Training Log Archive: HWW

Event: 36th Surrey Hills Trail Challenge
 

Surrey Hills Race 2013
Upon looking at the entry list for this, I thought I'd have a reasonable chance of winning this, having lost out to Ben Stevens last year with a small catalogue of errors. That was, until, GG announced his presence at the start, having arrived in the UK yesterday for an impromptu week-long stay. We had both previously run a fair chunk of the Hills Race course together a few years ago but, as I was in my non-training years at that point, I blew up massively after around 40 mins and we didn't finish it.
From the start I set out at what I have to admit was a fast pace, with GG, Alan, Ben and James trailing to control 1. GG and I took what was probably a sub-optimal route to 2, emerging behind the other three, but we recovered the lead on route to 3. 4 and 5 felt fine and we were able to maintain a strong pace. By this point I was essentially letting GG navigate and, while chatting to Ben afterwards suggests we maybe didn't take the best routes to 5 and 6, we were nonetheless well clear.

Approaching 6 I began I feel a stitch coming on - v annoying, as if anything I though I would have been affected by not eating enough food soon enough (cereal for breakfast at 0745) - but this sapped my pace. I quickly lost ground on GG and, while I kept him in sight until shortly after the water station at the Duke of Kent school, he'd built up a fair lead by the time I saw him coming back from 7. My route from 7 to 8 was mainly dictated by the fact I wanted to revisit the water station, but in doing so I think I unnecessarily added distance and hills. By now my legs were starting to wane (although the stitch had cleared up) and to make matters worse the sole of my right foot was being rubbed raw by my inov8s.

Now slowing, my route to 9 seemed ok but in taking the road less travelled (sounds like everyone else took the westerly option by the lakes) I probably added more time and distance. Then, running through a field between 10 and 11 I looked back and saw Ben. I knew I'd been slowing but didn't realise he'd regained so much ground. This momentarily had me in a defeatist mindset but, realising that I only had a couple of k to run at most I decided I'd try to hold him off. Navigation to 11 and 12 was fairly clean and I was still running, albeit v slowly. Ultimately finished around 4 mins down on GG and a little under a minute ahead of Ben.

A Course - Splits

CFA Level II exam - no physical activity (hopefully sufficient mental activity) but at least this does now mark the beginning of sporting summer.

EY Modern Pentathlon 2013: Riding (6 jump course)
I'd not originally intended to ride as part of this competition; my team (supposedly 4 but in the end an incomplete 3) had our designated rider (a virtual beginner). However, given the opportunity for others to have a go near the end of the competition I decided to try.
I have ridden before, most recently around 3 or 4 years ago as part of an OUMPA training weekend organised by my cousin, but have never jumped. Not that this effort really involved "jumping" - instead I was essentially led round over the lowest level barriers. Still, its something I'd like to return to and work on, and would love to be able to competently compete in a full scale pentathlon. Additional bonus in that, thanks to this participation I was still a contender in both the individual pentathlon and tetrathlon events.

EY Modern Pentathlon 2013: Running (3,000m run: 3 x 1km circuit of Tonbridge School cricket pitches)
Unfortunately the organisers decided that it would be too complex to arrange a chasing / Hungarian start format for the 4th wave of the run, based on team's points totals after the first 4 events and 3 waves of the run. As such, the run involved a mass start instead but there were still (just about) lapping opportunities.

With a fast start from the field, I made sure I got clear but also was able to find a comfortable pace. Arguably I did go off too fast (as evidenced by my km splits) but I didn't feel I was fading too much. The far end of the loop included a gradual ascent which felt tough, particularly when one was still heading away from the start / finish. I was also surprised that the guy in 2nd was only around 100m back on the second lap (the twists and turns of the course made this particularly apparent). I put a little more distance in on him over the 3rd as I tried to hold things together for a quick time.

Ultimately not super fast - an improvement of 2 seconds on last year but then I'd have thought I should be comfortably achieving sub 9:40 on grass. Still, it was enough to help move my team up to 10th (of 12) and for me to win both the overall men's tetrathlon and pentathlon, something which I really hadn't expected given my day 1 performances. With last year's prize having been tickets to the Olympic Games Modern Pentathlon, I had wondered what this year's rewards would be. The organisers didn't disappoint and so as a result I've now got myself a ticket to the Sunday of the Lords Ashes test, yay!

EY Modern Pentathlon 2013: Shooting (10m air pistol)
Not a great start to this year's competition; reasonable accuracy in the warm up but then only managed 7 targets in the actual competition, against a 1,000 point benchmark of 20 targets in 5 minutes (think I managed 12 last year).

EY Modern Pentathlon: Swimming (200m, indoors)
Hmm, having finally learnt and reacted to the fact that not training makes one slower at running I really ought to take on board the same point for swimming. Despite Monday's token effort at London Fields, I don't think I've swum since last summer, and certainly haven't done a session since last May / June.

Think I was a little slower than last year in this competition although I can't quite recall. It might of helped if the other people in my wave had been faster, but training would probably have helped far more.

EY Modern Pentathlon: Swimming (200m, indoors)
Hmm, having finally learnt and reacted to the fact that not training makes one slower at running I really ought to take on board the same point for swimming. Despite Monday's token effort at London Fields, I don't think I've swum since last summer, and certainly haven't done a session since last May / June.

Think I was a little slower than last year in this competition although I can't quite recall. It might of helped if the other people in my wave had been faster, but training would probably have helped far more.

EY Modern Pentathlon 2013: Fencing (Epee, 3 hits)
About the same performance as last year. As with swimming, I've not done a huge amount of fencing training over the past year - think that, prior getting along to HPFC on Wednesday evening to collect my kit and have one Foil bout, I'd not been since last September - and so was a little rusty.

In total I think I had about 8 or 9 bouts, so not too many. Given that pretty much everyone else was an absolute beginner, I shouldn't have taken as many hits as I did and, while I only "lost" 2 or 3 bouts (1 - 2), of the rest I only won one 3 - 0 - generally due to sloppy defending and poor timing / footwork. Since the competition scoring was on a hits made / hits received basis this cost me and meant I was only 6th overall, and 6th in the full pentathlon going in to the 2nd day.

Leytonstone to Fitness First, London Bridge

Kettlebells class

Gym to Whitechapel library

Cycle back to Leytonstone from Tooley Street

Event: Park Race 2: Wandsworth Common
 

The usual.

ParkRace orienteering: Wandsworth Park (5.2km, 23 controls)
Another fast 'n furious affair, but stupidity on route to 9 and 10 cost me, accounting for over half my 20 second deficit on Jonathan. Re 9, either the diagonal path to the north and round to the east or coming in on the path the control was on probably would have been fine; trying to run through the woods wasn't - reminder to self, this is a ParkRace, attempts at straight-lining it through white / green forest will seriously damage your speed.

With other controls where I lost time I think it was mainly a case of inaccurate dibbing (definitely lost a few seconds because of this) and sometimes just not pushing myself hard enough. Slightly surprised reviewing SplitsBrowser to find that I had fastest legs on 15, 21 and 22, all of which in retrospect I feel I could have taken better lines to. At least there's room for improvement.

Cycle back to Leytonstone from Wandsworth Park (NB. should also be logging cycling from the office to Wandsworth Park earlier that evening by my Garmin decided it wouldn't clock satellites until 50m from the venue).

Long - Splits

Over to London Fields for a morning swim.

First swim in many months. Decided that this would be a pleasant start to a Bank Holiday, especially when I planned to spend the rest of it indoors studying. This also means I don't feel entirely unprepared for the 200m swim in Thursday's EY Modern Pentathlon.
400m w/u, 4 x 200m, 100m w/d

South from London Fields to Whitechapel to discover that Whitechapel Library (or "Knowledge Centre" or whatever other name they've given it) is closed on Bank Holidays, resulting in heading back home the usual way (via Stratford).