<- Left Turns Only!

Saturday was the first short track meet of the season (for me), I might do another but that all depends on the schedule and whether or not they have time trials scheduled at the Pettit.  As for the race on Saturday, overall it was a productive day.  My times were better in all three races (compared to my only short track times from last November):

Last November 4th-5th (Great Lakes Short Track Meet, my best times in each race)

500M - 57.86, 1000M - 1:57:95, 1500M - 3:03:73

Saturday’s race results (best times)

500M - 56.36, 1000M - 1:53:36, 1500M - 2:55:52

Encouraging first races for the season, even if they are short track.  This upcoming weekend I’ll most likely be doing time trials for the first time this season.  It looks like they are only going to have them on Saturday - if by chance there are time trials on Sunday I might sign up for the Great Lakes Short Track meet (it’s only a one day meet this year, as opposed to two days last year).  We’ll see what the folks at the Pettit decide to do.

In other news, I believe I mentioned in a previous post that our head coach, Carl Cepuran was recognized by U.S. Speed Skating at the end of last season as being the Volunteer Coach of the Year.  This Saturday, something happened that I’m sure he is even more proud of - Carl’s son, Eric Cepuran, qualified to skate the 5000M for the U.S. at the Salt Lake City World Cup event.  I believe it is being held on November 9-11.  I know Eric, and have had the privilege of working out with him once in awhile when he is home during the summer.  He’s an excellent skater (obviously), but he’s also a good person and a great older brother.  Congrats, Eric!  Keep working hard, and see you in Vancouver!!!   

Last night was our first flying one lap time trial.  Last season, I finished at around 11.2 seconds.  This first round of the season I ended with an 11.3.  Not bad for the first one of the year, although it easily could have been faster.  I didn’t set my track up right.  I entered the turns later than I should have, the first lap (we get two shots at it during the session) I was almost three feet off of the apex block in the turn.  The second lap, I ended up trying to make an adjustment and lost my footing coming out of the turn.  Chalk it up to a lesson learned.  I think I can easily get below 11-flat, but need to skate a clean lap when I’m going all out… sometimes the feet want to get going too fast… and that’s when good technique flies out the window.

Tomorrow is the first meet of the season.  Although it is a short track meet, and probably the only short track meet I’ll be doing this year.  Time trials were canceled for Sunday, so I’m just going to be getting some practice in.

After a long wait, Saturday was my first day on the Long Track ice at the Pettit this season.  I opted to skip doing time trials that day - in favor of getting a day of practice in before doing my first races on Sunday morning.  Unfortunately, not enough people signed up to race on Sunday.  So time trials were canceled.  I didn’t mind because that meant I didn’t have to be at the rink at 7am. 

Instead I got there at around 10:30 Sunday morning to get my workout in (for some reason they didn’t have open skate until 1pm - so no one was hovering at the edge of the ice at 11:59 waiting to kick the speed skaters off).  I also got on the ice this morning for another hour and a half.  Right now, after a couple of light weeks trying to get my knee back to 100%, I’m just building the amount of laps I’m skating.  Saturday was a series of 4-lap sets.  Sunday, the main workout was a series of 5-lap sets - with a few 200m sprints.  This morning, the workout stepped up a little bit more to a series of 5 minute sets. 

It’s nice to be back on the ice after five months of summer workouts, and sporadic summer short track sessions.  The most encouraging parts of the weekend were:

1- The fact that the first day on the ice didn’t have the “first day feel” to it.  Over the last few years, each time that I’ve taken any considerable amount of time away from the ice it has almost felt foreign when I first stepped back out there.  I don’t know if it was because this summer I did a little more inline skating, or if the couple of short track sessions that I’ve skated this season helped that much, or if the muscle memory is finally starting to settle in.  Whatever the reason, it is nice to step on the long track ice in a pair of clap skates and feel like I’ve been there before.

2- I can’t tell you how much of a difference it makes having an apartment 15 minutes from the rink.  No more of the 5am, bleary-eyed, half-comatose drives from Chicago.  Also, no more getting out of the jeep and feeling stiff as a board -after the 90-mile post-workout ride home.  There’s not enough that can be said about being showered, done with lunch and working (on anything), whereas normally you would still be in the car!

Unfortunately, the weather didn’t cooperate yesterday and the JDRF’s Walk to Cure Diabetes turned into a rain-soaked mess.  Not only did the weather affect the walk, it also affected the volunteer turnout.  We were short a considerable number of volunteers.  Which made for a lot of running around by the site committee, along with a lot of phone calls where the conversation was essentially responding to the question “Did someone handle this?”

The good news is that all of the early feedback to our site committee chairperson has been positive.  From JDRF staff, walkers and volunteers. 

I didn’t get to take any pictures, so you’ll have to wait to visit the JDRF’s site to see team photos from this year’s walk.

As for the training, this weekend I’m planning to do time trials Saturday and Sunday.  First back-to-back weekend time trials.  Right now it looks like 500m/1000m on Saturday, and 500m/1500m on Sunday.

Briefly, I had a good week of practice and physical therapy this past week.  The main part of the workout on Tuesday night was a VO₂ Max workout on Tuesday night.  It consisted of a three minute all out skate, followed by a 20 minute session that was based on your three minute skate.  So, if you did 14 laps in the 3 minutes, during the workout you had to skate 2.5 laps in 40 seconds, then coast for 20 seconds.  We did the 40-20 split for 20 minutes.   The first couple of times it seems pretty easy.  But when you get past the 15th rep you are pretty much gasping for air during your 20 second break.

Last night our technical focus was on turn exits.  We did several 7 lap sets, along with a few sets of 3 lap excels (An “excel” is a lap set where you get faster with each lap - a three lap excel might be skated at 70, 80 and 90 percent of your maximum speed). 

Therapy continues to go well.  The other day as I ran down the back steps I noticed that there was no pain at all in my left knee, and even though I had a little stiffness this morning I attribute that mainly to our workout last night.  I think I’ll probably be done with PT by the end of next week, but may go an extra week for precautionary measures.

This weekend I’m going to be volunteering at the Chicago Lakefront site of the JDRF’s 29th Annual Ron Santo Walk to Cure Diabetes.  I’ll try to take a bunch of pictures and post them sometime Sunday night or Monday morning. 

Yesterday I paid a visit to the physical therapy office to have them take a better look at my left knee.  It really started flaring up over the weekend.  I gave it one more try at practice on Tuesday, but it wasn’t up for the entire workout that was on the schedule.  So I went in at 9am yesterday, to find out what the problem was.

Thankfully, the pain I’ve been having (mostly in weight bearing situations - going down stairs, squatting, holding a basic speed skating position for an extended amount of time…) is not the result of any major tears or long-term problems.  The x-rays showed that my left patella (knee-cap) is not tracking properly, as it has shifted slightly towards the outside of my leg.  The shift (due to muscle imbalances) is causing stress and irritation to my quadriceps tendon as my patella rubs over the bone - instead of gliding on the cartiledge where it is supposed to. 

The best explanation with a visual that I could find on the web is here.  Very brief.

The PT folks think it should be fine with two weeks of rest and ice.  I can practice but nothing too strenuous.  I’m going in for treatment Mon/Wed/Fri for the next two weeks.  Ultrasound, E-stim, massage therapy and some strength work.  When it’s all said and done I much prefer to baby things and not have them stick around, then to fight through it and have a nagging injury all season (although I would REALLY like to start doing some time trials!).

The last few days of my trip to Italy were spent in (or, I should say they were based out of) the small town of Corniglia, one of the five villages of the Cinque Terre. 

Here are a few pictures from our balcony:

You can hike along the coast to each of the five villages of the Cinque Terre.  Some of the hikes are easy (from Manarola to RioMaggiore it only takes about 20 minutes), while some are a bit of a workout (it takes almost to hours to get from Vernazza to Monterosso, and there are a LOT of stairs built into the cliffside hike).  Here are a few quick pics of the other towns (and a pic from where we climbed down on the rocks to go for a swim):

Here are a few pics, with my attempts to be artistic, of a fruit stand in Riomaggiore:

I departed Cinque Terre on Monday, making it back to the states on Tuesday evening (after flying from Rome to Frankfurt, then Frankfurt to Chicago).  So, I’ve been back in Chicago for almost a week now, and I’m finally starting to get back to a regular sleeping routine… although I was out of bed at 7am this morning - again, not the norm for me. 

Practice started last Thursday night.  I’m a little worried about the tendonitis in my left knee.  It hasn’t been bothering me much over the last month.  However, I’m starting to think that there might be some lingering problems from when I hyperextended my knee earlier this summer.  It only seems to hurt when I try to squat or sprint from a dead stop, but it doesn’t seem to bother me once I get going.  I’m going to stop by the old physical therapists office tomorrow to see what they think.  It was pretty sore on Friday, after our workout on Thursday night, even though it didn’t hurt while I was skating.  We’ll see what the prognosis is.