Training Log Archive: FoxShadow

Great game today, lots of fun, and a great workout. The legs were feeling it a bit afterward, but decided to meet Reed at Hyland for a short ski anyway. I signed up for the Leadville 100 lottery, so I might need to start making more and more of these decisions. Lottery result notifications are sent out February 8th.

Skiing with Reed, he's getting ready for the Birkie.

Great training event in Afton State Park. One heck of a workout, I was redlining much of the event postholeing in the deep snow. Marking this one as a 5. Two 3-5 minute mistakes, otherwise a good run. Awesome control locations on awesome terrain.

Got the new issue of MTB magazine. This called for a long session of spinning while fiending on the goods.

A few quick miles after biking when the badger game caught my eye on the TV. A fist pumping 8-0 run pulled Bucky from down 7 with 3 to play, to up one with 45 seconds to play. Somehow Bucky lost it.

I'm not sure I can go on being a Viking and Badger fan this winter. Not only are the losses tough to take, they happen right at the exact moment I let my guard down. Right when I start to believe. Why god? Why me?

Shred mill. One mile slow, half mile at 6/mile, repeated once. Cooled down and went to the weight room. I was feeling stiff from OTNT, I was running the flat trails fast as I was being pushed by the two headed Pete monster (Curtis and Wentzel).

Mostly lower body workout at the gym.

A really fun OTNT around loring park and the sculpture garden. Orienteering has taken me to so many places I've never been. This was same same but different. Places I'd already been--but going there in a way I'd never have expected. Thanks Todd, a great idea. Not idea really on time and distance.

Spent 5-7 hours studding a pair of MTB tires with 820 #6 3/8 inch sheet metal screws. It was worth it. The results are better than I expected, and probably than I imagined. I can bank as hard into a turn as I can on many dirt surfaces -- such a strange feeling. Went out to Maynards where they had the Pond Hockey tourney to find a vast expanse of ice (2+ rinks and associated roads and paths) and tested 'em out.

C • 820 5

Put on my skates while I let Scott have a rip on the new Ice Bike.

Short Stremph training session, upper body.

What a day on the Birkie Trail. My first time skiing the whole thing. Well, the course was not exactly the same as the actual Birkebeiner, but the Birkie Tour ended up being 47k and totally awesome, so it was probably a pretty similar experience. The snow was super fast, which made the effort much easier that what I've heard it can be. Skied with Reed and his dad, friend Duncan, and Biz. We all stayed together and had a ball out there despite the gloomy weather. An awesome first day on the trail.

Nice ski on the Birkie Trail, from the double-0 hut south. Just a quick one to see how the body was feeling, check out the snow and get ready to tomorrow.

Stremph training. Upper.

Spinning the last nastiness out of the legs nice and easy. Taking most of this week off as I'd like to ski the Birkie Tour on Saturday. It will be my 3rd time skiing this year, but I plan to take it slow, so we'll see how it goes.

C • cool....perhaps we will see... 1

Event: Purdue Outing Club Adventure Race (POCAR)
 

P.O.C.A.R. Mo$, crusher, and Biz Marquee tackled the 40 mile+ beast that is the Purdue Outing Club Adventure Race. See YouTube videos by a participating team here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tYmc8nZwrv0 and from a race organizer/student here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0QCAELD5EWg&feature....

I REALLY liked the terrain here in the Hoosier National Forest. In my opinion, this was best terrain for a long distance O-event I have seen. Close seconds include the nationals terrain we ran in the northern kettle moraine and the USARA nationals terrain in the Blue ridge mountains, but this terrain had both open woods and big elevation change.

The race was divided into three loops each of which we would plot individually after the completion of the prior. We started the first loop fast and knocked out the first 8 CP's in a counterclockwise loop around the lake in about 3:20. It was very warm. Forecast called for about 45 degrees, and it felt like 55. T-shirts for all 4 of us -- awesome! The CP's on this loop were all placed perfectly, we found them without really any problems I believe, and were feeling great.

The second loop was not as good. In fact, it was terrible, I suspect bad enough that I (and our team) may not return to POCAR next year. We were given one wrong UTM, and were chased down by an SUV carrying the correct coordinate. We went and grabbed that one and headed to the second. Unfortunately the second CP was placed both 1) 100M away and 2) in a very deep and steep reentrant. The CP was marked NW of a pond, the only pond within a kilometer radius. We left the CP, only to find out from CITGO/Grey Goat (15th at USARA nationals last year) that the CP was in the aforementioned re-entrant. We ran back and got it. It cost us an additional 55 minutes, and we were running most of the way. I untied it, and moved it up to the pond, upon Biz's suggestion. The end of the second loop ended with a cool team challenge, but where were the third loop's UTM coordinates? The guy who had them left the TA! We were told that he was making a 2k trip to check the location of the 3rd CP (which we already lost 20 minutes trying to find as it was 50M off and on the side of a reentrant in which it was marked at the low point. This was laughably bad form by the Purdue kids. What a shame. Molly started her stop watch and clocked that we waited around about 30 minutes for him to return. I can't say I was too upset about the opportunity to sit and eat. But it was, categorically, a total clusterfuck.

Then, the third loop. Almost total redemption here (time will tell). An epic challenge. All CP's placed perfectly. Huge elevation, reentrants so deep and open they felt like slot canyons, clear streams with gorgeous blue rock, huge distance, great route choice challenges, and a SWEET ropes challenge. There was only one loop I've done that could redeem this race, and it was likely this one. A true bad mother of a trekking loop. We found the first, second and third CP's without any trouble, biz and I working together on the map well. They were long though. I don't know, but I'd guess they took five hours. We had trouble with the 4th CP. We were tired, and I was not able to concentrate on the details of this part of the map well enough to stay on. I suspect that we would have done better if were to not chime in my opinions at all. I thought I knew where were were a number of times, but as I was unable to stay on exactly. It might have been the toughest part of the map, but I might have been the most tired too. As I look at it now it looks very tough, but should have been manageable. We never were really lost, but we took a ton of time studying the map, guessing as to our location, always being very close but perhaps never exactly correct as to exactly which part of the monster ridgeline we were on. I'd guess the leg could have been done 45 minutes faster if it were done right. We found the next few CP's well and did the last 5 miles or so on the road home in a slow and, for me, pretty painful jog.

Somehow we drove all the way home that day/night. Kelly drove us all the way up to Chicago and we were good to go from there.

C • Nothing worse than a CP in ... 1

Trail run with Kelly and Biz. We went to REI to get some new gore-tex shoes for Biz, Molly and Kelly for POCAR and then took them down to the river bottoms for a test drive. My new INOV-8 288 GTX's came yesterday, so I was eager to run with those. I was pretty into kicking through the deep stuff with my boots and gaitors, I was convinced they were working. Then Biz launched himself off of a bridge into a 5 inch deep spring fed creek wearing low top salomon comp 4's (with gore tex) That was a great laugh! He stood there for 15 seconds waiting to feel the icy cold pain, but stepped out dry and warm. Sweet! (he also had sweet stretch OR gaiters on, which are super sweet) I did the same test with my INOV-8's and they passed the test with flying colors. The nice new gear made the snowy and wet run painless and fun. What a difference the right gear makes.

C • fun 1

Really fun winter Score-O. Wore my orienteering shoes and ended up getting abused. So much snow worked its way through the forefoot mesh that my toes ended up curling up as large ice chunks formed in the forefoot of both feet. Pretty bad bruising on my toes. Two nails on my left foot are falling off and all toes on both feet are sore. Guess I won't be wearing those in the snow again. So, I have now worn those shoes for two days, and have sustained minor but significant injuries both times. You'd think I'd throw them away. But I will not. I am giving the shoes the benefit of the doubt and saying it was user error, both times. Was it user error to try to clear the Score-O yesterday? Is there a pattern here?

C • O shoes 2

Third annual "Ski to Beer", had 20 people this year. Soon we should have sponsors. This sport is catching on fast for some reason. A beautiful sunny day with fresh white snow in the park, making it probably the best day I've had in Theodore Wirth.

Shredmill

mile 1-8:00
mile 2-8:00
mile 3-6:40
mile 4-8:00

Wailed on the pecs, continued the arms race, back, shocked the abs.

With the back feeling strong I decided to moonlight with the old squad for a game. Damn that team is good. I was by far the worst player on the team and we rolled a decent squad 16-4. Shabooyah. Back hurts this morning, I think the cleats need to stay on the shelf.

Last minute training session at the river bottoms. Lots of good hills and uneven footing made for good POCAR training. The epic post run ROCK BAND session had my heart rate up for at least an hour. Can I log that?

Much closer game this week, which meant much better workout. My legs felt heavy after a pretty heavy week of running, but had a blast eeking out the 3-2 win over the Ice Hogs, a perennial powerhouse in the McCrae Co-Ed Rec league.

C • Is this the Broomball equiv... 2

Kelly meet up with Biz and I at Theo after biking, and somehow ended up with a much faster pace. That's embarrassing, I was really working all out on my bike.

Test of technical ability riding at Leb today. The track is effectively 4"-6" wide, so it's much akin to doing a five mile long log ride.

Working the body at the gym. Hit the shred mill for 6 miles, first three at 7:34/mi, fourth at 8:30/mi, fifth at 6:00/mi, sixth at 8:57/mi. Felt good. Then did calves, hamstrings, obliques and some stabilizing/balance ball stuff. A great workout.

After the shred mill did calves, hamstrings, obliques and some stabilizing/balance ball stuff. Si se puede.