Training Log Archive: PG

Event: US Corn Maze Champs
 

US Corn Maze Champs -- Sprint.

Remarkably good. Went to all the controls (and in the right order). No mistakes. Walked maybe 10 yards coming into each control to give my legs a rest and see where I was going next, but "ran" the rest. Very satisfying. First orienteering in almost a year (and that was a total failure), so nice to enjoy it.

C • Maps 1

US Corn Maze Champs -- Classic

Well, must have used up too much of my mental capacity on the sprint as there was not enough left to manage the Classic. A decent "run" except, having planned a nice route from 8 to 9, and then executed most of it well, I then seem to have decided that 10 was where I was heading. Not even a glimmer of concern that that wasn't where I should be going.

But I did spike 10.

Certainly was getting tired towards the end of this course. I guess for the time being I am pretty much just a sprint guy.

But still, in all honesty, delighted to be actually doing some running, and nothing hurt.

UC Corn Maze Champs -- See it, Find it

Hah, O' in the corn maze with climb! For real. Start with the climb up to the viewing platform to see about where the 3 controls might be, then go find them. A cool event by JJ, a modest mental eff-up by me, including not starting my Garmin, so no data. And then two wrong turns on the way to the control at the far end, where I guessed correctly and spiked it.

On to the middle one, possible it was on the outside of the maze. Got real close to the spot, no control, no windsock to be seen, Around to get real close on the other side, still no control, no windsock. Decided it must be only accessible from outside the maze, and only then did I spot the windsock. Yup, outside.

Off for the third control, guessed right on that one too, spiked. And then a long run/walk out and around to the back side of the maze, and then back to the finish. Rapidly running out of gas.

But a cool new event. And overall a fine day. Many thanks to JJ and also to Steve Richardson, who set the Sprint and the Classic courses but was unavoidably away on business. And, of course, thanks to Mike and Dave and Mike's Maze. Started doing these things in 2010, still going strong. 61 orienteers today, and lots of young ones too.

Note -- black circles are my guess as to where the control was. Red x's are where it actually was.

Sprint - Splits

Long - Splits

Platform-O - Splits

With Gail, to the south. First time that the first number of the time per mile is a 3. With some room to spare. :-)

I'm getting getting more exercise on our rides.

North Mountain up to Gunn and back. Mid 70s, low humidity.

With Gail, mostly. The Lower Road / Upper Road lollipop, new route for us, more hills. But a nice day, so why not.

Went just fine until Gail's electronic shifting ran out of juice when we had 5+ miles to go. A lowish gear, so she could get up any remaining hills, but not much help otherwise if you wanted to move along. Stopped to see if there was an obvious fix, but it seemed likely that any use of brute force might just make things worse.

So she moseyed home. I got the dumb idea of going up South Sugarloaf as I was going right by it. So 10:55 of slow suffering. But made it up.

A minute on, half a minute off. Old road on the north side of Quabbin. Dirt, almost flat. Upper 80s.

Drove over to where the D2R2 starts in Deerfield, then did the first section of this year's Mystery Ride, then back to the car via the easiest way. The thinking was to get out and do a decent ride, and visit some spots I hadn't been to for a while, and in some cases only in the other direction.

And the result? Well, it's done. Highlight clearly was finding two sections I hadn't been on before. Which gives an indication of how enjoyable things were, as each section was about 200 yards long, so not so exciting.

And the rest? It seems the legs were dead about a mile in, coincidentally where the first hill started. And things didn't get better.

Fox Hill in Bernardston was a special pain in the butt. Been up it a couple of times before, and it's only gotten harder.

Got to my initial destination, the five-mile point on the Green River Road in 2:36, nicely in my estimated range of 2:30-2:45, and turned to head back to Greenfield and Old Deerfield. And eventually got there. :-)

Certainly need to do more training to enjoy a ride like that. Whether that happens is another matter. At least there is some satisfaction for having gotten out and done it. And no aches or pains or falls or wrong turns, just very very tired legs.

C • Fox Hill 4