The Santa Ana’s
Are the hot, dry mountain winds
That spark our fires.
Monday, November 5, 2018
Trail racing and training, for me at least, involves a lot of tinkering. For example for this Saturday’s Griffith Park 30k I’m thinking of trying out different shoes, a different gel, and a different way of getting my hydration mix into my bottle.
Why? Both for logical and pleasurable reasons - sometimes it’s just fun to tinker and sometimes it solves one of those annoying little quibbles that many racers come across.
The little quibble is the Skratch Labs single hydration packs. At the Rocky Peaks 50k a couple of weeks ago, I had a damned hard time opening them and even after tearing them open along the perforation lines, the opening was so small it seemed like it took forever to pour out. To solve this I’m going to pre-cut them well below the perforation and use scotch tape to hold the package shut. This will allow for easier opening and pouring. The only drawback could be that during the rigors of a long race the packages might open prematurely and it could cover me in a cloud of hydration powder.
The reason I’m trying another gel also has to do somewhat with ease of use. Normally, I use Hammer Gel. I like the fact that it comes in a large bottle and therefore saves on the environment and allows me to use a flask instead of single serving packets. However, for racing I do like to sometimes use single serving packets for convenience. And the downside to single serving Hammer gels is that they, like a lot of gels, run a bit thick for my liking. When I use a flask this isn’t a problem because I can add just a touch of water to thin it out. 2nd Surge gels are a bit more thinner to start so I’m going to give them a try. I do feel their slogan of being “Protein Powered” is a bit misleading when their first 4 ingredients are sugar, sugar, sugar and water. But that doesn’t bother me too much because that’s what I want.
Now the big experiment …shoes. I have discovered the perfect trail shoes for my feet; Hoka Torrent’s. But this isn’t a typical trail race. It’s exclusively on hard packed fire road and single track with just a bit of grit on top to make the downhills a bit slippery. It really could almost be considered a gritty road race and there’s really no need for the lugs or grip on the Torrent’s. For that reason I’m considering road shoes. The only problem with that is the uppers on my road shoes are very unstructured and I’m afraid I’ll be banging my toes and sliding around in them on the downhills. I do have a new pair of Salomon Sense Rides that have a nicely structured toe box and upper, but they feel like they need a bit of a break in period. The lugs, though not overly substantial, also would be a bit of overkill, but I may give them a try anyway.
Either way, I’ve got to decide soon, as I can’t start working out a race kit until I’ve made a shoe decision.
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