Training Log Archive: iansmith

I weighed 179.6 lbs on the scale this morning, though I may still be dehydrated from the weekend's activity. Still, it's healthy progress.

The gauntlet was thrown, and I answered with a defiant whimper of eight minute core. A minute each of sit-ups, flutter kicks, oblique (knee-to-elbow) crunches, plank, tuck-ups, cherry pickers, kayakers, leg lifts; concluded with two minutes of side plank and one of supermans.

To give my legs a chance to rest after the weekend, I went on a bike ride around the Charles. My tires were not fully inflated, and there was a strong breeze from the west. The heart rate data is spurious, probably from poor contact, as I did not perspire much. Conditions were 13 C and overcast with some drizzling; I wore a long-sleeved and short-sleeved shirt.

2x24 pushups. Weak.

CSU Relay Champs commemorative uniform?

C • Yes, I'll be sure to have enough for you all. 7

On the CSU 2011 A-meet:

It is a tremendous relief that the meet went well, to general acclaim, and without major errors. My experience is that even with an enormous investment of effort, small oversights can compromise the entire endeavor. The entire club and not a few others came together to put on the event, and while it nearly killed us, it is done.

The event would have not been possible without considerable sacrifice and investment of time. I would like to specially note a less conspicuous group: the course team. The three course setters - Dean Sturtevant, Boris Granovskiy, and Brendan Shields had the singularly most critical tasks of the meet. Boris, who was working remotely for most of the preparatory period on a WRE course, is deserving of particular thanks, and Dean's task was mammoth. To vet and set effectively is to be invisible, and a doughty group took on that large and thankless task. Audun Botterud, Magnus Bjorkman, Brendan, Giovanni, Giacomo Barbone, Katia Bertoldi, Ross Smith, Eric Weyman, Will Hawkins, and Jordan Laughlin all contributed to the course tasks, and Jon Campbell consulted at length. Audun, Magnus, and Giovanni in particular invested huge amounts of labor.

While I had hoped to reduce my commitment to the A-meet given my NEOC responsibilities, my main task turned out to be the vetting and setting of the Middle. Boris directed me very well, and our combined efforts were effective. Brendan assisted with the vetting, and Will gave of his time in the eleventh hour to verify everything was in order for the WRE.

Much praise must be given to the event directors Ed and Giovanni, who worked tirelessly to make it a reality. Alex handled the unenviable task of registrar very well. Larry and Sara Mae provided substantial logistical support and hosted us many times for dinner. Giovanni and Katia likewise lent their home for our meetings. Thanks to everyone in the club who came to any of our many meetings and lent their views to the process. It was tiring - a conservative estimate of the time spent in meetings alone is 300-400 man hours. Thanks to all the event volunteers, who are too numerous to name, who worked critical posts on the day of the event, set up the accursed tent of tremendous mass, moved equipment, and helped make sure everything ran smoothly on the day of the event. While she lived remotely, Ali mediated some of our more heated conflicts, helped keep us all sane, and had the misfortune of carrying a saw horse due to one of my oversights. Finally, many thanks to everyone who helped with control pickup, particularly those with no affiliation to CSU; your help is greatly appreciated. Even among this noteworthy list, the unlooked for assistance of Eric Weyman is exceptional. He showed up on Saturday and without prompting or the slightest incentive offered to help us set the 115 controls on the long course. I do not full comprehend his utility function, but I am grateful for his help. Thanks to NEOC, Valerie Meyer, and WCOC for use of their equipment, and to the many NEOC members who gave of their time to further orienteering in New England.

After much contemplation, I remain convinced that despite its favorable outcome, this meet was not worth the cost to CSU. It was beyond what could reasonably be expected of our club, and was only achieved by a Herculean sacrifice of its membership. I am glad the event was successful, but I have no inclination to be a part of subsequent efforts of this nature for some time. A conversation about the future direction of the club is inevitable; my preference is to prioritize training and preparation for competition above organization. Even with my reduced involvement, the event was incredibly taxing. A-meets are wonderful, but the ratio of orienteering time to organizational time is pathetically low. It is impressive that despite the logistical challenges, the magnitude of the event, and even Clem's presence, the meet was a success.

Waking up and verifying controls in my sector before the long race. After wakeup, I helped out at registration and the start.

Control pickup. Eric Smith and I chose three sector in the west area of the map. We each took one and split up the middle sector. I answered a few phone calls from Brendan and Joanne during the outing.

C • Wow 9

Brendan and I arrived at Lynn at 7 and met up with the arena crew. We had five boxes still to set - one at a nearby cliff, the two Go stands and the two spectator stands. After getting some extra equipment from Ed, we drove to the northern lot and set a saw horse that Will had requested at a site because the stand was too low to match the description. Brendan set off to wake up and verify the presence and codes of the northern controls (which he had previously vetted), and I drove down to the arena and worked my way north.

We found everything to be in order - no controls were stolen, all the codes were correct, and all the controls were awake by 9:15. Brendan noted that the second saw horse lacked a backup punch, so I ran to set it via the start (dropping off some equipment on the way). Everything was ready by 9:45 - a bit close for comfort. Had there been a problem, we could have fixed it by the start time, but we had little room for error. A third control-verifier would have been valuable.

My job for the A-meet was solitary, and if I did it right, it would go unnoticed. After an arduous day on Friday with only Will for company in the afternoon, it was great to see everyone at the Middle arena. Brendan and I mingled until around 10:30 or 11, when we set off for the Fells to help set controls for the long.

Eric Weyman happily asked me if we needed any help setting controls - unsolicited, without incentive, purely because he wanted to help and is absurdly cool. We sent him to rendezvous with Dean, then bought rubber bands for the WCOC e-punch mounting system.

Upon arrival, Dean assigned a sector of the Fells to each of us. I was assigned 19 controls, with 18 WCOC stands. I greatly prefer the NEOC stands - they are light and very simple to set up. The back-up punch and flag are attached; the only task is to place the stand and clip on the e-punch box. While I'm grateful for WCOC letting us use their stands, they are much more time consuming. Apart from deploying the stake and planting the stand, the flag, back-up punch, and e-punch plate all had to be mounted to the stand. I was tremendously fatigued and hungry from the past two days, and I had a philosophical crisis while plodding through the woods. As I had plenty of time to think, I resolved it satisfactorily, and fought on to finish the day's work. There was a potential crisis when four e-punch units dropped from my bag (the first time this had happened to me), but I was able to reconstruct my path and find them scattered in the forest.

Brendan and I then helped Dean set water, and retired to Cambridge to shower before going to the banquet.

Event: US S/M/L Champs 2011 & WRE
 

Today, my assignment was to set the controls for the Middle distance race on Saturday. Unfortunately, due to the sprint and inadequate labor, I was operating alone despite efforts to recruit help. I have previously visited all the controls about three times, and with a full day, I expected the task to be feasible.

I slept late - woke up at 7, and drove to the NEOC equipment locker to get start clocks. I fought through morning traffic to Cambridge to hand off the clocks to Lori and called Jim Paschetto to ensure the NEOC Start/Finish stands were getting to Franklin Park. I arrived at Lynn Woods at about 9:40, and after some set up, set off with a bag full of stands. My plan was to first set stands, then set the e-punches and confirm sites. Will Hawkins graciously agreed to vet the controls after his race, and after they had been set to check for any errors or anomalies.

This track is the first set of stands, on the lower part of the map. I had already set some the night before.

I drove to the northern side of the map, set the remaining stands (and one saw horse), returned to my car for some quick refreshment (not lunch, unfortunately), and set out to place as many boxes as I could before 3 PM, when I was meeting Will at the southern parking lot. My effort to squeeze as many boxes into the window delayed my arrival to 3:10.

After meeting up with Will, I loaded the remaining boxes in my bag and ran out to set them. The only error I fixed in the box phase (as opposed to the stand phase) was moving one of the controls to a different side of a boulder; I had misread the control description when I set the stand. Time 1:42-1:52 in the track was a death slog where I carried nine gallons of water to the water stop.

I drove out to Lynn Woods and rapidly set ten stands on some southern non-trail controls in the waning twilight.

An easy evening run at "11:00 PM" after a packet stuffing party. The temperature was 12 C, with light to moderate rain; I ran in shorts and short-sleeves, but I brought out gloves for the first time this year. I was thoroughly drenched by the time I returned to my apartment.

I found a Motorola Droid smart phone lying on the sidewalk in the rain playing "Bohemian Rhapsody" and spent a few minutes searching for obvious identifiers and powering it off. The phone had recently received a text from 'Brad' remarking that "Kissing in the rain was nice" or some such sentiments.

C • phone 19

Five minute abs; I still haven't fully recovered from Saturday. The set consisted of a minute each of oblique knee-to-elbow crunches, plank, leg lifts, tuck-ups, and kayakers. The tuck-ups were agony, so I switched to crunches. Since I aspire to be not a sissypants, I finished with two minutes of side plank and one of supermans.

C • not quite 10 min... 3

Side plank + supermans.

Easy jaunt around the river. My legs felt good, which is somewhat surprising given the abuse to which they were exposed this weekend. I had to stop for awkward evening traffic - a problem I don't have at my usual running times. I may switch to the mornings to better calibrate my circadian rhythms and avoid a superfluous evening shower.

My assignment was to do 3x28 pushups, and I succeeded, though narrowly. The first set was trivial, the second arduous, and the third a struggle against my own frailty. I finished the third set because it is in the nature of living organisms to want to survive. I haven't done this many pushups in a long time, and I should avoid training my upper body excessively, as its sole function is moving heavy objects. Nevertheless, I would like to be able to do three sets of pushups without breaking down like a pansy T-rex.

I have reflected much on the events from this weekend, and I have resumed the fight. Activities over the past two days include Traverse course revisions and communication checkups on Needham, Prospect Hill, Breakheart, and Harold Parker. I hope to have a draft of the 2011 spring schedule by the end of the month, though that may be difficult with two A-meets these coming weekends. Much to do, but I am distributing the workload and managing rather than shouldering burdens.