Training Log Archive: Psuba

Event: Wessex Club Night & Night League
 

Placing controls

Placing controls

Collecting controls

Event: SARUM Galoppen & SCOA League
 

SARUM Galoppen, Collingbourne Wood, Brown course.

5th/32, looks like everyone made mistakes: http://sarumo.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/re...

Very brambley, and vegetation mapping quite off in some places, but beautiful weather.

I expected to hate it given my loathing of undergrowth, but strangely quite enjoyed it. Probably has to do with the fact that it was very much a middle distance style control picking, and maybe the lack of running in the last few days so I had energy to attack all the way through - except for losing focus for a short while at 16 which was very badly mapped vegetation wise and I got a bit upset. When I was overtaken by a lady there I pulled myself together and started to run properly again - note to self, it probably happens more often when I can't compare myself to anyone, so need to be more strict with myself.

Course was mostly a compass bearing exercise technique wise, some running around, possibly could have used that more??? But white map seemed very inviting despite the reality of brambles.

Time losses:
1 - just not confident yet
2 - slightly right but there were unmapped pits and so I thought relative to the brambles mapped I was to the left of the control - went right, control wasn't there, went back, control found. 50 sec
3 - Undergrowth mapping not right here, but should have watched my height, ran under control, out to path and then back fighting through the brambles that should not have been there according to the map... 1 min detour
4 - Chose to run up over the ridge, executed OK but looking at the splits quite slow, especially relative to Ben (although he is quite a bit faster than me so probably not fair to compare to him). Possibly would have been faster to cut across near #1 which is how I did 18-19 later but reverse, so I'll account 20s lost here for that as route choice mistake.
9 - Very strange control placement, possibly 8 was further W then mapped so had to run down the ride E more then expected, hesitant here a bit but nothing major, maybe 10s
10 - Bearing mistake which is strange, checking the track my direction was right on the red line. Possibly features are not quite well placed relative to each other? In any case was distracted towards the end by someone clearly pointing at a control in a similar depression than I was looking for, so went there and seen that the numbers weren't matching. Luckily quite quick at figuring out which one it was, so straight back to the other depression. A bit funny at this point I was leading a small train of about 5 people all following me as I was making the mistake and then the correction... Don't remember this ever happening before! Anyway counting 55s mistake here.
14 - plan didn't work here: did not see the ride running next to 14 which was overgrown, so overran then had to fight through undergrowth to get back on bearing. ~30s
16 - Very bad mapping of vegetation here, it is one thing that the undergrowth is not mapped but ditch with control was in what I would map at least as light green. Had to in the end run by big controur features and trust that that will lead me to the ditch - it did, but not before costing me quite a bit. Choosing to go left around undergrowth using the ditch also did not work very well, it feels like with the mapping issues in this area this leg was quite a lottery. Not even sure how much time loss to award as it does not seem fair, I was at least coping OK with the mapping issues here, still I'd say it should have been 30s faster even with the lottery element.
17 - I quite suspect the depression was higher up then mapped, ran past under it before turning back (thank god for the road as catching feature not far behind) - 45s, should cope with these more decisively, just run and turn around instead of stopping and hesitating which is what I do usually which is slower.
18 - Again bearing off and lots of brashings here which I found difficult and slow to navigate. To be fair this was a poor leg and imprecise bearing - not the best streak of legs here (16-17-18). 30s
19 - Bad choice, run across instead of around. Lost lots of time particularly in the short section crossing the two parallel roads to the one which had the start on, mapped as white but should have instead believed my eyes. The OK enough choice but this cutting across alone was at least 30s longer than should have been. Could have ran around, rough calculation says it would have been about 50s faster...
23 - Suddenly stopped and hesitant just before the control. Not sure why, the pines confused me, lapse of concentration? Cost maybe 20s

So summary of about 6:40 lost but not a major mistake anywhere which is encouraging. 3rd would have been realistic but not unhappy today, especially how all over the place last week was. Heading in the right direction.

Speed Endurance (1.6km intervals) level 35, passed.

I wanted to do 6 intervals but got quite dark, despite me starting earlier, on the way back on No. 4 so stopped there as I had no headlamp.
Quite happy with the pace, I think I would have passed level 37 too as all 4 intervals were sub 4-min (level 35 is 4:07, 36 is 4:02, level 37 is 3:57).

Gradually declined with speed (as expected) so may not have been able to keep it sub 4m pace for all 6 intervals if I attempted all 6, but happy to get my speed back to where it was before the long training sessions, so overall this is progression.

Wanted to run an undulating terrain run in Windsor Park at Virginia Water, but they are closing the gates early now, so did not manage to get in.

Ran alongside the fences then up/down through the hill two and a half times, as a mid-tempo undulating recovery run, with high cadence. Interesting to see a decent tempo now not really taking much out of me, which probably means training does work in the long run even if I mess up competitions quite a bit recently.