Training Log Archive: RLShadow

Event: ROC - Mendon Ponds Park Ski-O / Winterfest
 

Green random-O course at Mendon. Had to get 15 controls out of the 20 available.

Finished 4th out of 6 on Green, not too impressive of an outing.

Chose a clockwise route, doing all but one control on the east side of the pond, and skipping 4 controls west of Deep Pond. I'm not at all sure that was the best strategy.

Route: 117; straight line through the flat light green area to 115; another straight line to 116. Then headed towards east side of Hundred Acre Pond.

105, 107, 108, 103 (had a little trouble finding it -- circle said it was in medium green, instead it was in what looked like (but was not mapped as) white woods). 106, 104, 119 (skipped 120).

Over to the west side, in a somewhat non-efficient route leaving 119.

109, 101. 112, 114, 113. Lost a little time on 113 because the map showed a trail that left the main trail and headed straight to the control. The trail was pretty much invisible, and should probably be re-mapped as an indistinct trail at best (or even as no trail!). I think if the trail hadn't been on the map, I would have focused only on contour lines and found it with no lost time.

All in all I wasn't real happy with how I did, but I've hardly been running at all so I knew I didn't have much endurance, and it's tough to do well on a course of this length without that. I made very few navigation mistakes, but quite possibly a few strategic errors in terms of which controls to do and in which order.

I wore my Inov8 shoes, for the first time since last year's Mendon Winterfest event. I've never gotten to like these, because they are very non cushioned, and they also tend to give me a blister in the middle of my right foot (or at least a tender spot). But they have very aggressive tread, so they're good from that standpoint. I probably didn't need real good traction today because of the ground being frozen so there were very few muddy areas. I'm sure I'll keep these shoes around for other times when traction is more important than comfort. So far I have a grand total of 20 miles on them, to show how little they are used. I should probably experiment with some sole inserts.

With Teddy this time, not Homer and/or Hanna. Teddy is my son's dog; my son is away skiing for the weekend, and the dog is in the care of my son's roommate, who works quite a bit on weekends, so I stopped by their house and took Teddy on a longer walk than he usually gets.

Rec Center.

Rt 104 path, to Gravel Rd and back.

At Casey Park. Much more enjoyable games than yesterday. Nine people present, all reasonably competent, including a lady who has only been playing for a few weeks but comes from a tennis background, so she's quite decent already.

Got kicked off the court for basketball. And not by basketball players -- they were not present. Someone who wanted to play basketball called in and asked if they could come and play, so we 9 pickleball players got kicked off, in anticipation of the basketball players eventually showing up. Also, the gym is plenty big enough that it would be easy to have 2 pball courts going, and one halfcourt basketball court (they hardly ever play full court, we were told), with lots of buffer space in between. But the place has very strict rules, the lady at the desk told us, the pickleball and basketball an never both be played in the gym at the same time. It's nice to know that that Webster Rec center isn't the only facility with some rules that are difficult to understand the logic behind.

Very light turnout today. Played only 3 games, one of which I won 11-0 with Debbie S. as my partner, the other two I lost, with some much weaker players as my partner. Wasn't having a whole lot of fun, so I bailed out after the 3rd game, to take the doggies for a decent walk.

HJ trail, with trailsnail. Very slow pace, but I felt like I was working harder than the pace would indicate. Presumably due to somewhat poor footing, and being fairly bundled up.

C • screw shoes? 3