Training Log Archive: fitless

Just warm-up as usual.

A much awaited run on a unique terrain, that didn't disappoint. My expectations were really high, but they got fully fulfilled. The goal was to enjoy every second and showcase my problems in orienteering. I made a lot of mistakes, all by my own fault :)

Weather was awful, raining in places and mist. Stones were quite slippery and it was difficult to move around.

To the third control, executing the route-choice was difficult, slope orienteering doesn't get any more difficult - up-and-down all the time on the rocky soil. You are often moving at the direction, where it's less stony. Also at the end, I made a parallel mistake.

On the fourth control, I made another parallel mistake - running off the top of the final hill in the wrong direction. During the leg, I also didn't manage to spot a tourist path.

Next mistakes were to 6 and 7 in the far eastern corner of the map, at Vecsem-bükk. Executing the route-choice was the problem on both occasions. It was also here, where I realized, that I was the only person in the woods and what a tremendous feeling it was. I really felt free here. This was the best feeling I had during the race.

I was caught by Viktor Nagy at 7, but we were on different route-choices to 8. To 9, he made a massive mistake and also dragged me into a smaller one. Parallel mistake once again. I also fell on my shoulder here and it ached for some days. Small mistakes followed to 10 and 11, where we had some massive rocky areas, here it was difficult to even move and the wet conditions didn't make it any easier.

I had my best running feeling to 12, slightly downhill, with not that many stones :) Big mistake then followed to 14, where I ran around the last depression from a totally wrong direction. To 17, I didn't look properly at the map and wanted to search for the control a depression too early. Viktor Nagy also caught up here once again.

We went together a few controls, but then I didn't enjoy the pace and had no reason to follow the pace. Frankly, this last km was fairly straightforward, but I still made a little mistake on 22.

Altogether, I missed 10:45, far too much. But did I enjoy it? Absolutely yes! I was not too tired afterwards, but my hip was aching all week after, because of the extremely stony terrain. But altogether, FUN, FUN, FUN!

My route: http://less.blog.hu/2009/10/18/egyeni_ob_szogliget

All warm-up, as the start was far away and it was cold.

The goal was to qualify for the A-final, so started off hard. Caught a small bunch at around 3-4 and made maybe only a small hesitation in the first half. Route to 10 was sub-optimal and here I found out, that the green areas are really difficult to run through - map was more international, than any other Hungarian map I've run on. So I lost here almost a minute.

Next wobble was on 16, which resulted in a massive mistake. I was caught by Skuló and Haresz here and thus was very confident in the vague light green. But we were caught off line, much to the right of the control and lost 3 minutes here. From there, it was really one-way traffic, as I tried to hang on to their tales, only succeeding because of a mistake of theirs to the penultimate control.

I was 3 minutes off qualifying, but as I finished, I thought, that it would be better not to qualify. My waist was aching and this 10.2 km course seemed a bit too much compared to tomorrow's projected 16,5 km. So I wasn't disappointed about my 15th place and concentrated on enjoying tomorrow's race.

Surprisingly cold temperature today, some snow in other parts of the country, while we were 'fairly' dry - didn't rain during the run. From Szilvi's towards Poklostető, Töbrös-árok, then Száva's with Száva. Obviously, I don't remember much from the run, I had no pain, except for one major fall, in which I hit my palms and also my right calf is a bit stiff.

Maybe I will go out tomorrow morning for some faster run, as my body longs for it. I can't wait until Saturday.

Solid run in the rain and cold with Száva towards Berekalja, Vaskapu and Üllő u. She was tired from the week-end, I was feelin quite OK. My waist didn't work perfectly, but it should do. Easy tempo in the uphills, downhills being faster.

Weather has once again changed rapidly - from August last Thursday (26 degrees), we went to late November (3 degrees). Snow is forecast for tomorrow, a possible 20 cm can fall. At least bad weather eased my choice of shoes for the week-end - orienteering shoes.