Training Log Archive: АТ

Sprint. Last start so plenty of time in quarantine, timed the warm up perfectly but feeling heavy legged in warm up. Not too nervous at all :)

Sprint. 30 seconds of mistakes, 19 seconds off the win. 5th.

Results and Splits

Prize giving ceremony stream

1, 2: Best routes & no mistakes, even won the leg to 2.
3: Ran straight past shithole centre of. Confused by the forest, losing 20 very cheap and stupid seconds.
4-13: Stable, feeling good, all routes I think were the best but had to run up some killer steps to 4 which pushed me into lactate fairly quickly.
14: Best route, not well executed. Got caught out by the temporary uncrossable boundary at the top of the steps so had to go round, this was caused by a lack of forward planning and not slowing down to read the detail of the map.
15-finish: Apart from smashing into the Estonian who had been following me going round a corner it was fine: best routes. Bit slippy in X -Talons so couldn't sprint hard at the end.

 

Technically - two stupid mistakes costing me 30 secs and the win which is annoying but shows I can do it if I sort out my sprint technique.

Emotionally - Much better, less pressure since I wasn't targeting this as much and I knew I was running fast so remained positive to the end.

Physically - Could push again today, maybe not quite as fast as I would have liked but still very good and much better than the last two days of bonkage. Felt good again!

Positives:

-On the podium
-Had the potential to win
-Felt good for the while race
-Chose all the best routes
-Had a lot of fun
-BUZZIN

Negatives:

-Silly, Silly, Silly mistakes
-didn't read control descriptions...
-Bit slow up the steps
-Didn't really forward plan which lead to a few very last minute decisions

Things for Sprint:

-Always stay in control
-Know route for next leg before the leg - Make sure route works
-Check control descriptions - Inside, outside, on-top, under-neath etc
-Slow down to read uncrossable features correctly

Buzzin to be on the podium!


Never gonna live that smile down...

Jog from the event arena to the hotel with Lucy.

Warm up, some jogging then drills in the start pen, nervous but calmed myself down.

Relay. 1st leg in the GBR M16 team, with Jake on second and Grace on third.

Results

1: took the lead of the train and then navigating perfectly to the other gaffle, losing about 1 min being confused by everything. I was in the right place just very not sure and standing very close to the control for a long time consequently losing the train. Also my gaffle seemed exceedingly unfair, being on the other side of a gully to he rest (and the gullies were massive)
2-9: technically quite stable but started dying physically by 6, speed just kept getting lower. was also running through quite a few athletes.
10: on line, navigating perfectly to my gaffle, saw the other gaffle and got distracted, ran to that, punched, checked the code, figured it out, ran to my gaffle. Thus losing any advantage by having the shorter gaffle here
11-finish: fine technically but just trudging, painfully slow! Was very dead by the time I finished.

 

(This isn't my gaffle, #5 and #8 were different)

Emotionally I kept positive and kept trying to push even though I was dead and obviously going painfully slowly by the end, which was an improvement on yesterday.

Positives:

-Much better technically
-forest was very nice in most places
-kept positive
-finished in 8th on my leg
-learnt a lot about handling 1st leg
-great international relay experience

Negatives:

-heat hit me bad
-ran too fast off the start
-bonked
-got distracted by others too easily
-not forward planning enough

Things for next time:

-Sit in the pack and do own thing
-Read the map more
-Don't lose contact with the map
-Take a gel at spectator if feeling bad

Them trousers though...

Warm up map + drills, legs feeling meh.

Map:

Well at least I finished.

Results and Splits (as pdf files)

8 mins mistakes, 3.57 off first, 11th overall.

Map:

 

1-4: Very good, focused and only 30 sec max lost in the circles.
5: Wrong route, disaster in the circle, found 6, 3.30 mins binned.
6-10: fine but bonking
11, 12: Bonked, lack of focus, 3 mins lost, paths confusing, major compass issues.
13: lost 1 mins checking 12 was correct control by going back. Knackered. Trudging by this point.
14-finish: dead, so hot and disappointed.

Physically: I will put the shameful running performance down to the heat, but also wondering how fast I could have run normally since my legs just wouldn't give anything today. Will see how they feel for the rest of the weekend.

Technically: Again the heat caused some shoddy orienteering and much lack in focus, summed up at control 12 by forgetting the basics of code checking and binning a cheap minute. Exit direction at the end was bad, and paths confused me throughout.

Emotionally: Negative thoughts had taken over by spectator caused by the lack of pace and messing up, this is probably the main reason why I lost time in the final section because I just didn't focus and forget about what happened. I thought I had lost it all and was devastated which took over before the finish and lead to 4 mins being lost, a complete lack of motivation to give 100% physically and probably the podium as well.

Positives:

- was only losing 5-30 sec to fastest split on legs I did well.
- had a really good start
- much learning was generated
- Great experience for international racing.
- I ran for GB
- I went orienteering (still the best pass time ever!)

Negatives:

- heat really got to me
- focus slipped and negative thoughts appeared.
- Exit direction at the end was poor
- didn't adapt to the fact paths and vegetation were very unreliable

Things for the relay tomorrow:

- focus
- I am as good as all these boys, I just need to be clean
- Exit direction

Things in general:

- I will be positive the whole way and never give up the fight
- I will prepare more thoroughly, temperature, terrain, start time etc
- I will build myself a solid technique that can be applied to ALL Terrains and not just lake district/ Britian.
- I will do a solid BASE phase to stop any more bonkage.

Fairly shortened to get to bed at reasonable O'Clock.

EYOC Model Event.

Did a lot of walking round the Sprint area this morning, feeling confident about that, but was quite tiring.

Moved onto the long model this afternoon, jogging and walking round most of it, raced some controls at the end. Feeling goooooooodddd!

Terrain is weird and very varied, contours are massive and some marshes are wet. Full go us tomorrow!

Nice in a nice new hotel :)

Travelling. Whoop whoop!!

Shortened taper core workout of 18 mins then some ankle and knee exercises. Travelling tomorrow!

Nice. Legs feeling good.

Dropped off at Powter How , then jogged/ walked up the hill to the start. Very steep and calf/ Achilles tightened up dramatically half way so walked the rest.

Few stretches and drills at the start, trying to loosen off lower legs.

First Middle Course at Whinlatter, planned yesterday in a hurry.

Went well, pushing well but terrain was so tough, deep and soggy heather made the going hard. Nice forest though. One slip at #13 when my direction from attack point into control was just off. Relocated quickly though. Really enjoyed it and overall a good technical performance.

One thing to mention is that I kept getting pushed off line by terrain, however I don't think this is bad as I got back onto line and avoided the crap, so found the nice lines through the terrain.

 

Second Middle Course. View from the start was nae bad :))

Boulder at #1 wasn't there which put me off a bit for the rest. Just wandering off line a few times, but overall quite good.

Last downhill section was quite grotty in places so decked it a few times. Also the boulders were not very visible and hard to pick out from all the boulder looking logs lying about.

 

Two high quality O training's done and now some rest!

Cool down jog back to the car.

Bit late, still getting over the match. Just a stretch, lots of rolling in the next two days needed.