Training Archive: Swampfox

skiing 2:10:00 [3]

The snow be old, but it feels fast. Or maybe it feels fast because it is old, despite the best efforts of the beetle pines to add pine needles and bark fragments to the mix? Very nice out.

run 1:27:00 [3]

I had thought I might go out and run on one of the maps, but I was going to be running in the late afternoon and the wind was up a little bit. When I thought it over again, I realized that, no, what I *really* wanted to do was run on snow trails in the forest, so that's what I did. ; ) It was a good decision.

Note

I was curious to see how January's running volume compared with other years. Last year I ran about 21 1/2 hrs during January. The most I've run in January in the past 12 years was in 2006, when for some reason I ended up running about 38 1/2 hrs. Maybe that was the year lots of mountain lions were around? I can't be sure.

This January, I ran 29 1/2 hrs, so compared to last year, not so bad, volume-wise. Especially considering I just did whatever I felt like, with nothing special in mind.

Note

It has nothing whatsoever to do with orienteering, but I think the most amusing thing I came across this past week was the statement the Chinese government released in reaction to the announcement of a new US arms deal with Taiwan, and specifically it was where they said (about the deal) that it "seriously endangers China's national security" that got me laughing. I think everyone knows that Taiwan has been on the edge of launching a massive attack on the Chinese mainland any day now, and now that they are going to acquire 2 refurbished minesweepers as part of the deal, invasion is certain. China might as well go ahead and sue for peace, and hope that Taiwan will cut them some slack and accept the proffered branch of peace.

Note

Kissy left me some leafy green things in the refrigerator. I hope they're edible, because I ate some tonight. I know they're not lettuce (edible), spinach (edible), okra (inedible, and which I would recognize anyway, having grown up in the South), eggplant (don't even get me started), or hamburger (edible, but kinda gross, when you consider that a single patty might be made up of pieces of thousands of different cows.)

Whatever it is, I tried to inoculate it with a substantial amount of salad dressing.

I don't know if that really works or not.

C • edible 9

Note

On the next last day of January, the Laramie Valley moves back into the part of the year that has at least 10 hrs of sunshine each day (the crowd in the distance applauds and gives a few cowboy hollers as well.)

skiing 1:42:00 [2]

The Snowy Snow Commission met and ruled 3-0 that Wednesday night's snow was not sufficient to constitute a drought breaking snowfall. So therefore the drought continues, now going on for 3 1/2 weeks. The trails remain in great shape despite that. Really, the only thing marring the trails is all the dog piss.

Another brilliant afternoon with mild temps, lots of sunshine, and no wind.

run 1:22:00 [2]

Ran down onto a portion of the Lights of Cheyenne to savor a little high altitude, short grass prairie. Patchy snow, and mostly bare prairie on the wind scoured ridge tops. A long convoy of sub-moron vehicles roared by on Telephone Road, raising a surprising amount of dust, considering it's mid-winter and not mid-summer. I tried to stay inconspicuous; with sub-morons, you really can't be too careful.

Quite near the point I was planning to turn around at, I started getting a slightly unsettling sense of...nuetrality. At first I joked to myself it didn't feel like Switzerland (and it sure didn't look like it) but the sensation grew and grew until it was no longer any joking matter. Something was wrong.

I jogged over to a nearby lone pine tree, and found myself doubling over in nuetrality and on the verge of passing out. I reached out to the tree to steady myself, but instead of landing on the trunk of the tree, my hand went into a hole at the base of the tree and bumped into a letterbox!

Now waves of nuetralness were sweeping through me with overwhelming force, and my situation was unspeakably grave. At the last possible moment, I directed my eyes towards the eastern horizon, and caught site of slowly turning windmill blades from the wind farm west of Cheyenne.

Seeing those blades steadied me and I felt better and better the longer I stared at them, blades turning round and round and round and round. There's nothing more fills me with a more positive feeling than a Wyoming wind farm off in the distance, churning up those lickety split electrons and sending them coursing down the wires.

Soon I was recovered enough to be able to break free of the awful letterbox field of nuetrality, and I was back on my way, now running uphill back towards my truck. So fine.

run 1:03:00 [2]

The sun is out full strength today, and while a cold start to the day held things off for a bit, by the time I was finished up running, the sun had gained enough purchase to start working away at the blankets of ice cloaking most of the side streets in Laramie. I'm looking forward to seeing ice waters sweeping down the streets later in the day--kind of like the scablands, but on a smaller scale.

Note

Poking around, I came across this 28 Jan. blog posting by Patrick Hofmeister, entitled "Real Swedish Winter in Jonkoping":

http://www.patrick-hofmeister.de/?p=251

Recognizing the maps, I would suggest it would be more correct to have it as "Real Swedish Winter in Huskvarna."

The upper map has special meaning for me. I wonder how many maps there might be that have more O' history associated with them?

For instance, I can note a few things of some interest:

1) The course crosses into another map to the west overlapping this map on several of the westernmost controls, and the west map was used for one of the earliest World Cup events, back in the 80s.

2) This map was used once for the Skol SM (or maybe it was Ungdoms SM; I get the two confused sometimes.) It may have also been used for some big relay as well, but I can't remember any specific example, so I might be wrong about that.

3) Leg 1 passes very close by the home of a double World Champion.

4) Leg 1 also passes by the former home of several members of winning TioMila teams.

5) Leg 1 also passes by the former home of a JWOC medal winner.

6) The former home of another World Champion and national team member and member of multiple (I believe) winning TioMila teams lies just a little bit behind the start.

7) The start itself is centered (or so it looks to me, unless they have moved) on the home of a former national team member and Nordic Champion and winner of multiple World Championships medals, as well as another orienteer who was a member (I believe) of a winning TioMila team.

8) One of the row homes in the extreme NE corner of the map was the former home of multiple World Champion.

9) Many notable orienteers have worked in the facility denoted by the large building just east of the beeline between #8 and #9.

I'm sure there is more, but that's what I can come up with just off the top of my mind.

Well, oh, yes, there is one more thing that comes to mind--one of the folks who did a lot of the work on this map would be pretty well known by many people reading this.

skiing 1:19:00 [3]

Sparse amount of skiers this afternoon, probably because all the ski teams are off at races this weekend.

run 59:00 [3]

Beautiful run after skiing, with no wind and with the big full moon rising up out of the eastern plains to glow up the snow.

skiing 2:53:00 [3]

There was quite a contrast of views of the valley and hills from Laramie as I was driving up to ski. To the west, thick clouds and fog extended all the way to the ground and totally obscured even a hint of the Snowies. Fog meant most of the south end of the valley was hidden away too. Fog was over the Laramie Range as well, but there is was patchy, with some fairly wispy banks and some that were dark grey and ominous looking. The skies were completely overcast overhead and to the south, but just a little ways north of town the clouds ended abruptly and everything north of that line was totally blue skies.

Up top, all all the trees and signs and fences were covered in rime. There were patches of trees that had lost all the rime on the south side, which must have meant some patchy sun had been out briefly sometime during the day. It was completely calm.

I did loops on the Summit loop. Only a few skiers had gone around in front of me, leaving nearly all of the corduroy intact for my skis to bite into. By the time I was done, the corduroy had pretty well disappeared. 2 woodpeckers were at work in a beetle tree at the very top of the loop when I got started, and they were still there pecking away when I finished my last loop. Diligent birds.

But while I was skiing, I wasn't thinking about the woodpeckers so much. I was thinking about Albert King.

'cuz I love her,
I love Lucy yes I do,
And if you put your hands on my Lucy,
There ain't no tellin' what I might do."

(Lucy was King's guitar.)

When I started, the loop was foggy, but gradually the fog broke up and the clouds pushed south until it was completely sunshine. Later, small banks of fog started drifting through very slowly. Later still, it got much colder very quickly--the big mass of cold air off to the east must have started pushing up and over the range--and fog moved in again. By the time I was finishing up, it was totally socked in with thick fog.

Probably down at South Beach the beach dwellers were wishing they could be in some nice ice fogs instead! ; )

run 44:00 [2]

skiing 1:48:00 [3]

Light snow was falling for the last half of the ski--at last some new snow!

run 52:00 [3]

A friend invited me to go to the UW basketball game tonight, and I had just enough time to squeeze in this run and make it back in time. Running along at dusk, I saw a big bird start up and move through the trees, and while the only thing I got a distinct sighting of was the tail, there was a bright splash of white there, making me think it could well have been another bald eagle lurking about.

As a bonus, the UW men beat Utah in a very close game, making it their first win over Utah in, what, a couple of years?

run 45:00 [2]

Neither snowing nor sunny out. The winds have died down, and that's the main thing.

Note

Yesterday while running some errands, I talked a little bit with a guy behind the counter at a copy shop, who turned out to be a hunter and fisherman who travels around the state doing that, and also up very far north in the wilds of Canada. He mentioned that he really like seeing wolves and so I asked him if he had been up to Yellowstone to see wolves. He said he had, and added that he had seen them "over there", pointing with a finger to the west. Since we were inside, I asked him if he meant the Snowies, and he said yes. He went on to say he had hunted and killed over 500 coyotes and knew coyotes up and down, and had seen tracks that could not have been coyote tracks and that he were sure were wolf tracks, and said that buddies of his had seen actual animals that they were sure were wolves. He went on to add that he had talked with one of the local Fish and Game officials who confirmed that they knew wolves were in the Snowies.

What made this extra interesting to me was that one day last summer Dave Pruden, who was visiting, went running by himself up at Libby Flats, and that evening he started asking me about coyotes and what they looked like and how they behaved. He was asking because he had seen a large dog-like animal while he had been running. It was out in a completely open area and for the part of the time it was less than 100m away, so he had had a very good look at it. And as he described it, by both appearance, size, color, and behavior, it sounded more and more like a wolf to me, and not any coyote.

Well, who knows, but I am now more willing than ever to believe wolves have made it over to the Snowies, and that while there might not be any packs, there could well be solo animals over there.

skiing 1:23:00 [2]

run 56:00 [3]

Note

I think tomorrow makes it 3 weeks since our last snow. Despite that, the trails remain in very good shape. I wonder how well typical trails in the NE hold up these days without new snow for 3 weeks? Do they turn into ice? Or does the grass underneath start to show? Do the skiers start to fret and slash their strong pole side in attempts to appease the gods?

Maybe it will start snowing again in February.

C • New Snow 4

Note

Random weirdness: a little earlier, surfing the WSJ, I saw the headline: "Fed Emails Show Glee on AIG", which sounded a little weird, but I didn't read further, figuring I would just wait for the print edition to arrive. But when I went back just a little while ago, the headline now read: "Fed Emails Show Angst on AIG." It reminds me of the old traditional up-country question: is this love or is it just confusion? Or, in this case, to the staff of the WSJ, which is it, angst or glee???

Note

5th week of winter; 9 2/3 hours of daylight.

C • DLT? 2

skiing 1:51:00 [2]

A bit chilly with some big wind. It looked like a little new snow had fallen at Happy Jack, even though there had been none down in the valley.

run 53:00 [3]

More wind made for a brisk run up at Happy Jack.