Training Log Archive: PG

Last thing I expected today was to get out for a ride. Forecast was a mix of rain, sleet, freezing rain, and snow starting around 9 am.

Out of the house just before dawn, Christmas bird count today, my group of 6 had sector 15, and my part was mostly along Pearl Street (south of the range, plus a couple of small sections at the very west end of the range.

Had a fine time. Got sleeted on a couple of times, but both times it didn't last long, and got rained on for maybe 45 minutes, but very light rain. Saw a totally satisfying assortment of birds (remember, I have low standards), met several friendly residents, and didn't get shot or even shot at. Pretty good.

The 6 of us grouped up for lunch to compare notes. Had a new leader this year, the previous one had broken her arm while hiking a few days ago. New guy was cool, works for US Fish and Wildlife, supervises National Wildlife Refuges from New York to Virginia among other things.

At some point the question was asked how things were at work under the new administration. Different, he said diplomatically, though his views were quite clear when he offered as an example what they had to do if they, say, wanted to hire a new biologist in Virginia to replace one retiring. Now all new hirings had to be cleared by the Interior Dept., not just USF&W, and an essential part of the justification for every new hire had to be how they would help secure the south border. I kid you not. They've had to get real creative.

And if you're thinking of doing anything illegal at one of the NWRs, go right ahead, as most of their law enforcement folks are on regular rotations to, you guessed it, the southern border.

Did one more short hike after lunch, then headed home. Partway home it occurred to me that, regardless of what the forecast was, it wasn't actually raining and the temperature was about 40. No excuse not to go out. Checked the new rules, Valerie's to be precise, and headed out, 10 miles was needed. No reason to do 15, no reason to do even 11, hell, no reason to do even 10.1, you think I'm crazy?

Though I did think, after I'd gotten out of my bike clothes, how it would have been pretty easy to toss in another 5, or more. But no way was I going back out.

And it still isn't raining.

(evidence for Valerie of the major part of the outing)

C • Southern security 3

C • nice list 1

Low 50's, minimal wind, most cloudy with a bit of sun at times, also some fog as I was approaching Quabbin. Seemed a good idea to do a chunk of miles because December weather is not normally like this.

Started from the vicinity of Whole Foods in Hadley, where I needed to go afterwards, headed over for what turned out to be a successful winter assault on Quabbin Hill, then returned around the south side of the Holyoke range, bringing back some O' memories in the process.



O' memories #1 -- Quabbin. Made the map in the fall of 1978. First event was days 1 and 3 of the 1979 Team Trials in May, then one A meet (New England Champs) in 1981 and two Billygoats (1980 and 1987). A few local meets in the 80s, and then at some point we lost access. Dumb, but I didn't realize it at the time, should have just made events there to benefit the Friends of the Quabbin and they would have been our friends too instead of enemies.

One renegade event there in 2010, part of CSU Superstars weekend (remember Ross and the ax-throwing contest?), a mass start and a different course for everyone, designed so that if everyone ran the way they normally did, everyone would also finish at the same time.

The tower on top is certainly easier to reach on a bike than Mt. Grace was last weekend. There's a nice big parking lot nearby (where Phil parked for his assault on the summit earlier this year). For the first day of the A meet the start was right below the tower, nice view, very friendly. The finish was on the other side of the parking lot, also a nice view but perhaps significantly less friendly due to the severely uphill nature of the finish chute.

O memories #2 -- Departed the Quabbin tower, after a while found myself going west along Bachelor Street in Granby, the southern border of the Mt. Norwottuck map. Platt made this map. Took him about 6 months, January to June of 1987 I think, staying with us. It took him six months not because he was been extraordinarily precise but because he didn't care to go out on days that weren't sunny and pleasant. Needless to say, not much mapping got done that winter. Also needless to say, strange noises kept emanating from his room. He claimed it was music. We were pretty sure he was sacrificing live animals.

First use was for an A meet (and USOF convention) in 1988. I passed by where finish had been, then a little further on where the start had been. There were Billygoats there in 1989 and 1990, really fine orienteering -- this was getting to the end of the era where folks were so happy just to have a color map to run on that they didn't realize that one way to show how good you were was to point out how bad the map was -- and also the requisite foolishness. And then various events over the years, including Jeff Shapiro's Billygoat in 2005, aka the Death March, and Phil Bricker's Blue Hills Traverse several years ago, one of the two best traverses ever (neither, not coincidentally, being held at the Blue Hills).

My favorite of these was probably the 1990 Billygoat. Links to the map, results, story, and other foolishness are here.

O memories #3 -- Circled around the west end of the range, decided to go to the east end of Chmura Road, a spot often used to access the western half of the Earl's Trails map.

That map is much more recent. I made it in the fall of 2011. It was used for days 1 and 2 of the Western Mass 5-Day the following May, and then the Billygoat in 2013. Ah, the 5-Day, back in the days when Alex and Ali were here in the valley and life was very fine. And we raised something over 7K to send the ski-O team off to Kazakhstan.

There is a section of the ET map, north central, almost all dark green because there were some serious enough briers that I didn't want to wander around in there looking for bits of nice woods, nor did I want any future course setter to be foolish enough to put a control in there. There was one quite nice trail that connected the end of Chmura Road with Bay Road (actually, via part of my friend Dave's driveway). So I thought I'd use that to bike over to Bay Road.

Bad decision.

There had been no apparent maintenance on the trail in the last 5 years, so a mix of mud and sand and erosion gullies was on offer. All of that was fine. Also a blowdown blocking the trail, that was fine too. Just that in getting around it, I got about three different sticks stuck in my wheels, but only noticed two of them. So when I went to ride off it didn't take but about 10 yards before my chain had descended into prison, between the frame and the small chain ring (despite my what I thought was successful effort to make that impossible).

Whatever, five or ten minutes later I was on my way again. And a few miles later back at my car, wondering if I should have gone for 50 miles but deciding that 44 was sufficient progress for today toward 5,280. :-)

5,110

C • O memories #2 1

With Gail. Upper 30s, light breeze from the south, cloudy but very pleasant. Relatively easy pace as she is on the rebound from a lengthy cold.

25, minimal wind, snow flurries.

Just so I remember: Feet were starting to get chilly at about 45 minutes, would have been a problem maybe at 75-90 minutes. Ditto for hands. Face was chilly but fine. Legs were fine. Torso a little chilly at times but fine.

I think the rides are going to be getting shorter and less frequent. But so far so good.

About 35, NW 10-15, more sun than clouds. A pretty good choice of routes, Headed south in the flats, wind helping a little, then cut back north through a bit of the lower Whately hills. So not really anything straight into the wind. I suppose the trade-off was a bit of climbing, which is fine, and then a speedy downhill.

On the latter I figure my air speed hit about 40, so it supposedly felt like 20F. But 20 in still air is not bad, and likewise, this didn't really feel cold. I believe the proper word is invigorating.

I think the face can take quite a bit before bad things start to happen. I remember many years ago going for a run in the hills with Fred, 10 miles, first 4 were right into a good NW breeze and the temperature was about -5F. Over the next few days a bit of skin peeled off parts of my nose, ears, and cheeks. That was cold.

Coming back by exit 24 off the interstate, just past the truck stop, I spotted another biker up ahead. First I'd seen today. Got a little closer and realized he wasn't moving, just standing. Went past him, saw it was an old guy, long grey beard, rather shabby clothing. Had me wondering, is this a vision of me in a near future? When the time comes, should I be hoping someone takes away my bike, just as I hope they take away my car keys? Sure seems like it.

5,038

Down to South Main Street....

4,999.6

C • significant digits 3

Ah, such foolishness.... :-)

I figured there couldn't be a better place to celebrate reaching 5,000 than the one and only Mike's Maze, in the process doing my first corn maze bike orienteering. Perhaps the first ever corn maze bike orienteering? Also, perhaps the last ever corn maze bike orienteering?

But it was there and it had to be done.

Got out the sprint map from this year's champs, I'd had 10:50 I think. I figured the last thing I wanted was to be clipped in, so I put on a pair of running shoes because that seemed easier than changing pedals. And got set to go.

The maze, well, like me, it's not as young as it used to be. More precisely, it's old and it's showing its age. But there is still a maze. Of course there were no controls out, and a couple of times that would have been really helpful, but you deal with what's there.

Sunny day, light wind, upper 20s, beautiful. Except it would have been a lot better had it been cloudy, though I didn't realize this until I was in the maze.

Started off, moving nicely to #1, the ground was frozen hard, except where it wasn't. And in those places, where the ground was a dark brown, the top layer must have gotten enough sun that it had thawed and there was now a layer of rather gooey mud on top. With zero traction. Sure made things interesting.

Got to #1 OK, hit the button on my Garmin to take splits, on to #2. Got there, determined that I had stopped my watch at #1 and that I was now actually at #3.

Bummer in 2 ways. Thought for a moment. Decided -- because it was my party and I was making the rules -- that the only thing to do was a do-over. Headed back to the start outside the maze. Got there, deleted the data from the Garmin. Hey, if it's not on the Garmin, it never happened, right?

OK, started off again. Seemed as every minute went by there was more mud. Seemed like riding a bike in this stuff was rather difficult (and thank goodness I wasn't clipped in). Seemed like riding a bike in a maze and trying to orienteer was some combination of difficult and insane. And imagine if there had been, say, the 50 or so folks we get for the corn maze champs all in the maze at once, on bikes.

Nope, corn maze bike orienteering is not going to catch on. But for this one time, well, it seemed just right. Made the 5,000. And I was smiling before, during, and after. And didn't even mind the half hour it took afterwards to clean the mud off the bike (it went down a couple of times, though I didn't.

And I finished the course.... :-)

5,000.3

C • Well done! 12

And then back home. So nice to get out orienteering in December....

5,001.8

Had a little something to eat and then out for another ride, take advantage of the good weather. Didn't feel any need to work hard, so I didn't.

Thought I'd visit area where I made my first O' map, actually two little maps, done in either 1975 or 1976, can't remember. Lower Mill River and then Upper Mill River. Got used a couple of times, but I honestly can't remember any details. Black and white, that was the standard back then. Things sure have changed.

So went to North Amherst, then the Mill River Rec Area, then the main trail heading up through both areas. Hadn't been there for quite a few years, but not much has changed. I'll have to see if I can find a copy of the maps.

On the way back saw Gail, still heading out on the Zigzag, so I joined her, figured she'd like the company and so would I, just had to make sure we didn't run into each other. Which we didn't. Very pleasant, then a little before home I branched off to go get a photo of the maze. Yup, looks just like me, old, battered, shrunken.... :-)

Still supposed to be really good weather (for December) for a few more days.

5,022

Sprint - Splits

Low 30s, N 10, sunny. To Turners Falls and back along the river. Getting used to these temps, didn't even feel cold when the wind was in my face. :-)

On the other hand, seems I can't do math any more. Was aiming for 4,999...

4,998.2