Note
Time for a few numbers for 2007:
29 O races (68 in 2006)
-- 11 sprints (13 in 2006)
-- 1 middle (11)
-- 13 classic (34), though a classic varied a lot, from 45 to 95 minutes depending on whether I was running M21, M45, or M60.
-- 0 long (1)
-- 2 goats (2)
-- 1 O' marathon (0)
-- 0 cross/farsta (2)
-- 0 relay (3)
-- 1 night (2)
-- 0 trail-O (0)
plus 2 rogaines
303 hours training (256 in 2006), up surprisingly, including:
-- 38 orienteering (75 in 2006), way down for the year
-- 123 other running (181), way down also
-- 43 biking (0)
-- 47 rogaining (0)
-- 37 run/hikes (0), mostly rogaine training
-- 15 (0), nautilus, spinning, misc. junk
So much less orienteering and running training than last year, all due to injury, mainly hamstring problems in the winter and spring. That was offset by some biking in the first part of the summer, plus doing a couple rogaines and some training for them.
Note for anyone not clued into my terminology -- "rogaine training" is running/walking, the latter when it is uphill, usually with a pack, so perfectly valid training in other words, while "rogaine practice" is golf, of which I played a whole lot this year, enjoyed immensely, and actually got better at, something that sure could not be said for my orienteering. I'd guess those three comments about my golf are all very connected -- if you do better at something than in the past, it is much more likely you will enjoy it and also do it more often. I'd also guess the golf (many hours walking, carrying clubs) is actually useful training for rogaining, though I have not yet sunk low enough to log it on AP.
Also ran 8 foot races:
-- 7 on the roads, all short, from 5 km to 10 km.
-- 1 trail race, not quite an hour.
Other thoughts --
1. It was a pretty lousy year for orienteering. My winter/spring tally of A meet days comes up with North Carolina (one DNF, only made it 50 yards before I crashed and burned, hamstring, plus 2 DNS), HVO/Surebridge (finished day 1, very slow, DNF day 2 after 20 minutes, hamstring again), and the Team Trials in Michigan (3 DNS). One race completed, 2 DNF, 5 DNS. Things did get better in the fall, but not much that I would look back on and think "great race." Valley Forge came close, but it was 500 meters too long.
2. Did two rogaines with Barb (Oregon, Laurentians), plus several crack-of-dawn training sessions, all lots of fun, and very good for morale given that the orienteering/running was going so badly. She is a super partner, good O skills, full of energy, and very upbeat.
3. Once again spent a lot of time on the Team, bringing a lot of personal satisfaction. We've even managed to implement a coaching program. Now it would be really nice if we can show some real progress in the next year or two. Meanwhile, a whole lot of people have been very supportive (time, money, positive vibes) of the Team. Which has been great.
4. Also spent a lot of time on the Sprint Series, concluding with the Sprint Finals and US Relay Champs in late September. Helping to organizing events is always stressful, and this was no exception, but it was also a lot of fun -- the WCOC gang is just great, and the weekend turned out as well as we had hoped. And the Series will keep going, thanks to Cristina and Kris and Gil for pitching in.
5. As in 2006, laughed a lot, and got my share of being laughed at too, especially after posting some old photos.
6. Weight once again held steady at 1G all year long, though the G itself was higher than I cared for, especially at the end of the year, when a couple of weeks of no exercise and some binge eating boosted to year-end reading to 141.5. Need to do something about that when I get back to running, which hopefully will be before too long.
7. Topping the list of totally meaningless numbers, so far there have been 54,103 times that someone has stopped doing something useful to come look at my training log (27,034 at this time last year, 6,908 at the end of 2005). I admit to spending a lot of time on Attackpoint, and getting a great deal of enjoyment from it, and it seems like some others do too. By the way, in coming up with the numbers of O' events and races I've done this year, I had to go back through my log for the year. Took me several hours, I kept getting diverted, reading old posts and various comments, laughing a lot.
8. And finally, more important than all of the above, it was a very good year for friendships, starting with Gail, also my frequent traveling companions Phil and Charlie, and then many others in orienteering, of all ages. It was mostly a lousy year competitively, but a fine year in many other ways.
For 2008? Well, another year older means the downward slope just gets steeper. Have to see what I can do, can't stop trying. And how nice it would be if Gail's knees would somehow get enough better to get her back out orienteering again.