Training Log Archive: slauenstein

Warm up for the middle distance race, no cool down.

Very strange thing happened to me today. The first 20 minutes of my race went ok and then suddenly I bonked. I don't know if I was dehydrated or if I ran out of blood sugar but I basically couldn't run anymore. It started with an inability to read my map, I was still running at this point, but I would just run in a direction hoping I would find the control. Strange behavior. Then my vison started to close in on me and I started walking. This was on the steep downhill section of the course. My legs were too weak to run down. I went on auto-pilot to all the controls but I am not sure why. It was the strangest feeling. In the finish I started getting cold. It was a really hot day so that is strange. I guess that's a sign of dehydration though.

When I think back to the morning of this race I think I didn't drink enough water. The day before for the long race my stomach was really heavy before the race and I wanted to feel light for this fast middle distance race. I had my usual coffee but I probably didn't drink much else. Stupid.

C • Low energy 1

A long way to the start and then some cool down afterwards.

Long distance- Paired starts.

Today's race was a paired start long distance with butterfly looping. I am not sure why we did this type of format. The paired starting seemed to serve no purpose other than to allow someone to follow someone else during the race. Our first 4 controls were the same. I started with Sabine Hauswirth (CH) and we ran together to the first control, I got there first only due to a better micro route in the last 40 seconds of a 10 minute leg. On our way up to the 2nd control I already saw the two pairs of starters that had started ahead of us. On my way to the 3rd control, Hillary and the Finnish women, Marika, she started with caught up with us. From the 1st to the 4th control we were above tree line in open yellow and you could see a line of 6-8 women ahead. On my way to number 4 I hardly looked at my map at all, there was a line of us running to it. What I did do is check which direction around the butterfly loop I was to go, since that is something you can mess up pretty easily. At the butterfly loop Sabine and Hillary had a different looping. I caught up with Kat and some other women. After the looping there was 1 common control with water and then a long leg to the next butterfly loops. At the water control I saw Alison and Viktoria, I didn't see Hillary, I thought she was ahead of me.

The long leg was the central control of the next butterfly and I met up with Hillary there. I thought she had already run one loop because I assumed she had gotten ahead of me. This turned out not to be the case and we had the same forking for the rest of the race after that and from this point on the in course we were together. We collected people along the way (like Marika and Sabine as well later on). I was doing a lot of work for the group. Actually basically from the 4th control on I was working hard, navigating really well and helping a lot of runners out. The only real bummer of my race was a stupid mistake to number 22. I ran the leg really well, choosing a fast and easy route choice and getting to a really solid attackpoint on a bland hillside. Unfortunately from that attackpoint there were about 20,000 other runners going up to a control very close to ours. I was stupid and went up the well beaten path, with some WC runners in tow to the wrong control. Then I thought we were too high since I was running hard up the hill and it felt hard, I thought I went to far up, and went down and to the left. The control was just a little further up and to the right. I looped around, recognized a contour feature and went up to the control. I think I lost 2 minutes there. The leg after this was across the ski slope and then after that steep down the ski slope to the last few controls. At that point it was Sabine, Marika, Hillary and Fanni from Hungary who caught up to us on our mistake. Sabine and Fanni were pushing the pace and I told Hillary to go for it if she had the energy, since I thought that she might not do so since she spend most of the race with me and didn't feel it would be right to do so. She told me afterwards she didn't have the energy to go with them. I had some energy left and went with them finishing just behind Fanni and Sabine and ahead of Marika and Hillary.

I was really proud of myself in the finish. Granted Hillary caught me in the beginning, but I did a lot of good orienteering during the race in this difficult terrain. I had fun in the process and felt good physically.

We arrived last night really late, but since the World Cup Sprint isn't until this afternoon we could get out on a map and check out the terrain. It was amazing out there. I love this type of terrain and I LOVE being over tree-line.

Warm up and cool down for the World Cup Sprint.

This was so much fun! It was a totally different type of sprint than I am used to and I really enjoyed the change of terrain and location. I think I was in a negative spiral at WOC and couldn't get out of it on my own, but changing location helped and I had a good race.

It was an interesting experience to run this race. Basically we were up high on a open ski slope at the pre-start. You could hear the announcer very clearly up there and you could look down on the loads of people spectating at the finnish. Of course, since we didn't know what the course or the map was like, we also didn't know that the first 7 controls was the big show for the spectators. They could watch our every move through this first 1/2 of the course. Once I was in the finnish and looked up at the ski slope I realized how well you could watch the runners. I am glad I didn't realize that during the race. It was also tricky to block out the speaker during your race, of course you might listen to him a little, but you can't let it distract you.

For some reason right from the start I just got into the groove of racing and orienteering like usual. Exactly this wasn't happening at WOC. It felt so good to run normally and being in my race mode. I didn't make any mistakes, although I loose 30 seconds to Hillary on the long leg down the ski slope. This could be because I am not a great downhill runner, but also it was a tricky control and maybe I took it a little too carefully. All in all, I was really happy with this race and more so relieved to finally run well again.

Event: Oringen 2008
 

Rest day and travel day from the Czech Republic to Sweden for O-Ringen and the World Cup races.

Warm up and cool down for the WOC relay

WOC Relay

Not a good race again. This time my beginning was bad and I got better at the end. Just haven't found my self confidence and ran too tentative, not trusting myself. Now 24 hours later I am sitting in Arlanda, Sweden feeling oddly distant to a week that couldn't have gone much worse, hoping the next few races here at the World Cup will give me back that sense of security in my ability again. I need to do a ctrl-alt-del and reboot to my normal self. It's hard however to keep racing, we have had a tough schedule WOC and with today as a travel day, there isn't much room for recovery. I am also curious to see how I feel physically in the next few days. I hope the terrain is tough enough technically that having tired legs won't matter too much.

Sam twisted her ankle pretty badly during the race yesterday. She was able to keep running on it and ran hard on it for 15 minutes. After she stopped the pain became very apparent and it started to swell. Last night she was just hobbling around, not being able to put her whole weight on it. Running the world cup races may be questionable at this point. Too bad!

morning jog before the relay!