Tuesday Sep 30 |
 | Note | |
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| TNT - Todd @ Como |
| MTB (road) 35:00 [3] 6.0 mi (5:49 / mi) | |
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| Bike to and from Como. Tried the new neoprene shoe covers. Not that cold out, but they worked great. |
| Orienteering 53:00 [3] *** 7.6 km (6:58 / km) +50m 6:45 / km | |
| spiked:63/74c shoes: Salomon XA Pro 3D (2006, black |
| Flow control course at Como - emphasis on planning one or more legs ahead and not slowing down at the control - all in the dark. Todd set a Mega-O-ish course of 74 controls (no tape, but obvious features like boundaries, corners, junctions, etc.) I bobbled a bit at the beginning but settled in nicely without changing pace after the first 20. I'd estimate about 10-12 controls where I focused on the route and was unable to plan (short legs, and I still kept a general idea of which way to leave the control), a similar number where I had the route planned 2 or more legs ahead, and the rest were consistently planned one leg ahead.
I found a useful tactic was verbalizing the clue descriptions ahead - "Run to the E end of the batting fence, then turn right to SW side of S building, then turn right and go to NE corner of the building". I'm sure saying them out loud must have looked weird but it helped a lot with fixing them in mind.
The main drawbacks were momentary blindness from looking at the map with a headlamp, and a few places where the map needs updates (e.g., a paved road that was torn up, converted to a sidewalk and resodded.)
I've specifically worked on these particular skills for the last couple of years, so the drill wasn't new - but the course was long enough to promote improvement by repetition. |
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| C • TNT 11 |
Sunday Sep 28 |
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| Event: MNOC - William O'Brian State Park
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| Orienteering race 1:01:41 [4] *** 7.7 km (8:01 / km) +110m 7:29 / km | |
| spiked:12/16c shoes: Salomon XA Pro 3D (2007, gray) |
| William O'Brien course, set by Carl. Tough going in the woods due to the undergrowth (downed logs, brambles, AND nettles) resulting from the burn they did in '06. Quick tip: fire good for prairie - for open forest, not so much. Adjusted my routes to include more trail running instead of fighting the tide, and it seemed to work well. |
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| C • vegitation 2 |
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| C • trails were the way to go..... 2 |
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Red - Splits |
Saturday Sep 27 |
| Orienteering (memory) 1:15:00 [3] *** 8.5 km (8:49 / km) +80m 8:26 / km | |
| spiked:12/15c shoes: Salomon XA Pro 3D (2007, gray) |
| Visiting locations for next TNT, by memory. Did get turned around once and have to look at the map. |
Friday Sep 26 |
| Trail Run 34:30 [3] 3.9 mi (8:51 / mi) +80m 5:10 / km | |
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| Short run at Rez Woods. Kinda hot and humid and I wasn't feeling that good - little bit of a cold (Thanks Brian)
http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=2294609
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| C • Cold 2 |
Tuesday Sep 23 |
| Trail Run 1:18:00 [3] 8.5 mi (9:10 / mi) | |
| shoes: Salomon XA Pro 3D (2007, gray) |
| Jiffy Lube to Wirth and back. With Ian and Biz. |
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| C • Primal Quest in the South Dakota Badlands! 2 |
Saturday Sep 20 |
| Trail Run 1:10:00 [2] | |
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| Rest of the time for TA2->TA3 |
| Orienteering race 2:00:00 [2] *** 4.7 mi (25:32 / mi) | |
| spiked:3/4c shoes: Salomon XA Pro 3D (2006, black |
| Orienteering section at the Tower Ski Trails. A good middle-of-the-night section. I was careful to remember to plot the points this time. The first three were quick and easy and we stayed even with Bushwhackers. As we came back through the TA to cross the road and get CP 12, we saw MM on their way out.
Unfortunately, CP 12 gave us considerable trouble, and we ended up on the wrong hill with a bunch of nasty blowdown. This counts as the second big mistake, and took us about another half hour to get reoriented. (There weren't any trails marked on the east side of the main road, which made things harder.) However, once we got straightened out we quickly got the last one and ran back to the TA to get on the bikes. Bushwhackers only had about a ten minute lead at this point. |
| MTB (technical) race 3:00:00 [3] *** 13.1 mi (13:43 / mi) | |
| spiked:5/5c |
| Followed gravel and logging roads SE from the TA and picked up three checkpoints in various clearings off the side of the road. Between the characteristic bends in the road and the bike computer, it was very easy to pedal hard to the right spot, nail the CP, and get going again. After 13-14-15, we turned off on an unmapped (but flagged) new logging road and worked our way over to the west end of Putnam Lake on a rocky snowmobile trail that we had to walk in sections. The trail gradually got lower as we approached the lake and finally dropped into a mix of mud and sphagnum bog. Right at the end of the ridable trail we saw four bikes laying on the ground - apparently belonging to Bushwhackers. This was a bit confusing, but we found out what happened a little later.
So we started rolling our bikes into the muck, and the footing wasn't too terible, although there were places where we sank up to our knees in sticky mud. We went a couple hundred meters east and then turned north along the lake shore. Some sections of the trail were entirely floating bog, so it felt like walking on a waterbed. Rolling the bikes wasn't much problem - they were too light to sink at all, and the wetness prevented any difficult vegetation. Shortly before we got to the section of trail where we needed to dive in for CP 16, we saw Bushwhacker coming back (to get their bikes.) They had misunderstood the instructions and dropped their bikes a mile away, thinking they needed to backtrack. Only after they got in to the CP did they see they were supposed to continue past it instead.
We slowed down to be certain about our attack point, and evenutally picked what turned out to be the right point with the shortest bushwhack. We cut north off the trail to pick up CP 16, and then continued east. The trail rapidly got better and T-ed into another snowmobile trail. We took it south and east, riding together with Bushwhackers who had returned with their bikes (they caught up because they only needed to ride - they already punched 16 from their first trip in.) After a couple of miles we hit a three-way intersection where the main road swung around to the northeast. This turned out to be a pivotal part of the race, as more than one team went too far in the wrong direction. We stopped after 100 meters, corrected ourselves and went down the easy-to-miss grass track instead. After crossing another low wet area, we pedaled out to CP 17 shortly before dawn. At this point we heard that Wedali was long gone, Bushwhacker had another 10 minute lead, but MM hadn't come through yet, so we had jumped up to 3rd. |
| MTB (road) race 1:30:00 [3] * 20.5 mi (4:23 / mi) | |
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| Very cold ride south to the paved road, through Embarrass and up the back side of Giant's Ridge. Of course we all had wet feet, and the temperature had dipped in the upper 30s with enough dampness we could see our breath in the air. The solution, of course, was keeping a good pace, and the news at the last CP got our blood flowing. |
| Miscellaneous race 40:00 [1] | |
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| Dropped the bikes and went for a quick orienteering loop up on the ski hill. We hiked up (included in next entry) and followed a taped route to the mystery challenges before 18. The first one was a balance test - all four teammates had to cross from log to log using only pair of wooden boards. The second one was a tightrope walk between two trees, with two pieces of webbing at chest height in addition to the footrope. Dave quickly figured out how to use the upper two to balance himself and we all got through it quickly. The third challenge was to pick up a carabiner from a distant tree without touching the ground, and involved rigging up our own traverse line (using a provided rope). After this, we punched CP 18 and proceeded to the final three. |
| Orienteering race 1:10:00 [2] *** 4.9 mi (14:17 / mi) | |
| spiked:4/4c |
| Navigating from aerials on top on the ski hill. We bushwhacked out and got on a ski trail, but I biffed the map scale and took us on walkabout instead. Finally we ended up at the trail intersection where 20 was (although I did figure out where we were before then), and after that we quickly grabbed 19-20, run back down the hill through 21, and down to the finish in solid 3rd. |
Friday Sep 19 |
| Note | |
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| Wild 24 hr @Giant's Ridge
Full course here:
http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=2281370
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| Trail Run race 45:00 [3] ** 5.5 mi (8:10 / mi) vdot: 38.9 | |
| spiked:2/3c shoes: Salomon XA Pro 3D (2006, black |
| Wild AR fall race at Giant's Ridge. Took the bus up to Soudan State Park for the start. Trail run around the hiking club loop, out of the park and then a hot and sunny run down a bike trail west to Lake Vermillion. We ran by the first CP, as did Wedali, and we both had to backtrack a couple hundred meters to get it in full view of the rest of the field (who had not missed it.) However, we passed teams on the run and caught up by the lake. Wedali, MM, MM2, us, and Beautiful People were first on the water. |
| Paddling (kayak) race 5:40:00 [3] ** 13.1 mi (25:57 / mi) | |
| spiked:1/1c shoes: Salomon XA Pro 3D (2006, black |
| Long paddle on Lake Vermillion with some stretches of open water. Choppy going SW to CP 4 and again SW down Pike Bay after the dogleg. The second time around I moved my pack back between me and Dave and that got the front of the boat just high enough to avoid taking on water. Paddling until shortly after sunset. Passed MM2, stayed with Wedali and MM although they slowed opened about a 10 minute lead. Right at the end, Beautiful People came up and caught us, but we were faster around the portage. Pulled into TA 2 exactly 10 minutes behind MM, cleaned our boats, and then made the first big mistake of the race. |
| Trail Run race 2:35:00 [2] *** 12.8 mi (12:05 / mi) | |
| spiked:3/4c shoes: Salomon XA Pro 3D (2006, black |
| Started off down the road on our way to the next trekking section and went almost a mile and a half before I realized I had forgotten to transfer CP locations from the master map (CP 5 was preplotted, but not 6-7-8.) So we had to go all the way back to the CP, for probably a half hour delay. At least it was a paved road run. The rest of the guys took it pretty well, and we were heartened by the fact we only saw two teams coming up the road as we went back - Beautiful People and Bushwhackers (a team from Illinois). Quick turnaround brought us back to CP 5 and the entrance to the Taconite Trail.
The trail immediately disappeared into a low swampy area and we felt our way north and east to the treeline marking the edge of the swamp. A couple hundred meters paralleling the treeline brought us back to the trail, and we continued on to CP 6 in a clearing. There was a false clearing just to the west of it, and we looked for a couple minutes together with BP and Bushwhackers, without much success. I quickly became suspicious of the the area and ran north of the main trail to see how it looked, and figured out we weren't far enough east, so we snuck out and nabbed CP 6 ahead of the other two teams. Then we picked up the pace to a fast jog and continued to CP 7, in another grassy clearing.
As we entered the clearing from the rest, we heard a team up ahead leaving to the north and east, and it sounded like MM. We got the CP and thrashed through the trees to the north to pick up the trail, and heard BP coming into the clearing behind us. More jogging brought us to the Two River bridge, where we had to stop and refill water. We hadn't had a chance to refill since the paddle, and things were getting dire. We finished and continued up the hill towards CP 8 right as Bushwhackers caught up with us. We stayed together through CP 8 but they outran us on the road down to the TA. |
Wednesday Sep 17 |
| Note | |
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| MNOC meeting at Ian's |
Sunday Sep 14 |
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| Event: MNOC - Murphy-Hannrehan Park Reserve
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| Orienteering race 1:15:34 [4] *** 7.3 km (10:21 / km) +250m 8:50 / km | |
| spiked:7/12c shoes: Salomon XA Pro 3D (2007, gray) |
| So-so run at Murphy in drizzle turning to rain. Got turned to the east on #2, hit the trail near 3 and had to backtrack through fairly thick buckthorn. I didn't adapt as well as I should to the vegetation conditions, and had easily a dozen places where I had to near stop to crawl through a wall of vegetation. Should have done more trail running in some places - legs were feeling good. Also boomed #5, but only by 3-4 minutes, and after thrashing through to #6 I got the idea and ran more clean after that.
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Saturday Sep 13 |
| Paddling (kayak) 1:30:00 [2] 5.5 mi (16:21 / mi) | |
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| Team training in the morning. Paddled the orange boats from Fort Snelling up to the dam and back.
http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=2259446
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| Trail Run 1:20:00 [2] 7.9 mi (10:08 / mi) +60m 6:09 / km | |
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| Trail run afterwards with Brian and Val. Wore packs, and took a faster pace than desired because time was short.
http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=2259466
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Thursday Sep 11 |
| Orienteering (mapping) 1:30:00 [1] 4.0 mi (22:30 / mi) | |
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| Should need only one more real session (about 50 acres left) and then a final sweep or two for consistency. |
Tuesday Sep 9 |
| Orienteering race 37:44 [4] ** 4.9 mi (7:41 / mi) +10m 4:45 / km | |
| spiked:20/23c shoes: Salomon XA Pro 3D (2006, black |
| OTNT on the U of M Minneapolis campus, set by Todd P. Excellent long course all around the East bank. Had some problems "in the circle" for the first couple controls (even though I got the trick on #2 right away), so Ian and Tom caught up around #6. We ran back and forth for a while and Tom stayed up with me at least through #16 - I was never able to shake him, although some of the doglegs contributed to that. Managed a gap coming around the back of Peik Gym and was able to sustain it to the finish. The challenge was a little harder since all the controls were clues-only, and I didn't have a pen so was forced to memortize various things like the number of bike racks, words on signs, colors of assorted manholes, etc. But it's good practice!
Able to put out a 5 effort (with attendant risk of puking) from 23-Finish, which is a always a good sign.
http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=2249870
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| Road Run 15:00 [2] 1.5 mi (10:00 / mi) | |
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| Warmup/cooldown between Coffman and the car. |
Monday Sep 8 |
| Orienteering (mapping) 2:00:00 [1] *** 4.0 mi (30:00 / mi) | |
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| More mapping after work. It's turning into a rather larger project than I thought, but I want to have a solid map since it will probably be night-O. |
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| C • oooo yeah 2 |
Sunday Sep 7 |
| Orienteering (mapping) 3:00:00 [1] *** 6 km (30:00 / km) | |
| shoes: Salomon XA Pro 3D (2006, black |
| Mapping an area for TNT. Also found a large growth of sulfur shelf in the woods which may become dinner tonight. |
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| C • laetiporus? 6 |
Saturday Sep 6 |
| Terrain Run (no map) 1:35:00 [2] 9.0 mi (10:34 / mi) | |
| shoes: Salomon XA Pro 3D (2006, black |
| Checking out a TNT location. |
Wednesday Sep 3 |
| Trail Run 53:00 [3] 6.9 mi (7:40 / mi) +50m 4:40 / km | |
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| Mix of on and off trail at Como. Varied speeds as well. Felt good.
http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=2232027
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Monday Sep 1 |
| MTB (road) 4:00:00 [3] 58.6 mi (4:06 / mi) | |
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| Long ride along the river down to Chaska and back along the LRT trail. Hot out, and I was dogging going through Eden Prairie. |
| MTB (technical) 50:00 [3] 10.0 mi (4:59 / mi) | |
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| River bottoms from Mound Springs to Ferry Bridge.
http://www.gmap-pedometer.com/?r=2226143
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