddy sections, small rocks & tree roots which apparently slowed many runners, but I opened it up and passed many folks on the first benign little knoll. Felt good so pushed to open a gap in chasers. Dave Merkt a couple spots in front of me, but I felt unlikely to close on him so didn't push super hard, just hard enough to keep a cushion on chasers.

About 300m from the finish a spectator yelled 'he's gaining on you' as I went by and noted Aaron Flamino' closing hard. Found another gear and left everything on the final 100m of road to stay 2 sec in front of him. Amazing myself I managed to finish in 7th place and first master!

I guess 15 mile warmups aren't such a bad thing...

Run @ Case with Ryan & Kristina. First run on bare earth in a long, long time. Wet and muddy, but what a joy to run on. Unfortunately, just before the summit of Case, Kristina pulled something in her groin and could not continue, so Ryan helped walk her out to Spring St. while I ran back to Glastonbury to get my car and drive around to shuttle them back. Thus my return trip was probably 40% off trail - cutting tangents on the trail and taking a few overland routes to save some distance and time. Very brisk pace on the return run. Felt great...

GPS didn't acquire until 5:15 into the run...

Started solo, ran a bit with Bruce, Mark & Tony but skipped pavement & ice at bottom. Then off to work. Could have gone further, felt really good, no residuals from the weekend. Looking like back to back long runs this weekend. This bumps me over 300 miles for the year...

Feel pretty fine today. Tired from lack of sleep & some general fatigue, but otherwise not bad at all considering lack of long training.

Thoughts from Snowgaine-

temp management - started each day with extra light fleece shed within 30 minutes. otherwise comfortable all day, no need to go into dry clothes, hat or gloves. Started Saturday with nylon pants, but waist is blown and even pinning to shirt they were sagging too much. Stuffed into pack as emergency in case of not being able to travel. Regular tights were fine, even with lots off falling down, in and occasional partial brook submersions. 'ski boots good and warm, o shoes (worn with snowshoes for 2 hrs Sat) led to cold toes at end, but they were soaked from streams etc too.

fuel - perpeteum 6 scoops per 4 hour bottle worked well. Me like. hammer gel too thick @ 32F. poles precluded hand bottle so didn't have Nuun during race - no cramping, but not as high exertion/sweat level either. carried clif bars, didn't eat them on course. Perhaps just carry one for backup?

eyewear - opted against contacts, glasses good except for final push Saturday - high exertion rate, face too hot causing fogging. Keep exertion rate lower. Also found lower exertion level of skiing versus snowshoe beneficial / made decent pace without overexerting. Practice slower, lower intensity running as long runs ramp up in duration.

C • distance 1