Discussion: New World Record

A new world record in number of controls punched during one day in a single competition was set today in Marjal, near Alicante, Spain. The number of controls was 150, all equipped with Sportident. Course length was 21.1 km with 300m of ascent. 76 runners started. Winners were Pasi Ikonen at 1h 47' and Minna Kauppi 2h 00'. Find the map at Pasi's page under "Spain - week two".
I finished 38th (out of 62 in the men's class), was probably the oldest runner on the course.

I have to say that's really very impressive - to run 5 min/km, in complex terrain, hitting a control every 42 seconds for nearly two hours! See his total errors written on the side of the map? 90 seconds total, at an average of just over half a second per control :).

That area also has a lot of soft sand making it even tougher.

Very impressive result by Pasi! Looking at his training is always inspiring. I like very much "How to become a better orienteerer" slide on the 'Spain - week two' page :) Check it out!

Yeah, the "how to become a better orienteer" sketch is a good one. A theme that pops in several locations on the figure is 'sleep and diet'. Other aspects that I found particularly interesting was that mental training was 50% of total training and that beside dreams and goals was the word --> specialize. Inspiring indeed.

minna also features... how do i get one of those?

Pasi's original chart looked like this. The additional items were added by the participants of Pasi's Training Camp in Spain last week.

The part that interested me was the prominent location of the item "Have a girlfriend in orienteering". That's the one aspect of my training that has been seriously neglected the last several years...

But now I have a new excuse for any poor results I suffer this year: "Still no girlfriend" :-)