Training Log Archive: Swampfox

i stopped by the Forest Service office while I was out biking, and met briefly with my point of contact there, and it looks like a permit will be approved for an orienteering event over Labor Day weekend (Labor Daze). My tentative plans were for 4 days of racing plus a training event to kick things off with, with the dates being Aug 31 - Sept 4.

The timing might not be what some would prefer, but for those who can come, I think it's the best weekend of the year for O' in the Laramie area with everything considered. It's late enough in the season that the odds of a bad thunderstorm are pretty small, and it's too early for any bad winter weather (though not by much!) That said, one year that weekend we had a race at Pelican Bay where we got flat out drubbed by a hail storm.

Now I need to put up some information and details at the LROC web site.

C • Labor Daze 1

Orienteering at Remarkable Flats, 10.9 kms, gray, fog here and there, good amounts of south breeze, and weather threatening to get much worse (but never did, until the very, very end.) I printed out a map at 1:12500 and made out everything okay save for three control locations where my eyes just could not quite make out all the objects distinctly. Maybe if the sun had been out it would have been enough, but either way I've had plenty of indications that my eyes aren't as good as they were just a year ago.

I reckon I got lucky with the weather today both for biking and O', and good to get an O' run in today because tomorrow is looking worse/wetter waetherwise.

I was listening to the radio as I was pulling on O' shoes and gaiters, and was quite surprised to hear the news Comey had been fired. I guess a lot of people were.

When I got home after running, I discovered I had a hitchhiker on me--first tick of the year. I did not make it feel like a welcome guest.

C • Tick 5

Fierce reverse cyclonic winds attacked from the east all day long, with heavy fogs formed up along the spine of the Laramie Range. Running trails up top in the fog was otherworldly. Despite running for nearly 2 hours, I didn't see another soul the whole time.

First hailstorm of the season. Fortunately, I had used astragalus to divine the event, and managed to fit in some biking and running around the storm, and didn't get struck even once, not by a single halistone. Or maybe I was just lucky.

C • Weather predicting 4

Long bike ride down south to The Buttes and back, followed by a shortish run on trails. Definitely spring, trending towards summer, with highs in the mid 70s.

Ahh--the return of some real spring weather at last! It was so nice out today that in comparison to our recent snowier stretch of weather, it felt almost like summer.

Ran O' intervals at Remarkable Flats--3 x 3.25 km loop + a final 1 km section of several reordered controls, at the hardest pace I could manage.

Before all that, I took a bike ride around town to enjoy the sun, and before that I patched a tube that had gone flat yesterday (thankfully a slow leak that only manifested itself several hours *after* I had finished riding--if you have to have a puncture, that's the best kind, in my book.)

Woke up to a coating of new snow outside, so that's snow for 10 out of the past 11 days. Milder and drier weather began to push in during the day however, so that's apt to be it for snow for a while--for a few days at least, anyway.

I took the sun to be my signal, and I headed out to Pelican Bay for some O': 11.8 kms of mix of rougher and nicer footing. Blew one control pretty badly when I wasn't paying close enough attention to the map, and which can't in any way be blamed on eyes that aren't seeing as good as they used to.

Saw one beer can, which I stashed in a convenient place for harvesting later on, and saw one smallish, nearly yearling moose which ran off before I could even say hello.

I finished up before dark, which I count as a plus, especially given that I had no light with me.

Yesterday I was looking at results from the Team Trials races, which brought back some memories. The first Team Trials I ever ran in were in 1978, and which coincidentally also happened to be hosted by MNOC (MinnOC, back then, I believe.)

Few will know or remember it, but participation at that Team Trials was by invitation only. As I had only been running Red and had been orienteering for less than a year, I had no expectation of getting an invitation. It was quite surprising and quite a thrill when I did get one, though. It turned out that someone I didn't know and had never met--Keith McCleod, I think--had for some reason intervened on my behalf. I had no reasonable or unreasonable expectations of making the team; it was just exciting to get to go and get to compete against the best orienteers in the US. It was a lucky break for me, because I came back from those races determined to get better.

Those trials consisted of three classic length races with selections from the combined total time, with the top three finishers being automatic selections (I believe) with two others discretionary picks. The first race was on a tiny map of a piece of kettle moraine prairie (I can picture the map and area but for the life of me I can't remember the name of the map). The second day was at Afton St Pk, which is a rugged, hilly area of bluffs overlooking the Mississippi. The final day was at Lake Maria St Pk, which was quite similar to first day in most respects, but a bigger area and more wooded sections.

A couple of things stand out especially as I think back to that weekend. One was it was where I met Ron Pontius, who has been a lifelong friend ever since then. Another was meeting Steve Tarry, who was one of the best US orienteers at the time, and who was kind enough to go over his routes with me after the day at Afton, and give me some tips and ideas about how I might have gone about my race better. And, finally, on Day 3, I was an early started, and right out of the start we had a leg to the first control that neatly bisected a large pond that was in full view of the start.

Normally it would be an easy route choice decision, to either run left or right around the pond and then continue on the leg. But on the race day, the pond happened to be dry, and the question was whether or not to risk the direct route across the pond or not. If it wasn't too muddy and was relatively firm, it would clearly be quite a bit faster. On the other hand, it could just as well have been an impassible mire that you would get hopelessly stuck in. The first few starters ahead of me all hesitated out of the start, and elected to go around the pond. When it was my turn, I took a harder look at the dried pond, decided the mud didn't look too bad, and headed straight across. It turned out to be not bad at all, and was definitely the way to go.

After the race, someone came up to me and thanked me; they had started right after me and had watched me get across the pond with no problem and so they had done the same thing. In my memory, it was someone who ended up making the team--George Tuthill, I think. Well, it was a long time ago. Memories may improve with time, but accuracy of memory? Probably not so much, at least not in my case! ; ) I'd still love to remember the name of that Day 1 map, and maybe it will come to me, or maybe someone else who does remember it will prompt me.

To come back to the present, it was a shock to see the scoring list and see how thin the fields for the Team Trials were. It feels like sport part of orienteering--that group of M21s and F21s who are seriously training to be competitive--is melting away before our very eyes. It seems quite odd, and I have no idea how to explain what has happened and/or is happening to the sport here in the US.

C • Lake Maria was the map for ... 5