Tålmodighet: Pinseløpene

Rome wasn't built in a day. This training phase, since Easter, has not gone brilliantly. I've had various smaller and bigger challenges but managed to complete most of the planned training. It just hasn't felt good. It's felt like an uphill struggle the whole way.

When I started to ease off training to get ready for the next 2 rounds of the Norwegian Cup BOOM: I immediately got a cold. It was as if my brain -the boss- went: "TFFT! Hey calling all systems, we can all just chill out for a while! First let's give the immune defense department a day or two off, they've really been working overtime the last few weeks."

It wasn't a bad cold but it was enough to stop me in my tracks. I took 3 consecutive rest days to try to get healthy for the long and middle distance races in Løten over Pinsehelg.

It half worked.

Long distance
I was still in denial about this race quite late in the game. The logical parts of my brain (super-Helen) knew that based on how I felt 11k of racing was never going to happen. My "idiot brain" (crazy-Helen) did not want to let it go (the two nicknames I got from LOL's Nicholas Oskarsson this weekend but he is not really the best judge since he also thinks that it's a total scandal that I've never seen the film Lion King). Anyway back to the race.... I prepared and started as if I was going to do the whole thing at full on race pace. After about 3.5k of racing (5 controls) I admitted defeat and started walking. I didn't really know what to do with my day since I had planned to race a long distance... I drifted along walking and jogging until the 7th control and then sat down and tried to figure out what to do next. In the end I just jogged back to the arena. I really hate being sensible but better late than never.

Results 
Splits
GPS tracking

Middle distance
I felt much better but when warming up I thought it might still be too soon. I decided that since we had been bussed miles from the arena and the shortest way back was to run the course I might as well have a crack at it. Like I said: I hate being sensible. Once I started my shape was OK up until towards the end of the race when I started to have problems breathing. Quite a lot of this race was technically scrappy but some parts went really well, especially the long leg to the 10th control, not in Mari's league (noone is at the moment) but I was definitely going well on that part of the course. Too well. Spoilt it by binning 2 min to the 2nd last control.

Results
Splits
GPS tracking

Things are really starting to come together now I just don't have any evidence of that yet in terms of results because the "risk-balance" or "speed-balance" and all the techniques are not quite there yet.

Luckily I have not done my health any more harm by racing the first quarter of a long distance and the whole of a middle distance race and will now do some panic sprint training to prepare for NM sprint next weekend. I will give my body a break from terrain until next Sunday when I will get another chance to try to put together a complete middle distance race.

In other news the weather has turned tropical in Trondheim. :)

Emma, Julie & Turid on 17. mai, Norwegian National Day
Turid is so multi talented that she has even managed to grow an Olav Tryg. statue out of her head.
Kudos.

DAY 198: The first stage, the first 200 days is nearly finished. This stage has been about laying solid foundations or "getting the basics right". In order to build a really tall building you first have to dig a fairly deep hole and so it has been with 1000 days. 

Following my progress over the last 200 days or tbh the last year has probably been a bit like witnessing a car crash in slow motion. Behind the scenes there has been a lot of soul searching and reading books on everything from the neurobiology of emotional control to mind management methods to buddhist philosophy (for real). As interesting and useful as this process has been, what I can conclude is, introspection & DEEP personal growth: I'm really sick of it!! 

I am very happy to finish 200 days of finding solid foundations. I'm now in a good place to start really attacking the problems with my orienteering technique. Stage 2. :)

Jogging in after jacking Elgdilten
Wondering if I can justify softis when I raced less than 4K
Photo by Gro Ellegaard

Karma neutral Sunday: Vårløpet

There's nothing like a road trip with your buddy to a low-key low-fi old school Trønder orienteering race to energize and inspire after a tough training week. After hopping in Øyvind's car it became clear that we would be running the same course (H40 vs. D19-) and therefore we both immediately began to state our excuses (seriously is this somekind of autonomic defense reflex?)

Øyvind had been slightly ill during the week and gone over on his ankle on Thursday. I was a little tired. My excuse sounded a bit weak so I elaborated with an extensive (exagerrated) explanation of all the hard as nails training and work I'd been doing during the last week. 

In the end I beat Øyvind by 3 min. WOOHOO. 

As you can imagine I was very gracious about it.

I did however get my ass kicked by Mari Fasting. The right and proper thing to do after such a kicking is firstly to force Mari to upload her GPS track to 3Drerun and secondly invite her round for dinner so you can a) rebalance the karma after having multiple dinners in a row at her place without returning the favour and b) get her to teach you how she orienteers so damn well. 

Schooled and schooled. Nice. :)

DAY 190: Actually making significant progress. For a start I now have a 3Drerun account. Just 2 weeks ago I was 23 % behind Mari, 16 % down today, I am calling that progress.

Results

Splits

Rough, tough, Trønderland.

Thanks to Siri's tech help we got to see in full glory all the places where Mari kicked my butt.
(And the few millimetres of orienteering where I was marginally superior, in bright green).

Lots of learning for me but my most costly errors, apart from #12 which I've already totally wiped from my memory, were my three really bad route choices (4, 8, 9). However at least I executed two of those shit routes really well. Sometimes it's too late and you just have to: "Love your shit route!" (Sarah Rollins quote?)

One team, one destiny, one insane uniform!

Anchorwoman Kine
Photo from NOF

10mila 2013 with Lillomarka

I had a feeling we could be a top 20 team. Kine had a feeling we could be the 2nd best Norwegian team behind Halden. I was a bit skeptical about that since I knew that Bækkelagets, NTNUi, Fredrikstad and Halden's 2nd team would all be strong. I was confident that we would all give our best effort, have fun and support each other no matter what the result, as Vidar said: one team, one destiny.

With a solid team performance we managed both these goals, finishing 18th. It was a close race all the way with all the aforementioned Norwegian teams but Kine saw them off on the last leg. Our men also ran well to secure 23rd spot, just behind some KOKs. Probably not a good time to make KOK jokes after the rough night they've just had. :(

It was a pleasure to race with Andrine, Siri, Linn & Kine and hang out with the whole Lillomarka gang in our awesome party tent. Of course... I could mention THE CRAZY KIT... well I had an extra layer to protect my modesty in our 100% see through kit. We got some laughs out of it anyway (as did other people!) My own race went OK. After a mistake to the 4th control I ran most of the 2nd leg completely alone in no mans land. But it went fairly smoothly and not too slowly.

DAY 183: Training is starting to go better again after a tough & unstable April with huge medical bills. The problems seem to be mostly behind me & the fog has lifted. Now as my bus pulls into Trondheim (yeah there is even internet on the flybuss these days!), some serious training is waiting...  :)

10mila 2013 website: results etc. We were a GPS team, tracking replays available and find everything you ever wanted to know and more via WorldofO.

Edit: Since writing this post I have been inundated with positive (male) feedback about our outfit. The female opinion has been that it is "insane" "ugly" "clearly designed by men" and that it's an "engangsdrakt" ie you'll never get those mud stains out... we'll test Vanish Oxi action / Daz Ultra / boil washing and you can see the results at Jukola... ;)

Lillomarka's "angelic" ladies
From LOL website

How to deal with a form crash like a mature adult

First and foremost, definitely don't blog about it. Silence is golden. Censor yourself.

All serious orienteers know that blogs are for linking to results, maps, route choices and making bland statements. Mentioning anything remotely negative or personal is like taking your clothes off in public.. and we orienteers... we don't do that... err...
Seriously though.. maybe we could cut down on that part of orienteering?... please?
Swedish race + mixed changing area = scarred retinas

In the unlikely event that someone notices your form crash you can use standard excuses:
"I'm in a hard training period right now."
"Hard session yesterday; today I was running low i2 and focusing on technical execution."

Or more pretentious classics:
"I just didn't have a good feeling"
"I struggled to find my flow"

My preferred strategy is avoidance:
"How was your race?"
"Amazing. The grip on these new VJ bolds is sensational and they're pink so I feel 50% more feminine!"
"Riiight... so where did you finish?"
"Just over there" Point to the finish... (then run away).

NB Not a real conversation, I definitely don't own any pink shoes and I would only ever use the *hilarious* finish joke in the company of Nick Barrable (and we would both laugh heartily).

DAY 165 = 1 week and 3 days left til Norwegian Cup opener in Askim.

I'm a little concerned. The only thing good in my last race was my silky smooth punching technique and in Askim we're going touch-free. Tonight I practiced not punching the controls and... I don't want to brag but that's going prrretty damn well too... but hopefully my physical shape and O-form will make a reappearance soon...
Magisk snuoperasjon underveis...!?

JK 2013: Just be average

I spent Easter racing in the South of England at the JK. The main purpose of the trip was to show my face and show that at DAY 150 I can still orienteer.

Big Jon called it putting a marker down but even that sounded a bit dramatic and ambitious to me. It was still March so I did not invest a lot emotionally but I did feel like I had a bit of a point to prove. The superfit trio of Claire Ward, Tessa Hill and Cat Taylor were unanimously tipped to dominate the whole thing and true to form they took one convincing race victory apiece at the JK. But even if my whole strategy was to "just be average" my results were good enough to signal that I'm still in the mix.

Siri Ulvestad and I tied for 2nd place in the middle distance. It was probably the least technically demanding middle distance course I've ever seen. It was more like a prologue for the long distance than a middle distance. Still, it's only easy when you get it right! There were only two controls on the course presenting any real technical challenge and I lost about half a minute on each of them! But the rest of the course I did my ordinary orienteering routine. Ordinary average stuff when done little by little adds up to give you a good outcome and meant I got flowers to take home to my brother's lovely fiance, in return for cake. :)

Finishing the long distance. No top gear and a lonely mental fight

The long distance was more of a struggle. I had to fight for concentration the whole way and started to mentally check out from about halfway. To the 20th control I lost contact, binned 2 min and dropped from a clear 3rd place to 5th. Still 5th place was enough for 3rd overall. I was a long way behind new JK Champion Cat Taylor and 2nd place Claire Ward but 3rd overall actually equals my best ever JK overall result in W21E and I'm very happy with that.

It all looked promising for the relay with our MAROC Women's Trophy team all on the podium, Jenny Ricketts 1st in W16A, Rhona McMillan 2nd in W18E and me 3rd in W21E. Unfortunately Rhona was carrying an injury and was advised to pull out. Jessica Mason stepped in and ran the 1st leg, we were not so competitive but I was happy to wimp out and have a bit cruisier run on Easter Monday, I'm a bit risk averse at this time of year. We finished 13th, bit of an anti climax but a nice relaxed new start with my new UK club and great potential for the future.

I went to the JK thinking no heroics "just be average" and I've come away with average performances, a little above average in the middle distance and a little below average in the long. So in that sense it went perfectly to plan!

Now it's one month til the season starts back home in Norway and things will count for a bit more...because Siri and I need to have a re match to find out who is the alpha orienteer in our flat... with some additional competition from K Steiw. I could easily be only the 3rd best in my flat!! I'm going to need to be more than average!! Huge motivation to train on. ;)

JK 2013 website with links to results, splits, routegadget, all that stuff..

Middle distance flowers: me, Siri & Claire

Orienteers on a plane

Camp Norway: it sounds like it could be an environmental focus group or perhaps a Viking theme night at London nightspot G.A.Y. but in fact it’s an orienteering training camp. I’ve been on two previous installments of Camp Norway, in Halden and Kristiansand but this time we were off to Turkey! On a flight full of orienteers! Norwegian orienteers on a plane: the movie version of which would have been even less commercially successful than that 2006 Samuel L Jackson “classic” Snakes on a plane, despite the wall-to-wall beautiful people (plus me and Torben) mainly due to the niche dialogue (GPS analysis mainly) and lack of a central love story (despite significant matchmaking efforts by Torben and Isa).

Camp Norway is an initiative whereby the Norwegian team have a training camp somewhere and it’s arranged so that the sessions, controls, effort and thought processes that go into putting on high quality training for the National team can also be used by club teams.

So well organised that they even provided orienteering porn in the bedrooms!
Photo creds to the Grassieman.

All the inside info on the ridiculously well-organised Camp Norway can be found here, including maps, GPS tracking, GPS analyses, a presentation on how to do more with your GPS analyses, results, photos and propaganda. Just remember.. if you study that stuff... keep in mind.. and this is very important.. not everyone was trying all the time, not always pushing full speed. Many athletes were often just cruising, perhaps intensity 3.. well more like i2 really.. actually hardly even i2… probably only low i2…

I’m not ashamed to admit that on several occasions I was trying to orienteer as fast as possible! Sometimes (once, at Gebiz) I was trying so hard I could taste blood (only a slight exaggeration). But most of the time my orienteering technical skills were much too slow for that level of physical effort. During the camp I did 12 orienteering sessions including two WRE races. I’ll sum up each race in 3 words:

Sprint: Depressingly mediocre throughout. 

Results Splits GPS & maps

Middle: Good, bad, ugly.

Results Splits GPS & maps

STATUS at DAY 118 / 1000:

Physical: My body seems to tolerate the training load better than ever before. I’ve done a lot of general exercise and easy/ moderate running during the last few months which has served as a good base and now I’m seeing the benefits of the extra strength as I start to do some higher intensity training.

Technical: Things are coming together but I haven’t found the right balance for racing yet, I’m either too cautious (the sprint race in Turkey) or too aggressive (the middle race). Neither approach produces particularly good flow, and even when things click, it’s not sustainable for more than about 15 minutes. Luckily I have a couple more training camps coming up to help strengthen my O-routines.

Happy St. David's Day! (Not the 17. mai).

Mental: The most important element, without a robust and resilient mind your physical and technical preparation may not count for much in the heat of the battle. This is also the area where I've made the biggest improvements over the last two years and lately I've found the strategies I've learnt through sport can help in other areas of life. If you are actually proactive and use them! I have to keep working with this area, especially in times when life gets stressful but things are calming down which means I have a lot more energy available for physical and technical training, enjoying my day job, friendships, a fun new home life and being back in Trondheim to celebrate my National Day!

Finding my way / Off the beaten track

My inbox is asking: "Where the foux du fafa are you Palmer? It's day 90, what's happening with 1000 days? I want stories!" Well OK, here are some stories sprinkled with my usual brand of deep insight.... ;)

En route to New Zealand - after a delicious few days in England with my family - I experienced orienteering in Hong Kong and Australia. Taking in the Hong Kong Sprint & Middle Champs and some cool maps near Beechworth, Victoria: including Kangaroo Crossing and Rowdy Flat. I had a brilliant time but also picked up a respiratory tract infection. Less prima-donna translation: a slight scratchy / sore throat. 

Hindsight is 20/20. Things often seem like a good idea at the time. At the time I thought I played it pretty safe in Australia but in the warmth and my excitement I misjudged my limits. The infection spread to my chest and knocked me out the World Cup races in New Zealand. I did make an attempt to compete in the sprint distance races in Wellington, arguably another misjudgement. My qualifier felt bad but I finished a solid 17th= (1:25 back). I applied the same deluded enthusiasm in prep for the final & got myself fairly relaxed and focused but my formkurve had plummeted to null. I was physically even weaker and my orienteering toolbox contained only blunt objects. Imagine a Swiss army knife but made out of plasticine and pipe cleaners by an intoxicated, one-armed monkey.... No offence to amputee monkeys but the course was technically and physically demanding. To tackle it I needed the most shiny, sophisticated Victorinox not flaccid Play-Doh from the Early Learning Centre. If obscure metaphors don't work for you (a) this is not the blog for you and (b) the short version is that I finished in last place (40th), eons behind Tove (8 min, in a sprint race... Ouch).

My illness dragged on without much improvement. Then an orienteering goddess (or let's be honest THE orienteering goddess) said "What are you doing? You look like s***!! Get your a$$ to a doctor!" Well, those may not have been her exact words but... moreorless... Anyway this was a turning point! I responded quickly to antibiotics, gained some energy and could start training, at first only at lower intensities but after 2 weeks off even that felt incredible! I'm running! I'm breathing!! How amazing is this!?!! :)

The British team were self-help and mostly committed-orienteering-couples. Rather than be a third-wheel I traveled the North Island with the 2-strong Canadian team: tiny bundle of loveliness Carol Ross and giant sporty action hero Will Critchley. Well-looked-after by my "team orphans" teammates and drugged-up on Roxithromycin I continued to recover and ran some O-races including the Morrison's brilliant Sprint the Bay. I'm still perplexed at how the fudge they pulled that thing off. It's a bit like the Tour de Trondheim but that's organised by the NTNUi-O-gruppa-army and has 3 races in 3 days. This was 6 in 3 and mainly a 2-man-effort! Outstanding!!

One adventure-filled week later I arrived at the WILD South Island Championships at Rotoiti aka NATIVE BUSH INSANITY. There were moments when I was unsure if I would ever finish the middle distance, 4.6 km took me 91 minutes!! A feat even more impressive than my 28 min sprint final in Wellington! In comparison, the following day I got round the long distance in a rapid 88 min after a long hard think about how to orienteer.

As well as lots of orienteering I've spent time off the beaten track being silly with good friends. Chris & Emily have introduced me to the fine Kiwi art of tramping and we made this mini movie of our little adventure. Now, this thing is a self indulgent 11 min long so I feel like I need to include a WARNING before you commit that kind of time....It's been called "mesmerizing" by.. noone. It's been called "quite good" by one close friend, the budget was 2 x AA batteries and a trip to New World (supermarket) and it contains some mild nudity, mostly male & avian nudity. Yes avian nudity is a real thing.. I just googled it and found a full frontal of a naked eagle.. there's nothing that graphic in our vid, I promise. Also it won't work in all countries because of the music.. but for you lucky ones (?) here it is!