Training Log Archive: Jon X

Got out to check out Touch in daylight ahead of planning my night race. Glad I did, a few new paths and uncrossable fences to factor in. Some cattle to avoid too.....

hastily to enquiries then the start

BUCS individual, Men A 9.6km 26 controls.

Tough old course as to be expected in Devilla, a bit different from Portugal!

Enjoyed my run round despite all those speedy students legging it past me, some more than once.....
Ran quite hard but not full out - a bit rough to keep running through the terrain in places unless fully committed. Noticed in in the butterfly loops at the end in particular. Terrain like this makes lack of fitness a lot more obvious than nice runnable wooded dunes!

Missed little bits of time in a few places (poor direction 5-6 the worst, cost a minute). But biggest time loss when I got totally waterlogged in the marsh of death on 10-11, a lot more marsh and a lot deeper (and colder) than the map implies, lost 2mins (4mins for a 2min leg!).

Really good time from Jonny C for the win (55mins).

Warmdown with Helen B. As ever her warmdown pace a bit quicker than mine would be!

Second warmdown, back up the hill to the car park. Excellent cafe next to the parking, "The Walled Garden", hiding up the track on the E edge of the forest, didn't know it was there until this weekend.

Another day off. Didn't plan this one but home late.
Got a guest run for BUCS Mens A course on Devilla tomorrow to make up for it.

Day off. Definitely a good idea, calf soreness mostly gone by Friday morning.

Event: FVO Night #8 - Fallin
 

Back home after 5 races in 4 days - what better to help recovery than an another race...

New map/area - good varied wooded and urban terrain and with a three loop gaffle from #1 to break us all up, worked well. A few times losses in the gaffles (more than I thought, 3mins plus) and a couple of momentary wrong turns in the urban - but then brain fade at the end and missed out the penultimate control!

GG the mapper ran 37, Vojtech ran 42, Jase 43 and Rosco 44. I would have been a minute longer if I had actually gone to #24.

Little bit of jogging before, bit of control collecting after. Protecting calf a little bit on the climb during control collection, day off tomorrow.

To the start. Cutting it fine. Or nicely judged as I prefer to call it.

POM day 4, Dunas de Vagos again.
M45, 9.0km 22 controls
10th place, winner Jimmy Birklin 62:28
Finished 7th overall. Can't complain as highest finish any day was 9th!


Same arena as yesterday and an overlapping area, but a kilometre shorter today - a bit of a clue re what to expect...

Lots of green today and much harder to run straight, sometimes it felt like running in the detailed vegetation of Auchingarrich overlaid on the vague flat dunes in the south half of Lossie.

Pretty tricky in places - to pick a good line both on map and on ground, to stitch those together into a good route, and sometimes also actually to find the flag in amongst all the bushes in the circle.
Sometimes there was a choice to go round big blocks of fight - but often it was better to bash through it. Hard to know from the map of course, which makes picking the best route a bit more random than it should be....

Felt tougher than any other day, even allowing for being more tired with little zip in my legs. Didn't miss much, a few hesitations in the circle and ran through some green on one short leg thinking I was running down the white strip. Pretty sure I didn't always pick the best route but that was probably true for everyone today. Certainly no major time loss anywhere.

Similar result to the other days (winner + just over 10%) and dropped one place overall.

Enjoyed the different challenge today though, and the event as a whole - well staged, nice forests, good competition, sunshine, fine food and wine. Maybe an FVO trip one year soon??

Also very glad of course to get round all the days successfully - could feel where fitness is lacking (and a hilly area would have found me out far more) and calf is still some way from 100%, but with a lot of training and a bit of luck, could be a lot fitter in six weeks for JK. Which would be good...

Warmup of 2k to the start. Calf aching a little this morning but not too tight, seemed okay warming up.

POM day 3, Dunas de Vagos.
H45 9.9km, 18 controls.
9th place (of 86), winner 56:15

Flatter and much greener/bushier than the first two days, running largely straight still best but close attention required to keep in the best running and not tangle with the green.

Ran mostly pretty well, two errors:
1-2: poor direction initially, crossed track left of where I thought, had to retreat from some dark green and rethink where I was! (-1min)
11-12: longest leg on the course, did the first half as planned but got off line just at the key point where care was needed to bypass a big block of fight. Got stuck, had to backtrack, didn't know where I was, ended up doing a big chunk of extra distance and climb in sorting it out. (-1min 30s ffs)
Other than that maybe two 5-10sec hesitations (change of mind on route leaving #8, in the circle at #11), plus on 16-17 came perilously close to getting caught in the same block of green again as on the long leg....

Still improving however, 9th today (2min gap ahead to 8th) and now 6th overall. Can feel the lack of fitness though, short of speed over the ground. And can also feel the extra kilos....