Training Log Archive: Sergey

Brief warmup for Long Champs. Mainly on the trail to the start.

Long Champs at Fishtrap Lake. Once again usage of zip-bag as a map case is perplexing as well as map paper quality. Additionally map was printed 1:15000 and I had real troubles seeing details even with my magnifying glass. I again opted to use cap and sun glasses but that was dictated by merciful sun and open terrain. Map was okey in terms of mapping quality.

Lost 30 sec on #1, about 2 minutes on #4 due to the fact that I was first on the course and there were no elephant trails among those knolls (passed right knoll on the first attempt but didn't see control hidden more behind), about 1 minute on #9 hesitating how to interpret what was shown, how I missed #13 and lost about 5 minutes there is still mistery to me, then there was #16 which I didn't see on the map due to much cutting of the circle, loss of ~4minutes on #17.

My age shows as I make mistakes if I don't see map details enough :( Physically I was fine finishing with some energy in my legs. Good time for me would be something around 1:30. Joe finished in 1:34 or so.

Red Long - Splits

Event: US Sprint/Middle/Long Championships
 

Model event area at Moses Lakes. Didn't have problems with control locations and map though mapping could be better. Including re-run at competition speed @~ 6min/k.

Middle Champs at Moses Lake Sand Dunes. Wow, that was complete disaster starting right off the bat with 4:30 mistake on first control. Thin shiny wrinkling zip-bag used instead of real map case was really bad desision by organizers. I don't understand any reasoning behind such a decision. Additionally all maps during these USa champs were printed on unappropriately thin and easily tearable paper.

Red course layout just raised my eyebrows right from the start. I just don't understand why course designer wanted to confuse competitors more with crisscrossing so many times. Completely lost contact with map right from the start. Had to return to start triangle and start the course again. It was uneventful and moving with good speed until #13 where I made about 30 second wobble to the right due to wrong interpretation of vegeation boundary and one more disastrous decision to cross thin strip of swamp going to #15. When water reached my waist I just re-treated back and had to run around lakes using unfavorable route for the loss of ~1:30. Decision was based on map showing clearing path where I wanted to cross but in reality it was all green swamp. Without these mistakes my time would be more like 38:30 which would be fine for 2nd behind Mikkel.

One additional mistake was to use cap and sun glasses. With damn zip-bag I had real troubles comprehending map behind. And I couldn't remove map from it in the fear of swamps!

Red Middle - Splits

My usual tapering test course :)

12x200m@0:45