U.S. Orienteering Convention

This past week, Orienteering USA has held a convention in Rochester, NY. Ed and I are here, mostly because it's convenient to stay at home, but also because of the high-level orienteering on the bookending weekends. Unfortunately the courses got messed up last weekend, here's hoping that next weekend goes better for the organizers. Anyway, we've been in various talks and conferences all week, some really interesting stuff going on out there, a lot regarding mapping and new mapping technologies, but also some age-old questions, like fundraising. Ed and I teamed up and gave talks on using GIS for orienteering mapping, and on ski-o mapping, and they seemed to be well-received, if a bit on the techy side. One guy we know said "what you guys were saying was way over my head, but you were just so enthusiastic about it!" Good to hear.

The afternoons have been filled with orienteering training, mostly put on for the juniors, who are doing a training camp all week, but also for us non-juniors who want to train. Monday we were at Mendon Ponds, Tuesday at Durand Eastman, Wednesday we took off, Thursday was at Webster, and Friday is the Trail-o champs and a canoe-o, neither of which we're doing. Fun!

Lindsay and Judy killing time before the picnic on Monday.
A horrible shot of us post-sprint.

Tuesday we were at Durand Eastman, and there was a "super string-o". String-o is a technique used to teach very little kids about orienteering, well in this case the string was a full 250m, with 30 controls! The idea was to just run the course as fast as possible, basically as punching practice, but it was pretty hard work, too. Here, Andrew Childs (US Junior team member) hits a corner at full speed. It was an intense sort of race!
Ed on the super string-o
My super-string-o attempt. 12 seconds off of Andrew (who won), but still 7th, so not too bad!


Ed running a sprint, so fast even the trees are blurry. Oh, wait, the trees weren't also moving?

2011 U.S. Classic Orienteering Championships

There are way too many U.S. Championships for summer orienteering, but the two big ones are the Classic champs, that consists of two days of racing and you add the times together to get an overall winner, and the Individual Sprint/Middle/Long championships, where each race produces a separate champion. This past weekend was the classic champs, and the courses were pretty long and gnarly, in the marshy/deerfly sense. I was a little nervous about this, since it's orienteering, and I haven't really run in the forest since twisting my ankle, but I have a new fancy ankle brace, and I was able to avoid re-spraining it, which is really the goal.

The first day starts weren't until almost noon, so it was pretty hot and humid. The deerflies were also out in force, which wasn't too bad while you were moving, but they started feeding if you slowed down to read the map too closely. This was probably good for me, because it kept me moving, but when I made a small mistake near 5, they moved in for the kill. Overall, the course went pretty well for me, but deep ferns meant that I kept my running to a pretty cautious pace, so as to not re-twist my ankle, and so I never really felt like I was pushing hard enough. Below is the map, with my route. I ended up 2nd for the day, just ahead of the usual rivals of Angelica and Anna. Ali had destroyed us, and finished way out front - probably not going to catch her on the second day!

The second day's course had fewer ferns, so I could run a bit harder, but then I couldn't find control 6. At this point, I like to think that I know what I'm doing out there, but I got to the point where the control should have been, and there was no control. I figured I must have gotten off the perfect path somewhere, so went to a different point to re-attack the control. I ended up at the same place. Frustrated now, I headed out to an even more obvious point to re-attack, and as I approached, was overtaken by Andrew Childs, a very fast junior runner who just returned from the Junior World Orienteering Championships. When he also couldn't find the control, after leading us to that same spot, we determined that it just wasn't there, and headed off to 7. Which also wasn't there. One missing control, and you're like, well, ok maybe they put it in the wrong spot. But two in a row, and you're starting to doubt everything.


It turns out that an over-zealous control picker-upper from the day before had removed those two controls, since they were used on both Saturday's and Sunday's courses. Somehow, vetting the course in the morning had slipped through the cracks, and so because the course was missing two controls, everybody who was running the red course had their course thrown out, voided. A big bummer, because the reason to go to these meets is to get ranking points, to contest the US championships, and in general race on a course that has all the controls in the right places. There were some really upset racers, but what can ya do.

I kept running after the second missing control, but my give-a-damn was pretty damaged by then, and I had trouble motivating myself to push hard. Then I made a mistake on the penultimate control, and just couldn't find the darn thing in the circle. Blah.

So, they used just day 1 for the championships, and I ended up 2nd! This is the first A-meet where I've ever finished inside the top 5, and it happened to be the US champs, so I'm pretty psyched. (Angelica, 3rd place, me, 2nd place, Ali, 1st)

Ed ran an open class, and got 2nd, so got a medal too.

Boom

Thing have been going alright in my prep for WOC, recently. Not great, because ski coaching does not equal time in the woods, but not too badly. Boris came up to town the other day, and we got to run in the woods, where he noted that I frequently divert from my planned line because vegetation pushes me around. So, it was determined that I must be more forceful about bashing through thick vegetation, and to do this, I was going to practice running in a straight line from one point to the next, regardless of what was in my way. With a few exceptions for things like cliffs, deep lakes, etc. This seemed like a fine exercise to me, I mean, what is the point of running through the woods if you aren't going to bash through vegetation and swim through marshes? I finally got around to it on Saturday, when my brother was visiting, so he came along, intrigued by this bashing practice I was planning.


We headed to Hammond Pond, and the bashing was going pretty well, I was starting to really get into it, when I hopped over a log, landed with my foot twisted on a side-hill, and felt the crunching that immediately precipitates a sprained ankle. This was my "good" ankle, the one that hasn't been FUBARed by multiple twists and sprains and torn ligaments like the other, and it's remarkable how much it hurts to sprain an ankle for the first time. Compounding the pain are all the negative thoughts that immediately flood your brain when you injure yourself in a traumatic way, as opposed to those ever-present overuse injuries. The realization that you've totaled your ankle four weeks before the World Championships, and you still have a good bit of work to do to be ready for those World Championships, is a hard one. I think that's most of what drives the emotion after an ankle sprain. The straight-up ANGER at your body for letting you down when you really aren't in the mood to be let down, the frustration at events you can't control. It all rages through my head for a few seconds as I think that the world is coming to an end.

But I stood up, and after a couple limping steps, I could put some weight on it. Not full weight, but there was no sharp pain, just a throbbing ache that wouldn't leave. After about five minutes, I could walk, not normally, but enough to get back towards the car, that Christophe had gone to retrieve. Dammit. Dammit dammit dammit DAMMIT! (I may have used stronger words at the time). Time to RIICE: Rest, Ice, Ibuprofen, Compress, and Elevate. That second I is an important one!

Things seem to be coming around, now. Still a bunch of swelling, but I have most of my mobility back, and the pain is mostly gone. I can walk normally, and will probably be taping it up and attempting to run pretty soon... I've never been good at resting.

We'll call these girls the enablers... not that orienteering is an addiction or anything.

Luckily, last weekend involved most of my mom's family being in town for a funeral/reunion, so my chances to go abuse myself even more were scarce. Three generations of women in the photo below, so great that my grandmother could make it up here!

CSU Ski camp

The CSU Ski camp just wrapped up, in Winchendon MA. This is the third year we've been there, and we're still super psyched to have this perfect location for camp. There's a pool on campus, dorm rooms, good rollerskiing, hills, and a great view.

The dining services apparently have a new manager now, with some different tastes than what nordies tend to eat during training camps, but we've learned our lesson there, and we'll be calling ahead to request some "special" meals of pasta before next year. Who knew that pasta was a special meal.

After two weeks of ski coaching, I'm feeling a little on the tired side. Mostly from rollerskiing; I haven't rolled this much since last fall, but the good news is that my elbow hasn't fallen apart yet. Other bits of my body seem to be cracking off, but that's just par for the course. Who really needs achilles tendons, anyway?

My favorite day of camp is the long hike along the Wapack trail. Here's a classic Alex-selfie, with the heads cut off of Hannah and Zoe.

One of the reasons I love this hike is for the blueberries. It's a mandatory stop along the ridge to stuff our faces with them. So good.

We had a lot of obligatory fun at camp, including tie-dying, minigolf, ice cream, ultimate frisbee, and orienteering. With five junior counselors to whom we could delegate tasks, it was actually almost relaxing for the so called "grown up" staff. That's in quotes because I count as one of them, and god knows I'm not a grownup yet. Anyway, Hannah organized the tie dying, and got headbands for everyone. I learned an important lesson about rinsing out your headband before wearing it on a long hike... check out the blue forehead!

The orienteering was a 30-minute score course, and the skiers were paired off. Different controls were worth different amounts of points, and there was only one team that got all the controls in the time limit. Two more got all the controls, but were over the limit. More importantly, everyone seemed to enjoy themselves.


Handing out the maps.

After the orienteering, I had set up a 20-station circuit, that we ran through twice. That's a bit on the large size for a circuit, but, with 40 groups of 2, you needed that many stations. Rob couldn't handle the supermans, and demonstrates his best gopher face, which we've since determined is the face he makes any time he's really concentrating. Jamie snapped this photo just before I totally lost it convulsing with laughter.

Overall, it was a really fun camp. Great team spirit, and a great work ethic by all the kids. I'm ready to not do any more 6:45am morning runs, though... or any more rollerskiing, for that matter.

This is usually how I feel by the end of ski camps... it's hard work, no matter how much you delegate!

(Any photo with me in it is courtesy of Jamie Doucett)

Oh hey New England

I clearly don't feel that I know New England well enough, so I've been doing my part to travel to every single bit of it. At least, that's what it feels like. What happened to that plan to do less traveling?

Two weeks ago, we had the park-o run-off on Thursday; basically a chase sprint based on the results from during the season, where runners with lower points started first, and the faster runners tried to catch them. It was a really fun way to run a race, and it came down to sprint finish between Ari and Dean, through the rain across a muddy field, and Ari tripped right at the finish, sliding across the line on his belly, through the mud. Maybe it was planned, either way, it was a spectacular finish to the Park-o season. The picnic afterward was just icing on the cake.


Saturday I headed out to Baldwin Hill with our new Lithuanian recruit, Minda, and Jordan from West Point. We met Ali and played in the woods for an hour or two, and then went to Ross and Sam's goodbye/engagement party. They're headed for Sweden soon, that'll be sad.


Sunday I headed up north to Craftsbury, VT, with Rob, the head CSU coach. We had eight athletes at the Regional Elite Group camp, and we were on coaching duty, along with a bunch of other coaches from the northeast. Bryan Fish was leading the camp; he's the new USST development coach. It was a nice camp, if a bit rustic. Not sure I can deal with another week of phone-less internet-less seclusion... This is the only photo I have of the camp. Nice little accommodations, if a bit on the rustic side.

I made it back to Boston by Friday night, only to turn around and head back to VT at the crack o' dawn on Saturday. First stop was to put out some more temperature loggers, one of which required a 21km jog along the Appalachian trail, toward Stratton Mt. I managed to avoid any major climb, but my body was letting me know, in a very firm manner, that I needed a day off. My brain was in full agreement, and I was pretty grumpy by the time I got back to the car.That smile looks a little forced, eh? Nothing worse than running to a turn-around and realizing you still have to come back.

But, by that point, I was in VT, and Ed was there, so life was instantly a whole lot better. I managed to spend all of Sunday doing NOTHING work-related. Slept in 'til 10, took two naps, lit a mattress on fire (deliberately), watched a movie, drank some beers. Life is alright.





Hillbilly campfire.

The 4th of July happens at the Landgrove picnic. The fireworks were awesome, as always.



Now, it's frantically back to work for a day and a half, and then off to CSU's ski camp, in Winchendon. At least that one is close to civilization... but ski camps hold a lot less appeal when you don't really feel like rollerskiing. Bummer.

New Car

Life has taken a turn for the crazy the last few weeks. After coming back from Maine, I was in VT with Ed, having a nice little weekend away from it all, when we got rear-ended. By a Stratton snowboarder, good thing she wasn't a nordie, I would have been upset. We were having a relaxing Sunday, and decided to drive over the hill to Manchester to go to the bookstore, and spend the rest of the afternoon reading books on the porch. But driving along, someone is tailgating, so Ed pulls to the side, to let them go around, because clearly they want to go faster. Instead, she drives into us. WTF. We sort things out, file a police report, my car is driveable, so off we go.

Of course, I'd been planning to spend the beginning part of the following week down in Connecticut, with my friend Becky, training on the good orienteering maps down there. Ed offered that I take his truck down, and he would limp back to Boston in my car. Really, I should have just not gone to CT, but what the hell, I'd already decided to take the time off from work, feeling that I deserved it after my work trip to Maine. I made it to CT, but I really don't enjoy driving Ed's truck, so that was unpleasant. The training was great, though, and I felt all ready for team trials by the time I came back on Thursday, which was the day I was setting the park-O, that had all of 15 runners. Woo. That was a stressful day, but that's a different story. Anyway, all this meant that I waited a while before starting the whole deal of talking to my insurance.
Gratuitous map sharing! Line-o at Osbournedale.

That weekend was team trials, so I put the car out of my head, and went and raced. Things went well. I'm going to France. I came back to Boston, and tried to catch up on life and work, somewhat unsuccessfully. By the end of the week, I'd finally talked to both insurance companies, gotten my car appraised, gotten it into the shop, and gotten myself into a rental. Woo, normal life may now resume. That only took one sentence, but it took HOURS. Why is insurance so difficult to deal with? I headed back to Amherst for work on Monday, in the rental car, and got a call from the shop saying that all is well, parts have been ordered, and my car should be fixed by Friday. Yippee!!

So then Wednesday, I get another call, this time from my insurance claims person. Apparently, there was supplemental damage, and they're declaring my car a total loss. Wow, way to mess with my emotions, Arbella. I try (unsuccessfully, still), to get a copy of the supplemental damage appraisal. I call the shop. I want to know what changed, and if my car can be fixed with pieces off another car, from a junkyard, for less than the cost of new stuff. Turns out that's totally doable. I want to do that. It's my car, it's basically driveable, it's a unibody frame, so totally fixable. At the same time, I start looking around for other cars. Trying to convince my insurance that what they want to offer me for my car isn't enough to by an equivalent car. They just say, hey, tough luck, you don't have a replacement policy. Sigh.

Fast forward a bit. I've been on the phone with some variation of a car insurer for a minimum of an hour every day for a week. The end result is that obtaining a salvage title is a complete and total pain in the ass, involving over six weeks of waiting time, and there is no way to get around that. I give up. Hopefully, somebody else will take this poor little salvaged honda and make it driveable again, but I don't have the time or patience. I never even got to tell it goodbye =(

So today I bought a car, from a girl. It's an '03 Civic. It's name is Chloe. Naturally actually buying the car was no small deal, it's somewhat of a hassle, but now it's mine. Deep sigh. Hopefully life will get less crazy now.

Team Trials Middle Distance

I woke up rested, and within about 5 minutes of consciousness I realized I was nervous. Crap! I thought I could avoid being nervous! Alas, no. Luckily, it was a long jog to the start, so I got enough of a warmup to calm my nerves, and I had a plan and was in the zone when I started. It was still humid, but some thunder in the morning had made things a little less hot, so that was nice. This time, I had Ali 3 minutes behind me, and she's pretty speedy, so I just hoped to hold her off as long as possible.

The race started out on the wrong foot, though, when I bobbled #1, and then whacked my kneecap really hard against a log I was jumping over on my way to 2. That left me hyperventilating enough that I couldn't breathe for a bit, but eventually I got some air in my lungs, determined that nothing was broken, and let the adrenaline take care of the rest. Unfortunately, this extra minute that I spent lying on the ground meant that Ali had basically caught me as I was leaving #2, but I tend to race better when I'm trying to hold someone off, so 3-4-5-6 all went pretty well, with Ali just behind me at each control, both of us taking slightly different routes to each one. That area of the map was technical enough that she just couldn't run any faster, which is the only reason I could still see her for that long.

I started bobbling and hesitating more on 7-10, culminating with a bad route to 10, but I finished strongly, and because Sam had had a horrendous day, I took 2nd. I don't think I've ever done that before, so I was pretty pumped. I didn't know if that would be enough to get me onto the team - it would take the other girls making some big mistakes to help me out, but luckily, that's what happened! The points were really close. I snuck onto the team by 0.3 points, ahead of Pavlina, and just 3.4 points behind Hannah. The men were also really close on the bubble, as is always the case.

So I'm going to France! Weaseling 3 weeks of vacation out of my advisor was not fun, and nearly brought me to tears, but I am really excited to represent for CSU and USA at WOC this summer! I don't have any aspirations, but if I can pull out three (or however many I'm allowed to start) solid races, I will be pleased. I know that I have a lot of room for improvement in my orienteering, but as long as I'm not an embarrassment, it's all good. Now, about that wine and cheese they have over there...

Ian working on the breakfast of champions - Cheerios, in a humongous bowl.

Peter recognizing the folks most responsible for pulling off this meet - super skeleton crew that did a truly amazing job.
He also called up our ski-o relay team, so we could have a photo op and get recognized for general awesomeness. I love that when I stand next to Ali, I'm miniature.
Milling about waiting for awards.

A very inspired-looking women's WOC team.