Training Log Archive: maprunner

Possum Trot XVII at Longview Lake.

I was nervous about today, and really hoped that the computer would behave itself. Eric S (meet director) brought his father's RV, so we used the generator to run the equipment. WOrked out great, and would have been nice to have a warn dry spot, if we had needed it. Weather was great, sunny and upper 40s.

This park has a weird shape, so Mike Shifman set a one-direction course. Which meant we bused people to the start, for the first time ever. I went to watch the start (I love that!). I put the maps down on the ground. I had not seen the course. The meet director told people to line up on one side of the map. But when they started, it turns out that #1 was behind them. It was fascinating to watch how long it took people to figure it out and start running back down the road. Proud to say that Spike was the first to turn around :)

Also rode the bus to watch the start of the Half Possum (no turn around here, just a much slower start group). Then back to man the computer. We had a beginner course, so that helped me make sure that download and printing were working. I also used a different download station than we had used the day before. That seemed to help.

I set up the courses in MeOs as rogaining, with 1 point per control. As long as the competitor punched 31 controls, then they had done the full course. You could punch fewer controls, but then you were correctly sorted down the list, below those who had found 31. The downloads all worked well, until late in the day. Suddenly, the printer stopped working, and the download was recognizing names again. I unplugged the download station, plugged it back in and restarted MeOs. Success! Crisis averted today, with just a short period of time where split printouts weren't available. I was able to print them out later for anyone who missed them.

We had a problem with some competitors not getting a beep on the last control (but not all). We could see the last control, so we knew they had punched, and I gave them credit. Turns out we have older rental cards (SI-7?) that only hold 30 punches, and they needed to punch 31 today.

Always fun to watch the race, and see Andrei win (again!). Seem s like more women participated this year, I'll have to check. Nick and Reta did a great job with the food. Paul, Dick, Mike and Eric handled all the controls.

Came home and tried to export the splits, but could not figure out how to do that with rogaining controls. Decided to just post results, and work on splits tomorrow.

C • Possum Trot 3

Event: Possum Trot XVII
 

Working at the Pre-Possum at Kill Creek. It was a beautiful day, and we had a a great turnout from SLOC, MNOC and other clubs. My course was well received, even if it was a bit too easy (hard to set a navigationally challenging course here).

But we had a disaster with using MeOs for results. We had used it three times prior with no issues. This time, it worked fine for a bit, then stopped reading the cards,. Next, the computer gave me the blue screen of death. Then we got it back up again, but now it read every card with no name assigned. So we tried to shut down the computer again, and we had to force it to shut down. Came back up and now worked, but we lost all the downloads that had no names associated. Some folks had already left, so we couldn't read their cards again.
As near as we can tell, the software didn't like old firmware (download station). Stressful day, I hate when I can't give people results right away.

Came home to enjoy a nice visit with iamstillhungry and Lisa. We fed Tom so much that he actually said he was no longer hungry :)

I just had to get outside after work today, it was 22c! And I hadn't orienteered yet this week.

How to take it easy (I walked) yet still get a bit of a challenge?

1. Cut up the map into tiny snippets, then pick 6 random pieces and try to find them on the map (scroll down on the map image to see them)
2. Wear a crappy Petzel headlamp
3. Try to hold onto the map in the gale force wind

I thought it would be too easy, but I made a mistake.
Next time I think I'll go out with just the pieces and no map

Workout with my trainer. We avoided leg exercises that could hurt my knee. Also did lots of arm stuff. Hadn't done straight bicep work in awhile, this was tough.

Hair cut and color tonight, then home for the KU basketball game (Mike watched it, I didn't).

Knee and ribs are worse. I had a hard time sleeping last night. Knee hurt during the day. And it was difficult to find a position where my stylist could wash my hair. Guess it was too soon to trying running again. My self-diagnosis is a knee contusion and fractured ribs.

C • oof 5

Annual Geography Awareness Week event at KU. I ran back and forth to the parking garage, and lugged some equipment up and down stairs.

I had lined up plenty of workers, because we can get inundated at this event. But this year it wasn't well advertised and we only got 9 starts. Bummer. But it meant we had more time to visit with Gene, Dick, Sandy and George. Nice dinner afterwards.