Training Log Archive: simmo

Day 2 of Scottish 6 Days M65S. Much better today and finished 2nd, 1:40 down but could have found 2-3 minutes. The map and area were better too, still very wet and boggy, but the contours inparticular were easy to understand. The course was in two halves, start to 6 in open glaciated terrain with many knolls, cliffs and marshes, while after 6 we entered a very dark mature pine forest, part of a deer park.

Went to wrong knoll at 1 - 20-30 secs, 2 was a long leg which I did well until the last 50m, another 30 secs, 4-9 went ok, 10 I went too far left and lost maybe a minute. Could have been a bit more confident going into a few others too.

Organisation not so good - parking area was 2km from the arena, but traffic queued up a further 2km further out, and the organisers had to allow a punch start for the hundreds of people who - like us - got to the start late through no fault of our own.

Splits available now & confirms above, except 1 was more like 45 secs, 2 1 min, 10 1 min, and also 12 which was a knoll off a track where I could have gone in earlier but got put off by high bracken, 30 secs. The winner was more consistent, his worst split was 8th, mine was 30th.

NB Don't regret my decision to run Short - the Long courses for the first two days have been much longer (5.5 km) and twice as tough.

S6D - Day 2 Strathfarrar - C19 - Splits

Day 1 of Scottish 6 Days, M65S. Knew that the area would be boggy, so should have gone straight across the dark green marsh to 1, but tried to go around and got confused by contours - 4 mins lost straight away. OK to 2, but then did an 'ahead of myself' error at 3, losing 7-8 mins. Lots more bog to a road before 4, which was in a weird archery forest with a myriad of tracks and targets next to life-size deer, boar and other game animal models - got totally lost again for another 5-6 mins. Lost another minute at 5 which was meant to be on a clearing about 30x40 but was actually about 3 x 4m. After that I went pretty well. Was 18 mins behind the leader when I left, and no results available yet.

Watched the Sprint final on BBC - good run by Hanny to come 5th.

S6D - Day 1 Achagour - C19 - Splits

Event: WOC 2015 & Scottish 6 days
 

To Bos Amsterdam, around various paths there. Stopped for coffee on the way, then stopped at the goat farm in the woods to buy some cheese. Then back into town for lunch, a bit of shopping and a wander around. A longer ride with fewer stops.

Into town and back, with walk around a part of Amsterdam we hadn't seen previously. Found a very good lunch spot called Droog, upstairs in a store with very hipster-like gifts.

Later we took the tram into town for a wander around the Van Gogh Museum, followed by dinner - risotto for me, duck for PP - at a nearby pleasant cafe called George WPA.

Into town via our Aussie coffee shop, then to the hop-on, hop-off cruise where we bought day tickets and had a nice day swapping boats and walking around various parts of the city. Highlights were bumping into (almost literally) Conchita Wurst, and climbing up to the roof of the Oude Kerk (old church).

In the evening we went to a concert at the Concertgebouw, an alternative German classical band of 5 (piano, cello, viola and two recorders) called Spark. Different but good.

Ride to Central Station from our digs on a green/orange clunker. No gears and no brakes. Also no map board and couldn't be bothered stopping in the rain to pull a map out of my pocket every intersection, so got a little bit navigationally challenged. Found an easier but longer route home, which passed a nice looking Italian Wine & Pasta place near our digs called Cantinetta. So we booked for dinner, which turned out to be excellent; Tagliatelle Carbonara done the traditional Roman way without cream for me, and spag with one of three variations of tomato sauce for PP, accompanied by good salads and followed by good desserts.