Training Log Archive: Bash

Tired with sore quads today! A good day for a big Indian food feast with 'Bent's Mom, and an interesting movie on satellite - "Proof" with Gwyneth Paltrow, Jake Gyllenhaal, Anthony Hopkins and Hope Davis. The damage from my front slide on a sandy trail may take awhile to heal. There was never any blood on my arm, just a very fine abrasion like sandpaper, about 5 cm in diameter. It hurts like crazy and remains very messy. Yuck. Now I know why some experienced ultrarunners were wearing long sleeves in 30C temperatures.

Event: Dirty Girls (6, 12 & 24 hr) Trail Race
 

Well-organized first-time event with good sponsorship and lots of cool little details, like the yummy buttertart that was handed to each racer at the finish line, with a little thank you card tied to its package.

A hilly 10K marked trail run was set up at Mansfield, and there were 6-hr, 12-hr and 24-hr categories. Racers could enter solo or do laps relay-style as a team. To my surprise, very few people entered the team category. I wasn't surprised to see so many solos - I just thought that a few more people would take advantage of the opportunity to enjoy a summer's day of fun training with friends, similar to the very popular mountain bike relays. The Tree Huggers consisted of 'Bent, Hingo, Tiny and me, and we were all just looking for a fun day of hanging out at our campsite with some good training thrown in. ThunderDog and BulletDog came along as team mascots. We were looking forward to cheering for our friends and enjoying good company. We'd also offered to support Char V, who was competing in the national 12-hr solo championship, which gave us something useful to do besides reading the newspaper, chatting, snacking, and calling out "Good job!" to passing runners.

'Bent did our team's first lap, and Hingo and I were hanging out in the shade in our big screened-in tent. I commented that 'Bent had recently done a 10K trail run in 44 min, so we agreed that as soon as the first couple of runners came by, Hingo should go to the nearby transition zone. This was a great plan, except when we saw the first runner pounding over the hill toward us after 46 min, it was 'Bent. Aacckk! Hingo fumbled with the tent zipper for a second in his surprise, then dashed over to the transition zone in the nick of time. It was 5 minutes before the 2nd place runner came by, and SHE was on a competing relay team. TVP came by looking strong in 3rd place, but unfortunately he had to abandon the race there due to very uncomfortable heat rash. He headed home to suntan his nether regions.

The Tree Huggers don't have a good history with marked race courses, and this one was no exception. There was one sketchy intersection, and Hingo misinterpreted the markings, which was easy to do. As Tiny waited at the transition zone longer than expected, we heard reports of an "adventure racer guy" who had passed people running the wrong direction on the trail. Oh oh, that sounds like our team. Sure enough, Hingo had done an extra loop out there before a kind gentleman turned him around. So that was an 11K lap for our team, and actually his time was pretty good.

Tiny and I went out in turn as the heat and humidity got worse. We noticed that some of the 6-hr solo racers quit early, and several of them mentioned that they hadn't run in weather like this for a long time. Our team was doing well except for one little thing - we were unable to stick to our plan of making it "just a fun day of training". It turned out that the only other team in the 12-hr category had one more member than we did, and boasted a couple of strong runners. The competition between our teams was very close, so all of us kept pushing hard, in spite of our protestations that we were just out there for a good time. Any one of us would have been undisappointed - perhaps even relieved - if *another* team member had slowed down and put us out of contention so that we could relax, but each one of us was damned if it was going to be us that would make the team lose.

And so we ran in turn throughout the day, with most team members putting in three 10K loops. As we approached the finish, we had a strategy decision to make. Unlike the mountain bike relays, this race would end exactly at the 12-hr mark. You had to check in with course marshalls at the 2.5K, 5K and 7.5K marks, and you could receive credit for a partial lap. So we decided to switch our last two runners, sending the speedy 'Bent out for a 4th lap before I started my 3rd lap. Since I'm the slower runner, and I would be the one running the partial lap, our team would get the most out of the remaining minutes.

What I'd expected was for 'Bent to arrive in plenty of time for me to run a relaxed 5K in the dark. But as I arrived at the transition zone, I saw someone tearing across the field - someone who looked very familiar... Oh NO! Glancing at my watch, I realized that if I beat my best time to the 7.5K mark by a minute, I could record an extra quarter lap. And of course, my competitive nature required that I make the attempt. Rats! So instead of a relaxed jaunt through the woods, I had to sprint hard on my tired legs. I missed seeing a tree root in the dark, and did a Superman dive that resulted in huge bloody scrapes on my arm, but I had to leap up and not lose precious seconds. When I looked at my watch at 5K, it seemed almost impossible, but I knew there was a big downhill section ahead that I could push harder on, so I decided to keep trying. I got to the 7.5K course marshall with 40 seconds to spare. Phew!

So our team got to stand on the coveted "Dirtiest Girl" and "Dirtiest Guy" podiums, with a distance of 127.5K over 12 hrs. The 2nd place team recorded 120K. The top solo in the 12-hr event did 102.5K, and our friend Char V just missed winning the women's solo event with 90K. The amazing Laurie McGrath had already completed more than 110K in the 24-hr solo event. Wow!!

Lap #1. My goal for the day was to run everything, including all the uphills, and I succeeded in all three laps - although some of my running was excruciatingly slow. Man, it was hot out there!! It was a great event for the ego because most solos obviously can't push hard for hours on end, so I didn't get passed on any of my laps. The majority of the people that I passed were walking or even standing still. Hey, I think that ultrarunning might be the sport for me! But having said that, I was quite happy to retire to my lawnchair in the shade with a cold drink, and raid the cooler for snacks while my teammates did their laps. Real ultrarunners are very tough cookies.

Lap #2. Hotter. Slower. No zip in the legs at all. But it actually went faster in my brain - perhaps because I knew exactly what to expect, so I was looking ahead for certain intersections and curves in the trail.

Lap #3. As described above, this was a mad dash to see if I could reach the 7.5K marshall before the air horn sounded at 9 p.m.

This was more like intensity level 8, but the system doesn't let me enter it that way. This was a sudden, unplanned run after 'Bent returned home with only one of two dogs that he had taken out for a walk. He wanted me to come quickly to help him look for ThunderDog at the last place in the forest that he'd seen her. Luckily, she emerged from nowhere shortly after we arrived - with a big smile on her face and completely covered in tiny burrs. Crash, in case you heard someone screaming in the woods... don't worry, it was only me.

ThunderDog and I went for a hike under steel grey skies. Go ahead and laugh, Urthbuoy and Revy, but this was my first time alone in the forest behind our place since the cougar was spotted in there almost 2 weeks ago. Considering that I've hiked alone in the Rockies many, many times, I know that my feelings are totally inconsistent - but that's how it is. I kept ThunderDog on leash so she wouldn't do any chasing. It was nice to be out there again.

Info for the locals... the Ontario Puma Foundation says that a female cougar has been living in the Loretto area, but they're wondering if she's moved down to Palgrave. There was a sighting in Glen Haffy several months ago, plus the recent sighting near the Palgrave Forest & Wildlife Area. For further proof of our wilderness status, a farmer in Caledon East spotted a black bear recently. Hey, who needs to go out west?

Rocky was a welcome addition to this week's Albion group ride! Like Leanimal, she goes just enough faster than I do that it inspires me to work harder, but she is nice enough to not desert me. 'Bent was back to his usual recumbent bike - which was good, given the amount of technical single track we did. I don't think the Orion is up to all that.

Just when I thought this was going to be another pleasant, uneventful, sunny ride, 'Bent headed up onto the trail that steps down the dusty hillside high above Lake Albion. We'd ridden it last week, and it was so rutted and torn up that we'd agreed (or so I thought) that we wouldn't ride it again this year. But there we were, and when I came around the corner where the steepest, dustiest, most rutted part began, I saw 'Bent on the ground and Rocky forced to stop suddenly right behind him. I was going at a good clip, and I had about 3 bike-lengths in which to act, with a couple of big, rooty, sandy steps on the way. And so I flew over the handlebars, apparently breaking much of the fall with my right knee, wrist, nose and chin, plus the bike smashed onto my left ankle bone. My main concern was seeing the end of a log pointed toward me as I slid face first, since I didn't want to ram into it. It was one of those falls where you just lie there in slight shock, polling your body parts to make sure they're all answering and imagining what could have happened. Rocky came back, taking the bike off me and pulling me to my feet. (Thank you!) I was very cautious for the rest of the ride, and it wasn't until I got into the shower that I realized that I'd banged the top of my right shoulder harder than anything else. Just as well - that's better than my head getting stopped by the log! I'm not sure I've ever done an endo since moving to a Gary Fisher frame (supposedly designed to reduce the possibility).

Anyone interested in joining the Tree Huggers in a last-minute entry for this Saturday's Dirty Girls Run at Mansfield? It's set up like a mountain bike relay, with teams hanging out at a base camp while their teammates head out for 10 km trail runs. We'd like to do the 12-hr relay with a 5-person team. Most members would do two 10-km loops, but probably 'Bent and one other person would do 3 loops. At the moment, we've just got 'Bent, Hingo and myself, which means that the 6-hr relay would be more appropriate, since we're just doing this event for fun to support a cool new event. Late entry fee per person is $90.

Please get in touch soon if you're interested!

Rocky was a welcome addition to the Tuesday Gurlz Run. Normally, Leanimal and I can't convince anyone of the joys of running the hilly HVT with us at mid-day in summer. Rocky led us down the CSI trail, which was a pretty cool discovery, even though there were a few places where the vegetation was waist-high (on Leanimal) or chest-high (on Rocky). We did some cross-country running after the trail ended, then met up with the HVT near Duffy's Lane. Then we were able to return on the trail, making a nice, adventurous loop from downtown Bolton. Fun!

Rode hilly trails across Forks of the Credit Park, then took the Elora-Cataract rail trail to Elora. 'Bent was trying his new (extra) off-road recumbent bike. It's not quite as nimble on rough trails, but it was quite speedy on the rail trail. Certainly it was the first time that we've passed a group of teenagers and had them yell out, "Wow! Pimpin'! Sick!", and I'm pretty sure they meant all that in a good way - although if they'd said the bike was "bad", I could be sure of that. I attribute their admiration to the fact that this new bike is a nice, shiny blue, off-the-shelf model that doesn't look as handmade as his regular bike.

We've done this ride annually for the past few years, and last year we were proud to cut half an hour off our two-way trip time from 2005, riding for about 5 hrs total. Somehow I got it into my head that to match last year's time, we needed to ride each direction in 2 hrs 15 min. When we got to 2:10, I was starting to feel disappointed that we were just going to miss our goal when it dawned on me that half of 5 hrs is actually 2:30, not 2:15. D'oh! So when we arrived in Elora at 2:18, I guess the sort-of good news was that my math skills have declined more than my fitness! My average heart rate was one beat lower than last year, although that's not really a coincidence, since I was aiming to stay in the aerobic zone.

We met up with our teammate ThreePin and Mrs. ThreePin for a wonderful vegetarian lunch at the Desert Rose Cafe in Elora. Nachos, spinach-ricotta lasagne and a maple pecan tart for me. Yum!! Our trip home took 2:20 - undoubtedly because of all that lovely food bouncing around in our stomachs! No dinner for me.