Path/Terrain1:00:01 [2] 11.84 km (5:04 / km) +198m4:41 / km shoes: Salomon Sense Marin
Ante
Easy with Oleg round the standard hour loop. Quite tired for the rest of the day so leaving it till tomorrow evening when I'll be back in Halden to train again.
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Road19:06 [2] 4.04 km (4:43 / km) +10m4:40 / km shoes: Asics Dynaflyte
12 PM
Path/Terrain warm up/down 18:47 [2] 2.85 km (6:35 / km) shoes: VJ Bold (2018)
Orienteering race 28:51 6.27 km (4:36 / km) +120m4:12 / km shoes: VJ Bold (2018)
British Relays - Men Open - 3rd Leg - 2nd Overall
Knew it would be tough to chase Kris so instead of trying to bridge the gap I decided to wait and see if he would slip up. He never did, no surprise. Had a decent battle with Speake though. Very (completely?) different gaffles so lots of splitting and rejoining again, absolute textbook relay racing. Eventually he got unlucky with a significantly larger gaffle and I managed to sneak away, rather thankfully as I was really struggling to hold his terrain pace. Last loop running slightly scared but had a big enough gap on him for his smaller last loop to not matter.
Very clean run with under 30s of slips, little bit tired and sick from being a bit hungry/sleepy but decent stuff regardless. Nice to pick up the fastest leg split of the day too but unsure how other peoples gaffles compared.
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Path/Terrain warm up/down 10:00 [2] 1.62 km (6:11 / km) +2m6:09 / km shoes: VJ Bold (2018)
Road warm up/down 15:25 [2] 3.28 km (4:42 / km) +38m4:27 / km shoes: Asics Dynaflyte
2 PM
Path/Terrain warm up/down 12:33 [2] 2.13 km (5:54 / km) +74m5:01 / km shoes: VJ Bold (2018)
Orienteering race 1:34:24 16.33 km (5:47 / km) +612m4:52 / km shoes: VJ Bold (2018)
British Long - Balmoral - M21E - 5th, +2mins
Before the race I expected it to be a physical struggle but surely technically clean after last week's terrain and a few months in Halden. It ended up being the other way round. Unfocussed from the start and quite frankly lucky to find number 1. Confident though I headed to 2 not checking my map enough and binned almost a minute. Panicked and lost more to 4 before a lot to 5. Considered retiring and was so ashamed but turns out this had happened to everyone.
From here it was essentially game over already. I felt like I was hitting the wall by 30mins and wasn't sure how I'd even finish. At the first TV control I could barely pump out any rational thought but after having a gel I was shocked to feel fine again. Made a few slips on the southern hill but was fairly stable and taking the correct long routes, just not committing nor attacking hard enough. I then took another gel and had a very fast final section before finishing fairly intact, but a total of about 7 minutes of very avoidable mistakes which is very frustrating given the results.
Essentially threw away what could have easily been an excellent race with potential selections following on because I felt like I wouldn't have time to look at the map, an effect from running at EOC I think. Perhaps I was still a bit tired from last week and a few heavy days this week, but no medals or selections were/are deserved out of my racing performance recently, I need to learn how to navigate first. Back to school before Jukola I think.
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Path/Terrain warm up/down 3:49 [2] 0.68 km (5:35 / km) shoes: VJ Bold (2018)
Path/Terrain21:14 [2] 4.61 km (4:37 / km) +32m4:27 / km shoes: Salomon Sense Marin
3 PM
Road19:33 [2] 3.92 km (4:59 / km) +101m4:25 / km shoes: Salomon Sense Marin
HFW
Bumped into a nursery group singing the national anthem. Very cute, half of them stopped and stared when they saw me join the audience.
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5 PM
Road warm up/down 17:33 [2] 4.09 km (4:17 / km) +15m4:13 / km shoes: Salomon Sense Marin
WU
Nice cruise down to the park.
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Path/Terrain intervals 29:38 6.82 km (4:21 / km) +85m4:05 / km shoes: Icebug Acceleritas4
Rodsparken Intervals - 2*4mins [2mins] 6*1min[1min] 6*30s[30s]
Quite a brutal session in some very hot weather again, drinking water every second rep. Started hard with Niels hitting a good pace, but managed to stick ahead of him (just) on each rep. Finished the minutes strongly and then cruised through the 30s reps.
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Path/Terrain warm up/down 16:56 [2] 2.77 km (6:07 / km) +74m5:23 / km shoes: Salomon Sense Marin
Path/Terrain16:14 [2] 3.43 km (4:44 / km) +13m4:39 / km shoes: Asics Dynaflyte
2 PM
Road9:47 [2] 1.81 km (5:25 / km) +80m4:26 / km shoes: Asics Dynaflyte
5 PM
Orienteering1:30:26 11.45 km (7:54 / km) +173m7:21 / km shoes: VJ Bold (2017)
Training
Scorchingly hot outside, must have been close to 30c. Going well for the first half with a few misses in when I was losing focus. Then stomach became sore and I began to feel very sick, thinking I was probably low on hydration. Had a few stops to sit down and get my breath back, which was now going a little bit as well. Eventually made it back to lots and lots of drinks.
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