Training Log Archive: Ollie

HH Frolics event at Whippendell Wood, near Watford.
Very warm indeed and quite muggy - I was also running at the hottest part of the day. I made loads of mistakes, probably due to the heat, and also ran at a slower pace than normal, again due to the heat but also because of a long cycle ride the day before - and I had another one straight after the event.

It was a nice, white forest, made up of a curved valley with a few contours. I definitely felt every one of them. Quite a few controls were on very large features - typically in or beside large pits which were up to 10m deep.

Suprisingly, I ran 9.3km - almost 2km longer than the straight-line distance, which is very suprising as, due to the white nature of the forest, I generally tried to run straight. This extra distance may explain why I was over 10 minutes down on IanW and JonM.

Mistakes:
To 1: Overshot by 150m (90s) - should have taken safer route.
To 2: Poor route choice (45s) - should have taken path route.
To 3: Poor bearing (20s) - swung right.
To 6: Poor route choice (30s) - should have gone round on path.
To 15: Poor map-reading (150s) - stopped far too short.
To 17: Poor route choice (60s) - should have taken path route.
To 18: Poor route choice (60s) - missed shortcut path, and overshot.
To 19: Poor route choice (30s) - should have gone straight to path.
To 20: Poor map-reading (120s) - ended up back at No. 3!
To 22: Poor bearing (20s) - swung right.

Evening event at Wimbledon Common - final one in the series of four SLOW July evening park races. The start was from the south-east end of the common, not a part I've been to before. The grass was five foot high and the forest looked pretty impenetrable from the start, but once I got into the race area it was actually exceedingly pleasant, especially considering it's July. It was pretty warm, although not oppressively hot.

I unfortunately started 30 seconds in front of PatS, which meant I was looking over my shoulder until he inevitably overtook on the way to No. 4. I went the other way to No. 1 compared to everyone else, and really hit it hard for the first two controls, beating PatS and even Nick B's time (they finished 2nd and 1st in the end) - but made a 30 second error at No. 3, looking for the control in the wrong place. Pat overtook when I unwisely went straight through some vegetation to No. 4, and then we both went wrong to No. 5, as I was concentrating on getting ahead.

My line to No. 7 was a bit too direct, again getting caught in some vegetation, and again from 10-11 I took a direct route and caught in the nasty stuff. 9-10 and 11-12 were proper mistakes, I took a different path than expected. I recovered well for 10 but took a while to work out what had gone wrong for 12. 13-15 were smooth, 16 I went right around the control circle before I got in to it, and 17 was straightforward - I had spotted it from the start.

So, I thought I had a good, fast race, and was disappointed to have been just beaten by only a few seconds by a few people. Certainly if I hadn't made the mistakes at 3, 5, 10 and 12, I could have done a sub-23 minute time. Nick B won in around 21:45. GPS says I ran 4.7km - I was able to do plenty of sections straight as the park was so flat and the undergrowth was really not too bad.

Although the weather wasn't exceptionally hot, I had paced this one faster than my "normal" race pace, and so had a higher than normal HRavg and was feeling pretty hot at the end. Thankfully there was a nice pub around the corner serving Magners, that we all decamped to for the end-of-series prizegiving. (NB. HRrest also high as it's quite hot in the house this evening.)

Decided to cycle to/from the event this evening at Wimbledon Common. It's longer than I thought it was, I think I might get the train back in future! West Hill, near the end, is relentless, although it was good fun going back down it on the return journey.

Out via Whitechapel, Blackfriar's Bridge, then along the minor road through South Bank, then to Vauxhall, where I took a wrong turn and ended up on the road to Clapham. Then the usual route through Wandsworth, up West Hill to the Common, and down the side of it to the far end. The return was the same to Wandsworth, then Battersea, Battersea Park, and the road on the south side of the Thames to Vauxhall, then the same route back as out. Took 1h10 out, 1h05 back.

Running in the fourth Frolics series of races, a MV event at Nork Park. A brand new area, never used for orienteering. It is rather small, but has a couple of ares waith interesting detail, and the whole park is on a slope, part of the Epsom Downs. It was sunny and warm, but not too hot.

Unfortunately i mispunched the 10th control, instead punching a nearby one that was on the "extension" part of the course. Things didn't quite fit on leaving the control, but unfortunately I thought this was a mapping error (unlikely, as the map is brand new) rather than a mistake by myself. I only realised on revisiting the control once I was on the "extension" map. This probably meant I ran 150m less that I should have. I also had quite a few really poor route choices. I might have been trying to be a bit clever in places but it really didn't pay off.

The "frolics" part of the course was quite slow anyway - I took 27:31 for the 3.62km section, and then just under 20 minutes for the 2.5km extension.

My GPS ran out of batteries half way around so I don't know how far I actually ran, or my HRavg/max.

Congratulations to GG, JD and Jamie Stevenson for bringing home the Gold for Great Britain at the World Orienteering Championships today! Awesome! I wish I had stayed in and watched the event webcast rather than going orienteering myself.

To/from Southfields, for a meeting. Should have taken me less time but it was a hot, muggy day.

My Nopesport report on the Ultrasprint is here.

SLOW July Park Race Series - Event 3, in Dulwich Park. Hot and humid, clear blue sky. This meant I consiously didn't run at 100% speed. France is going to be crazy if it really is going to be a lot hotter than even this.

Loads of people made it out - probably 60 people. After 50 last week and 40 the week before, this series is going from strength to strength. Unfortunately my current leading position (due to organising the last one) is probably under threat once this event's scores are added in.

Had a quite good run - starting last, and overtaking quite a few people. I made quite a few mistakes - easy to do even on such a simple area, due to the high speed. Controls 2-10 were in a butterfly loop, near an area of several complex curved paths, so I had to use the compass and check I be careful. I was a bit hesitant here at some controls, which were normally the far side of a tree - but I tended to pause when I couldn't see them on the approach. After a few longer legs through the simpler parts of the park, I took a bad route choice back into the complex area, and had a couple more poor legs near the end - including running towards the finish and not the final control, and then running towards the start and not the finish! It must have been the heat HRavg of 185 says it all, I think.

I reckon I made eight leg mistakes on the course - ouch! GPS says I ran 4.8km with just 20m of climb - it was indeed extremely flat. I finished 10th - one second behind 9th, and five minutes behind Nick B.

To/from Dulwich Park, via London Bridge and Denmark Hill. Very warm.

Finishing off the final section of the City Map, the area around Finsbury Square. It will not be an area that will be used directly for the race, but it is possible that runners may use it as a through-route between controls.

Noticed that a large section of Exchange Square is now hoarded off, for access improvements to the Broadgate Tower - the plaza of which is still a long way from completion. The work is due to finish in December.

My Map Progress Page

Event: Cliffhanger Ultrasprint
 

Garmin Ultrasprint race organised by SYO in Millhouses Park, Sheffield, as part of the Cliffhanger outdoor events festival.

FINAL. Running the Men's B final - although the controls were the same as for the A final, with four butterflies, each with two wings, to break up the competitors. An impressive 46 controls - although the four butterfly central controls, each visited three times, were dummy controls, so my v5 SI card coped.

Had an OK run, no big mistakes. Going a bit slow on the longer running legs, just didn't have the pace needed for a good result.

The course included a couple of shallow river crossings, and started and finished in the labyrinth (1:1000, the rest of the map being 1:2500.)

Main difficulty was reading the control codes - some of which were less than the control numbers. Having a control marked "35 - 34" made things a little tricky, there were a couple of hesitations in the final labyrinth section while I tried to work out where the next control was and what its number was suppoed to be.

C • glad you enjoyed it 1

Garmin Ultrasprint race organised by SYO in Millhouses Park, Sheffield, as part of the Cliffhanger outdoor events festival.

QUALIFIER. One big mistake, when got stuck by an out-of-bounds section, having to take a long detour around it. This wasted perhaps 50 seconds - a long time for a sprint, let alone an ultrapsprint. Finished 7th, 70 seconds outside qualifying for the A Final - the top four from each heat qualifying.

Full results now up: http://www.sloweb.org.uk/summer08/QueenMary-res.ht...

Winsplits for the Queen Mary race yesterday that I organised:

http://www.obasen.nu/winsplits/online/en/default.a...

and Routegadget:

http://www.slow.routegadget.co.uk/cgi-bin/reitti.c...

The results page should be going up on SLOWeb in the next day or so.

C • That was a top little map a... 4

DFOK "Frolics Series" Course (Light Green + Sprint Extension) at Addington Hills, South London. It had been raining earlier in the morning, and rained during the second half of the course too - but not too cool, being July.

I had a very good Frolics run (the first 16 controls) - which count towards a handicapped club league. Everything went wrong when I did the optional extension course - a very poor route out of the second control was followed by a very odd leg where I climbed up a steep hill - and somehow back onto the path I had just left. I wasn't the only person to do this, so there may have been something odd with the map (which was rapidly disintegrating in the rain, having not been printed on waterproof paper.)

The rest of the sprint was a little smoother - interestingly, I took longer to do a leg that was the same as a Frolics leg - although this is mainly because I took a bit of a tumble the second time around.

Pleased to have finished a solid 4th out of 29 finishers, behind three other SLOW people including Seb and Ed. It looks like only one additional runner, who didn't do the extension, beat me on the Frolics part, although I can't be sure as the splits aren't up. Once the handicaps get applied, I'll be well down the leaderboard though!

I didn't think my performance was that great, to be honest, so I'm surprised to have beaten so many people. My HRavg shows that I never really put a lot of effort into the race. The rain, and the lack of sleep from a camping trip the night before, probably didn't help things.

First of four SLOW July Park Race events - I'm hosting the second next Tuesday. This one was in Bishop's Park, in Fulham - never before used for orienteering. It was mapped as a school area but not used. The area is quite restricted - it's essentially a thin strip of parkland alongside the Thames, a churchyard, and three roads. But Don managed to plan a decent sprint out of the area.

I was pleased to beat Brooner by 4 seconds and Seb by 2 seconds, despite making 40 seconds of mistakes near the end - first going the longer way around a long either/or leg, and then overshooting the very last control.

It was very warm indeed (27 degrees) and quite humid too - quite unpleasant running conditions, and I had to check my speed in a couple of places, in case I passed out! Average HR was 184 - over 23 minutes!

Ran exactly 5K, according to my GPS. Not sure what the winning time was - Pat did sub-23 and wasn't first. Good turnout at the event too - 40 people. Hopefully the weather will be as sunny, for the QM race.

Home to/from Putney Bridge, via the City and the Embankment.