Training Archive: wilsmithIn the 7 days ending 2008-04-12:
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Saturday Apr 12 | ||
| Orienteering race 1:00:00 [4] | |
| shoes: 07 VJ Integrator | ||
| Moravian Open Championships - Long Distance
Basically, I did did my plan, which was to run for about 60 minutes and then jog back from wherever that brought me. The course was "OK" - I probably ran the most boring part, which included a 3km leg that was on trails/roads for all but about 100m. Holger was smarter and cut out that section, heading for the butterfly after completing the first 6 controls. Anyway, a cold day - about 7 C, overcast and windy; had been raining earlier, so it could have been worse. Needed Craft under a O-top. Race went OK, but legs very dead, especially on the long road. Guess I lost roughly 3-4 minutes on my usual contemporaries, just on that leg. Stopped after about 10km of orienteering, at which point I had lost about 4 minutes versus Mike, and 5 minutes versus Patrick. So not too bad, particularly considering this is my first week of real running after a long, snowy winter. Very small orienteering mistakes, but in this terrain any mistake loses precious seconds. Have to be careful in the green areas - and after a week it has become clear that Czech course-setters LOVE to hide controls in medium/dark green. In the long distance, as well as the sprint distance (and probably the relay), having fast legs and the ability to focus, concentrate, and execute at your very top speed will be important. That sounds like it would apply to most orienteering, but the main words there are "top speed", which doesn't necessarily apply in other orienteering terrain/scenarios. Anyway, much more interval training in my near future, "that's for sure". No photos taken today, but will try to remember to take pics of the maps and post them before they get filed away for a month or two. | ||
| C • Moravian Champs Theme Song 2 | ||
| Orienteering 42:00 [2] | |
| shoes: 07 VJ Integrator | ||
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The "jog home" aspect after hitting the 60-minute mark. Decided to carry on to the butterfly zone (only a small detour) and visit a few more flags too. | ||
| Running warm up/down 15:00 [2] | |
| shoes: 07 VJ Integrator | ||
| For the above.
| ||
Friday Apr 11 | ||
| Orienteering 50:00 [4] | |
| shoes: 07 VJ Integrator | ||
| Middle distance "training race" (map = Helfstyn Castle)
Very tough race, particularly in the beginning - opened my eyes to the possibility of sadistic Czech course setters. I don't THINK this middle distance would be relevant for the WOC middle distance, but you never know.... After all, it was used for the selection races of the Hungarian and Polish teams. Extremely steep scree-like slopes along the base of the castle in the beginning; you could trot a little bit and often walk and/or stumble along the hillsides. Not so much fun. Then a long climb up to #8. Long climb. After that, a bit of flatter stuff which was much more enjoyable, before climbing again to #15 at the end of the course, which seemed a bit gratuitous. Overall, not too technical a race. Probably not possible to make it too technical on this map, I guess. I don't think the middle embargoed area contains any slopes as steep as the ones in the beginning here, which is good. Picking off the right 50cm boulder on a hillside like that would tend to be frustrating.... On the other hand, few (if any) could run up anything that steep, and we all probably walk at roughly the same pace. Maybe. Feeling tired, and having a bit of a hot spot on my left heel. Will take it easy this afternoon and perhaps snap a few pics. Many teams are skipping this pseudo-sprint, which is not relevant for WOC racing anyway. Have to see about tomorrow - may only do about 60 minutes of the course; longer than that is more likely to be harmful rather than helpful at this point in the season. | ||
| Running warm up/down 10:00 [2] | |
| For the above.
| ||
| Note | |
| Moravian Sprint Championships.
Spent the afternoon spectating, looking after Aksel (Sandy was running, Holger was out training), and snapping a few pics here and there. Apparently a boring course, not relevant for WOC. Most of the "big guns" skipped this one. As always, more images available on http://orienteering.smugmug.com | ||
| C • nice pics! 1 | ||
Thursday Apr 10 | ||
| Event: Moravian Open Championships | ||
| Orienteering 40:00 | |
| shoes: 07 VJ Integrator | ||
| Relay training with Norwegian team (map = Rachava)
A very nice training course with SI units and mini-controls. About 6km long, decent amount of climb too. Good course setting and fairly interesting use of the terrain. A few significant route choices - did a bad route on one of the three when trying to go straight. Went around on the other two, one of which was good and the other about equivalent to going straight (very slightly slower but far safer approach). Very gradually getting my legs back under me but quite a ways to go. Will skip this afternoon's city sprint race - who would I be kidding anyway? Went through a police checkpoint this morning, but this time with my lights on (thankfully). The Norwegian van behind me didn't have their lights on but they turned them on just as they passed the cops and they were not stopped - partly I suppose because they were driving a big rental van with "Hertz" plastered all over it. "Stupid tourists..." | ||
| Note | |
| Spent the afternoon watching the Sprint Prologue at the Moravian Open Championships. Took a bunch of pics - some of the images have been uploaded to my gallery at:
http://orienteering.smugmug.com More to come. | ||
Wednesday Apr 9 | ||
| Orienteering 55:00 [3] | |
| shoes: 07 VJ Integrator | ||
| Middle distance training with the Norwegian team (map = Helisova).
A very nice little course, which restored my faith in the possibility of actually having interesting courses at the WOC middle distance. The ground was actually quite stony underfoot in many places, and you even had to slow down a bit to be safe. If we race in places like this, people with weak ankles had better be very careful indeed! Missed a little bit on a control or two on small features in the green, but overall not too bad a day orienteering-wise. Legs still slow, but that's to be expected. Stopped by police on the way back to the hotel after the training. Headlights are legally required to be on at all times of the day (which is a good idea), but the rental car here in Czech does not have automatic daytime running lights (which is a bad idea). I'm so used to the car automatically turning on the headlights at home that I often forget to turn them on here. Luckily, other drivers here often flash their lights to remind me in the daytime that I have no lights on - but this morning nobody did before I hit the police checkpoint so we got pulled over. After an inspection of the car papers, my driver's license, and passport, plus me explaining that daytime lights were automatic in Canada, they let us go. Probably would have given us a lecture too if they could communicate it in English - clearly a lecture in Czech would have fallen on uncomprehending ears, so they saw fit not to waste their time. ;-) | ||
| C • Smith's smooth moves 2 | ||
| Orienteering 40:00 [3] | |
| shoes: 07 VJ Integrator | ||
| Middle distance training with Norwegian team (map = Kosir)
Not as interesting an area as this morning, and the map was a bit out of date, particularly with respect to vegetation. Unfortunate, since there weren't many contour details and so vegetation was purportedly the significant obstacle on which to base route choices. Steady cruising around covered 5.5km in a bit under 40 minutes. Clearly in this type of terrain, sub-6 min/km is possible even for a mortal such as myself, and the real speed demons would be much faster still. Slight hot spot coming on my left heel, but no real blister yet. I guess that's what comes from wearing a brand new pair of shoes starting this weekend, and wearing them twice a day.... Better to toughen up now anyway, before the real season starts. Overall, a nice training camp thus far. | ||
| Running warm up/down 10:00 [1] | |
| For the above.
| ||
Tuesday Apr 8 | ||
| Orienteering 1:00:00 [2] | |
| shoes: 07 VJ Integrator | ||
| Training with Norwegian team on Long-distance relevant terrain (map = Ales/Belkovice). Still tired and jet-lagged, not to mention still trying to find my running legs. Very heavy legs = slow going, at least for a couple of weeks.
Anyway, the terrain was not so interesting, fairly bland stuff really. And lots of climbing - I think the guys with altimeters on were saying about 400m climb over 7km. Probably not my favorite WOC terrain. Maybe actually my least favorite ever, which is saying a lot since I've been on the go for 15 years. Pretty close to Germany 1995 in my books. No leaves out yet so visibility was excellent. Runnability also quite good. Nice not to see so much garbage in the forest as in the last WOC. | ||
| Orienteering 1:00:00 [3] | |
| shoes: 07 VJ Integrator | ||
| Afternoon training with Norwegian team, again long-distance relevant (map = Jerabech). Starting to feel a little bit better physically but still a long ways to go.
Less climbing this afternoon, and more longer legs with route choices. Controls buried in green were tricky, and if you lost concentration on the longer legs you would pay for it. | ||
Monday Apr 7 | ||
| Note | |
| (rest day) | ||
| Travel day. And what a bad one. Started out with a 5-hour wait in Pearson, then made it to Frankfurt on time, only to land in a blowing snowstorm (!) - who would have guessed?
Of course, my flight to Prague got canceled, so I was re-booked on the next one. Scheduled to arrive at 1815, rather than 1700, so not too bad. Patrick and Mike would have to wait a bit for me (car rental in my name), but that's not the end of the world. Then another announcement, another gate change, and a further 30 minute delay. Then a further announcement with gate change, and now we're delayed a further hour. Finally, we end up boarding but it's so late leaving that we're waaaayyyy late arriving - we eventually arrive in Prague at 2100, some 4 hours late. Yeesh. Luckily, my bag arrived (for once), and we were able to hop into the car and start the long drive. It took nearly 3 hours to get to Prostejov from Prague, so we pulled in just after midnight. The Finnish team was just checking in and slowed things down, so it was after 0100 before we got into our room. Needless to say, apart from running around the airport in Frankfurt, no training today. | ||
Sunday Apr 6 | ||
| Running 30:00 [3] | |
| shoes: 07 Saucony Kilkenny | ||
| Just a light run around the mapped area, after Katarina finished. We were in a rush to get back to the airport, so only one of us could race. And since I'm heading off for a week of orienteering, it made more sense for her to get the chance to race today.
Beautiful weather, wonderful day out there. I am sure 17+ kms would have killed me (especially with 4% climb up muddy, slippery slopes). But maybe half of that would have been fine. Anyway, off to the airport for a 26-hour trip that will end in Olomouc, Czech Republic for a week of abuse on hilly, continental, WOC2008 terrain. Can hardly wait.... | ||
| Note | |
|
PHOTOS! Now available (some of them anyway) for viewing online. Mainly action shots of National Team types, so we can build our portfolio for use in future marketing. Uploaded some of Sam Saeger as well, just in case the US Team wants action shots for their own uses. See: http://www.orienteering.smugmug.com | ||
| C • Thank You 4 | ||