Training Log Archive: ndobbs

WOC Relay
Vers-Sar-Bérc, Hungary

Started 31st, finished 22nd, overtaking CAN, USA (sorry boys!), ISR, SLO, POR, and, ummm, FRA, NOR, CZE... hats off to the last three for coming to the rescue of SWE. I didn't see sight nor sound of them until they came up the run-in.

Best Irish relay since 2004, happy days!
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Dave and Nick ran reasonably coming in in 30th and 31st, not great, but within shouting distance of the teams ahead, which was where I wanted to be. 4:30 - 6 mins behind USA, CAN, SLO and POR.

Took a mildly aggressive route to the first (straight line), went ok. Second was short, didn't go straight line, but nothing serious. 3rd, track route, good idea!
Coming to the 4th, caught and passed CAN. One down ;p
5th leg was longer, involved another hill. Control wasn't too hard, 30m east of a lone tree in rough open, but with some veg. Saw two runners running up the hill out of it (ISR? + ?) and caught USA at the control. I took the contouring through green route, figured I'd be forced to walk a bit but save energy compared with the uphill then ridge-run route, and the time was similar, still with USA at the next, also ISR was there. Left of the line to the 7th, so didn't get away.
Skipped the drink, feeling relatively strong, and I missed it, and wanted to psyche out eddie, but met him at the top of the hill anyway, he punched 8 ahead of me.
9 looked dangerous, I made it easy by going north of the line and following the open then dropping through the green. Think I was ahead of USA then.
10th, again, potentially tricky, played it safe, fast down to the path, along the path, dropped to the open corridor leading almost all the way. Easy!
11th, depressions, up down up down up up up. possibly lost a little time on the route.
12th tiny bit left of straight, no prob, except the hill at the end :)
13th, overtook the 3 here I guess. Made a balls of the control, got up onto the broad spur, ran across, didn't see the ruined fence at all, lost a minute and let USA back in the game. Doh. Worried he'd start feeling stronger.
14th, USA was ahead, let him punch ahead and lead the way up the mountain. Another guy (POR?) was there too. They seemed to have a different gaffel, over the top of the hill, and tougher, but then skipped my next control. Anyway, got mine (15) fine and legged it off to
16, where I lost 15s being a bit to the right. The control-watcher was lying down reading a book, so was no help to spot the control :(
17, got a fright after crossing the un-tarred road, thinking it was the road that I was supposed to cross after, but things fell back into place.
I made 18 easy, going to the right of the line, then dropped to the road to the spectator 19th.
Pretty happy going through there, feeling confident about the last loop, at least until I realised it was pretty tricky finding the 20th control on the map. Seemed to find the grottiest possible route up out of the spectator. 20 wasn't too hard (although I got a little confused with all the paths and open areas). Good to 21, except lost a few seconds not seeing the control in the depression immediately, it being on the other side of a pile of branches.
Took 22 handy, no point throwing away a good lead :)
Ran back out to the track to go past the 20th en route to the 23rd, the 50m from the track to the control were the longest ever. The zone was really hard to understand with low veg and broken relief. Couldn't work out what were knolls and which was mine. Checked a couple of bumps before POR arrived. Knew he hadn't punched it, so no panic yet. We spotted it at the same time, I punched first and flaked it to
24, with POR right behind. It was simple (down a big long re-entrant. Then a sprint up to the last control, had a bit of a lead, sprinted more up the start of the run-in, looked back and saw I had enough of a lead... relief. Looked back scared five or ten times up the run-in, which I was enjoying. Apparently I was well pale. Took a couple of hours and a swim in the lake before getting some colour back.

Happy days!!!


That red stripe is not yet part of the official clothing, I know neither how nor when the gash on the knee happened :)

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edit, climb advertised, 350m,
actual climb, 450m +/-

C • Well done! 4

Started warming up a fair bit before, deliberately didn't take any sports drink until just before the race to try to get the fat burning.

Pretty hot, so returned often to the shade. Couple of minor niggles which left once I warmed up, but the muscles felt good!

C • What 1

C • one spot early 1

pre-brekkie, of which 7 fast

Nice to be out before it gets HOT.

More pics at http://picasaweb.google.com/neil.dobbs/WOC2009#

Lidingö boys:


This photo gets better and better:


The heads on Colm!


And the team:

C • girls 2

C • pics from the sprint qual today 6

Event: WOC 2009
 

MiddleF/Relay Model

Real gentle jog around the model area. A bit rougher than the qualie. Map was a bit dodge, esp near control 34, 40m west of where it should have been in comparison to the charcoal x to the north. Also, a couple of green circles were root stocks and not trees.

Tough to stay cool and hydrated and sleep properly in the heat.

Bat-Cave map, it was crap!!!

WOC is great. Butterflies, composure, nerves, confidence, self-belief, self-delusion, hindsight, and most of all there's no hiding and no excuses.

And the great people, of course!

Pics from: http://live.woc2009.hu/Gallery/08.16.%20-%20Middle...

Shane ready to go:

Yours truly:

C • Could you... 5

Walked to and from the canteen three times. Only took the lift 4 times. Tough day!

WOC Middle Q

Galuzsnya, Bukkszentkereszt

Unfortunately it wasn't technical. There were maybe four or five slightly dangerous controls, but the map was good and visibility was too, so no serious problems.

I didn't have power in my legs running the hills. Perhaps the race the previous Sunday was still in my legs? Maybe I should have taken a rest day instead of driving 3hrs to train on a crap map the other day. Maybe I should train more.

Felt like my HR never got too high. Certainly my head didn't feel like it was going to explode. Couldn't push hard enough. At least that made the nav straightforward.

Happy with my race when I finished, less so when I saw my placing, 24th in the end. That's worse than last year where I was 21st. Partly last year was a little more technical, so others made a few more mistakes, partly the standard is higher every year, partly I was in a bitch hard heat.
5:09 down on the heat winner, 2:38 from qualifying (Last year, 7mins down on TG, 2:40 from qual).
In comparison, 5:09 down would have been 19th/16th in heats B/C. But I still don't have a top-20, and I still want to qualify next year. Grrr.

Details:
1: lost 2 seconds picking my map up off the ground at the start. Merz flew off, the Chinese less so. CHN navigated perfectly to my first control, then looked like he was probably confused as I punched and ran off. Nice start.
2: Easier than I thought. A little slow, but safe.
3: easy, 50m of path in the middle
4 nothing hard yet
5: First really tricky control, in the end wasn't too bad, but I spent ten seconds deciding I was where I was 50m above the control.
6: A little slow, but safe.
7: A little slow, but safe, 5 seconds off to the right/down :)
8: no prob
9: straight straight line would have been slightly better. No pb,
10: Hesitated 10-15s at the edge of the circle.
11: No prob
12: No prob
13: Overtook a Hong Kong guy. First man I saw in a while.
14: Teeny weeny bit left of the line, which meant a little extra climb, but maybe 5 seconds worth.
15: substantially left at the start, corrected and went back in the right direction, got a bit nervous, then Ross Morrison went past, gave me a bit more confidence, then felt a contour, knew where the control would be, ran ten metres and could see the feature 50m away... it was easy after all. 20s lost.
16: Trivial, running hard.
17: Ditto
Run-in - Gave it all, fastest split.
Lay on the ground with a smile on my face afterwards.

C • Exxcellent job 11