Training Log Archive: pi

Woke up in the morning to snow outside the window! I have never been in a snowfall in August before in my life! By the time the race started at Mount Laurie it was just a few degrees over freezing and slush was falling from the gray sky. I ran in long underwear, a jacket and a cap. Almost the entire course was set in the very intricate area of the map close to hwy 1A. It was fun to run in the snow, but it made the terrain even harder to interpret somehow. I had trouble adjusting and made a bobble to 2, losing over a minute. As I came in to the control from the wrong direction, I started out running to 3 in the wrong direction. I quickly adjusted after looking at the compass, but the damage was already done and I was running on the wrong ridge, compared to where I thought I was and I ended up in a big parallel error that cost me 4 minutes to solve. After that, I did really well until control 11 and just had a few smaller problem the last km in. Was very surprised to win this race, but the others had even more trouble in the snow than I...

Barebones Night-O. This year was a mass start, un-forked course. We were all pretty inspired after a relay talk by Patrick and Mike W just before the race. We sprinted off at the start and the pace never slowed down during the whole race. After the 4th control the lead pack had pulled away and it was mostly headed by Patrick, running faster than everyone, but not quite able to pull ahead, as we could always close the gap when he had to slow down to get the controls. The others in the pack were Eric B, Erik S, Brian M and Damian K. We were all right together at the tricky 6th control, up on the hill with green forest, but then the pack stretched out a bit in the fast running in the semi-open fields back to the camp area. The course finished with control picking around the houses and tee-pees of the camp. On the way to 18, I felt that the pack was too much to the left, I stopped a bit and turned right and got the reflector! I punched 18 first, but the rest saw me and quickly caught up to 19. Here I made a critical mistake, staying in the forest to 20, instead of running on the road. Patrick and Erik S passed me on the road and Erik B beat me in the finish. Brian and Damian were right behind me. Everyone finished within a minute. This was a super intense and fun race.

Warm-up.

Event: Barebones 2008
 

Setup sprint at Canmore Nordic Centre. An intense map, packed with ski trails so dense that the map is mostly black (it is not a sprint standard map, just a zoomed in 1:10000 map). I ran a pretty solid race in terms of navigation, but my body felt very slow and unresponsive. Nevertheless, was only 30 seconds behind the winner Eric Bone. Compared to him, I lost 15 seconds to 4 and 15 seconds to 9. This was not due to any mistakes, just not aggressive enough.

Chase at the nordic centre. Did not feel well in the stomach after the lunch break. Had painful gas and could not run fully normal. Started third behind Eric and Erik. Because I could see them running out of the start, I could catch up the 25 seconds Erik S had on me to the first control. On the way to 2, we followed a trail too far and missed the control to the right. Had to come back and Eric B was now out of sight. Did the next few controls cleanly and when we came up the hill to 6, Eric B was very close again. 7 and 8 were a bit longer easy trail running legs and I could not keep up in the running. Climbing up the steep hill to 11, I could see Erik S up above me, but Patrick was suddenly right behind me. 12 was the key route choice. I had looked at this and knew that the best was to stay high and go around to the right. Patrick went left and I did not see him until he finished behind me. Going in to the circle at 12, I again caught up to Erik S, who was a bit confused there, but he beat me in the finish chute.

Warm-up.

Placing and picking up flags for the WET at Cypress Falls.

Short run in the pouring rain with Markez. My calves felt really stiff and after the run I had actual pain in them. Don't know what's up with that.