Wednesday Feb 28 |
 | Note | |
| (sick) |
| Boo. (Can I count Catching Features as training?) |
| |
| C • That's what the 0 intensity tr... 4 |
Tuesday Feb 27 |
| Note | |
| (sick) |
| Got a cold. Fair enough, I deserve it. |
| |
| C • not you as well! 6 |
Monday Feb 26 |
| Running 20:00 [1]4 km (5:00 / km) | |
| (rest day) |
| Very easy run to deal with an onset of RDD (rest day depression). It worked, I feel better. |
Sunday Feb 25 |
| Orienteering race 35:00 [5]***** 7 km (5:00 / km) | |
| spiked:22/24c |
| NOAM middle distance. Really felt tired when I woke up this morning, but perked up a bit after an expresso at the race. Legs felt OK after a bit of a warm up and actually felt quite good during the race. Very fast start to the course through some sparse rock detail, then plunged into some really intense stuff. Made a couple of silly mistakes on straightforward controls when I lost concentration - need a good rest after this week, I am feeling a bit jaded. |
| Running 25:00 [2]4 km (6:15 / km) | |
| |
| Warm up and warm down for the race. |
| Note | |
| |
| Long day of travelling - finally got home at about 1.30am after lots of driving. It was a great camp so thanks to Nails for sorting everything out and to all the group for providing motivation and being up for everything. |
Saturday Feb 24 |
| |
| Event: NAOM - Norte Alentejano O Meeting
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| Orienteering race 1:15:00 [5]***** 16 km (4:41 / km) | |
| spiked:28/30c |
| NAOM day 1 and WRE - feeling surprisingly good today after a hard week. It was actually quite easy to feel good on this area, which was short grass and rolling hills covered in amazing rock detail. The map was perfect today and the first part of the course, which weaved in and out of a rocky labyrinth, was great. The last part was just flat out running accross fields and through the streets of Arez. Just a couple of smallish mistakes. |
| Running 30:00 [2]5 km (6:00 / km) | |
| |
| Warm up and warm down for the race. |
| Orienteering race 15:00 [4]*** 4 km (3:45 / km) | |
| spiked:14/15c |
| Night sprint around Nisa. The organisers made a really great atmosphere with music and entertaining commentary. Lots of locals were out to watch what was going on. Took the race as a training and ran comfortably - not too demanding technically but some good route choices and a tricky last part around the central square. A lot of fun despite tired legs. |
| Running 20:00 [2]3 km (6:40 / km) | |
| |
| Warm up and warm down for the night sprint. I ran a lot of circles in the tiny, busy quarantine zone! Then hunted for food in the tiny town that was overrun with hundreds of orienteers. Subsisted mainly on cake and coffee today. |
Friday Feb 23 |
| Orienteering 45:00 [2]***** 7 km (6:26 / km) | |
| spiked:26/26c |
| Easy training near Sao Pedro. Cruised around a couple of loops, whole body feels tired - taking it easy today ready for a race tomorrow. |
| Orienteering 5:00 [5]***** 1 km (5:00 / km) | |
| spiked:7/7c |
| Sprinted hard round the shortest loop of the morning training. |
| Orienteering 45:00 [2]***** 6 km (7:30 / km) | |
| spiked:12/13c |
| Model map for the NAOM - very bad mapping of the rock detail, almost impossible to understand. Jogged round with Mike trying to understand something...hope it will be better tomorrow! |
Thursday Feb 22 |
| Orienteering 1:30:00 [4]***** 15 km (6:00 / km) | |
| spiked:50/52c |
| Long course on the Portugese champs area from last year. Different sand dune terrain with lots of vegetation detail and very fine contour shapes. Did a long course with a control pick added in the most technical part, going for the best possible spike rate, managed about 96%. |
| Orienteering 50:00 [3]***** 8 km (6:15 / km) | |
| spiked:20/23c |
| Map memory on a nice area near Fig da Foz. Stopped at the controls for a few seconds then ran the leg without looking at the map (although I needed to cheat a few times). I think I look at the map too often, maybe I should practise this a bit more. Bit of warm up and warm down. |
Wednesday Feb 21 |
| Orienteering 30:00 [1]***** 3 km (10:00 / km) | |
| |
| Shadowing Kathy round one loop of the morning training. Nice runnable dunes, but tricky if you lose concentration. |
| Orienteering 55:00 [3]***** 10 km (5:30 / km) | |
| spiked:34/38c |
| The rest of the loops of the morning training. Ran one using my compass a lot to stay as close to the red line as possible, and the other with no compass still trying to go very straight. Easy with a compass, tricky without - what a surprise. |
| Running 20:00 [1]3 km (6:40 / km) | |
| |
| Morning jog to the beach with Mike. It's sunny today - we deserve that! |
| Orienteering 1:15:00 [3]***** 11 km (6:49 / km) | |
| spiked:29/33c |
| More loops on the World Cup model map - nice terrain with some bushy parts to make things a bit harder. Short line course to start off then some intense control picking - I got very tired at the end of this session and made some stupid mistakes. Still, that's what we're here for. |
Tuesday Feb 20 |
| Orienteering race 45:00 [4]***** 6 km (7:30 / km) | |
| spiked:26/30c |
| Chasing start or 'rabbit day' of the POM. With a lot of big names not running all days it turned out that I started in 3rd place with a 3min gap to Damien in front and behind - a good chance to focus on my own race without too much distraction. Still I did a good job of using up my safety margin with a few small mistakes and I was looking over my shoulder at the half way point. This was the hardest day to run with rock and bushes everywhere and some of the controls hung in tiny crack inbetween boulders. Hung on to third, my legs are ready for a change of terrain after this! |
| Running 25:00 [2]4 km (6:15 / km) | |
| |
| Warm up and down for the race. Dodging the odd sleet shower! |
| Orienteering 45:00 [2]***** 8 km (5:38 / km) | |
| spiked:17/17c |
| Stopped off at a sand dune area on the way to Marhina Grande. Some warming up then a nice gentle cruise round a really good area with small details and low visibility in places. Legs feeling tired but nothing too sore. |
Monday Feb 19 |
| Orienteering race 40:00 [4]***** 5 km (8:00 / km) | |
| spiked:23/27c |
| Wow! This was one of the best areas I have ever run on. The map was 1:7500 and for good reason - it would have been impossible to show all the details on any smaller scale. I started quite late and heard that the early times were close to 10 m/km. I took things slow and carefully and managed a pretty good run with only a few small mistakes. Once again a long way behind Thierry, who is setting some great times in this detailed terrain. I wonder how he manages to keep his speed so high without ever coming unstuck..? |
| Running 15:00 [1]3 km (5:00 / km) | |
| |
| Morning jog with Mike and Rob to loosen up legs after yesterday's hard racing. |
| Running 40:00 [2]6 km (6:40 / km) | |
| |
| Warm up and down for the middle distance. Climbed to the top of a rocky hill to see the view but the fog had closed in again before I made it to the top. |
Sunday Feb 18 |
| Orienteering race 1:10:00 [5]***** 12 km (5:50 / km) +410m 4:59 / km | |
| spiked:28/30c |
| POM Day 2 and WRE. Got my head together today and ran with much better control. Less fine detail on the map but still very challenging to find the flag in a rocky lunar landscape - almost everything was rock and only some of it was shown with black or gray features. Control descriptions are very important here! A couple of small mistakes and feeling good. |
| Running 25:00 [2]4 km (6:15 / km) | |
| |
| Warm up and warm down for the race. |
| Orienteering 30:00 [3]*** 5 km (6:00 / km) | |
| spiked:15/16c |
| Night sprint around Sao Pedro. Took it as a light training after the hard long race earlier in the day. There were problems with the start, so after a 45 min delay the organisers decided to let everyone go in a mass start with no timing - there were people everywhere around this small mountain town. This kind of thing must be strange for the locals... |
| Note | |
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| Mike, you owe me a Euro - I'm afraid Thierry did beat you on leg 29, by a whole second. |
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| C • Damn it 1 |
Saturday Feb 17 |
| |
| Event: Portugal O-Meet
|
| Orienteering race 35:00 [5]***** 6 km (5:50 / km) | |
| spiked:20/25c |
| POM day 1, very technical middle distance in alternating fog and rain. Fast running to link up pockets of rocky detail, which I didn't succeed in reading properly. The map was great, but very detailed and hard to read at full speed, so a few smallish mistakes and a poor run overall. |
| Running 30:00 [2]5 km (6:00 / km) | |
| |
| Warm up and warm down for the race. |
Friday Feb 16 |
| Orienteering 40:00 [3]***** 6 km (6:40 / km) | |
| spiked:20/20c |
| Model map for the Portugal O Meet. Weather wasn't particularly nice down in Sao Pedro (15 degrees and cloudy), but we were on a warm weather camp so it seemed appropriate to wear shorts. We drove up the hill to this map and sat in the car for 30 mins waiting for the lightning storm, gale force winds and driving rain to abate. Gave up and headed out into the elements in full goretex, but 5 mins into the training the weather lifted and we saw the extent of this strange rocky landscape inbetween banks of thick fog. Very challenging terrain! |
Thursday Feb 15 |
| Orienteering 35:00 [2]***** 5 km (7:00 / km) | |
| spiked:24/25c |
| Training on a sand dune map near Obidos on the way from Lisbon to Sao Pedro. Took it very easy, feeling tired and delicate after a 4.30am start this morning. Nice terrain though! |
| Note | |
| |
| Woke up at 4.00am to leave with a very sore gum around my wisdom tooth - I get this a lot, but it's usually a sign I'm getting run down. I'll take it very easy until Saturday's race... |
Wednesday Feb 14 |
| Weights 40:00 [3] | |
| |
| Free weights and circuits in the gym. Legs feeling OK after track. Slight increase in reps this time. |
| Running 35:00 [1]6 km (5:50 / km) | |
| |
| Easy run into the gym and back home. |
Tuesday Feb 13 |
| Track session 30:00 [5]7 km (4:17 / km) | |
| max:191 |
| Hallamshire intervals descending distances, 1650, 1600, 1550, 1500. Ran 5.16, 5.04, 5.00, 4.49, plus some strides and drills to warm up. Although not too sure about them...my splits are a bit of a mess. Good session anyway and feeling better at the end of it than I have all day. |
| Running 55:00 [2]10 km (5:30 / km) | |
| |
| Run to track and back with Mike and Rob. I was pretty grumpy on the way, really didn't feel like leaving the house today. |
| |
| C • grumpy 6 |
Monday Feb 12 |
| Running 40:00 [2]7 km (5:43 / km) | |
| (rest day) |
| Easy jog in the sunshine, now it's chucking it down. Felt weary, must have run harder than I thought yesterday. |
Sunday Feb 11 |
| Orienteering race 55:00 [5]*** 8 km (6:52 / km) | |
| spiked:14/16c |
| Orienteering at Lindhop near Chatsworth. They haven't used this area for 30 years - I can understand why. I got in quite a bad mood running uphill through brambles on the way from 1-2 and the rest of the course didn't exactly cheer me up. Oh well, you got to take the good with the bad, managed to push it reasonably hard on the hills and hamstring felt OK. My biggest mistake was falling onto a control and knocking the SI Unit off - it bounced down a steep slippery slope into some brambles and I had to follow it and fix it back on. |
| Running 25:00 [2]4 km (6:15 / km) | |
| |
| Warm up and warm down for O event, bit worried about sore hamstring... |
Saturday Feb 10 |
| Running 1:55:00 [3]20 km (5:45 / km) | |
| |
| Run from Three Merry Lads with Mike in the snow, varying from proper knee deep stuff higher up to wet slush down in Hathersage. Long uphill slog from Hathersage fighting for every slippery footstep. Hamstrings tired and sore from last night but otherwise feeling pretty good. |
Friday Feb 9 |
| Weights 40:00 [3] | |
| |
| 30 mins of weights then 10 of circuits in the uni gym. Added a bit of weight today, it feels good to use a bigger dumbell so that I don't look like such a weakling compared to all the buff iron-pumpers around me. |
| |
| C • they've got silly muscles but... 6 |
| Running 35:00 [2]6 km (5:50 / km) | |
| |
| Run into gym via Rob's house and back |
| Running (Hill Reps) 30:00 [5]5 km (6:00 / km) | |
| |
| Spirals (pyramid hill session on roads). It was lightly sleeting down at my house, I run about 100m up hill and it's a full-on blizzard so the session was a lot more slippery than normal. You might have thought that snow and ice might make drivers think twice before using the second steepest hill in Sheffield as a rat run in these conditions, but you'd be wrong. Splits were 8x15 secs bounds on Bate Street to warm up, then: 33, 37, 42, 49, 56, 56, 49, 41, 36, 32 - positive splits on the way back up. |
| |
| C • positive splits 11 |
| Running 30:00 [2]6 km (5:00 / km) | |
| |
| Run uphill all the way to the start of Spirals tha=en a jog back down via Bolehill Park. Grey, cold, icy and miserable. Bring on Portugal. |
Thursday Feb 8 |
| Running 40:00 [1]7 km (5:43 / km) | |
| (rest day) |
| Took a much needed rest today. Short jog with Jenny up Loxley Valley in wet snow. |
Wednesday Feb 7 |
| Running (Terrain run) 1:55:00 [2]** 17 km (6:46 / km) | |
| |
| Long run with Rob around Burbage, Blacka and Longshaw on a crisp, sunny morning. Sort of orienteering but really a straightforward terrain run with a map, running Neil's Long O from a couple of years back. Feeling generally tired this morning, so the pace was pretty steady. Some really tough heather and a few half-frozen marshes. Nice. |
| |
| C • I want to be out in the sun! 2 |
Tuesday Feb 6 |
| Running 25:00 [1]4 km (6:15 / km) | |
| |
| Easy morning jog to loosen legs up ready for this evening's pain. |
| Track session 40:00 [5]8 km (5:00 / km) | |
| |
| Track session, 5x500, 5x400, 5x300, 5x200 (recovery 55,50,45,40). Very cold night so difficult to warm up, but felt pretty good even at the end, nice to do a 'downhill' session like this. Average times were 89, 71, 51, 32.5. Jogging inbetween reps. Some strides and drills to warm up. |
| Running 55:00 [2]10 km (5:30 / km) | |
| |
| Run to track and back with Rob Mike and Phil. |
Monday Feb 5 |
| Weights 40:00 [3] | |
| (rest day) |
| Free weights and circuits. No extra weight today, legs and muscles tired from the weekend. |
| Running 30:00 [1]6 km (5:00 / km) | |
| |
| Easy jog into the gym and back home afterwards. |
Sunday Feb 4 |
| Running 30:00 [5]8 km (3:45 / km) | |
| ahr:179 max:189 |
| Timetrial route in Greno. Really good conditions, sunny and dry, but with a few fallen trees in the way after the storms. Felt bad when I woke up this morning but once I started running my legs felt really good. Until the looong hill at the end, where I nearly died. 27.47 my time (2 loops, 13.53, 13.54), a 14 second improvement on last time which was 31/12/06. |
| |
| C • glad you didn't.... 1 |
| Running 25:00 [2]5 km (5:00 / km) | |
| |
| Jogging around the timetrial route to warm up and a warm down run afterwards. Mike thought we should pick up a 2 tonne tree that was blocking the route...hmmm. |
| |
| C • We could have moved it! 3 |
| Orienteering 1:15:00 [3]*** 9 km (8:20 / km) | |
| |
| Steady pace group run through some nice and some not so nice bits of Wharnecliffe on the way out to the far end. This is a seriously tough area, think rocks, brambles, bracken and steep slopes. I used to like Wharnecliffe - maybe I'm getting soft? |
| Orienteering 20:00 [4]**** 3 km (6:40 / km) | |
| |
| Higher intensity section on a detailed slope of old mine workings. The map looks really nice. Reality doesn't quite match up. Spent my time running fast to catch Mike back up, then standing still scratching my head. Oh well. (I should add that I even helped to make some of this map - I hang my head in shame). |
| Note | |
| |
| This has been a tough weekend, but it felt really easy to train hard because everyone has been so well-motivated. Thanks guys (and girls)! |
Saturday Feb 3 |
| Orienteering 40:00 [4]**** 8 km (5:00 / km) | |
| |
| Downhill trains on Macc Forest. The sun was shining, the terrain was surprisingly nice, the company was good, and it was mostly downhill. What more could you ask for? 4x2km, taking in turns to hang bog role. |
| Running 40:00 [2]8 km (5:00 / km) | |
| |
| The flip side of the downhill trains. Running uphill inbetween efforts. Taking it pretty easy though. Extra ten at the end looking for missing girls with Rob Mike and Neil. Nothing is ever simple. |
| Orienteering 50:00 [3]**** 7 km (7:09 / km) | |
| |
| Compass course on Err...can't remember what the forest was called. Pretty green on the map but much nicer in real life. You have to get used to it being quicker to run straight through dark green than running around an open ride. Tired after the morning so taking it as steady as possible in the soft and rough terrain. |
| Running 20:00 [2]4 km (5:00 / km) | |
| |
| Jogging to the start (at the top of a big hill) and back from the finish (up a big hill). |
Friday Feb 2 |
| Weights 40:00 [3] | |
| |
| Weights in uni gym - 30 mins of free weights then 10 of circuits followed by a much needed stretch. |
| Running 35:00 [1]7 km (5:00 / km) | |
| |
| Run in to gym and back, really warm and sunny again, good to top up the vitamin D after long weeks of cloud and rain. |
Thursday Feb 1 |
| Running 20:00 [1]4 km (5:00 / km) | |
| |
| Easy morning jog to loosen legs. Must have been about 15 here today, who needs South Africa for warm weather training, anyway? |
| Running 35:00 [5]7 km (5:00 / km) | |
| |
| Hallamshire intervals at Langsett Cycles. 4x 5 mins-ish with long recovery jogging. A nasty loop with a pretty big hill in the middle. Paired with Kathy, who was running well against the other girls. |
| Running 30:00 [2]6 km (5:00 / km) | |
| |
| Warm up and warm down for intervals, with Rob and Mike at the end. Taking it nice and easy, legs and lungs feeling tired after the reps. |