Training Log Archive: roar

Shamrock O-Ringen Day 2 - Crohane Mountain Map.

Wasn't too bothered about this race before the start. Felt I had done everything I needed yesterday... Went out to have fun on a hopefully nice course. Plan was to start easy and pick it up, as always in recent long distances.
1: was a little left but was getting into the map, so many more mapped features than yesterday! Saw the re-entrant with the stream before the control and in from there.
2: Was already feeling tired on the hill but tried to just keep plodding up it. Saw Colm in the upper marsh and shouted at him, "What are you doing up here?". Somehow he heard "you're too low"! Easy control up the re-entrant and in.
3: More climbing out of 2, but then really easy, could see the gap between the two hills.
4: Stayed right to try and avoid some of the re-entrants, was a bit higher than planned but the legs seemed to be getting into this running thing. Easy control from above then.
5: Compass, read some features, see two marshy re-entrants and in over the ridge.
6-7: saw the feature from the previous control.
8: Hadn't really planned this before as the running was so tough, reading the map was difficult. Decided on staying high, again stayed a bit higher than intended but it turns out that afforded me slightly better running. Running up the re-entrant I found a piece of runnable ground! It was grassy and only slightly uphill. It was great! The entry to the control was going to be tricky so I slowed right down and picked off all the features and came down from above it to make the feature as big as possible. Saw Nick Barrable down the hill here and he found the control because he saw me go into it.
9: Had to go down, but hadn't actually decided what I was to do. Was a bit wavy at the start but the rest of the leg was fine.
10: Saw I needed to be careful I went down the right spur. Once I did that it was fine, had a little hesitation half-way down.
11: Could see the hill I needed to get up, just a matter of getting there.
12: Got to run a little along this relatively flat piece. Again it was pretty clear where I had to go. Barrable caught back up to me here and got to the control just in front of me.
13: Very easy control. Barrable was running a bit faster than me on the hills so he got a gap here, but I knew I'd get him back on 14.
14: Compass, knew once I was right of the line I'd see all the marshy features, I did and then it was easy enough into the control, now ahead of Nick again.
15: Higher crossing point and through the god awful marsh. Worst runnability of the day, really suffering. Caught Hugh Power here but no Barrable to be seen until I left the control I saw him behind me.
16: Downhill, past the crags and down the re-entrant.
17: Went to the crossing point, then just up over the ridge.
18: Was tired here and couldn't make myself climb so I went around, but then Barrable got into the control just ahead of me.
19: Trying to pass him out, but no dice.
Finish: Really boggy.

6th, so now in 7th overall! Classic Ruairi form, with a terrible middle and a decent classic putting me in a good position. Was set up for the chasing start now, Dave ~5mins ahead, Barrable 6sec behind. If I had looked at the results at all yesterday I might have tried harder to get away from him today!

Happy though, a lot better than yesterday!

1 - Splits