Training Log Archive: Ari-o

NEED TO TAPER.

I was pretty beat this weekend from three races. On Saturday, I will race 90+ kilometers in 30 hours. That's … insane. @AliC will be doing that too, so I'm not alone in my insanity.

Anyway, I need to remember to taper. Which means … no November project on Friday. Which means that if it's really cold, I won't go for a run. I just need to take it easy this week. I'll log a good 7 hours this weekend, there's no reason to be tired for that.

Oh, yeah, it's in Minneapolis.

After the day in Vermont, it was off to NH! Cold night with good friends at the OH, including some ski waxing there. The woodstove got the temperature up to 51, and then it dropped to 34 overnight despite coals. Of course, it was -5 when we woke up.

Race was shortened to eliminate anything on the fields where possible, which was fine, because it was quite windy. Wore lots of clothes and was dressed correctly, also nice. Start was frenetic because a) I was late b) it's self-seeded and c) they don't set enough tracks. This race really has potential, but needs some things changed. Like, more tracks at the start would be nice.

Anyway, I got a bad start but kicked by some people on the climb up the Yodel. I realized on the first few hills that my kick was very good, but my arm strength is lacking (or my legs are stronger, see Project, November and a year of running 2000 feet of stairs every week), and that a tall person in the wind doesn't do well double-poling. So I made up some time on the hills and then lost it on the flats.

I was in a group of three and reeling in a CSUer ahead. Not sure who it was until we caught him, hi Andy Milne! I tried to put some time on him going up the Wave but not enough, and we were at the front of a group. Coming back in to the downhill we made some significant gains on our group, which was nice. However, Andy stayed close enough to make some gains down in to the Yodel. The uphill there is too steep to kick and I wasn't gaining time herring boning (but my striding was fantastic, really happy with my wax and technique) and I was about 7 seconds behind him going in to the downhill. I gained most of that back down the hill; it's nice to know exactly how it skis, but couldn't quite catch him in the double pole, finishing 2 seconds behind.

29th overall, 10 minutes behind Eli, and a bunch of Dartmouth guys, too.

Got dry, fed and warm and went out tooling around with Jess and Lincoln. The drone wasn't flying but the scenery was great. Put a few hard interval-y things in, but mostly took it easy. I need to taper this week for next week.

Run out of Lonesome. Nice cruise down the trail, then a scamper across to Vermont for Ski-O. Started snowing on the drive, too!

Fun Ski-O up at Craftsbury. I'd never skied Craftsbury before, what fun trails! Really out in the middle of nowhere. I'm going off memory here and will put up controls in a bit (map board is in the car still), but a few things of note:

1. Ran a lot of the "snowshoe" trails. It was faster.
2. Lost a minute getting frozen snow out of my boot. Grr.
3. Paper punching is a pain.

But otherwise a great race. Went out right at the end of the envelope but finished in a bit more than an hour (don't have the time; using Strava). Goofed on one control overrunning a snowshoe trail by a little bit, but then made great time by skating across a lake. Everyone else was a local and knew all the trails, and I knew nothing, Lebowski.

Controls:

1. Easy to find down the hill.
2. Easy to find the little trail at the curve.
3. Overran the little trail but caught the hill to the right; went back and found it. May have been better going around on the big trail since the snowshoe trails were slow.
4. Up to the road then run through the woods.
5. Came down the trail around the building, back across the road. At the little pond at 5, I was able to skate straight across. Spike.
6. Should have gone back to the dashed trail, dotted trail around was slow. Caught the little trail and took off my skis for some running.
7. Ran up through the woods to the next control. Uphill DPing on branches was not worth it.
8. Spent a good bit of time (a minute?) deicing my binding. Skied to the further little trail and then ran straight (off trail) to the control. DPed on the dotted trail back to the big trail.
9. Long leg, apparently same route choice as everyone else. Down the long, gradual hill. Nice, but not too fast.
10. Punched, ran the hill, and then went to the left of the range. Apparently the big trail and power line was a secret option. Then went to the little trail and skated the lake. Apparently there's another unmapped secret trail that the locals used.
11. Good navigating back to the finish.

Decided in between races to skate the race loop ahead of the college race. What a fun loop. I spent time ignoring control set up by thinking about course homologation. Then tooled around near the stadium watching the race. Ah, college racing!

UGH. This was a really fun race, but I mispunched. It's a good lesson—and better to mispunch here than, say, at Stowe—but it's just annoying. I partially blame the college race; I made a route choice which was mostly "don't scream down a hill that has racers coming up it" which took me by a later control, and I just thought "oh hey, control, I will punch you and then go to the next one." Forgot about the out-and-back from there. Would have easily had the win here—won most of the splits but just missed that control. And it meant I skied less than I could have. Boo.

A couple of notes. I well like the "go to a control, punch, stop for two to four seconds and plan your route" school. Also, running through the woods is probably the best idea at times, even when there is no trail. Long downhills that might be a slightly longer distance are probably better route choices since you can just fly down them, as opposed to rolling terrain followed by a steep downhill with intersections where you have to scrub speed (maybe less of an issue on a closed course, more of an issue when you're crossing college racers).

Controls:

1. A little confused since only six of the solar arrays are mapped.
2. Spiked the control in the middle of the field. E-punches on trees are hard to punch, though. Have to hold it with one hand.
3. Whee.
4. Easy to find off the trail.
5. Took the lower route through the range.
6. Got a little confused at the first junction which I read as the second junction, but quickly saw the terrain was off and reconned.
7. Mistake here. I planned to take the east-bound leg, but got on the northbound leg. This was rolling, then a right and a steep downhill. But both were the wrong route choice. Kestrel took the southbound leg/snowshoe trail which was all downhill, slightly longer but faster. Good route choice options!
8. Huff and puff uphill. Passed Allison here.
9/10. Was going to take a right but this would have meant going down a steep hill with racers coming up. So took a straight. This messed me up. I then wound up with a zigzag route choice instead of a straight downhill one. I lost time to Allison and had to pass her back, and then got to a control. Punch. Oh, and look, the next control is through the woods up a hill. What I forgot, having rejiggered my routing, was that I was actually supposed to go back to 9 and then come back to 10. Would have been 4 extra minutes, so I would have finished with time to spare. But I goofed. Spiked 11, skied to the finish, and DNFed. Ugh.

Ski around a bit to cool down, then in to the car to Jackson. No good way to make that trip; two full hours from Craftsbury to Jackson. But more, because it was snowing, and people don't understand how to go down hills in snow (use your car's gearing, not your breaks). May have made some dangerous passes before Crawford to make sure to avoid sitting behind a spinout-waiting-to-happen in the Notch. May have gone 65 in the snow, too. No one told NHDOT to plow, either. But. Snow!

I took the bus and train to NP, which was the right choice. 14 minutes and then a walk up the hill. Last time it was cold when I biked there I got a little too warm going up the hill (have to overdress for the flats and then go up the hill) and then very, very cold on the ride home (starting out damp with a 1/2 mile coast downhill). I'm not averse to winter biking, but biking to a workout and then not having a full change of clothes (and somewhere warm to change) is a challenge. Less so for a flat ride to the stadium (which is out of commission until our next melt, which may not be for quite some time, but goddamn it's given me some good base) but a couple of miles with a big hill at 0º is more of an issue.

Run up the hill once, then a bunch of little hills at the top. Mostly sprints and bounds, one piggy back ride, and one crab walk. Cold!

Run home from NP. Cold and slow. River is very frozen. Another week of this and a dusting of snow and you could probably ski from Watertown to Boston. Which would be EPIC.

C • ski from watertown to boston 3

I love the Lonestar Roadside Inn. Whenever I need to stay in the Franconia Notch area, it's just as easy to run up the LLT, stay at Lonesome, and run out. Especially when it's packed snow in the winter and the lake is frozen. A little harder with a little ice, but otherwise, pretty damn nice. It's really easy to push hard up the hill, and with ski poles you work up a sweat. When I got in I was quite warm. It was about -10.

Meant to ski longer but got a later start than I meant to before a meeting. Really nice skiing, about 10º and sunny. Definitely necessitated dark sunglasses. And the showers at Weston have water pressure fo' sho'.

Classic around Weston. Good kick except on the new snow. Would have gone longer but a) I was going back for a (non-occurring) StreetO and b) holy smokes there were about 1000 BKL kids out and it was basically impossible to stride. Note to self: don't ski at 6:30 on Wednesday.

Run from Riverside to Weston with ski bag. Some walking, but definitely got some warmth going.

Scraped my fast skis because SNOW and soft, then went out to ski, then realized that I'd left my glasses inside, so then skied back. Not much of a warm up.

Worlds! Three loops of the funky new course which is relatively easy compared with the Mount Weston climbs of the past. I got boxed out of the start and was hanging out in 8thish place for a while. On the second lap I passed two guys in the HOLY COW mashed potatoes under a snow gun, and one of them tailed me for a while. On the final lap he caught up to me on the flats by the river, perhaps because I let him catch me. I then powered up the hill and he hung on but I got in front, and then slowed down a little to go in to a tuck down the final hill. Then fast V2 to drop him for the win. Lactate jumped up really quick, probably because I didn't really warm up. So fun to ski in the snow though!

Skied round and round Weston, slowly, with Anna, recovering from the race. Good times in the snow which is certainly coming down. Then got a ride home with Alex (yay!) to Waban, and the Green Line to a perfect 47 bus transfer home. 40 minutes door to door by car/train/bus. Not too shabby.

Running late to NP, I ran pretty fast, apparently, and made it in plenty of time.

NP today was Stata circuits at MIT: big amphitheater stair jumps (box jumps, basically) and burpees. Burpees did not do good things for my elbows, but box jumps were fun.

Round and round Weston for 45 minutes. No poles. Elbow, get better. Thanks for grooming, Weston, taking nice, fast hardpack and making it in to stupid sugar which is just going to freeze in to ruts so you have to groom again which you'll probably do again at the worst possible time. Hopefully it's snowing for Worlds tomorrow.

C • no grooming 3