Training Log Archive: expresso

Warm up/down before/after all races. Clearly not enough.

Flying Pig Sprint @ French Park. Chilly morning with very fresh breeze but I was sweating by the finish. Not a very good race for me. I misread the foliage to 1, chose a poor route to 2 and skipped finding an attack point to 6. One error is too much in a sprint and I had 3. This is another good learning experience and I will break it down over the next few days.

Flying Pig Sprint @ Burnett Woods. Much easier park-o sprint although there were a lot of good route choice legs. The only thing that slowed me down was my fitness & speed (i.e. 5k skills). As I've been emphasizing long runs and not tempo/intervals, this is to be expected. The really cool thing is that this park bordered my alma mater, UC. Had I known that I'd be competing there 20 years later I probably would have taken at least one walk through there while in school.

I stayed with mom the whole time and had a great time. On Saturday night we dined near UC (where she taught) and went to see the film "Das Leben der Anderen." I can't say enough good about this movie so I won't bother trying (although it's in my top 10, all time). I have vivid memories of driving through East Germany to West Berlin almost 30 years ago. We also toured East Berlin through Checkpoint Charlie on the same trip. Of course there is no comparison to having lived in the DDR or other Eastern Bloc countries. This movie touched these deep/scary memories of mine so maybe my movie review is overly skewed, but it did win the Oscar.

Sprint 3 (Blue/Red) - Splits

Sprint 3 (Blue/Red) - Splits

Event: Flying Pig XI
 

After driving to/from Cinti nearly 100 times, I could almost time it to the minute (so I did). I made a poor route choice through Chicago but recoved well with a clean run the rest of the way. I arrived about an hour before my start with just the right amount of time to warmup & get my head into my upcoming run. I was expecting a technical and hilly course. As I get little practice with either of these types, I was a little concerned going into the race.

Decent warm up/down with add'l stretching.

Short Pig (middle) @ Miama Whitewater. Very cool and breezy but I ran in short sleeves knowing that I'd st* warm up on the hills (which I did). Some good stuff on this course but I was a little off as I was becoming accustomed to the terrain & map. I also had 1.5 booms on the course. I need to analyze them a little closer to find the flaws and determine how to avoid these types.

Red - Splits

Spin on the elliptical and then some stretching (time not logged).

Alternated between 400s, 300p. Felt smooth. Then some jacuzzin' (time not logged =).

Pokey run out (and almost back) at OO path. Still pretty sore.

Reflecting on the past weekend, I feel like I just got back from an a-meet. I am physically tired from both days and emotionally drained from the build-up & execution of directing a successful CAOC meet. Fortunately, everything went great and I just need to recharge my batteries before the Pig.

Too little warmup/down.

This is a race that we chuckle about for a while. Jeff set some great courses but expressed concern that they were too short. I never saw the maps beforehand because I planned to run. It wasn't until red runners were limping in to the finish completely gassed from their race. OCAD had measured the distance at 6.46K so winning times were expected to be around 50 minutes with most people coming in before 90 minutes. No way!! Someone layed a ruler on the map and measured almost 10K for red; apparently the OCAD scale was off by 50%. LOL!! Componding this was tough footing and many route choices to either add a lot of distance or have you bushwhacking through green. BTW, all courses were off by this factor so we had many white runners out almost an hour and most orange over two. I think I'll call our meet the "Camo Goat" because it was a goat race in disguise. As meet director, I started late and thus knew the distance I was going to face. I hadn't brought any Gu to the meet so I mooched some energy bars and jammed my pocket full of raisins before my start. I paced myself because I knew it was going to be long and I was a bit fatigued from yesterday. My race was fine, I planned ahead and executed ok. I had a few errors but they are correctable and not fundamental o-flaws. I was not thrilled with my sixth place result but I know how to improve this. I felt quite good physically and am well on track with my fitness goals. One highlight that I'll take with me is winning the split to control 12. The top three runners took all of the other winning splits but I knew my planned route to 12 was sound and I executed it perfectly. Plus, my advanced acquisition of mass over the years gave me the advantage of higher momentum down the long slope. Those thin Europeans will learn this American secret someday.

C • ocad 6