Training Log Archive: Whitesheep

So many good things about the JK. OK we got lucky with the weather, but the organisation was great and the parking/arenas worked really well. I was pleasantly surprised by the areas. Thought Minley in particular was just perfect for a JK relay, not too physical, nice open arena, enough tricky bits to catch people out for going to fast, some open sections for fast pack/train running. Windmill Hill was also a really good middle distance area. I'm not sure there was a huge amount of meaningful route choice to be had on Cold Ash but it was lovely runnable terrain and the planning did give you a really long leg to think about.

But then I make it four missed punches in four days (one sprint, one middle, two on the relay). Two of those were on busy units where I went through as a group, but the other two were just me on my own. That is about one in every thirty controls; for comparison I don't remember ever missing a punch with SI or SI air.

It's not fair on the organisers for that to tarnish things, so will remember this as a great JK and hope for more SI/less Emit in the future.

JK relay - 1st on men's short
Great fun. Got near the front for the run-out and quickly worked out there were a few faster than me but not by too much. So planned to be steady and careful, and push hard when I needed to to keep the leader in sight.
No errors to speak of though I remember being pleased to see #3 and #7 pop up just as I was getting a bit uncertain of the veg.
Not exactly sure where I finished as there were a few different classes, but definitely in contention. Alex and then James had really good runs to bring us home first, both keeping their heads while chopping and changing the lead with some faster runners.

Then had an awkward finale with emit. At download the units weren't working properly so I didn't get a proper printout - just a basic download and then waved through with no indication of any problem. An hour and a half later I saw we were DSQ - turns out my download was missing #5. Went to the download tent to ask for the unit and the backup unit to be reread - no chance as they were both by now in a pile of thousands of other units. Given the issues they'd been having they reinstated us.

I think that is a fair decision and one that I'm confident isn't wrong. #5 was a common control, I can clearly remember going to it, and my GPS shows me going to it. After what happened on the sprint day I was careful to check for a flashing light at each control and so am as sure as I can be that if the main card didn't register my backup did. It is a shame there was no chance to check that. Also had a problem going through the spectator control in a group, but this time saw no flashing light on either unit and went back to re-punch.

JK classic - 38th
Even more of a missed opportunity than the middle. The course wasn't overly hard on the whole but I missed badly on #23. Another one in amongst lots of intricate line features - paths this time. I was just caught out neither following an accurate bearing nor reading the indistinct paths carefully. I was only about 5m away but not sure enough to see the feature/flag. Took a good 4 minutes to sort myself out.
Particularly annoying as Jegor had caught me up but not gone past. Should have just followed him but easier said than done.
Physically I held on better than at most previous classics, have come to the conclusion that it is near-impossible to over-fuel given I'm going to be out for 2 hours and am not an efficient terrain runner. Still made an annoying tired mistake at #38 when I misread the rides.

JK middle - 41st
Decent placing for me as there were quite a few errors and people suffering in the heat. But...
I really made a mess of the two trench controls. Found it a bit tricky to separate gully from contour, and turned off too early for #12 such that by the time I was near I'd lost track of them completely.
Also a bit annoying that when Murray went steaming through around #6 I then had an emit failure at #7 and had to turn back, would have enjoyed a slightly longer tow!

Event: JK 2019
 

JK sprint - 35th
Pleased with this. Didn't feel quite as fast as on some other occasions, but on the other hand was well in control all the way around. Didn't get distracted by others haring off at the start especially. In the start box I saw #3-4-5-6 were all inside corners so thought they could be tricky - and didn't start pushing hard until I was sure of them. In the event they were straightforward but I think that was the right approach anyway. The steady pace also helped on #11 and #27 where there were cut-throughs that I could easily have missed.
Almost DSQ for a missing punch on #28 but saved by the backup unit. Hmm...

yoga