Wednesday 31 July 2013

Back to Reality

     After 42 day in Europe I will be flying home tomorrow August 1st to Winnipeg where I hope to compete in the WCOC’s http://www.orienteering.mb.ca/WCOC2013/ if my knee is up for the challenge. It has been a very enjoyable past 42 days in Europe with tons of great orienteering races and trainings on unique terrains. I feel I have brought my orienteering abilities to a whole new level. My goal was to improve my orienteering technique and I think I have succeeded which is exciting for COC’s this fall in Hamilton where I hope to be fighting for gold in all three disciplines.

I      was unable to compete in Day 5 of Bubo Cup due to a severe knee contusion and missed all five days of OOCup because of the same injury. I went to the University Medical Centre in Ljubljana Slovenia to make sure nothing was broken or cracked in my knee and the doctor said I was lucky nothing was broken because there was a lot of swelling. I was given crutches and sent on my way. I was impressed with how fast the emergency service was, in and out in 3 hours. After a week of rest my knee is doing very well and healing faster than expected. I can see and feel improvement on a daily basis. There is a good chance I will be healthy enough to compete in the WCOC’s despite my right leg being weak and out of shape after not using it for a week. I expect my leg to bounce back quickly and despite it being a bit out of shape/weak I think I will do just fine. My bigger worry will be fighting off jet lag. I arrive late Thursday, August 1st and will be racing the Middle Saturday, Aug 3rd followed by the Long and Sprint Sunday and Monday respectably. This is not much time for my body to adjust its internal time clock and recuperate after a very full day of travel but I think I will manage just fine.
 
Lets go tot he top! I didn't make it out of the parking lot. Near the top of Mangart Mountain (as far as we could drive)

Mangart Mountain on the Boarder of Slovenia and Italy

Sheep near the top of Mangart Mountain

Some random lake in Italy we past driving to Ljubljana


Trebon Center
Trebon

Train on,
Damian

Monday 22 July 2013

Bubo Cup Day 4

     Day 4 of Bubo Cup was held high up on the Bisaga map. I decided to walk the course today which was a bad decision because my knee was very sore and even worse after the course. It was very unique and difficult terrain today, so it’s too bad I couldn't run. The ground was uneven, rocky and steep so it was not easy to walk on (or run on I guess). The only upside to today was that since it was so high up the temperature was cooler, around 22C. I finished the course and I wasn't last!  I placed 22/25 if it even matters. I may have to go to the hospital tomorrow to remove some fluid from my knee if it doesn't improve (so I was told by the paramedics today). I will probably walk to the start tomorrow to pick up my map but will not start. I will try to make it to the start even though its painful to even walk now.

My route (some mistakes because I questioned why I was out there and stopped paying attention)

My swollen knee, looks worse in person
View from our camping spot

Train on (well actually off),
Damian

Sunday 21 July 2013

Bubo Cup Day 3

     Today was day 3 of Bubo Cup at Vipava at 1:4000. The sprint race was held in the village of Vipava. It was very warm 32C. My goal was top 5 yesterday before my knee started to really hurt later at night after falling and smashing it on a rock during the race yesterday. I thought nothing of it and expected it to be fine. Well it wasn't fine, it was very sore before my start and I thought about seriously not racing. Well I put some topical pain cream on it and started. I didn't think a top 5 was possible anymore but during the race I didn't feel it hurting much. I ended up having a very good race with two bad routes and a few hesitations. I lost 5 sec on #2 because of a bad route choice, 3 sec on #8-bad route, few seconds on #9-going too slow and 5 sec on #18- too careful and hesitated going though the small passageway. I ended up 3rd/30, 18 sec out of first and 10 sec out of second place. My knee is was very sore after the race and I have been icing it all night. I will see if I start tomorrow...
     We spend the morning enjoying the Adriatic Sea. The relatively cold water was good for my sore knee. I spent most of my time there soaking my knee in the water of sitting in the shade because it was very warm.
Bubo Cup Day 3 Sprint July 21, 13

Photo: Martin Tichy


Photo: Martin Tichy

Adriatic Sea

Train on,
Damian

Saturday 20 July 2013

Bubo Cup Day 2

     Day 2 of Bubo Cup was held across the road from day 1 on the Postojnska jama map. It was another good race for me with fewer mistakes than yesterday. Although I made fewer mistakes they were very dumb ones. I wasn’t reading the map enough going to #1 (I was mostly just running haha). I made one really stupid route choice to #4 that was slightly unintentional and was standing above #13 and didn’t see the control so ran to another depression to relocate and came back to the same spot I was in and finally saw the control. We did some more sightseeing this afternoon and visited the Rakov Skocjan cave. Day 3 tomorrow is a sprint in the village of Vipava which will be held in the late afternoon. I am looking forward to the race tomorrow and I am hoping for a top 5 finish!
 
Day 2 Postojnska jama July 20, 13
 
Outside the Rakov Skocjan cave
 
Ouside the Rakov Skocjan cave
 
Inside the Rakov Skocjan cave
 
 
Train on,
Damian

Friday 19 July 2013

Bubo Cup Day 1

     Today was day 1 of Bubo Cup on the Magdalena map. The scale was 1:7500 which I thought would be a problem for me to get use to but I had no problems with it at all. The terrain was very different than what I was used to from Czech Republic. It was a bit of a shock to see so many deep depressions. There were lots of rocks, cliffs and deep depression with some hills. If you lost contact it was very hard to determine what depressions was which on the map.  The ground was very uneven and rocky which made it difficult to run fast. I did fairly well with a few stupid mistakes right near the control, it was hard to pick out what rocks were mapped in some places. I got very confused going to #13 where I swear there was another trail. It was a really warm day around 26C. I Placed 11/22. After the race we went sightseeing to the Predjamski Castle and the Planina cave which are well known in Slovenia. Day 2 tomorrow will be in relatively the same location with very similar terrain as today but with a bit more green and less rock detail.

Results: http://www.orienteeringonline.net/Results.aspx?CompetitionID=816
 
Bubo cup Day 1 July 19, 13

Predjamski Castle

Entrance to the Planina cave

Train on,
Damian

Monday 15 July 2013

HSH Cup Satge 3

     Yesterday was the final stage of the HSH Cup (stage 3). It was a longer middle distance chasing start. I had another pretty good race, with a few small mistakes. I placed 14th/43 on the stage and 11th/53 overall. I am now back in Trebon for some training before I go to Slovenia for the last two competitions (Bubo Cup and OOCup) before I fly home. Time for some rest and some light training.

Stage 3 results:
http://www.obchrast.com/2013/07-HSH/fanda/results/botas2013/E3/index.html#class_H21E
Overall results: http://www.obchrast.com/2013/07-HSH/fanda/results/botas2013/E123-results.html

                                                         Approaching the last control                     Photo:Tereza Tichy
 
                                                                     Finish sprint                                    Photo:Tereza Tichy

HSH Cup Stage 3 July 14, 13
 
Accommodation during HSH Cup

Train on,
Damian


Saturday 13 July 2013

HSH Cup Stage 2

     Today was stage 2 of the HSH Cup at VRATIC. It was a long distance is some tricky terrain with lots of streams, wet ditches and vegetation detail. It was another decent race for me with a few more mistakes than yesterday. My legs were pretty tired today so on the long trail runs I couldn’t run as fast as I would have liked to. It was also not as flat as I thought considering I had 180m climb. I placed 12th out of 51 runners. Tomorrow is the chasing start which is a longer middle distance (9.3km, 150m).  After the race tomorrow we will be driving to Trebon and training there until Wednesday or Thursday when we will drive to Slovenia for Bubo Cup and OOCup.
Results: http://www.obchrast.com/2013/07-HSH/fanda/results/botas2013/E2/index.html#class_H21E


HSH Cup Stage 2 July 13, 13

Train on,
Damian

Friday 12 July 2013

Night "O"/HSH Cup

     Yesterday night was a night “O” at CECHRICE which was very challenging.  My course H21 was 8.2 km. It was raining and fairly chilly which added to the challenge of orienteering at night. I found it hard to read the map while running and plan ahead because you have to navigate from 10m ahead of you at most. Luckily I got to use a friend’s headlamp that was way brighter than mine so that made it easier to orienteer than if I had to use my dinky one. It was a good race besides being slow and unsure in spots and one not so great route choice on the long leg at the end but that was partly because my map was wet and falling apart. I placed 4th out of probably 27 runners.

     Today was Stage 1 of the HSH Cup near Vysočina which was a middle distance at SPORYS. It was another great race for me where I maybe lost 1 min total, spread out on a number of control. I believe I placed 15th out of 50 runners in a very strong H21E category. Results will be here when they are available: http://www.obchrast.com/nz.php?nzid=977&co=6
Tomorrow is a long distance and should be another great race. My course will be around 11 km but it is very flat and fast, so it shouldn't be too painful.

Night Race July 11,13
Stage 1 HSH Cup July 12, 13
Train on,
Damian

Thursday 11 July 2013

Olomouc Training Camp

     For the past four days I was training around Olomouc with some Canadian and American juniors. It was a great few days of training as I got to train on some of the maps used for WOC 2008. Since I have arrived in Europe I have been orienteering everyday which is starting to catch up with me. I am feeling pretty tired but today is kind of a rest day until tonight when I have a night race which is going to be 8.2 km. I hope my dinky light will be sufficient because I don’t think they make the courses easier here in Europe for a night O. After the night O I am racing in the HSH cup Friday (middle distance), Saturday (long distance) and Sunday (chasing start/longer middle) near the town of Vysočina. After the HSH Cup I am travelling back to Trebon for some training and then I am driving to Slovenia for the Bubo Cup and OOCup.
 
 
Training #1 Sunday AM
Training #2 Monday AM
Training #3 Monday PM
Training #4 Tuesday AM (WOC 2008 Middle Qualification)
Training #5 Tuesday PM (WOC 2008 Middle Qualification)
Training #6 Wednesday AM
 
 
Train on,
Damian

Saturday 6 July 2013

End of JWOC Tour

      JWOC and the JWOC Tour wrapped up today with the relay where both the women’s and men’s teams won gold which was amazing to see.
 
     Stage 4 was at Certovy Skryse and was a true middle distance. In short it was not a great race for me. It was a really tough map with tons of rock detail and many rocks that were not mapped because they were slightly too small.

     Stage 5 was a sprint in the town center of Hradec Kralove. I had a good race but sadly lost around 30s near the end because I miss read the impassible walls. I also might have chosen the wrong route here but it is hard to say since I made a mistake on the leg. I placed 7th out of 47, 40 seconds back of first. It was raining lightly which made the cobblestone pretty slippery but it was a bigger challenge to avoid running into other competitors when reading the map as there were people running in every direction.
     Stage 5 was a chasing start, long distance race at Koliba. I started in 13th spot but could have started around 10th if I had made my start on time at stage 2. I ended up in 12th passing one guy who started before me (the winner of the sprint distance). I placed 12th on the stage and 12th overall out of 46. It was a fairly clean race despite four 1 min mistakes. I am still happy with the race as it was tricky flat terrain.
     Tomorrow I am off to Olomouc for a training camp on the maps that were used for WOC 2008. We will have one training Sunday and two trainings a day until Wednesday. After that I am competing Thursday in the HSH Cup starting with a night race.

Stage 4 Certovy Skryse Middle 
 Results: http://www.jwoctour.cz/upload/live/tour/resultsclasss4.txt


Stage 5 Hradec Kralove Sprint
Results: http://www.jwoctour.cz/upload/live/tour/resultsclass.txt


Post race Hradec Kralove


Stage 6 Koliba Chasing Start Long 

Results: http://www.jwoctour.cz/upload/live/tour/resultss6.txt

Wednesday 3 July 2013

JWOC Tour

     Yesterday was Stage 2 of the JWOC Tour at LESNI HRBITOV and was considered to be an extended middle distance. For the first time ever I missed my start. I miss read my bib and thought I started 10 minutes later than I actually did. I realized it and started 3:04 late. It was another good race until the end when I made some stupid mistakes and a slow route choice. It was not a very good run even if you minus the time I missed my start by.

     Today was Stage 3 at ZAVORA SEVER. It was considered to be a shortened long distance. Really rocky terrain that was difficult to run in and navigate to the right rock. It was a really good race considering how hard it was. I placed 7th out of 42. Tomorrow is a true middle distance race in the same type of terrain so it should be very technically challenging.

     Yesterday I got vaccinated for tick borne encephalitis which is a viral infection transmitted by ticks which apparently can be quite bad. There are lots of ticks here that are very small and hard to see to get off of you so I thought it was a good idea to get the vaccination. My arm was pretty sore today and I might have been a bit more tired than usual but I don’t think the vaccination affected my physical performance much, if at all.


JWOC Tour Stage 2 July 2, 2013

Stage 2 results: http://www.jwoc2013.cz/upload/live/tour/resultE2_class_final.txt


JWOC Tour Stage 3 July 3, 2013
 
Stage 3 results: http://www.jwoctour.cz/upload/live/tour/resultsclass.txt

Monday 1 July 2013

European Tour

After arriving in Prague I raced the Czech middle distance championships the next morning and was very tired for racing. I ended up doing alright considering my situation. For the next week I was training twice a day in the northeast of the country in the area that JWOC is being held in. During the whole week of training I logged over 13 hours of orienteering for a total of over 80km! It was a tough week of training on some of the hardest and most enjoyable maps in Czech Republic. Today was the first stage of the JWOC Tour which was a long distance race on KOLCARKA. I ran H21E which was 12.5 km and 450 m climb. It was a nice day for orienteering and a fun map to run on. I had a very good race with almost no mistakes, if I had only just been able to see one control. I ended up in 8th place out of 43.

Map +Route


Results:
http://www.jwoctour.cz/upload/live/tour/resultssplits.txt

Drabovna map