Training Log Archive: BigWillyStyle

I'm disappointed to have had to DNS the Sunday events; I was ready and feel like with a good run I had a shot at a top-five-NA finish in the sprint (which is of course a lot easier to say than do). The sprint relay from NAOC 2014 is one of my favorite orienteering memories, so hated to miss out on that as well. Still, really fun to cheer everyone on in both events, and the relay was very exciting.

I've only been to two NAOCs:

2014 NAOC Middle: ~25th NA
2014 NAOC Long: ~22nd NA

2016 NAOC Middle: 11th NA
2016 NAOC Long: 7th NA

There is still potential, and room for improvement. In 2018 my goal will be a podium finish. For motivation, obligatory pic of happy Canadians celebrating. I must pretend that I'm not friends with any of them. Except Will and Graeme obviously

C • Goal 2

C • knee 2

Event: Street Scramble Fremont
 

NAOC Long

Fell and gashed my knee on a rock. Extent of damage unknown but hopefully just a flesh wound.

Re: the long - a grueling race in really epic orienteering terrain. Sort of like a very long middle - you had to maintain focus and map contact almost constantly, with few of the mental breaks you get in most longer races. Very hard for me at times to read the map while moving with any decent speed, and I never felt like I could really open up and run at full speed. At some controls in the more complicated areas I could hardly parse things out inside the circle and just sort of barged in on a bearing and went into search mode. I lost a minute on 2 and several on 3, but got into a solid groove from then on. Only other controls I had significant problems on were 15 (bad route choice) and 16 (overran). Was pretty much alone for the entire course, and felt good about putting the rough start behind me and hanging tough. Still, a race that could've been a lot better.

Long - Blue (WRE) - Splits

Event: North American Orienteering Championships 2016
 

NAOC middle. Despite bobbling 6, I was having a solid race until bobbling 13, then blowing the long leg to 14. Reason: not having an attack point. I contoured around the hill, trusting that I would figure things out when I got close - not a great plan. I came to a vague lumpy area with lots of clearcut/trail thingies running this way and that, and couldn't make sense of them, so wandered for a while trying to find something real to relocate on. Luckily that something happened to be the control, but it was not until about three minutes later.

Middle - Blue - Splits

Tooling around on the middle model.

And the long model. Finding some areas of the map very difficult to read at 1:15000.

Today we continued our roaming ways and eventually ended up at Moreau Lake State Park, so we ran around most of the blue middle from 2013 (?). Very cool area. We had to cut things a bit short as it started to get pretty dark in the forest and I started to get scared. Because I am afraid of dark forests, which is a totally rational and legitimate fear.

Not much clue about time or distance as I've forgotten my watch charging cord at home and therefore my watch has been dead since Sunday. If anyone else has a Forerunner 220 I'd be mighty obliged if I could borrow your cord for a bit this weekend.

Forgot to mention, when we had just arrived and were about to head up the hill from the parking lot the big Frenchman himself came trotting down and chatted with us for a bit. So that was cool.

C • Fear 2

C • I have a 220 and will have ... 1

We roamed around upstate New York today; I spent most of the day pretending I was Hawkeye from Last of the Mohicans. We did some hiking in Treman State Park outside of Ithaca - the scenery is gorges.

C • Gorges 1