Training Log Archive: RLShadow

Event: ROC - Ellison Park Score-O [2011 Sprint Series #4]
 

Ellison Sprint. Didn't find #8. Found out later that someone (from ROC) had moved it during the competition because (I'm assuming) there were complaints from people using the lodge that it had been at the south corner of. Of course, just moving the control without modifying the competitors' maps (or having someone on the course alerting people to the changed location) doesn't do anything to reduce the number of orienteers going to the mapped control location, in fact it makes people linger longer in the area of the lodge, looking in vain for the control.

I probably spent a minute looking for the control (according to my GPS track, that's about right), then I was a little less motivated to push myself the rest of the way, knowing I had missed the control.

I glanced at the results and saw that they had given me and others who came through after the control had been moved credit for completing the course, which was nice. I'm still guessing my time was 1-1.5 minutes slower than if the control had been in the right place.

C • Sad 4

Ellison Score-O. Actually started about 10 minutes or so after the official start, so I was really on the move more around 52 minutes, even though the official time was just under 62 minutes.

I started late because my son (late 20's) and his 2.5 year old son came out to the meet. He's been talking about bringing his son to a meet for a while now, but afternoon meets tend to conflict with his son's normal nap time, and there have been a lot of times that he (my son) has a conflict and couldn't make it anyway. They were just finishing up the White course when the Score-O was starting, so I just had to stick around and get a few pictures of them, and chat with them a little about how it had gone (very well, it seemed).

So not only did I start very late, but I had a pretty poor strategy, and then made a major navigational mistake to help add up to a pretty poor showing.

The navigational mistake was on 197. I came from 191, up to the E-W trail, then took the trail east to the first trail on the left, which looked like it should take me right to 197. I went down a spur, then down some more, then it leveled out a bit, but no control. I finally concluded that I was on the wrong spur, and I needed to be one more spur over to the east. The spur that I was on, even though it had a very distinct trail, did not have any trail shown on the map. To complicate things, the contour lines were printed extremely lightly, especially it seems in this area of the map, so I could hardly see (and only in retrospect) that there was another spur (the one that I wound up going down the first time). I finally got on the right spur and found the control, but it took me 12 minutes to go from 191 to 197 which I'm guessing was about 8 minutes longer than it should have.

From there, I got 196, since I didn't want to pass up that nearby high-point control, even though I suspected I would finish late, which I did, but only a minute late, for a 10-pt penalty, so getting the 50-pt #196 certainly did make sense.

Edit: The split sheet from the finish line said the penalty was 10 points, but I see from the results that the penalty was actually 30 points. Well, still worth getting the 50-pt control.

C • Written penalty?! 6

C • 197 5

Sprint - Splits

Morning urban run, starting from Winton near Blossom. I felt very lethargic. Not sure why, it was warm but not extremely so.

Hojack Trail run, mid-morning. Not too hot today, low 70's. Cheryl and Homer came along and walked while I ran.

I threw in two 0.25-mile intervals near the end, to try to start easing into doing some speed work. Didn't go very fast but felt like I should have been going fast; 1:45 and 1:48 were the times (the first one slightly downhill, the second one back uphill).

Iron. Bay Park West, running trails with the mapping GPS in hand, to make more progress on getting the new and very extensive trail system mapped.

In general, I like the trails. It makes some previously nearly inaccessible parts of the park more accessible. It will definitely make setting White and Yellow courses easier (and make for more interesting courses for those levels). Orange courses shouldn't be affected too much, one way or the other. The park was never ideal for much beyond Brown because it's so small, and it still won't be, and the trails may make it tougher to find challenging control placements (but of course, at Dryer Rd, having a lot of trails does not necessarily make navigation easier! But the trail system at Iron Bay isn't quite as bizarre or confusing as Dryer Rd).

All of the mtn bikers I've encountered in my two visits to the park have been exceptionally polite, so based on my limited experience, I haven't seen any issues with bikers sharing trails with people on foot.

Short morning run, to see how things felt after the race yesterday. Felt totally OK, surprisingly.

Warmup jog.

Fairport 5-mile race. First road race in a long time.

I had a loose goal of being under 8:00/mile, which I didn't quite make but I came reasonably close.

I felt like I ran a pretty constant-effort race, not going out too fast or too slow, not fading at the end, but not having anything really left either. So I'm not sure I could have done any better, other than, of course, by being in better shape (or by being younger :) ).

I surprised myself by finishing 2nd in my age group; I really didn't think my time was worthy of an age-group place. Likewise, trailsnail surprised herself by placing 3rd in her fairly new 55-59 age group. Guess there are advantages of getting old and moving into easier age groups!

Official time was 40:26, and of course the official distance was 5.00 miles. The course is listed as certified, although the starting location and the turnaround point have both changed in the last couple of years, and the map of the course still on the web site shows the old course layout. I'm assuming it's been re-certified, but who knows for sure.

My GPS said I covered 5.05. A small amount of that difference is no doubt the distance behind the starting line that I was when the race started (maybe around 0.02). The rest might just be GPS error. I don't think I took any non-optimum "route choices" (in how corners are rounded, etc.) that would add up to that much.

I finished 181st out of 635 finishers (around 29th percentile -- a bit better than I do at most trail races), and 2nd out of 8 in the 60-64 age group.

C • Good Job! 3