Training Log Archive: jfredrickson

Event: 2006 North American Championships (Golden Leaf Orienteering Fest)
 

Warm-up for the NAOC Sprint at McMaster University. Legs feelings crazy.

A pretty solid race. Made one 5 second mistake on control 9 as I couldn't figure out fast enough how to get into the little walled area and where exactly the control was located inside it. Had to stop right outside to figure it out. Then made a rediculously stupid mistake on control 16, running right by it even though I had purposely spotted it early in the course. I was just reading ahead and just didn't realize how fast I went by the control. Lost another 10 seconds there between running by the control and back to it.

I made some debatable route choices, but I don't think any of them were significant enough to count as actual lost time.

A more detailed race analysis is now below. Splits and route commentary are up. Routegadget animation is up with my routes.

Easy cool-down jog after the sprint. Legs hurt like they do sometimes after a tough speed workout.

Sprint
3.2km - 15:55 (4:58/km) - 5th place (24 secs behind)
I was pretty satisfied with my Sprint race. I spent a good 1:30 walking around the campus during the morning prior to the race and got a really good feel for the campus layout and some of the interesting possible control locations. This definitely helped me save some time because I could glance at the map and immediately recognize areas of the campus that I had already walked over. I did have two small mistakes (one of which wasn't actually that bad because it was such a tough spot that stopping to figure it out may have actually been necessary). Of course losing 10 seconds by running by a control out in the open simply because I was looking at my map and didn't have my head up when I knew I was approaching the control was really stupid. I am usually really good about this, but I will have to make a conscious effort to remember to avoid mistakes like this later in the race. I was really surprised to discover after the race that I was tied with Patrick (the winner) at the spectator control and that I lost a good 14 seconds to him over the last 7 controls in addition to my 10 second mistake. He made some very different route choices from me on these last controls, and that may have made the difference in the race. On control 12 I really had the urge to go around the building to the right, but before starting I had seen everyone going around left and decided that they must all be right. While it is good to get as much information as possible before your race, you still have to rely on your own skills when it comes down to the race, and trusting other runners route choices over my own is really bad. Even at a big race where you know that the majority of the competitors are better than you, you still have to trust your own skills in the race. At races in NA though, where I know that I am one of the top competitors, I should be even more trusting of my skills over other peoples. Patrick went right around the building and beat me by 5 seconds on the leg.

On control 15, I went left around both buildings after considering going right around the second one. It looked slightly longer to get around the far corner of the right side of the second building, but I didn't even see the option of going right around both buildings. It is only a short leg and it looks almost about the same, but the fact that I didn't see that option during my race is a bad sign. I know that I was in pretty extreme oxygen debt by that point, and that is probably the main reason behind my poor performance at the end of the race. I think the main thing that I can take away from this race is that I am still not in good enough anaerobic shape for these pure running races. I am definitely qiute good at being able to think fast and make quick decisions, and especially at reading the map while running and navigating at high speeds. If I want to be competitive in the Sprint discipline though I need to do more speed training and probably lots more track work specifically. I think that the 2-mile is probably the most relavant race for Sprints, so I'll have to see what I can dig up on training for the 2-mile.

Sprint 4 - Splits

Slept all morning, and now I am off to Hamilton. I'll drive as far as possible tonight so that I can be there in time to get out on the maps tomorrow morning. Should be fired up and ready to go.

Went for a slightly long, easy run instead of doing the workout with the team. Felt kind of crappy to be running so slow, but it should leave me feeling crazy on Friday :)

C • Feeling crazy... 2

Taper, taper, baby. Legs feeling a lilttle tired going up stairs, but otherwise feeling great. Got to keep busy to keep from thinking about the race too much. I think it is really good practice taking one or two races outside of WOC really seriously every year. Even if the pressure at the event won't be the same, I at least feel the same anticipation leading up to it. I can't wait!

Will try to get back to Trout Brook Valley tomorrow to brush up on my technique. I'll spend the night at home in NY tomorrow night, and then drive up on Thursday. Thursday will be another rest day, aside from a possible easy jog to loosen up the legs after driving. Want to be there already Friday morning to get a chance to get out on the maps before the events start. By that time my legs should be dying to race.

C • pressure 3

Warm-up run at the rail trail. Went out for about a mile and back. I measured the distance on gmap-pedometer, but it isn't very exact since I couldn't see the trail very well on the satellite imagery.

Did a 32 minute out-and-back run on the rail trail. The trail is about 2.7 miles, and I made it a little ways past the end before hitting the 16 minute mark and turning around. I wasn't able to quite hold the pace on the way back though and went 1:28 overtime.

Today was the last day to run hard before the North Americans and it felt great. Didn't quite push it up to a level 5 since the taper has officially started. I can't wait to kick some Canadian ass!

Cool thing is that my pace was faster than my first (and only finish so far) XC race this season. I wasn't pushing quite as hard, and this was longer, so maybe I am in better shape now. I didn't have my best race that day, but it still looks nice to be going down to a 5:56 mile pace on a 5+ mile run when I wasn't going all out.

Real easy cool down run, feeling a bit tired but not too bad.

Event: WCOC Trout Brook Valley
 

Got to the meet late so I offered to pick up controls on the Red course. I took my splits as I got to each control and as I left each control so that I could just post my splits from control to control without the time spent taking down the flags and wrapping them up. Actual time out on the course was 1:15:32, but all the control-to-control splits added up to 55:27.

It actually turned out to be a good exercise since I had about a minute at each control to recover. That allowed me to really push hard on each control and make it an interval workout which worked well for working on speed, but didn't help much with my flow since I had to stop at each control.

I had a pretty good race nonetheless although I did make a few stupid mistakes. I had about 2:30 in lost time, so not a great race, but not too bad considering it was so hard to maintain a decent flow with all the stopping.

I can't remember ever running at Trout Brook Valley before although there was apparently a Billygoat there and I thought I had run in every Billygoat since my first one in 2000 at Fox Forest in NH. Ahh, but looking back at the results I indeed missed the Billygoat in 2003 which is the year it was at Trout Brook Valley. That was the year I was on exchange in Norway.

Anyway, the terrain at Trout Brook Valley is absolutely awesome. The woods are wide open and beautiful and the terrain is rocky and detailed. It is actually probably pretty similar to what we are going to be running on this weekend at NAOC although the NAOC terrain will be significantly flatter. It was definitely a good warmup though. Maybe I can get back there one more time before heading up to Canada...

Red - Splits

Clark XC Race: Mt. Holyoke

C • Curious to hear how the todays... 11

Warmup for XC Meet at Mt. Holyoke College. Feeling pretty decent.

Felt great for the first mile, going through at 5:36, a little bit faster than the planned 5:45, but not too bad. Started to get a cramp in my side about half-way through the second mile and started to slow down a bit near the second mile mark. I managed to make it through the 2-mile mark at 11:30 right on target although the mile spllit was a little slower than I would have hoped for.

It was all downhill from there though. I knew I had to pick it up a bit at the 2-mile mark to keep the pace, but the cramp kept getting worse and I actually slowed down even more. By the time I reached the 3-mile mark it was pretty painful to run. I started walking a after the 3-mile mark and trying to stretch it out. After about a minute I started jogging again but it hurt too much so I tried walking some more. After about 2 minutes of walking I decided to just drop out because the 4th and 5th place guys on our team had passed me, so it didn't really matter any more.

I find it really surprising that I got cramps in both XC races I have run in this year and other than that I have not had a cramp in years. The first thing my coach asked me was if I had eaten any apples or drunk any Gatorade before the race, and interestingly enough that was my exact breakfast (plus a bagel). I haven't eaten an apple in a long time either, so perhaps that is a good explanation for the cramp, but I don't know what the cause was on the previous cramp.

It's pretty frustrating to have to drop out of a race because of something so silly. I have never had a cramp before that was so serious I couldn't just run it off, but this one was pretty painful.

After everyone finished we all went for an easy cool-down run. I could still feel a tightness in my side but I was able to run at the easy pace. For some reason my legs felt really tired though. I don't know what that is all about. Maybe they had just stiffened up a bit.

C • What's wrong with apples and Gatorade? 3

C • My legs feel great after a goo... 1

After watching the girls race, T-Mac and I decided to go for another run just to get in a little extra mileage. I felt much better on this run. We came across a police radar sign that displays how fast you are driving, and discovered that it picked us up as we ran by it on the sidewalk. We of course picked up the pace to a full out sprint to test it out and got it up to 16 mph. I wonder how accurate that is...