Training Log Archive: Ari-o

Back to Great Glen. Striding in new classic tracks, 20˚, on whatever I had on from yesterday and Craftsbury. I hadn't brought classic wax because I did not expect this good skiing, but here we are.

The classic tracks were nice, and I kept thinking of going in and changing to skate gear, but the icy climb up and then being wet and cold and all, I just kept striding. Right near the end I saw Sam and Aubrey and skied with them for a couple of minutes but I was pretty bonky at that point so said adieu and went in.

And then BAGELS PLUS!

So I was in Bridgton. Driving to Craftsbury to ski on a couple of kilometers of congested manmade sounded not great. Sugarloaf got 9" but posted nothing. Jackson didn't get the snow. The Sherbie sounded promising. And Great Glen posted 18k of trails open. I've never loved their trails but granted haven't been on them much, and only in lousy conditions. There aren't many, and no big climbs, mostly because of the Forest Service.

So anyway. I drove across Pinkham and asked a skier how the Sherbie was. It sounded meh, good up top, icy at the bottom. I figured I'd drive to GG, see how the snow was, and I could always go back.

I skied about 150m at Great Glen and there was no going back. 18k groomed, maybe 14k in the woods and not on the golf course getting blown off, all of it with track, maybe three thin spots. I skied every trail forward and back, and after 80 minutes did no poles for a while. A few bumps in the skate deck, but mostly good. Not too crowded, although at one point a group was stopped in the middle of a hill chatting at a pretty blind corner. They were very apologetic, maybe Canadian?

Anyway, was very glad to have gone up, since the skiing really was excellent.

C • Jealous! 2

And then out to stride. I had not expected to be striding and hadn't brought wax, but it was cooling off and whatever was on my skis worked. The light on the Carters was gorgeous.

Up to Maine in a rainstorm on Friday night. 37 when I got up, snow line not much further north. But Thursday it was spitting flurries and breezy, and I decided not to go try to win the local turkey trot. My uncle wanted me to look at something on the other side of the lake but said it was too long a run, and I agreed, thinking I was only going to go for 5 or 6, but then got out and felt good, and went out 5 and back. I didn't exactly know what I was looking for. Nearly circled the lake, too, but the last mile might be a bit more O, so I ran back.

Then I ate an inordinate amount of food.

Legs still feeling a little bit from Sunday, and I was 1:20 off the PR.

Some guy brought two goldens to the stadium and they were running around off their leash near the end. I told him that it was dangerous, with a lot of people running around on wobbly legs, he didn't seem to give a shit, and after I was done I went right back to the other side of the stadium to get dry clothes lest I make a scene which came damn close to happening.

I'm an idiot.

Looks like skiing this weekend will be minimal, given that it was 45 in Craftsbury today and raining tomorrow.

So up to Maine with the fam, and maybe if it's snow at elevation a lap of the Sherbie, and then down to Boston at some point, without all the extra Craftsbury driving.

Then I did something stupid.

Airline status got me some perks this year, like free bags, several standbys and, oh yeah, the business class ticket home from Europe. I need x miles to requalify and have only y time to do it in and went looking for a trip I could make in the requisite amount of time and miles. (I got a real job, so want to keep it at a single trip, so, say, an RT to DLH and DEN wouldn't be that feasible.)

Also, looking at where the snow is.

Silver Star (YLW) is too many flights. BZN doesn't have enough snow and is expensive. But RNO works, and is about to get dumped on, and if the long range forecast holds, could have six feet of snow in the next week. Mileage checks out, I can do it as a weekend, and if I fly in to RNO, I can get a day of skiing for free at Squaw, where friends/family have passes. I get in at 10:59, so with a rental car could hit the slopes for an afternoon of free skiing, and then maybe find Biggins for an evening nordic ski, more nordorking Sunday morning, then back to RNO for a flight home. Also, I have a ton of friends out in Tahoe to see.

This is on par with the crazy BZN trip of 2017.

I'm actually pretty excited.

C • When? 4

Orienteering punishes a completely different set of muscles from road running.

Not the same DOMS-type pain because it's not repetitive, but everything below my knees is tired.

Out to pick up the car in H2Otown. Nice evening for a run. Ankles and legs are tired. O is hard.

I did not get lectured about needing my brakes done (and then given a $1000 estimate). Thanks, Ed!

Event: NEOC: Blue Hills Traverse
 

Definitely a Type 2 Traverse today. Heavy rain, low 40s, so actually, a day I could probably do well, if I could orienteer. Caught a ride over in a van, took my broken umbrella and stood under a building alcove, went to the bathroom, back in the van, and then we began the walk to the start. My umbrella went in a nearby trash can, having scratched my finger with some metal, so I drew blood before the start of the Traverse. Probably best.

The start was just in the woods, and likely to be north given where it was. They said go and we went running off. Not a lot of turnout this year (gee I wonder why) and I was running with a group of 5 to 1: two Swedes (father and son, Jonas and Tim) in their team kits, and two other guys, Neil, a CSUer who I had ridden over with and ran 18 miles pre-CIM before the Traverse, and a guy in a BAA raincoat.

2 and 3 were with a crowd, with the Swedes running ahead, I led the charge to 4 and fell a bit behind to 5 (slightly different route choice near the circle, taking trails rather than bashing, was a good choie). For 6 I took the north trail, which might have been longer in retrospect but had a nice attack. The trails were all flooded but everything was wet, so it was splashy. I was running in a long sleeve wool shirt, a short sleeve wool shirt above that and the CSU uniform above that; on the bottom a pair of spandex with O pants above, and it was just about right.

I began to realize that the other guys around me were fast runners but that I might be a better navigator, so after punching 6 (which I went to the wrong cliff for, for just a second) they ran out to a trail, but I was just going to run north. I ran through the end of a marsh and got ahead of them, found a trail, and another trail, and right on up the hill to the control (almost spiked, closer to the road than I realized; it was a water stop, not that we needed water). Then 8 I knew exactly how to run. Don't try to nav straight through the green, but go around on the road, around the hill, come down the trail, find the bench, go across the bench. I did this and went right to the control. Basically, good orienteering. And saw no one around.

I figured that the Swedes were long gone, but put real time on the guys behind me. So, down some greenbriar-laced rocks on a steep hill—I love Blue Hills terrain—the trail, a nice trail run to 9, more really good orienteering to 9 (find the reentrant, go up the reentrant, beep) and then crossing the road to 10.

10 was the worst control for me. The shortest attack was from the north, through a bit of green to some white, but Blue Hills, so meaningless. I tried this, and it didn't work. Green enough to be hard to read the terrain. So then I went to the trail and attacked from the south as I probably should have (looking now, I should have run down Route 28 to the next trail and attacked off of that trail) using features, and found the control pretty easily, but by this point Neil had caught up to me, so we found it together. Also, it was on a path through the green other runners and the course-setter had set, so probably by later in the race there was a herd path.

11 was manned at a trail junction, 12 on a stone wall, and 13 near the highway on an obvious rock near a fence. Easy catching features, but nice to run it with someone else. 14 was more navigate-y. I chose to run the fence line to a trail to a road and then attack up a line of rocks rather than to go cross-country through some green and white, in an area I knew to be confusing. I did this perfectly. Ran the road, handrail the rocks, find the reentrant, beep. This is how most of the O went for me. Dropped Neil in the process.

On to 15. This was a trail run, mostly, in an area I was pretty familiar with. Three options around the last hill: right, left or over. I went left but then decided to go over. There was a great attack off of a curve in the trail: take a tangent off of the curve and it would go straight at the rock. And like the rest of the controls, it worked. Trail bent left, I went straight, right at the only rock around, and 1m at that and … no control.

Ah, this is how orienteering normally goes for me. So I went to the left attack from a trail junction. Not only an obvious one, but one on my regular running route, so I knew I was in the right place. Went due east on a compass. Bumped in to the same rock. No flag. Neil got there from the south. I said "this is the rock, right?" He said, I think so. I said that he'd attacked from the north, and I had attacked from the east and south, it had to be. We decided to run and look at one other rock, way uphill. It had a control. Strava has trails, and it is very clear that the flag was on the wrong rock. Only cost about 5 minutes, but kind of deflating given how good I had been orienteering, and that now I had Neil trailing me.

But, again, orienteering. We ran down and across the road and they had 16-17-18 in a great section which just has hummocky knolly terrain with open forest and intricate terrain navigation. I split off from Neil, got just ahead of him, and took the trail further than him to spike 16. Then ran across the short leg to 17, and it took a couple of tries, but I found the control pretty easily, and then a few seconds later saw Neil trailing in to me. I figured I'd stop and plan my route to 18 and 19, but also, that I'd make him think I was reading the map for 17, and I think he did. Devious! Then I started running, and curving away. I just wanted to get far enough ahead that he wouldn't follow. 18 I spiked, reading the terrain perfectly.

19 was up over Hancock Hill and I know Hancock Hill is a maze of trails which go every which way except the way you want them to and wanted no part of it. And that going north is nice running. So I ran. After 10 miles of O, maybe a little walking occurred, but I was on the right trail and again spiked the control and as I was leaving, saw that I was just behind Tim. Now it was a race. I had a few things in my favor: I am in good shape for long runs, I know the area well, I like this kind of weather and the next segment had a road run and I might be able to dust him on a road run. He had one big thing going for him: being Swedish. Who would win?!

We staggered down a bit of Skyline Trail—something steep there was unavoidable but this was the least steep to runnable trail—and then some very familiar trails headed down to the road near Houghton's Pond. I got to the road with Tim a few seconds behind me. Apparently he had injured his knee but seemed to have recovered, also, being good Swedes, they biked there. In the pouring rain. I knew none of this. I put some time on him on the road but cut into the woods too early, found the wrong ditch, but the the right one, and spiked the control, gaining a bit of time there. But then, I knew how god-awful running on the rocks on that side of Great Blue Hill is, and immediately ran down to the trail. He went across.

The trail was a stream, but fine, and I got to 21. Okay, up the trail, a cliff above two cliffs. Spike. Then 22. This is right where, in 2015, I sprained my ankle pretty badly, and then overran the control, so I was trepidatious. But the obvious route choice was to contour across the rocks until there weren't rocks anymore and a reentrant, so off I went. Rocks, rocks, rocks, rocks, rocks, reentrant without rocks, control, spike.

Then it was just a run across the ski trails to 23, which I navigated fine, as the heavens opened and the rain poured down that much harder (but really). I was excited. I was yelling obscenities at the sky. I was having fun.

2nd overall, first non-Scandinavian :) But also, really some of the best navigation I've done. And looking back at it, the controls weren't really that easy, but I would just make a plan, and execute the plan, and not run so fast I got confused, and that's what I did. Navigated all but 1-5 and 10-13 on my own, and made no mistakes except 10. Orienteering is fun!

C • Congrats! 4

Traverse - Splits

Rollerski drills, which involved hopping over curbs and running through grass. And some weird slumped shoulder thing. Russians …

Classic day. With broken classic pole tips I was lazy and used my skate poles which are too long but I don't really care. Coach problems. Went out with Victor and four older boys. Brisk in the shade but super nice out. Harvard hill, then Vaughn Hill and back. Linden was going for 3+ hours so we let him do that at Robinwood and 2:30 was fine for everyone else. There's a new section of chip seal in Harvard and I want to murder people, but the Horse Farm Hill climb is such a nice climb now it almost makes up for it.

I was pretty bonky at the car.

Oh, the traverse is tomorrow? In the pouring rain? Great. Pouring rain might mean skiing on Monday and Tuesday somewhere, though. Time will tell.

Nice enough day that I wanted to trail run, so I decided to go to the Blue Hills.

Left my house at 2:15. Figured it would be clear sailing down. And proceeded to sit in traffic at the BU Bridge rotary for 15 minutes. Which means rush hour there is now at least 5 hours long. Good grief. 50 minutes door to door.

But the run was lovely. It got cold on the run (50-->39) and my hands got cold, but otherwise a very nice way to spend an hour and a half. Finished just before dark, and then traffic on the way home, too (really just the left turn from the Riverway to Longwood, because again, traffic is bottlenecks).

Stairs. Legs felt bounding. 52 sections, not too hard.

Out to bound at Prospect. Left plenty of time and caught a 10-minutes-late 70A. Crowded, and delayed further when a disabled passenger boarded. But got me to a mile from Prospect with time to spare, so an easy jog up the road.

Went easy with the group on the first bound, then went hard and passed a bunch of people and felt good and it was much faster. The last three were slower, but faster than the first. Legs still feeling this past weekend.

Pole hiking around, and down the hills.

The 70A, which is supposed to come every 30 minutes, was coming twice an hour: two buses, both about an hour away.

But there was a 70 bus 20 minutes away. A perfect excuse to run over the hill.

Went and visited Alex and Ed, home of the $160 brake job (cost of parts, and also some Hill Farmstead).

Then Ed and I went exploring, found some excellent O/Ski-O terrain back in the woods, and then a trail which connected back to another field, and then a trail back and I think Ed is now inspired to go out and map it and build new trails and such, in his copious spare time.

Probably walked a mile. Really should have taken a watch. Definitely not loggable.

We didn't ski in the dark last night, opting to sauna instead (good decision). And this morning? Skiing. Beautiful skiing, and very cold. 0 at the center and probably well below down in the valley. But nevertheless, we persisted.

More skiing! Skating, and we went out and ooh look fresh grooming on Hosmer. So we got first skate tracks out Hosmer. And then came back on Lakeside, which I had never skied before, and it was stellar. The best was the in-the-process-of-freezing lake, which was beautiful through the trees. Then around Ruthies and down Sams and then back to Hosmer, skipping the camp, and after two hours I could have done more but it was definitely also lunch time and six hours of skiing in mid-November is not bad.

SKIIIIIII

Skating around Craftsbury. Skiing is excellent. "Bony" in Craftsbury-ese means "not enough snow to send out the Pisten Bully." We looked for rocks but didn't find many. Skiing is so much fun!

What do you do after skiing (and lunch)?

More skiing!

Classic this time. No tracks, but plenty of kick. Good enough for my decent skis (I need to get new classic skis, and my rock skis have disappeared). Out and around and around and it's all so much excellent.

Oh and then we finished up and went to Hill Farmstead because skiing + beer = :)

And then Craftsbury dinner, and I overate, but it was good.

Jogaroo!

First I waved at a bus driver friend.

Then I ran past the ramp down from the Harvard Bridge to see what was going on on Storrow (a fender bender, it seemed).

Then I got attacked by a dog in a park. Okay, so it didn't try to bite me, but it jumped up into my path and pretty firmly hit me in the side of the leg. A 60 lb or so lab-ish looking dog (it was dark, who knows) and while it didn't trip me up, it certainly could have.

I as nicely as I could said "you really need to have your dog on a leash" and the woman seemed to not give a shit because … dog owners are a pretty special breed.

Of course, if I had fallen, she is personally liable for any injury. I don't think most dog owners know that.

C • dog owners 4

Back to stadiums! Slept through my alarm by a few minutes but made it in enough time. Cold! 20ish, and breezy, so perfect. Did most of it with a short sleeve t-shirt on. Several skiers from Harvard, a CSUer from before I spent much time with CSU.

54 sections in 42 minutes, which felt pretty good. Although I have a blister on one of my toes which hurts, so, yeah, some neosporin going on that puppy.

Out to rollerski before the rain (and maybe snow … Craftsbury reports 6" and if it sets up, I may be at Craftsbury this weekend). Plan was originally to go out from Alewife to Lexington and back, and try to get home on a transfer, but I had slightly mistimed the bus schedule and it wasn't raining yet and the bike path is mostly clear of leaves (they've done some nice leaf blowing, and it shows, no caked gross leaf slidey stuff).

So what the heck, all the way out to Bedford, DP. Then back. Goal going back: under 1h. Spitting rain so I had to DP some of the leafier sections, but once I hit the new pavement east of Lexington on a downhill I turned in four miles in 20 minutes and made it to Alewife in 55, just as the steadier rain started.

Feel good, except for a toe blister (from running) and hand blisters (from the rollerski).

C • Craftsbury 1

Spent the whole day writing code to scrape data from the state's traffic database (which is very cool) so didn't get out to rollerski, but managed a slow shuffle around the river in the evening.

Yellow loop at Blue Hills and then a loop of Houghton Pond. Woods look so dreamily runnable, excited to get lost there in a couple of weeks.

CL skiing with juniors. Talked to Barry for much of it. Pointed out that they were already blowing snow out at Wachusett. (It was cold.)

Then realized: wait, wouldn't Wachusett be a perfect place for an Eastern-ish Massachusetts snowmaking course? Closer to Boston than Dublin (1h without traffic), high-ish elevation, existing snowmaking infrastructure, existing lodge, parking, etc. Plus a snowmaking trail could connect to Balance Rock Road, which would then connect to 10+ km of roads which are unplowed in winter and would provide a trail all the way to the summit. Plenty of elevation to homologate a course, probably a good place to move many (all?) Mass Bay West meets, a permanent site for the state meet, and potential venue for larger meets.

A 2.5 km trail would add about 2.5% to the current acreage of Wachusett, so wouldn't require any new infrastructure, so would only require a couple of new guns and some new pipe to serve the trail. Plus trail construction and lighting. But given the proximity to Boston, it would probably get a lot of use from BKL, CSU, high schools, etc. And certainly us master blasters.

I think this works. Google Doc in development … friend from out there has the email for Wachusett's people …

C • XC at Wachusett 2

Watch has developed a habit of not finding satellites. UI isn't great to tell you this until you start (I think I have it figured out).

I want to create a watch that takes the good parts of a Garmin and the good parts of a Suunto and combines them and actually works.

DOMS really not that bad this race. I've been walking okay, going down stairs isn't horrible, and I felt fine getting on rollerskis for DP today. 8 miles on the bike path, which is in really good shape for this time of year: no wet leaves despite rain yesterday. Saw another rollerskier on the roll (but didn't recognize him) and then talked with someone about the Birkie on the T on the way home.

RE: DOMS, this means that I really think better shoes would be better, or at least justifiable. Less DOMS = I was trained better but things still fell apart around mile 22. My legs at age 35 might not be the same as my legs at age 29, running on flats. Plus, in the past five years there seems to have been a move from "we make running shoes so your feet are comfortable and you don't get injured" (not an issue as I have good arches/support/feet) to "we make running shoes to make you fast."

Well, I want to go fast!

This was an interesting day.

Up early, out the door, down the subway, onto the ferry, onto a bus, down to the start area with plenty of time to spare. Unlike some races (cough Boston cough) they had plenty of port-o-johns, so I was well, uh, evacuated by the start. Everyone but everyone has the new ultra-padded Nike shoes. Expensive? Yes. Probably worth it? I'm thinking so, especially as I get older and brokener. Perfect day. 50, sunny, a bit breezy but not windy.

We were marched up on to the bridge, I ditched my last throwaway item, and we were off. Up at a 6:50 mile, then down at a 6:15, and then settling into 6:31 to 6:47 for the first … half. By my watch, which was faster than the race clocks, but still managed the first half in 1:27:45, which I think is right about where I wanted to be. Not too fast, but not going crazy.

There are two big hills in the second half. Before one, a friend (former college skier) of mine gave me a back split off the USST contingent, who were right behind. The first "hill" was over the 59th Street Bridge. 7:06 up. Fine. Down the bridge, made the sweeping right, and up 1st Avenue. Around 65th Street, out of the corner of my eye, I saw a woman with short, pink hair. That could only be one person.

"WOO GO US SKI TEAM! GO IDA! GO LIZ! GO KIKKAN."

Liz looked at me and said "who are you?"

I explained. I fist-bumped Kikkan in the middle of the race. I will repeat that for those not paying attention at home. I fist-bumped Kikkan fucking Randall in the middle of a race.

And then I ran with them. They had been running a pretty similar race. A little more conservative at the start (probably a good idea?) but similar 6:35-6:50s. I matched that for about 2.5 miles up the East Side. I was having fun. And then at some point they pulled away, a little. Which was fine, lots of people on the course, and they were running as a pack and I was a bit of an interloper. (Side note, Liz/Ida said at one point "CSU, but do you ski?" OF COURSE I SKI. Why do you think I am so fucking excited about who I am running with? Okay I didn't say the last part, but still. It was quite the experience.)

And then they were a bit further ahead. And a bit further. And I didn't quite have the legs to catch them. I think by this point I was getting dehydrated a bit too. It was sunny and very dry. Cool, so I wasn't overheating, but I wasn't getting enough water. I don't think this helped, as my HR went up a bit as the race went on.

At mile 21 they were out of sight (a minute ahead), I was holding just-over-7s, and still shooting for a PR. I chugged up the hill, saw my family, and turned in to the park. My hope had been to be able to hold the pace, and to have something in the tank to keep going. But a combination of dehydration (I think) and feet and legs (more on that in a second) meant that the wheels started to come off. When I feel like I'm running a 6 minute mile and it's actually 7:25. So not completely off, but enough off I was over the PR and over 3 hours. Still the fastest race in a couple of years, but given the conditions, I was hoping for better.

And as much fun as it was to run with Kikkan Randall for 3 miles, it would have been even more fun to run with them for 10 and cross the finish line with them. And only a little creepy. (I think Liz was confused because who in this race knew random skiers. They were not at all identifiable unless you were looking close.)

Anyway, some observations …

1) Dehydration. Not too much I could have done. I don't think I missed any drink station but didn't start taking double water until about mile 19. I should have done this earlier. Also, anyone running a 3 hour marathon pace should not be allowed to stop and drink water in the middle of the course. I don't think this helped with my legs.

2) Speaking of legs … I've been wearing the same shoes to race in for about 6 years. Flats. Super lightweight. And they've been fine, but two things today changed my mind. The first is that when I took my sock off there was a little blood, and I have never gotten a bloody blister in a race. Ever. But the second is that everyone has the fancy new Nike shoes. And they are supposedly a lot faster. And my friend Jakob's friend describes them as "running, but better." Are they expensive? Yes. Did I drop $295 on the NYC marathon, and is that more than a pair costs? Also yes.

Strava says I have put 600 miles on the New Balance shoes, which I got through November Project in 2013. So they've served me well. But maybe they'll be relegated to a local 5k here and there. Hello, Nike, take all of my money!

3) I kind of wanted to finish between 2:55 and 3:02. <2:55 would mean I'd have to decide, in the next few months, whether to run NYC again (since it would be a guaranteed entry into NY) and it's a lot of money and logistics. Today was a perfect experience. Great weather, crowds. I don't need to do it again. <3:02 is basically a BQ for 2021. Now, if Boston 2020 has the weather we had in NY today: 50, tailwind, dry, and I get new money-shoes, I can go PR like a motherfucker. But if it's 75˚, I can take it easier, and not die.

So, yes, the race was everything I expected except for my finish time. And I wish I could have kept up with Kikkan. But … that's okay.

So then we walked a while, got food and drinks (and I drank all the drank) and then went out on Central Park West. I got a poncho, finally cooling down, and walked over towards the 72nd Street IND station, and a volunteer stopped me.

"Everyone is supposed to walk down to Columbus Circle."

I was not impressed. But also not very mobile. And she was blocking my way. I went a little New York (and yes, dropped some NY accent):

"Why would I walk all the way down to 59th Street just to get to the 8th Avenue Line when there's an IND station I can go to right here?"

(why = whoi, walk = waulk, all = awl, etc)

"Well I guess you just ran 30 miles so who am I to argue" and she stepped out of my way. I was maybe a little ruder than I should have been, but really. 13 blocks at that point was not about to happen.

Then I ate not that much food, and went downtown for a November Project party, and then rode home with my folks. All in all a successful day! (I am not in the hospital, so, that.)

C • Nice run 5

Shake out run. Felt pretty good. Now all I have to do is run fast.

C • Good luck! 4