Training Log Archive: Gswede

A rerun of the 2008 US Team Trials Middle at Hickory Run.



Really beautiful day. Sunny and on the warmer side. Water features were quite dry, except for the uncrossable marsh south of #14. That still had enough water in it for me to sink waist deep after two steps.

I included a quote from Thierry to remind me how to approach this middle. Okay. Maybe he said it in an interview at WOC and was talking about Estonia. But, he would say it about Pennsylvania too, as I'm sure anyone who's run at Hickory Run would agree.

The vegetation reduced visibility in most parts to about 20 meters, 50 meters was as good as it got. The worst part was definitely the overabundance of spiders and their webs. I lost focus on the way to #2 because I had to keep cleaning them off my face.

I do not count Hickory Run among my favorite maps to enjoy orienteering. It's difficult to enjoy getting smacked in the face by plants every step. To enjoy orienteering, I prefer places like Harriman, Laramie, Peguerinos, many parts of Sweden. But it is a very technically difficult map. Such low visibility and subtle features mean that you can never relax. It's great to have a terrain like this to prepare the US team for Latvia.

I'd like to take a few sentences to celebrate the disappearance of
snot-nosed kid Greg (way down in 42nd) and the emergence of snot-nosed adult Greg. Kid Greg ran the red course at the same meet nearly ten years ago and spent almost as much time lost as adult Greg spent on the blue course today. So progress can happen!

Picking up the last USARA control.

This is the first time I've been on the Shades of Death map (awesome name) to the best of my memory. The green is very green. But the white is extremely open. I've hardly seen woods that open in Pennsylvania. I'll have to play around with that area in the future.

Blue Middle - Splits

Legs were pretty beat up from yesterday. So I went out for an easy morning jog with the padre. I love these woods early in the morning.

100 pushups, 20xpedestal, 10 minute plank, 20 pullups, 5 minute calf raises

A double rerun of the Wissahickon 10k Trail Classic. I was very excited to be back in the Wiss and ran too fast for the first 7k. I relaxed for the next 7k to finish strong but the damage had been done. Shoe also came untied in one spot. I should probably start taping my shoes for workouts like this also.

I'll have to run smarter next time. Still really fun and great to be back in this park. Hot out, 31°C and humid.

Very vague features at the start and difficulty understanding the mapping criteria for rocks. I may have to give myself a transparent background for these maps for a little while. Very low visibility (15-20m) and lots of spiders. I was hoping the spiders had decided the season was over for web building, but they apparently had not. Vegetation very similar to Estonia.

Maps do not have white background so that course review makes more sense.

Part 1:


Part 2:

Morning run with Viol along the Charles. We went out to run 30 and continued on for 55 minutes.

100 pushups, 20xpedestal, 5 minute calf raise, 5 minute plank.

Alex gave Juanma, Violeta, Vilppu, and myself a red course in Prospect Park. Pretty sweet little park. My compass kept acting funny for the first half of the course. Initially I assumed I was rushing too much and not taking good bearings, but on the way out of #10 I saw it do a 180, and then another 180. After that I stashed it in my pocket and continued on. I don't like orienteering without a compass, but something was strange about it last night. Really enjoyed getting back to forests like these.