Training Log Archive: BigWillyStyle

Round 4 @ U of Washington, semifinals. Had Graeme and Ian in my heat so I knew this would be the first real fight of the weekend.

S-1: Graeme took the lead out of the start with me right behind; at the first decision point I was still figuring my map out so went with him. Luckily he chose the best route :)

1-2: Still right behind.

2-3: I went right, Graeme and I think Ian went left. Right appears to have been better as I got a couple seconds ahead.

3-4: I went low, Graeme went high, Ian did a middle route. We all had the same split on three different routes.

4-5: First mistake - bungled this one for 12-15s loss. I missed the small entrance into the area with the bridge, then missed it again coming back and ended up going up and around. Graeme took the lead by ~10s here, Ian still just behind me.

5-6: Went right on the small trail which I think was a good choice.

6-7: Around on the sloping path to the right to avoid the stairs. Still ~10s behind Graeme and just ahead of Ian.

7-8: The long leg. I picked out the straightish route just left of the line early, and then caught a glimpse of Graeme heading off to the right into the zigzaggy area. Was pretty sure my route was better so was encouraged to push hard to get back into it, but then Ian comes storming by me and I'm unable to match his pace. Punched 8 ~10s behind Ian, just a couple ahead of Graeme.

8-9: Went right around the building; left may have been better.

9-10: Second mistake - went to the wrong tree, which cost me 5s and allowed Graeme to jump ahead by a couple seconds.

10-11: Short leg. Feeling pretty gassed by now.

11-12: Decisive third mistake - wrong route choice. Dropped 10s to Ian and Graeme here. Went left around the first building, then right around the second one. Graeme went left, which is clearly better. No longer in contact and now 29s behind Ian and 13s behind Graeme, which would basically be the ending margins.

12-13: Nailed this one with the right/left zigzag.

13-14: Did this one well too - straight through the quad, right of the peanut-shaped open area and left at the Y junction.

14-15-F: Pushing hard as I could since I knew I had to beat Eric out in the other heat to sneak into the final. Ended up 31s behind Ian, 10s behind Graeme.

Round 5 @ U of Washington, Le Final. Got smoked pretty good in this one. There were three butterfly loops, which meant that in each five-person heat there would be two pairs of people beginning their first loop together. It was set up such that the fifth qualifier in each heat would be the fifth wheel, as it were, which is totally fair as it's a sort of punishment for being slowest in the previous round. Anyway, that was me in the final, so I didn't have the benefit of a first-loop buddy like the other guys did - but more importantly I didn't have much juice left in my legs and was just too slow to be in contention. Made a few small inefficiencies and hesitations but no real mistakes per se. My main achievement was being first to the first control :)

So - the Predictilator 2000 was spot on. It's a new goal of mine to convince J to try for a spot on the NZ WOC team. In my estimation he could certainly be competitive for one of the non-Robertson sprint spots, but he is noncommittal thus far.

Event: 2016 Seattle Adventure Running Tournament (9/10 - 9/11)
 

SART Time Trial. I pushed hard and hit the two or three short tricky legs well, and surprisingly managed to snake the top seed on a tiebreaker over Adam and J. This set me up with a pretty easy path into the semifinals.

Round 1 @ Woodland Park. Sandbagging pretty hard.

Round 2 @ Carkeek Park. Still sandbagging, but going a little harder. Overran 9 pretty bad which caused me to worry a little about getting caught, but it turned out ok.

Round 3 @ Seattle Pacific U. Went out pretty hard then eased up later on when I was alone.

It's recently been brought to my attention that it is, in fact, SARTember. How exciting! Since I've been grossly negligent to date in covering the 2016 Days of SARTember, the universe will have to be content with a shamefully truncated preview.

The Venues
TT: Gas Works Park. Wide open grassy fields with some weird mechanical junk lying around. Protip: Don't be distracted by excellent views of downtown Seattle.

Round 1: Woodland Park. White forest, relatively hilly; excellent runnability. Old-timers will remember this venue from the inaugural edition of SART. Protip: Go straight.

Round 2: Carkeek Park. Thickly wooded, quite hilly park with lots of green and lots of trails. Protip: Route choice is the key here.

Round 3: Seattle Pacific University. A compact little campus largely unknown to this author other than the presence of some buildings and some grassy quad-type areas. Protip: Watch for buildings and grassy quad-type areas!!

Rounds 4 & 5: University of Washington. A sprawling campus with plenty of irregularly shaped buildings and cozy out-of-the-way nooks, but not much canopy or trap action. Protip: Beware the bridges; the dark, damp places underneath them are ideal habitat for controls.

Bonus protip: Maps of Woodland, Carkeek, and UW can be found on the SART website.

The Weather
I dunno google it lazyass
*EDIT* or I guess look at the weather thingy right there literally on your screen right now ------>>>

The Contenders
The Kid (alias Adam Woods) - 2015 third place
The Bonesaw (alias Eric Bone) - 2015 seventh place
Graembo (alias Graeme Rennie) - 2015 fourth place
The J / The Man in Black (alias Jourdan Harvey) - 2015 runner-up
The Hard Man (alias Ian Saari) - 2015 champion
Me (alias Will Enger) - 2015 eighth place

The Predictions
Top Woman: Tori Borish
Top Man/Overall Winner: Jourdan Harvey. 2016 is the J's time to complete the unprecedented Sprint Camp/SART double and become the Unified Sprint Champion of the World of the Pacific Northwest - as long as he doesn't stop somewhere for a trail selfie with iffy hashtag game.

C • SART vs NAOC 4

The last Wednesday Evening event of the year was tonight at North Seattle College; we had a pretty low turnout due to rainy-ish weather and start of school. I had to throw the courses together somewhat hastily and in hindsight should have made a couple adjustments, but people seemed to like them well enough. Shout-out to the Jonesaw for his possibly first ever victory. THE JONESAW IS COMING YALL

C • Yo. 3

Fairly strenuous BT run. Was meaning to go farther but developed a weird pain in the outside of my right knee :/

I support the coalition candidates for the OUSA BoD - as individuals and as a group. No doubt the other candidates are all knowledgeable, dedicated, hard-working people too, but for me it's a referendum on the substantial problems OUSA is facing. Perhaps some of the non-coalition candidates may also be open to change, but I have seen nothing in their candidate statements or elsewhere which gives me confidence they will work for the kind of change I feel is necessary. I care little for the "institutional knowledge" or "continuity" of an organization in decline.

In any case, even if none of the coalition (or just one, I guess) gets elected, they have already done a service for American orienteering by getting people to think and talk about the issues, by making service on the BoD seem like a coveted thing instead of something no one really cares about, and by challenging and hopefully shaking some of the complacency out of the current leadership. History tells us that those who lose elections often have a profound impact on the subsequent policies of the winners (just one recent example - Bernie Sanders' unexpected successes pulled Hillary Clinton significantly left on a number of issues).
Predictably, the coalition's efforts thus far have been met with a healthy dose of reactionary "get off my lawn" pushback - this is good, as it means they and their positions are being considered a threat. Politically speaking, to attack someone is also to acknowledge and legitimize them.

As a separate aside, our voting system seems hopelessly antiquated. Is it so hard to put a ballot in the mail for each OUSA member (or even an email)? God knows there are few enough members.