Training Log Archive: dbakker

COC 2019 Long in Rawdon.

Routegadget: http://orienteering.ca/cgi-bin/reitti.pl?act=map&a...

I was really happy with this race. Still had crazy accommodation and other factors wrecking havoc on the mental end of things - but was able to focus up before the race well. Didn't do much of a physical warm-up, but just the good old 7 minute injury prevention special...

Started 3 minutes behind Graeme, and 3 minutes ahead of Robbie. I took the first control really slow and safe, and met Graeme right around #2 where we both overshot. Robbie caught up to us there as well. Ran a leg and a half with Robbie, before I took a subpar control entrance into 4 and then latched onto Graeme for the next control. Our routechoice involved a nice swim surprisingly, with a crossable creek ending up involving me going in so deep that my heart-rate monitor chest strap was submerged. Good thing we had sealed map bags.

Caught up to Robbie at the water control, and Robbie led us for a few controls before Graeme got dropped/took a different routechoice on the long leg up the hill. I took a difference routechoice to 13 (I think) and lost Robbie there. Saw Graeme a few more times on a few legs around 15 and 16 when he caught back up, but Robbie was long gone.

Was really feeling it around the last loop of 17 onwards, but managed to keep it fairly clean with only one really bad mistakes of a couple of minutes when I overshot 21.

Ended up in 6th place - happy with that.

Long 11 - Splits

COC Middle in Rawdon

Routegadet: http://orienteering.ca/cgi-bin/reitti.pl?act=map&a...#

Very unhappy with how I performed in this race. A lot of various distracting factors with accommodation and other stuff that impacted sleep and mental function. I didn't do a good job of clearing my head before the race.

I also really struggled to understand some of the mapping, and found that my brain was somewhat more on a being critical of the mapping rather than actually trying to use it properly. I found the lack of interplay of contours and cliffs challenging to interpret. But mostly I just mentally didn't get in the game like I should have.

Over-ran and got off on the bearing to #2, and the race kind of just went downhill from there. Lots of hestitations and small and big mistakes.

Mostly just walked everything after the spectator control - I was struggling in the heat and the green on the south slope.

They held onto the maps and didn't give it back until after the long distance the next day.

Middle 11 - Splits

Event: 2019 Canadian Orienteering Championships
 

Did too long of a warm-up and tired myself out a bit considering my current fitness level.

COC 2019 Sprint Laval

Routegadget: http://orienteering.ca/cgi-bin/reitti.pl?act=map&a...#

A frustrating sprint that I did not enjoy from many perspectives. I knew coming in that the terrain was going to be fairly bland and got almost exactly what I expected. We started slightly further north than I was expecting, and skipped the little village which was probably the most the technical area on the map.

I was happy with the first three controls - and then I started to feel really tired from the last weekend and the trainings during the week. I also just don't have the top end running speed to do well in this sort of race right now because of a serious lack of speed training. Anyways - was pretty much just hurting a lot for the entire rest of the race. A couple of stupid bobbles of 20s and 30s otherwise pretty clean. Those mistakes were both me not interpreting the map and terrain in the same way where I would have mapped things differently then they were mapped. That's not saying the mapper was outright wrong - that's saying I need to do better to think of alternate ways to map things.

I really do not like this new sprint standard. A large portion of the run was me trying to figure out if I could or could not run through various shades of green. Trying to figure out if I am allowed to run through stuff or not is not the fun part of sprint orienteering in my opinion. The map and terrain should be very clear whether you can or not - and the new sprint standard is a large step in the wrong direction on that front.

Course 6 was pretty boring with a lot of just pick a tree and run to it legs especially the middle chunk of the course and the last few legs.
It looked like course 5 was a much better course design - better routechoice decisions and less tree picking/dead running.

Also: Need to remeber to tighten the heart rate strap before starting/check it. It fell down twice during the first three controls before I gave up pulling it back up to my chest and just let it flop around my stomach for the rest of the race.

Course 6 - Splits

M21E sprint training at Algonquin College with unmapped construction and artificial fences not in the terrain.

M20E Sprint Training at Algonquin College.

Easy training mostly walking at P19 of Gatineau Park.

Walk/jog to start of the training from the parking lot.

Hotter, really tired training and more walking at P17 of Gatineau Park with Lillian.

Off to the beach later in the afternoon.

O-Fest HPP Relay

3rd Place

Picking up controls