Training Log Archive: Jagge

Sad to see we are not the only team who has these SI issues. Yesterday Liisa Anttila was the fastest on Women's Ski WOC, but was DQ:d for missing punch. Other competitors saw her punching, but punch was never found from her stick.

Yes, it could be that she didn't wait for the signal. The real question is why she couldn't do it right? Did she do it in purpose? No. Weren't she experienced enough? Why did it happen?

The problem with SI is you need to wait. When you are racing you are supposed to do everythin as fast as you can. That's what racing is all about, right? This is why you shouldn't need to wait for any mechanical device to do something on is's own while all you can do is just wait. With pin punch you did the puching yourself, some were faster than other and it did take some time but you didn't have to stand still and wait for something to happen.

With regular Emit system punching is a lot like the good old pin puncing. You need to do it yourself and you can learn to be very fast in it. You can do it as fast as you can and you don't have to wait anything. You can not do it too fast. If you are superhuman lightning fast, you can be too fast for the electronic system, but you'll get a pin mark on your backup paper and you will not be DQ:t.

I have a feeling people think Emit back up paper is for backing up for a broken unit or a dead battery. Of course it for that too, but the more important thing is making sure you get the punch no matter how fast you do it. When you puch with Emit, there is never need to doubt if you got the punchig done or not. And you don't need to wait for anything. As a competitor, the absence of waiting aspect is the major difference between these systems. No matter how fast new stick you have, you need to wait and see you get the signal. With (regular) emit you never need to think of it. People who uses mostly SI and Emit only occasionally doesn't seem this see this difference.

Waiting is also big issue with big realys. In last 10-mila (actually 2-mila) there was 200 girls fighting and rying to punch until they let them without puching. Some lost several minutes there. The only reason wasn't the small amount on puch units. It's not easy to punch with SI if you need to keep your stick in a hole for almost a second while ten other competitor are trying to push you away from the unit.

As far as I can see SportIdent system as should not be used for competerive orienteering, because the designg includes this waiting aspect. You could use it for recreational activities. But in real competition only systems without waiting aspect should be used.

And as far as I can see SportIdent system doesn't have any major advantages. You can use Emit a lot like SI style without backup (and with the need to wait and check you got the punch) by using the Emit's touch free mode.

I am not saying Emit system is perfect or even good, but the whole Emit concept is faaaaar better than SportIdent's. And I say SportIdent's concept is quite bad (waiting issue without backup). And it may be the hardware is much more unreliable than Emit's hardware. It's sad to see this unreliable and wrongly designed SI system keeps spreading around the world just because it's already used in so many countries and is used in Sweden. If Swedes made a really bad and unlucky choice some years ago, the rest of the O world doesn't necessarily have to suffer for it, you know.

I hope some wise men/women would start working with this issue instead of this m[i/a]cr-o nonsense.

(But this is just my opinion and I may have missed something, but I am afraid I am right)

C • Wow 13

Indoor track, 12 min (3400m ) + 8 * 300m (~58 sec)

Damn, look's like will loose our 12 min test run bet.

Ice klister rocks!

C • Cool 3

Tejas, ZZ Top, 1976

Unusual tiny tracks and some foot trails to get some ski-o style skating training. Just in case I'll race this winter.

Evening.

C • #2 2

Today's map has some robust hills. A little bit east from Mikkeli.

10-mila preparation continues. Today it was köttbullar med mos och lingonsylt.

C • Busy week... 2

C • Snow melting? 1

Rastivarsat Easter training camp, Latvia & Estonia! There is some free places left! http://www.rastivarsat.fi/web.cgi?sivu=167
Bus trip from Finland, lots of nice maps and trainigs, good company. Ask, if you like to know more.

C • Yes, that was easier... 1

Hell's ditch, Pogues, 1990

Album name would make a good map name.In Norway there is a town called Hell near Trondheim. There is even railway station, Hell's station.

In one of the songs Shane sings with his "clear" voice
"I tried to take a late night piss
But the toiled moved so again I missed"
It made me think of the boat trip to 10-mila, big ship zig-zagging in the middle of the archipelago. Maybe going there isn't bad idea after all?

I have started 10mila preparation with a special diet designed for night orienteering.

Last night I had a glass or two Australian red wine (Moondarra). The grapes were picked at night time to get the wine well balanced for night orienteering. But I am not sure if I drank enough, I didn't get any 'darra' (Finnish slang word for hangover)

Next week I'll go to the local Ikea and have some Swedish meat balls!

AM

I heard yesterday our club will try to get team to 10-mila. Our MTB stars like MTB-WOC winner Mika Tervala will not be availabe, they need to ride world cup elsewhere. This means all male runners in our club who (1) still can remember in which had they used to keep compass when they were young an used to go O races, (2) are reasonably sane, (3) are not too much afraid of darkness or (4)too bored of getting DSQ by SI malfunction or afraid of (5) sailing by boat over the sea and are (6) fit enough to walk couple of hours in forest, must prepare themselvesfor travelling to 10 mila. I am not a top athlete like that, but I have already right 3 out of 6 (1,3 and 5). I'll be working on the 3 missing items and I hope I'll be ready and in out team before the take off.

And we will have strong team again, ten young and sturdy middle aged man like me. We'll aim for top 50 but we will be placed 91.

C • 10-mila 3

12 min test run (Cooper), Liikuntamylly indoor track.
3420 m. (PB = 3730)

My target speed was 3:20 /km (3600m). But it didn't go well. I started all too fast (first two/three laps ~3800 speed), could keep the speed only 6 minutes. There was a lot of runners on track jogging slowly (not any wonder, -19C outside), I had to zig zag quite a bit, it didn't help... my last minutes was very very slow.

Anyway, it was the first track run for years. It should be easy to improve from here.

C • Too difficult? 2

Lappeenranta, round airport, "hippodrome", Skinnarila (map1...) and around Ruohosaari and back

C • Not found... 3

C • Found 1

Lappeenranta - Vihtolan laavu.

Evening jogging.

C • Found it very quickly... 8

C • ...and this one too... 2

Second skate session this winter. Much easier than the first one. It's also nice to be able to start skiing right from the front door.

Easy run with Minna.

C • A lot harder this time... 6

Sunday skiing was my first classic skiing session for ages. Lifting legs felt so painfull yesterday I had to have a rest day. So I used 4 hours (!?) for fixing a charset problem in RG. Special charsets used to work just fine but for some reason it all stopped working last summer. I had done some changes for viewing gps routes. Well, now it works again if you need to have required fonts in your OS/VM.
RG in Hebrew.

C • I found it... 3

There was an article about orienteering in Los Angeles in Suunnistaja (=Orienteer) Magazine. It is O magazine published by Finnish O Federation.

Now most Finnish orienteers know there is orienteering in the US and terrains are pretty cool.

LAOC, Vasquez Rocks article in Suunnistaja magazine

LAOC RouteGadget
(I guess almost nobody reads my log, I better post this as discussionn thread).

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A little bit more about our Spain trip:

Here is our Mijas hike in google earth

One morning we saw dolphins from our balcony while eating breakfast. Too long way to take picture, but I tried anyway.

C • Reading your log 2

I ate lots of cookies and too much cake while playing Carcassonne with some friends. I had to burn some calories to make me feel better. Today's excercise album was:

What's going on, Marvin Gaye, 1971

-12C, blue sky, sunshine...

Waiting for the sun, The Doors, 1968

There is one orienteering song, third track 'Not To Tough The Earth'. Orienteering is running, being at one with the nature and eating lizards, isn't it?

If someone here understand Finnish and likes orienteering computer games, here is one something new (article and link to web site you can download the game/demo for free).

Let love rule, Lenny Kravitz, 1989

FRWD is back! FRWD is now owned by telecom company Elisa. It's one of the biggest telecom companies in Finland, they plan to continue the business as it was and they have hired the old personel again. more in Finnish

Some Spain trip photos

C • Nice pictures! 2

No training today, long day at work.

Jogging with Minna, -18C.

Tattoo You, Rolling Stones, 1981

The rest of my Spain trip GPS tracks and maybe some photos are coming soon.

-18C, it feels terrible after Spain. Better rest and adapt to this weather to not get sick. Makes good also for hamstring I hope.

C • Skiing! 9

Morning run before flight to Helsinki. :-(

Hill paths near Mijas Hippodrome

Climb to Mijas mountain. 3,5 hours, 1,4 hours logged (intensive uphill part).

Mijas Costa hills after sunset with tiny led headlamp (Petzl Tikka plus).