Training Log Archive: BorisGr

HittaUt excursion with Ross and Alli on a really nice day. My first run after the needle treatment, and Ross' first after surgery, so we took it fairly easy, but had a really good time.

Went to Mårten Prosell for a needle treatment for my knee. Hurt like hell. He put needles all over my quad and then in the hamstring too. We'll see if it helps, but being close to 100% by WOC does not seem very likely.

C • But if the needles hurt... 12

There are days when I really like living in Uppsala and its proximity to nature. On the way home from work today, besides the usual flock of sheep, I saw a massive bunny, who got up on his hind legs to observe me, and upon arriving at Blodan after the usual ride through the forest, saw a Great Dane taking a Great Dump.

C • Alan Mogensen.... 1

Planned for intervals in the morning, but woke up with a sore throat and a headache, so skipped the intervals and drank a lot of tea. Then went to the Uppsala OL-Allians training that Länna put on. Took it easy on a middle distance course and was fairly unfocused, but still enjoyed getting out. Really hoping to wake up healthier tomorrow.

To and from the gym with Alli

Some hills on the elliptical at Blåsenhus with Alli, while watching the European track and field champs. Then, off to the hospital to accompany Ross for his elbow surgery.

Warming up and cooling down and getting from the finish to the start.

Running two sprint courses while Ross was getting cut up. Did the short versions of the Uppsala Sprint Cup courses at Polacksbacken and Ulleråker. Ran hard, felt pretty good. Times: 10:33 for the Polax, 10:19 for Ulleråker. Then off to the hospital to collect Ross after his surgery, which went well! He is happy and back home now.

C • "while Ross was getting cut up" 1

Ellipse intervals at Campus 1477. Did Linné's scheduled workout for tonight: 1-2-3-4-5-5-4-3-2-1. One minute rest after short ones, two minutes after long ones.

In honor of Csaba's comeback to the world of international orienteering (http://postas.mtfsz.hu/csaba/2012/06/ob-merleg/) , I ran a Csaba loop around Rödmossen from home. Nice run, and legs loosened up as the run went on. I have never seen Nåsten as wet as today - virtually every little dip in the terrain was filled with water. The marshes were beautiful and smelled delicious.

Morning elliptical at Blåsenhus with Alli. Planned to do a second session this evening, but feeling under the weather, so will skip it and I hope I can train hard the rest of the week.

Various warmups and cool-downs.

Training day!

Drove up with Lina and Rasa and reran the course from Middle-DM 2010, which went quite horribly the first time around.

Rasa started two minutes after me and bet me lunch that she would catch me. This was good incentive to run hard and stay focused, and I did that, smashing my time from 2010 by 17 minutes (though that's more a testament to my performance from last time than today) and earning a free lunch.

C • Easy win 7

Second training of the day, next to the terrain where Middle SM will be this fall. Tried to take this easier, but it was still hard work, as the terrain was very rocky, and the ground soft and covered with deep blueberry, so moving forward was always tough. Orienteered well until making a couple of tiredness-induced mistakes near the end. Still pleased with my map reading, as I am trying to jump-start my dormant orienteering skills in time for WOC.
Really nice training day, followed by a skinny dip in a lake, a magnificent barbecue at Mama Stenström's summer house, and an ultrasprint (or "urban" as the cool kids call it) courtesy of Albin.

Nice, easy-paced orienteering with Andrew at Paradiset after midsommar, with Alli running her own loop on trails.

I'd never run on this part of Nacka before, and it lived up to its name! Beautiful terrain, and Andrew and I were really enjoying it the whole way. Knee wasn't too bad, but definitely reminded me of its existence quite painfully a few times.

Backbana with Ross and Sam. Ran over from home, did a lap, then stopped in the beginning of the second lap. The downhills hurt my knee, especially when the ground was rough, so I picked the hill with the least gnarly footing, and did a few uphill intervals on it while Ross and Sam did a second lap. There was incentive not to stop, as mosquitoes were out in full force.

A lap of the Norby elljusspår with Lasso, plus some more warm-up and cool-down.

OK Linné's Sprint Champs

This was in Eriksberg, around our neighborhood. It wasn't a very tricky course, but you could still find places to lose time. I had a pretty good race, and only had a couple of moments when the knee made me wince in pain. Ended up 5th, still too far back from the leaders, but definitely better than my last couple of sprints. I think my shape is slowly returning.

Splits: http://www.obasen.nu/winsplits/online/sv/default.a...

So damn proud of CSU boys right now. Jukola weekend was wonderful, and it would have been great regardless of the result, but it was so nice to meet and exceed every single expectation we set for ourselves as a team.

Kenny's pictures: http://kenjrwalker.com/photos/2012-06-17-jukola/

More later.

C • Am I just being stupid? 21

Some Jukola excitement, courtesy of some of the top teams: http://news.worldofo.com/2012/06/17/jukola-gps-wow...

C • Nice job at the Jukola 2

Jukola 2012 - CSU

I ran leg 3, the long night leg. Will and Kenny did an excellent job, and sent me out in a good position, well on pace for our goal of top 200. I responded by getting overexcited and flying past the first control by an embarrassing amount. I was frazzled for the next few controls, and lost some time there as well, before settling into a decent rhythm and having a pretty good section in the middle of the course. I made one more big mistake on #12 when I tried to get around a pack that I caught that was moving too slowly. I focused on running hard and didn't notice that we took a trail that was going 90 degrees in the wrong direction. This cost me another three minutes. After this I finally managed to run pretty well (it helped that it was getting light) and picked up some places in the end of the course. A disappointing run, but at least my knee survived and did not seem too much worse afterwards.

My mood improved immediately after the run, as the excitement of my CSU teammates was contagious. I stayed up the rest of the night cheering for the boys and was thrilled to see Ross bring us home in 188th place! What a great experience! I loved being part of Team CSU once again!

My splits: http://online.jukola.com/tulokset/en/j2012_ju/kilp...
Leg times for Leg 3: http://online.jukola.com/tulokset/en/j2012_ju/ju/o...
Final results: http://online.jukola.com/tulokset/en/j2012_ju/ju/t...

Event: Jukola 2012
 

Orienteering!!

Testing out the knee and the terrain with the boys on one of the Jukola training areas. Knee has been a bit better since the second, more aggressive, treatment with Kenneth Rooth. Felt ok, but the knee was weak, and occasional foot plants just felt like they couldn't support weight. Still, much better than the last time I tried running in terrain. I'll give it a shot tonight.

C • Goats 7

Another morning sweatfest at F&S Ekeby with Mats. Did shorter intervals: (45"on-15"off)x30, with 3 minutes rest after every 10. Very thankful for the company. We outdid ourselves this time, as the guy working at the gym was very impressed with the amount of sweat we produced.

A long run! ... on the elliptical machine at Blåsenhus with Alli, while watching the Greece-Czech Republic game. It definitely made the time go by faster, but I'd still rather be in the forest.

C • you're doing great! 2

Elliptical intervals at F&S Ekeby with mats-apan. Hard work, lots of sweating, but nice to get it done.

Running home from the gym.

Got an appointment with a physio in an hour because he had a cancellation. Not as a good as an orthopedist, but definitely progress.

Update: went in to see Kenneth Rooth, a physio at the idrottskadecentrum in Uppsala. Within five minutes of prodding, he determined that my meniscus was just fine! He said that I had a massive build-up of fibrous tissue on the side of the kneecap, which was causing the pain, swelling, and "clamping sensation" that I feel when putting weight on the leg. He then proceeded to pull out some needles, thresh around in my knee for ten minutes, and said he could have me fixed in two treatments! I am certainly skeptical, but it's the best news I've heard in a while, so I'll take it!

C • Knee update 9

Morning run with Ross from Nyköpings OK's clubhouse on a 5km loop. Saw a baby fox! Then - Boda Borg.

C • Boda Borg 3

Elliptical at F&S Ekeby with Alli.

Running to and from the gym. Horned sheep and hairy cows were observed.

An hour of elliptical at lunchtime with Alli.

Sometimes I really hate the Swedish medical system. I tried all day to book a time to see someone about my knee. Maybe I just don't know what I am doing or the right people to call, but the best I could do was book a time on the 18th so I could get a referral to see an orthopedist. Brilliant. Everyone else I tried is either already on vacation or fully booked until they go on vacation. I just want to see someone who can order an X-ray of the knee and tell me if my medial meniscus is torn as I suspect it is.

C • Solution 16

Tried running in terrain for the first time since the knee pain got really bad. Couldn't do it. Trails and roads were halfway ok, but any uneven terrain, and I just could put no weight on my left leg, so it degenerated into a particular type of limping along a la an injured, awkward animal.
2012 is getting to be a forgettable year.

C • That sucks! I'm so sorry! ... 6

Various runnings around and also going around the open course at the first sprint with Alli. She did well, so I sent her out by herself for the second sprint.

The second sprint of the day, around Polacksbacken and Uppsala Science Park. Feeling very unfit, but was orienteering ok until running into an unmapped uncrossable fence on the way to 9 and having to turn around and go back. Was a bit less motivated after losing lots of time there, but ran ok the rest of the way.

Splits: http://www.obasen.nu/winsplits/online/sv/default.a...

Just saw this from the GB WOC selection sprint race: http://irishseniororienteering.files.wordpress.com...

How can anyone think this is good course setting???

C • Wow 10

Since obviously I should be focusing on finishing my PhD, here is a leg-by-leg preview of CSU (team 1161) vs. DVOA (team 986) at Jukola.

Leg - DVOA - CSU

1. (12.7km) speedy vs. feet
Analysis: Both feet and speedy get jittery at the biggest orienteering mass start of their lives, but both settle down and have good races, rising quickly through the ranks well above their starting positions. The two runners are within minutes of each other for most of the race until speedy gets too excited and goes to the wrong forking towards the end, while feet is strong at the end, picking up more places.
Standings after 1: CSU by 10:00

2. (12.7km) OldGoat Balter vs. Matthias
Analysis: Balter starts out with a chip on his shoulder and gains ground on Matthias through the first half of the course, but Matthias' steady pace pays off as Balter fades towards the end of the grueling night leg.
Standings after 2: CSU by 15:00

3. (14.0km) Wyatt vs. BorisGr
Analysis: Boris gets to go out in a good position after two excellent runs by his teammates, and is carried along for a while by the rush of adrenaline and the fast pace in the pack around him. He runs solidly until making a mistake after 10km and then rapidly fading and losing places in the last section of the course. Wyatt is solid throughout, doing his own navigation, and finishes well, but unable to close the gap.
Standings after 3: CSU by 15:00

4. (7.8km) J-man vs. mindsweeper
Analysis: Mikkel is rock-solid and keeps CSU around its 200th place while j-man makes early mistakes and loses time before getting his act together and running very fast towards the end, aided by the coming of daylight.
Standings after 4: CSU by 18:00

5. (8.2km) Nate vs. Biggins
Analysis: The biggest question mark of DVOA's lineup, Nate pulls out the race of his young career and is the first DVOA runner able to gain time on CSU. Biggins makes a big mistake early when he is distracted by admiring Catching Features fans chattering at him in Finnish, but soldiers on to keep CSU's lead a comfortable one.
Standings after 5: CSU by 12:00

6. (10.2km) Eddie vs. Ken
Analysis: The father of AttackPoint makes an uncharacteristic mistake on the first control, allowing Eddie to get closer, but is steady after that, picking up places and keeping CSU's hopes of a top 200 finish afloat. Eddie
runs well, but is frustrated by having to constantly pass slower runners, and ends up making a number of small mistakes in the control circle. He gains quite a bit of time in the end of the course, giving DVOA some hope before the decisive leg.
Standings after 6: CSU by 10:00

7. (15.1km) z-man vs. Rosstopher
Analysis: z-man opens with his trademark blistering pace, while Ross is somewhat uncomfortable getting into the map, and the gap is down to 6:00 a third into the course. DVOA's hopes are dashed, however, as Ross picks it up to turn in some of this best orienteering of the year down the stretch while z-man struggles with the unseasonably warm Finnish morning. Ross is cheered loudly by his teammates as he crosses the finish line in 181st place, while DVOA's faithful have to wait a full 18 minutes to will z-man to the finish in 234th.
Final standings: CSU by 18:00

C • Awesome story! 18

Elliptical intervals at Blåsenhus while Alli did strength exercises. Same session as last week's.

More elliptical. Knee hurt the whole time, decided to stop.

in Moscow.

Elliptical machine at the hotel