Training Log Archive: PG

Event: UNO Camping Weekend
 

Blue course, set by Ernst, all the points were knolls (tomorrow it's boulders). Very hot, got an early start about 8:30, but it was still hot. Easy pace, some running, some walking, and the running was at a very mellow pace, lots of zigzags looked for the cleanest forest, walking when it was crappy. And the result -- only one fall!

Hit all the points, it's not so hard when you are going so slowly with plenty of time to read the map. And o couple of them, 10 and 13, were in areas of very low visibility. Only time loss was that I wasn't looking high enough sometimes -- I'm looking at the usual couple of feet off the ground and some of the controls were up 6' or more. So I'd get to the right place, be perplexed for a moment, and then look up and see it.

Took a swim after I was done, had some lunch, really wanted to nap but didn't, and then got ready for event #2....

My routes.

C • cheater 2

So this was Barb's Bus-stop-O'. I sat on my hands when she was looking for bus drivers, but since there was a need for participants as well as drivers, I couldn't resist that.

Snagged bus B (Samantha) at B1, right at the start, then around on the road to get bus F (Barb) at F2 -- I had spotted her on the way to F2, that was actually quite cool, there goes my bus, marked by the special orange and white hat, and I zipped over to catch it, but then I realized I got more points if I waited until she was on the road at F2. (And, no, I am not going to explain the rules, other than saying that it was tougher for adults to score points than for kids....)

Then some time to klll until bus A (Tim Parson) got out to the road just after A4, then scoot down the road, all at a walk, to intersect bus C (Ross), who was doing an awesome job to stay on schedule, Then around to D6 just in time to get bus D (Brendon), who also had really hustled to stay on schedule. Never did get bus E (Phil).

It seemed rather loony but was actually quite good fun, including chatting with a couple of kids while we waited for bus A.

Got done just in time for dinner, eaten with the foreboding thought in mind that the night-O' was waiting....

World's Hardest Night-O' at Pawtuckaway. My route, except for around #9, and around #13 is a guess.

So there was discussion beforehand, knowing that JJ likes to keep statistics about such things as who has finished every edition of various events, there was discussion about how if you didn't get all the controls, you would severely regret it in the future. JJ did offer various scenarios for skipping controls, but the underlying message was, anyone worth anything better get them all. At least that was what I was thinking. And I was afraid I might be in for a long night.

Ross was clearly the class of the field, plus he had the biggest headlamp. I had chatted with Ernst, and he claimed he would walk the whole thing because of a bad back. And I figured I would walk the whole thing. So JJ says Go and Ross takes off, and Ernst takes off after him, and I take off after Ernst, trying to keep him in sight as long as possible. So much for truth in pre-race plans....

In company all the way to #1, fortunately, because when I left the trail heading due east looking for a boulder in vague terrain, my immediate thought was that this was really dumb. But at some point someone stopped just to my left, and lo and behold, there was #1.

Lucky again to #2, was probably going to go too far, but I heard a little noise to my right and figured I had better check, and over the little rise was #2.

To #3, on compass, in control of distance all the way, company of Jim Arsenault and Brendan, At the bottom of the steep slope Brendan spotted it first.

To #4, I got across the marsh first and was all by myself on the approach, but was a little too high and too far. And about when panic was setting in, down the hill just behind me came a couple of lights, heading right to #4.

#5 was pretty easy. Thick woods all the first part to #6, then a straight shot to the control, someone else there ahead of me. I think at this point Jim turned to go to #10, skipping 7-9.

#7 was a pain, because the forest got really bad for the last half, thicker than shown, rocky. Took advantage of Brendan here again.

To #8, he went a little left, I went a little right, no sign of him until just at the control, he was just ahead of me. But on that one I was in control all the way.

And then #9, mega-disaster, 32 minutes. Was careful, dropped down the last slope, thought i was just about right, but didn't see any control. Nor did Brendon. So we circled a bit in the immediate area, maybe 3-5 minutes, and then Brendan said he was going to bail out to the pond. Which seemed unnecessary to me, figured I could relocate, but I couldn't. I think i was SW of the control. Never saw Brendan again, but before too long there was another light, Ross this time. And after a bit he said he was going to bail out to the pond. Which I did too, and found the pond, but had a hard time telling where I was along the pond. And pretty soon no more sign of Ross, and I was getting pretty frustrated. And I looked at the rest of the course, and man, the rest looked easy if I could just find this dumb control. So I was trying and trying and trying to find something distinct in the terrain and finally I'm heading up a hillside going NE, at least 3 lines of climb, and I see where I might be, if there is a big boulder on the top of the little knoll on top. And there is, and other stuff matches up, and and I do the next 100 meters to the control, no problem. Why was it so hard 30 minutes earlier? Argggggg.

Well, off to 10. On the compass all the way, kept hoping to hit the bike trail, didn't for a long time, but I had good control on my distance and knew right where I was going. No problems.

To 11, ok until the end, tried to make sense of the bends in the bike trail, should have just stayed on my bearing. Still not bad.

#12 was easy, nice big features. #13 was easy too, you're just about done, I thought, and then blew it, badly. Hit the cliff just NE of the control, then missed the point from there, circled all around, tried to relocate, finally heading back NE to get back to the big reentrant, saw a light there, and it was Ernst. A bit of consultation as to where we might be, correctly done, but then I headed back down to the cliff, he went elsewhere. Got the control this time, and clean the rest of the way, Ernst in a couple of minutes later.

Finished, but not with much dignity, a double disaster is still a double disaster.

And also incredibly dehydrated, I'd been sweating away, it was still warm, but hadn't carried any water and there were no water stops on the course.

But still, finished. And a podium position at that.... :-)

WHN-O - Splits

Off to Pawtuckaway for the weekend. I imagine I will have to do version 2 of the world's hardest night-O', plus maybe even run a regular course or two. That will be interesting -- I've only run a handful of courses all year.

But the streak is intact, the weight is getting under control, the blood pressure was 114/70 yesterday, and the stress level in relation to the Sprint Finals and Relay Champs preparations is still mostly under control. Life could be a lot worse.

Version 1 of the World's Hardest Night-O'.

Started the day off with a fine round of rogaine practice with Charlie and Rhonda and Gail. A couple more PRs withe the D1 which was really smoking, plus tied an overall PR (73) from a few years ago.

Then up to Pawtuckaway, a nice pasta dinner, set up the tents just as it was getting dark, and then of course I had to deal with the demands of the streak, so on with the headlamp and a nice run out the Fundy Trail for a ways. Legs has some energy despite the full stomach. Surprised a porcupine in the middle of the trail, it very slowly ambled off into the underbrush, my first thought had been that it was a skunk, so this was much better, seeing a porcupine is always a pleasure.

Power line (17:43) and back (14:12), very dead legs, perhaps because I was stoned, well, as close to stoned as I ever get these days, meaning I had somehow returned from Canada 10 days ago with a box of Stoned Wheat Thins that Barb had procured but then abandoned, and the last couple of days I've been working my way through them, including a handful or two just before running, trying to keep from sitting down and eating something more substantial.

Now yesterday, on the Dean's run, that's in Amherst, home of the state university, and must everyone there is stoned, so I didn't give my condition any thought, and maybe I got carried away a little with my run report (but I still keep laughing when I re-read it!), but today, well, Sunderland is a little more law abiding, so I have to watch myself, so today's run report is, well, over.

C • college rankings 1

C • "these days?" 1

From the Mill River in North Amherst, north on the Robert Frost trail to Juggler Meadow Road and back. Relaxed pace, 25:38 out, 24:04 back. An ordinary run, but not an ordinary route, as for very, very specialized students of history, this route played a key role in the FDF War, and more specifically, in the development of that most potent weapon, the blue cap.

To start at the beginning, a quote from Phil's AP log on June 12, about this very route, one of his favorites:

"The headline for today is: "THEY'RE BACK" I felt like I was trapped in a grade B horror flick. I had 8 kills on the way out to Juggler Road; then I decided to take the road back. The Frost is now closed for the summer."

It was just at this time that the original blue cups (CUPS, not CAPS) were being tested, with Barb and Phil joining me as the chief testers, and while the blue cups clearly worked, there was a problem for some of us. To quote Phil again:

"The next question is: is there a way to do this without looking quite so silly?"

And Charlie offered some advice:

"I think the answer is to cultivate the zany yet confident grin that PG exhibits, instead of the furtive look of the philosophy professor trying to avoid his dean."



The main problem, of course, was one of image, maybe also one of fashion, for apparently Phil's dean liked to hike on this very trail, and the thought of a chance encounter, with Phil decked out with a blue cup, was just to awful to chance. And before long we had moved on the blue CAPS, and the rest, as they say, is history.

But there was still a little research to be done. I needed to go check out this bit of trail, partly to confirm that the FDFs were completely gone for the season -- and they were -- and also partly to see if I could find this mysterious dean. Of course I wasn't sure what he looked like. All I had was the one-word clue -- Dean.

And I thought, maybe he looks like this --



But no, that's James Dean, and he's dead, and he's too cool to be Phil's dean.

And then I thought, maybe he looks like this --



But no, that's Dizzy Dean, and he's dead too.

And I was about to give up, but I had one more thought, maybe he looks like this --



And damn if I wasn't right!

Phil, I can see what you didn't want to run into this guy. He looks really silly.

C • Time 10

Up to the power line (17:26) and back (14:22), easy pace especially on the way back as hamstring was just a little tight in the morning. Got out just before dark after an all-day guy trip to Berkshire Hills, so fine.

Falls Road to the town line (18:35) and back (18:08). Streak got me out the door again, this time in the last bits of daylight, starting about 7:15, sunset today 7:22, was careful the last 10 minutes to be well off the road every time a car came by, just to be sure nothing really stupid happened.

The departure time also meant that my gastric juices were still doing battle with a fine dinner of salad and smoked salmon, so I had to be careful to keep a mellow pace to make sure there was a little blood left for the brain, needed for daydreaming, after the legs and the stomach had grabbed their share.

And the daydreaming included --

1. The thought, and I was pretty sure of this, that my streak was not just a streak but also a ramp (not to be confused with The Ramp, an occasionally fun but mostly foolish undertaking). Just to be clear, further extension of this ramp is a very low priority.

2. This weekend seems to have been a time for PRs for Gail and Phil and perhaps others, and it certainly was for me. Thanks to rock-hard conditions and a smoking D1, PRs included several in the 270-280 range (3, 4, 9, 10, 14, 16, 18), a downwind/downhill 310 at 17, and a very fine driving the green 280 on the short par 4 13th. No mention will be made of other attempts that went awry, sometimes badly awry, all clearly not the fault of the D1 but the owner.

3. At the turn-around point, there is a nice spot by the falls coming down from Whittemore Pond, and a guy was on the porch listening to the Sox game. I thought of asking for the score, but didn't, but then my mind flipped back to the winter of 1980, when the Olympics were in Lake Placid, scene of the "Do you believe in miracles?" 4-3 hockey win over the USSR. Which, as perhaps fewer people remember, didn't mean so much unless the US team also beat Finland a couple of days later, which happened to be a Sunday, the last Sunday in February, the game starting at noon. But for the last 30 years or more, the last Sunday in February, starting at 1 pm, has always been the day for the Sugarloaf 10-miler, a tough road race with an especially nasty hill from 8.5 miles to 9.75 miles. And as a person usually much more interested in participating in sports than watching them, I was running in the race, but also wondering how the hockey team was doing. And just past the 7-mile point a guy was standing on the side of the road holding up board with the words scrawled on them: "USA 4, Finland 2" And everyone cheered, and the good vibes helped get us all up the last hill. Ran 65:11 that day, age 35, best time on the course was 62:27 at age 43, best effort was probably 63:57 at age 54 when I was still running well.

4. And that flipped my mind to wondering what the best road race was that I'd run, best result that is. And the candidates were a 30K at age 49 in 1:57, 3 39-minute 10Ks in a row, very hilly course, 6:23 pace, felt just awesome, and then the 87:30 half-marathon from about 18 months ago, age 61, 6:40 pace. Have to do a little more thinking abut that.

And by now I was about 10 minutes from home and it was getting quite dark, no time for daydreaming, just keep out of the way of any cars that might not see me. But at least the first 25 minutes of the run went by very easily....

Falls Road, up Gunn Mt. Road, back down North Mountain.

This run wouldn't have happened if I didn't have a streak going on, but that was enough motivation to get me out the door despite feeling crappy, headache all afternoon. Figured I'd take it real easy but I was under the gun to get back in time for dinner, so after a few minutes the pace picked up until it was actually quite brisk (as was yesterday's, 8-minute pace is hard work, unfortunately...).

Blisters on right heel are still distressingly sore a week after the rogaine. I can manage fine by taping them, but it would be nice if they would hurry up and heal.

C • Heel blisters 3

I've been reading more recently, real books that is, although I have pretty demanding criteria for what kind of books I can read -- large print, widely spaced lines, short chapters, not too much heavy thinking required, maybe some humor, but also something interesting.

I'm not sure how this started, but in the last few years I've read hardly any books. And the funny thing is, we have a beautiful new library just down the street, finished about 2 years ago, I was on the "Building Committee" in town, group of 7 residents in town that ran the whole project (a couple of design people, a lawyer, a guy familiar with planning and zoning, a teacher, an investment advisor, and me), about a 5-year effort, a couple of years to get state funding for about half of it and town approval for the rest, a couple of years working through the design and bid process, and a little over a year for construction. My responsibility was the financing and dealing with town politics, plus I ended up sitting in on the weekly construction meetings even though I knew nothing at all about construction.

We had an architect who has a really good sense of design, but was a terrible procrastinator when it came to getting things done, and a builder who did excellent work but also was trying to do what they could to squeeze more money, well, a lot more, out of us. The weekly meetings were invariably stressful, the builder telling the architect he'd screwed up something, the architect trying to dodge responsibility, plus promising to submit revised drawings right away for whatever the problem was, and me and the head of our committee trying to figure out how we could fix whatever the problem was and still stay within our budget. I got very good at both pounding on heads (e.g. you say you'll have this revised drawing tomorrow, what time tomorrow, we want it here at 10 am...) and trying to cut the best deal possible on all the change orders. All a real education. Plus one Saturday morning spent with the highway department (3 guys) and the head of the board of selectmen spreading this thick goop on all sides and the top of the town vault (a good-sized room included within the library) to make it more waterproof, because the architect wouldn't guarantee the planned design was sufficiently water resistant in case of fire, and the builder wanted 5K to fix it, and we could do it in one morning for a cost of about $200 in materials. But that's another story....

We came down to the bitter end, 3 weeks before the building was to open, it was beautiful, but we had unresolved differences with the builder of about $60,000 dealing with who was responsible for the grouting of the pipes for the geothermal system that heated and cooled the building. Someplace between the first and second round of bids (the first round had been 400K over our $2+ million budget, so we had to do a bunch of redesign and slimming), some things got changed in the specs, and in the second round the geothermal subcontractor assumed the general owned (i.e had to do the work) the grouting, and the general contractor thought the sub owned it, so neither had apparently put it in their budget. They had done the work under protest, finances to be resolved later. And through the eventual resolution of all the other issues, this one issue stayed unresolved. Letters from lawyers had gone back and forth, both the general and the sub blaming the architect, the architect saying they should have asked if they didn't understand something, the town feeling we had gotten a bid for the whole building that certainly included a heating and cooling system. Although I was pretty sure that neither the sub nor the general had actually budgeted for the work.

I'd reserved the 60K, had to say no to a bunch of other add-ons that I didn't think were necessary, but I really wanted to keep the 60K for doing a proper job of equipping the building with computers and setting up a fund for maintenance. Of course, neither the builder nor the architect knew this.

So we had our final showdown one morning in town hall. Architect and his firm's owner and their lawyer, builder (the sub had already been paid, the general was the one who hadn't been) owners and their lawyer, town administrator and the two of us on the building committee and our lawyer.

The first hour spent with each side making their case, no one giving an inch. At some point I ask our lawyer on the side if there is anything to be gained by pleading poverty, and he says, legally, no. So I try it anyway, and I toss out that all we have left in the bank is a little over 10K, maybe I can get it up close to 15K if I'm really lucky, and that's it, that's all we have. And I explain the current state of town politics (where we're looking at a $5 million bill to reconstruct the elementary school after the roof fell in), so there is absolutely no way we can go back to the town for more money because the residents are so pissed off at the school situation. But we'll kick in the 10-15K to try to make a deal. Knowing that they will latch on to the 15, also knowing I'm willing to go a little higher, but let's see what happens.

So the builders and their lawyer go for a walk, and after a while they come back and say they are willing to cut their demand in half, or a touch more, down to 29K. But that's it.

By now we're all in separate rooms, and we send them off and call in the architects and their lawyer. And the message to them is, do you really want to spend a couple of years in court, with some non-trivial legal fees, or do you want to settle this today? And if you want to settle this today, you have to put something in the pot, just like we are, just like the builder is. And it so happened that we still owed the architect 8K of their total fee, so I said they really needed to put that 8K in the pot. And there was a lot of grimacing and protesting and unhappy body language, but after a while, and consideration of the alternative, they finally said ok, they'd give up the 8K.

So now we were only 6K apart, the builder wanted 29, between the town and the architect we were offering 23, and I'm thinking we'll try to split the difference and up our offer to 18, when our lawyer suggests we see if they will just take the 23. So we call the builder back in, and now the pitch is, we've put in everything we've got, the architect is basically giving up his profit, how about it. And they think about it and go for another walk, and then their lawyer comes back and says ok.

And everything inside of me is screaming, Yes!, and it takes all my willpower to whisper to my folks, "No gloating." And we shake hands, and there are compliments all around about how beautiful the building is, and how terrific the construction is, and then they are all gone, it's been about 3 hours, and we are jumping up and down because we'll still have 45K to got a lot of nice things for the building.

Though a little bit of me feels like a lying schmuck, though I rationalize it away by thinking, this is the way the world works....

So anyway, it is now a couple of years later and I still haven't taken a book out of the new building. And one evening about a month ago I decided I should read more, so I went down and picked out 4 books -- something light by Carl Haissan, Get Shorty by Elmore Leonard, State of Denial about the Iraq war, and something titled How to Live to 100. The first was amusing and light, as was the second (we'd seen the movie and I kept imagining John Travolta in the role of Chili Pepper), the third was interesting and really depressing, and I haven't made much progress in the fourth. But getting through three of them was a major accomplishment, managed I think by alternating chapters, a chapter from one book, then put it down pick up another, and so on. Somehow my short attention span seemed to deal with that better.

My latest batch is again a little light, a little heavier -- something by Nora Ephrom, mostly light and funny, but little bits very thought-provoking, something even lighter by Dave Barry (hardly qualifies as a book), and then something on two subjects I really don't understand at all, a book about DNA, though it seems to be more about using DNA to investigate ancient stuff, and a biography of Einstein. I doubt that I will get far in the latter, but I have hopes, a chapter at a time with some Dave Barry in between might at least get me a little ways.

Suggestions of books for future reading are welcome, keeping in mind they they should be suitable for someone with a bit of curiosity, a short attention span, and an interest in still trying to learn something new even as my mind is fading away.

C • This was a most excellent and ... 15