Training Log Archive: DWildfogel

At the cabin: All 3 (upper body) Theraband exercises; one set of pilates mat.

Armstrong Woods. Louise and I go for a moderate walk on the replacement trails (nice change) and then up a little ways towards the East Ridge Trail so we could go out to the little falls. The woods were wet and glistening - very ovely.

Kortum Trail, with Louise. Overcast, but still a lovely day. Easy run, not pushing at all. We started at Blind Beach (as usual), but walked up, over and down before running, starting at a trail side boulder just before the first big rock outcrop, finishing in the same place. We turned back when Louise's GPS watch said 2.5 mi, but that watch always seems to be a little short.

For the first time in a while, didn't feel very good running. Every little uphill tired out my quads. Am I sore from Wednesday's speedy track workout?

27:43 - 25:32

Warm up and cool down: walking up and down the first hill S of Blind Beach.

The usual weekly accumulation of morning stretching,

Bodega Head - Louise and I go for a moderate walk along the edge of the cliffs. Spot a couple of whales not far from shore.

Louise and I go for a moderate walk on Skyline to Four Winds and back. A drippy foggy day, but the sun comes out as we near home. My right hip and hamstring start aching over the last ten minutes.

All the theraband exercises; half the sets for pilates mat, hips, and thigh adductors.

Weights (curls and military press, as usual)

Los Gatos High School track. Threshold intervals: 3 x 1200m with 1 min rest.

5:42(:56)5:39(:58)5:29 Note: Mile pace for the 3 runs: 7:38, 7:34, 7:21.

Felt very strong; these were actually easy. No doubt in my mind that I can break 7 for a 1 mile. Having no pain in my achilles makes a huge difference!

It was a bit muggy out; ran with my shirt off. Louise was out there doing a similar workout, but we ran on our own.

Warm up: 6 laps plus on the grass inside the track.

Cool down. 2:20 recovery jog (not counted in the total for this session) immediately after finishing; :50 stretching; then 1 mile on the grass inside the track. Finish with 6 minutes of stretching.

Intended to do my strength exercises today, but never found the time.

Skyline to Black and back, on my own. Nice and easy on the way out, but pretty fast nonetheless. Put a little oomph into it on the way back, resulting in some fast splits and a fine time overall.

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5542(108)5434(1017)4416(334)4043(503)3539(519)
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Stayed overnight with the Minariks and went out early in the morning with Louise so that she could run in the Coastal Trail Runs 5 miler at Redwood Regional in Oakland.

Paso Nogal. A-meet Middle course by Get Lost! (Vlad G). Sunny, a little warm. Start at 10:48. Ran well (had to walk some hills), navigated well. Two significant mistakes (1 min on #7 and :30 on #11) plus a half dozen small ones (5 - 15 secs). Overall, quite a good run, good for first on Brown by a wide margin. Really enjoyed it; in fact, towards the end, was wishing it wasn't going to be over so soon! Got more aggressive as the race wore on and my confidence grew; that led to a few bobbles, but since I was going hard and with little hesitation, splits for those legs were good anyway.

Hadn't been here before (there had been two prior events); very good venue for the Bay Area, more technical than usual, and though somewhat steep, no massive hills.

Surprised that the scale was 1:7500 as I knew that last year it was 1:5000. (Later I saw that the meet notes did in fact specify the correct scale, but I hadn't noted that.) As a consequence, I wasn't exactly sure of my pace count, which definitely hurt me a couple of times.

Warm up: jog to start, plus a couple of minutes once there. 6 mins, 0.5 miles

Cool down: 6 minutes, 0.4 miles

Day Two: Brown - Splits

Event: Run Black Diamond
 

The usual weekly accumulation of morning stretching.

Diablo Valley College. A-meet Sprint conducted by Get Lost! Cool but pleasant evening. Starts delayed by 15 minutes (I started at 8:20). Distance is straight line (point to point); actual distance, going around buildings, considerably greater.

When I finished, I didn't think it was that good of a run because leaving most of the controls, I had to stand still for a bit in order to locate the circle for the next control: there are a lot of dark buildings on the map, the controls and numerals were overprinted in a fairly dark color, and the campus was pretty dark. Nevertheless, by taking my time in that manner, I didn't make any mistakes and my route choices were pretty close to optimal. So, I would up with quite a good result: fastest time on the Masters/Juniors course, which included all the Green runners (e.g., Tapio).

Because of the technical difficulty of the course, there were very few times when I could actually run. Weird finishing a sprint and not being tired at all.

Started catching up with Gavin Wyatt-Mair (who started 2 minutes ahead of me) as I approached #3, and passed him as I was going into #6 (thought I hardly saw him in between as we had taken different routes). After that, he left most of the controls faster than me (which certainly contributed to my feeling that it wasn't a great run) and then I wouldn't see him (it was dark) and then pass him near the control; apparently, the time I took leaving the previous control paid off in that I was able to go right to the flag once I got in the circle. Got ahead of him (yet again) going into #12, and stayed ahead because the last two controls were away from the buildings (making the control circles and numerals more visible) so I was able to plan those legs while on the run during the previous legs.

Warm up: a little difficult to plan since Vlad was still out hanging controls and it wasn't clear when we'd actually start. Fortunately, my legs felt great and I got loose immediately, and didn't have to do a lot to stay loose. 8 mins, 0.7 miles.

Cool down: 6 minutes, 0.4 miles.

Day One: Masters/Juniors - Splits

Theraband and weights, about half the usual amount.

Front of house. Get out early, ahead of the rain. Just loosening up for Friday's race. Got going quite swiftly and felt great. Be very happy if I can run Fri's 1.4 km night sprint in today's time :-)

618, 507, 106.

Watch battery died; got a new one later in the day.

Pilates mat interleaved with theraband, hips, and thigh adductors. Only did about half the mat exercises since my right quad is somewhat sore from Sunol's hills.

Upper body weights.

Event: BAOC: Sunol Wilderness Scramble
 

Sunol. Gorgeous day. 90 minute wilderness scramble; however, I used it as a training day. From the controls available, put together a (not monstrously hilly) 11 control, 5.9 km (as the crow flies), 230m climb course. The first third was mostly along a reasonably flat trail, which I used as a warmup. The rest was Sunol-type orienteering: mostly open, very hilly. Took my time (tacking back and forth) on most of the downhills to avoid hurting my toes. Probably got 20 minutes of decent training out of it. Used last 5 minutes (jogging from last control to finish) as cool down.

Skyline Ridge OSP. Hilly hike with Louise, Liane and Steve. Lovely day, moderate effort.

The usual weekly accumulation of morning stretching.

Front of house. Planned to do an easy 3 miles. Figured it would be slow because my legs felt rather sore, but it was actually pretty swift, and quite easy.

600, 533, 523, 515, 507, 109

The usual short warmup; 5 min cool down.

Pilates mat (only 3 sets) interleaved with theraband, hips, thigh adductors. Weights.

Skyline. Very warm, 75%. Ran in shorts and t-shirt. Had to wait nearly an hour for L to be ready, by which time I was getting hungry.

Usual 5.66 in 58:45, with an additional 5:08 of loop backs for Louise. She wasn't feeling well and started very slowly; stayed behind her for about 1.7 miles, then went on my own and looped back for her several times. Ran hard to make up for the slow start; probably over did it, as I was pretty beat afterwards.

Making a U-turn on the pavement for one of the loop backs, my shoes lost their grip and my knee and hip hit the ground hard.


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5845(109)5736(1040)4655(342)4313(507)3806(537)
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Cool down

Just got back from viewing Comet Pan-STARRS. Yesterday we drove a couple of miles down Skyline to a spot with a good view to the west and we were able to pick out the comet in binocs, and then later when it got a little darker, it was easy to see with the unaided eye. Since there were low clouds partially obstructing the view, we thought we'd try again tonight. This time, we went only 500m away, and again, we found it first in binocs and then eventually without them. But meanwhile, a neighbor whom we'd never met, and whose mailbox we were standing near, came home and said he was about to get out his 22" (!) scope and invited us to join him. We saw the comet before it set, and then Jupiter and its moons and bands, the absolutely fabulous Orion Nebula, the Pleiades, and the Double Cluster in Perseus. It was our lucky day, er, night!

Theraband, weights, pilates mat (only 3 sets instead of 4 as right groin felt a bit sore), hips (one set); no thigh adductor exercise.

Event: BAOC: McLaren Park
 

McLaren Park, San Francisco. Lovely day. Good, technical Green/Brown Middle set by Tapio. Didn't think I had done that well at the time that I finished, since I made one significant error (though it was only 1:30), a few small ones, and there were several times that I stood still for 5 or 10 secs because I was puzzled. Nevertheless, I came in first by nearly 5 minutes, and I figure my equivalent time for Blue/Red was about 47:30, which would've been good for 9th or 10th of 28 people. (Figured that by comparing my time on the 15 common legs - 29:54 of my run - with the 6th through 12th place finishers on Blue/Green). So, I guess my feeling of not having had a particularly good run was due more to the technical nature of the course. Also, warming up my legs felt very tired on uphills, and the course was 5% climb. Finally, I ran the first 6 legs thinking the map scale was 1:10K when it was 1:5K, and that caused errors on #5 and #6 totaling at least 1:45.

#1 - #4. No problems, good splits.

#5. Ran past the turn off to the small trail, though I recovered quickly. Then found myself at the trail fork past the control; again recovered quickly. Those errors should have been signs that my opinion of the scale was wrong, but that didn't occur to me. Lost :15-:20.

#6. Didn't take the best route, relying too much on trails. Overshot the control due to having the scale wrong: found myself on the trail below the control thinking I was on the trail just above it. Confusion compounded by an unmapped building below (later realized it's in the mapped olive green rectangle, but it should have been shown). Took a minute to sort things out.

#7. No problem, except slow uphill.

#8. Took a few seconds to find the beginning of the trail, but this still turned out to be my best leg, with the 4th best time of the 28 Blue/Red's (missed 3rd by 1 sec). Ran pretty hard on the trail, and executed the tricky last part very well.

#9. Left #8 in too much of a hurry and didn't get on the trail I intended to (also didn't notice the better route: contour N). Following bearing, noticed I was closer than anticipated to the amphitheater, but didn't adjust. When I got to the trail, saw fence ahead to the right but thought it was the fence that was actually ahead to the left. Took several seconds to sort this out. Lost :25.

#10. No problems, managed to keep running even though the leg was almost all uphill.

#11. Good job of getting to the trail junction right below the control, but something about the trails was confusing, and I stood there looking in the wrong direction for a bit. Lost :10.

#12. Fine.

#13. Stood still for a while (again!) after leaving 12 because the plainly visible triangle of trails below didn't look quite right. Finally realized it was OK, did rest of leg fine (though I probably should have taken a direct route rather than the last small trail).

#14, 15, 16. Getting a little tired, but nailed the controls. Somehow, though, I was :13 behind Cornelia on the short leg to #16 despite not remembering losing any time.

#17. Another good leg for me. Swung around to the right to take the trails; executed the tricky last part very well (as with #8, studied the detail carefully while I was running on the trail).

#18. Good; had studied this one, too, while running on the trail to #17.

F. Lost 4 seconds because the control unit didn't beep (though it actually recorded the punch) so I went back and punched the other epunch unit.

Routes (including mine) can be seen on the BAOC RouteGadget site.

Warm up

Cool down

Front of house. Just loosening up. Felt pretty good.

618, 534, 458

Cool down

Pilates mat interleaved with theraband, hips, thigh adductors and weights.

Skyline. Cool and drippy. Easy pace following Louise (who hasn't run much lately) to 7.0 mark in 25:50. On way back, several one- to three-minute burst, especially up the hills. Used last .9 (not included in the stats for this entry) as a cool down.

The extended cool down (mentioned above) on Skyline.

2/3 workout: pilates mat, theraband, thigh adductors, hips. (Intended to do weights later, but it never happened.)

Skyline. Low 50's, sunny, no wind. Seemed a bit chilly at first, but after a while was very comfortable in my short-sleeve shirt. Legs still pretty tired from Sat's sprints, but after a couple of miles I felt generally good and pushed the pace a little, without ever getting anywhere near oxygen debt. A fast but easy run despite tired legs!

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5754(110)5644(1034)4611(347)4224(511)3712(556)
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Cool down

Event: BAOC: U.C. Berkeley Classic Sprint
 

Left very early to drive to SF (again!) to meet Rachel (who was still asleep when we got to her hotel) for breakfast. Took her and new beau Jordon out to Dottie's, which was excellent. After taking Rachel to SFO, drove to El Cerrito for George's celebration of the first anniversary of his new heart. A very nice gathering, with lots of orienteers fresh from the Berkeley meet.

Jog around some grassy areas on the UC Berkeley campus to warm up for my pre-run of George's courses (can't run in the meet tomorrow because we're taking Rachel to the airport). After agonizing for days over whether to do both or one (but which one?), settle on a plan that seemed good: Going to run the first 7 controls of the middle as a warm-up, then run the Sprint.

Temp in the low 60's, and feels a bit muggy.

Berkeley. The first 7 controls of George's Middle course. Ran hard, pretty efficient, no navigation mistakes. Missed the best route to #5 (went back past 4) [lost :15] and didn't see the underground passageway which would have made a better route to #6 [lost :08]. 12th of 60 at that point.

Berkeley. George's Sprint course. Fun, and great training. Would have placed 12th of 65. Lost about 2:10 altogether.

#2. First tried to go around W side of building; didn't see uncrossable fence on the map. Then went around E side and did fine, but didn't see the direct route via covered walkway, with entry partially blocked by fence. Turned out George hadn't seen that route either! Lost :55.

#9. Got up on upper deck before realizing that I should've gone through underground passageway. However, that passageway should have been emphasized with a purple crossing point symbol. Lost 1:00.

#14. Only navigation error: found myself at the beginning of the bridge S of the one I intended to cross; had to backtrack a bit. Lost :10. The route coming at the stairway from the N was probably slightly better.

Also, there were slightly better routes than the one I took for #3 and #8.

Cool down. While I wasn't in much oxygen debt when I finished (the navigation was the limiting factor rather than my running ability), my legs were pretty spent by the end.

The usual weekly accumulation of morning stretching.

In the afternoon, picked up Charlie and Rhonda at SFO and drove them to SF. Later we met George and Leslie for dinner. Prior to dinner, we walked around downtown, Chinatown and even into North Beach, for a total of about an hour and a half.