Training Log Archive: cporter

US Champs Day 1 at Diamond Bay, WY - Not one of my best races to say the least. My stomach didn't feel great before the race and then at the start I realized my compass had bubbled up which didn't add to my enthusiasm for my race. Neither of these is meant as any sort of excuse for my poor racing though, because I was thankfully able to shuck all my pre-race frustrations once I started. My goal for the race had been to navigate as cleanly as possible since I am definetly not in the best shape right now - especially not at 7,000+ ft. I was fairly successful at this racing strategy until my #10 control (plus a slight bobble at #3) when I kissed any chance a decent race (despite my slow running speed) goodbye with an appx. 10 min error. Upon reviewing my course I can tell you exactly where I was on the map when I stopped reading it - about 200m before my control. I'm not exactly sure why I did this...probably because I hit an one of the open/rough open fields on a downward slope and just started running/stumbling in what I thought was the generally right direction of the control. Problem was I wasn't 100% sure I was running down into the right reentrant, the contour details were more vague in the terrain then they were on the map. Also, once I crossed the open section, my control was on a pretty technical hillside with a lot of rock detail. When I thought I was just outside of the control circle I saw a control that was not mine that I thought was hung on a rock pile that was just up the slope from mine so I was even more confident that I was right, but when I reached the rock feature that I thought my control was hung on ( two hill tops that were mapped as open rock) of course it was not there. When I tried to relocate I realized that there were two other similar map features to the one that my control was on the hillside - of course they were about equidistant from my control on either side of it and I wasn't sure which one I was at. I guessed that I was too far to the right, which was the wrong guess so I traveled even farther to the left of my control, then ran back up the hill too far and then over-corrected to the right of my control, finding the other similar rock/hill combination, then finally found the control after some more hesitant wandering. I didn't formally keep track of lost time, but by my own judgement of lapsed time and by how I finished in comparison with everyone else I'd say it was about a 9-10 min error. After that I had relatively little trouble besides just being exhausted and therefore slow so its kinda a shame. It would have been a deecent race had I not blown my #10. As always though I had a great time and really enjoyed the course and the terrain.

Ran about half the course of the afternoon training/model event on East Pelican Bay map to familiarize myself with the terrain/ continue the acclimation process. I was not very successful at either. I think messed up just about every control and felt awful doing so. I had wanted to run fairly hard for at least a couple of legs to see how my lungs would feel, but I wound up walking much of it because I was a lot more tired than I expected (probably since I had to get up before 4:00am to fly out and only had a couple more hours of sleep on the plane.)

Quick run around the airport with Wyatt after we picked up our rental car to start the acclimation process/ stretch the legs.

Greenbelt (Perimeter Trail and Dogwood Trail) - after checking out the course legnths for the US Champs and discovering that they were longer than I expected, I decided to get in one long-ish without going overboard only a few days before racing. Despite my best efforts to take it easy I started out the run feeling very tight and more than a little tired. I did take 3 or 4 days off at the end of last week and over the weekend, but I feel like I have a strong enough base built up at this point that those couple of days off shouldn't have affected me so much - if any thing they probably helped since I was so exhausted/jet lagged from my trip. The only explanation I could come up with is that my body must have become unaccustomed to all of the stregnth training exercises that I do in my kickboxing classes. Granted, I stated back with my classes last week as well, but again being so tired I didn't put my best foot forward (literally :) ) in my first week of classes. I know you start to loose muscle mass after two weeks of not doing an activity, nevertheless, I was unpleasantly surprised at how sore I was today. It took me a solid 20 min of running just to start to feel OK, and I didn't really feel like I found my typical pace till about 40 min in :(

Hopefully, with the rest I'll be forced to take with traveling to WY, some ibuprofin and lots of stretching I'll be feeling better in time for the US Champs!

Another stretch right before bed along with some ibuprofin to see if that helps with the soreness.

Kickboxing - a lot of emphasis on cardio into today's class which kept my heartrate up for most of the class so I was sweating buckets. It was a good mix of exercises today too - a lot of upper body stregnth work with dumbells/medicine ball while keeping the lower body moving, doing agility work. We had a couple of sections that Adele slowed down to emphasize controled movements with weights to improve our boxing form - she's so great because she also has us use the weights to work on our running form just for me! Lots of jumping/jump roping too which means my calves will be killing me tomorrow :) Great class, as usual!

Tempo Run along Paint Branch Trail (went like this 1,2,3,5,5,3,2,1 with 1 min recovery beween, except after the 5 min legs then 2 min recovery)- didn't go as well as I had hoped. I got caught up with things at work so I forgot to drink enough before my run. Dehydration began setting in before I was even half way through the workout - worse still, I drank as much water as I dared to immediately before the workout and then I had to pee the whole time (the section of the Paint Branch Trail I was on runs directly between a swamp and a golf course, neither of which offered enough cover to take care of business - so I just had to hold it) so I felt pretty terrible all around. To add to my frustration, I decided to venture to the other side of Cherry Hill Rd. ( I usually just turn around when the trail crosses it) only to discover that the trail only runs another 400m, at best, on the other side of the road. Of course I started one of my 5 min legs once I cross the road and not wanting to stop to cross the road again I just circled around the whole time. Bummer. Despite not feeling that great, I'm glad I got the run in since I just checked the course legnths for the US Champs today and I'm running 7.7 and 11 km!!! IDefinetly wasn't anticipating that. I'm thinking that this weekend isn't going to go as well as I had hoped :(

C • Paint Branch 1

Event: 2008 Laramie Daze & US Champs
 

Core Workout Class - mostly did variations of crunches and planks. The strech/cool down felt really good, but now I'm really relaxed and don't want to go back to work :(

Gorgeous weather today! Even though it got up into the 90's there was very little humidity and a breeze than never quit. Took a run around the south end of the UMD campus and then out Paint Branch for a look around Lake Artemesia and then back up through the main part of the campus. It was a very pleasant run and I felt alright. The start of the run was mostly down hill, so of course I had to come back up at the end, but I felt pretty good on the hills. It was actually on the flats that I felt like I was getting no where fast, but it was probably just because I started out my run going downhill. The loop around the lake was especially nice - its been a while since I ran down there so it actually felt a bit like a new run. Not that that helped my concentration (hence pace) much, but it was still relaxing.