Training Log Archive: fletch

Event: KillaFergus 2010
 

Well, this one didn't go quite to plan. First activity was on an aerial photo of Evedon. Collect at least 6 CPs, Aussies in the Tour de France worth a 5 minute time bonus. Knew who the Aussies were, planned a route that got 5 of them in the minimum 6 controls and barreled down the hill. Nailed Wiggins (my token non-Aussie), then had a total scale fail runnig up the hill on the other side of the creekline and never got anywhere near my next control. Wandered around clueless for quite a while, with the mini-pack that had followed me gradually giving up and heading off elsewhere as I was clearly clueless. Had a few people go past in the opposite direction, clearly on their way back, while I still only had the 1 CP. Relocated when I saw a stream of 3 people bolting downhill. I went up and found a CP, and stopped for long enough to figure out it was McEwen. #6, when I had been looking for #8. Another minor miss a couple later, but fairly clean through the rest of my heavily modified route to return from the 'split-em up' activity with 4 Aussies, in 46 minutes and change, having covered well in excess of 7km. Bugger. Took me about 23 minutes to get to McEwen, so probably about 15 minutes down the toilet.
Had gotten pretty hot and sweaty by this stage and regretted not taking any water on the first leg, and also wearing the long tights. Tried to take them off in transition, but couldn't get them over my ankle braces and shoes, so gave up sitting in the mud, pulled them back up and hopped on the bike.

Clean to MB1. To MB2, tried to follow my highlighted route that stood out so well on the lightly printed map. unfortunately, the map had 2 tracks, and I only saw the highlighted one, so added a little distance here as well. Went the north and east option out of MB3 to avoid a climb, then struggled to find MB4, which was clearly not SSE of the junction, as WAlly squealed with glee finding it and disappearing while I was looking in the right spot. Should really open my eyes though, it was clearly visible from the track junction. Blindness apparently struck me a few times during the course of the race... such as again when I didn't see a track junction and misjudged distance and flew straight past the turnoff to TA2, straight out to the bitumen (and past a returning Dolf + Co. who were nice enough not to point out hte error of my ways) before turning around myself and finally hitting TA2.

The next activity was a cracker. 13 CPs. Had to get 7 on the bike and then return to TA2, followed by the option of getting any of the 6 remaining on foot for 10 minutes bonus each. I decided to do a loop through 11, 2, 13, 1, 3, 5, 7, leaving 6,4,12, 8, 10, 9 to get on foot. Looking at it now, this was a stupid plan. It would probably have been heaps better to go8,10,7,5,3,1,2, and dumped 13, then got 9,12,4,6,11 on foot...
As it was, I did 11 first, riding straight past it, as I hadn't read my descriptions and assumed we were MTB orienteering and the controls would be on the tracks. Rode pretty much up onto the spur before turning around. Even more annoyed than I already had been. Turned around and headed south west. Don't know what happened here. Missed a turn maybe? Ended up popping out of the denser part of the scrub into an area criss corssed with sigle track and I just couldn't make it fit with anything. Eventually gave up and headed south until I could see the road and figured that the single track I had found there must be the bit on the map. Followed it east, and after a while crossed a Nth Sth track, which i really should have taken, but I just wasn't confident that it was the one on the map, or in fact that I was on the map, so I followed the singletrack (slowly) all the way back to transition.
Headed out again and after a little trouble finding the (very) overgrown track down to 13 I got on that and got through 13, 2, 1, 3 and 5 with minimal hassles. Starting to feel a bit better and looking forward to running. Rode the overgrown track to 7, checked my descriptions, and was too busy trying not to fall off my bike at the critical time and missed the control, riding on to the next junction before turning around and seeing the control on the way back, in full view from this direction, but very hard to see coming from the west. Oh well. Bolted back to transition on the bike, ready to run hard to make the most of my time bonuses.
Arrived at transition to be told very politely that I would be heading straight onto the singletrack ride. I hadn't planned on that at all, but I was informed that it was 12:05 and I had missed the cut-off to be allowed to to do any controls on foot. I couldn't believe it. I could have just done the closest 7 on the bike and been miles quicker, but had cost myself ages, figuring I would make it all back on the run, which I now couldn't do. And I had a little sook, (sorry Karen and Michelle and Boltboi) knowing I could get all 6 and get back to transition before some of the people that were already out on foot. Rightly, the transition marshalls did their job, and after sitting down to have some food and drink and regather myself a bit. Knew that the race was well and truly over as a competition, but pressed on. Passing poor Michael who was running the singletrack with a broken derailleur put things in perspective a little. Got the first 2 Cps on the singletrack fine, but lost the trail a bit towards the end and missed the last one somewhere. 15 minute penalty to add to my woes :(
At the Wild Bull Activity, I heard someone saying that the eagle-eye option was easy, so headed off on that minus pen and paper, figuring the 6 clues would all be beer related and hence easy to remember. Got to the end and wasn't sure from memory which beer it was, as from the clues I had been expecting Amber Ale or Stout and I knew the alcohol percentage was wrong. Ran to my backpack, pulled out my cheat sheet and knew it was Irish Ale, so off I went.

I was a little confused about how to get to Wovenfield, as we hadn't been given any new maps, and I had hidden and forgotten the main map, which ad the whole course on it, but knew which way down the road to start and was smart enough to read the road sign to Wovenfield, passing someoene who was stopped right under the sign and looking confused in the process.

The Wovenfield activity involved finding 3 controls by observation / pot luck in the vineyard. I could see one from the start, near the middle, so headed across the top, finding one in the process, headed around the back, then into the middle, then saw the one down the bottom, and I was off in pretty reasonable time. After checking again that there were no new maps to be handed out, I finally remembered the map I already had and headed off. Mb5 was easy, thanks to the Tooms map alternations, and MB6 was easy as there was a big crowd of photographers awaiting my much anticipated (not really) and very overdue arrival. It had been a real struggle up the hill towards MB6, not helped by the longer than expected cycling in running shoes and without the wonders of clippy pedals. It only got harder, and I walked the vast majority of the leg from MB6 to final transition.

Scoffed by back up carboshot before starting the last orienteer, as I had well and truly used all my others before this point, and headed slowly out. It was a real struggle on the steeper uphills, which I walked, but slowly jogged around most of the course and picked off a few people in the process. Absolute slog up the final hill, but ran that one, just to look good for the crowds. First time all day my navigation was spot on for more than a 10 minute section of the course :)
Fortunately, Penny was waiting (and waiting, and waiting) for me at the finish, so I got lots of food almost immediately. Unfortunately, I had to leave before presentations, so I don't know where people finished or how much time bonuses came into play. Pretty sure my GPS distance tells a pretty woeful tale. Compare it to Wally's and then factor in the fact that I did no extra controls in the entire race... not a happy story, but a good one to get under the belt, and it really was a cracker of a course, even if I didn't make the most of it

C • Dolf & Co... 4

Event: The Maidens
 

Followed up my effort shadowing Cameron around a course by having a crack at the hard course. Should have read all the details about control placements and tracks that weren't on the map before I started. Interesting sand dune terrain. Mixed running a few legs really well (sometimes helped by having been to the control before) with 2 absolute disasters. 5 minutes dropped at 3, 11 minutes plus at 6. Then followed it up by running within 2m of 8 and not seeing it.

Hmmm. The main result of this paddle was to make me feel lazy for not training for the last 4 days. Cold has progressed hnow to thick mucus stage, but I felt totally fine out on the water, so probably should have done something the last few days.
Didn't really learn much of what I had hoped to today. First paddle in Jen's XT, so headed to the usual spot at East Perth to launch, figuring it had been pretty wild and windy. It was totally calm, barely a wind ripple on the water, and none to be found of any significance even most of the way down to Barrack St. Shold have started at UWA or Claremont.

So, zero stability issues, but none expected in those conditions. The big question for this comes from the fact that this was comfortably my fastest paddle for the year. I did make an effort to focus on twisting my torso properly for a change, but certainly wasn't going any harder than last time. Will need to get out in some more testing conditions to figure out which ski to racw with...

C • Stability 6

An afternoon building a garden bed and throwing round lots of straw meant I had an antihistamine, ventolin and a vapodrop before I got out the door for this. About 15 minutes warm-up, and didn't feel too bad, but a little tight in the chest. Resolved to run hard, but not totally flat out, as with the handicap start, I knew I would be alone if something went pear-shaped half way around.
Despite trying to be a little conservative, still felt a little flat on the steeper bit of the hill near half way and also the second half of Durston. Didn't destroy myself coming down the hill, so a bit surprised that I cracked 17:30.

17:26 for the 5km. Given the circumstances, pretty happy with that.

Tooms' Golf Course 5k TT - Splits