Thursday, August 19, 2010

29 days out of home!

It's been by far the longest journey in my life. It began on 19th July...

Day 1
Train to Gdynia. Waiting for Olej. Shopping in Tesco. Pizza in DaGrasso. Sleeping at AP's house.

Day 2
Ferry to Karlskrona. Michael (from Nybro OK) takes us to their clubhouse. Wow! We've already been there (Baltic Junior Cup 2008).

Day 3
The best O-training in my life! Normal course, Swiss game, in and out, contours and corridor. Just see how close to the control (a piece of toilet paper) I was during the 'Swiss game' part of the map! Then, sauna in the evening;)

Day 4
In the morning a middle distance course. I was very satisfied with my orienteering. In the afternoon we decided to check if the BJC 2008 mixed relay terrain was really so difficult and we made sure it was NOT. It means that we were poor some 22 months ago...

Day 5
Finally reaching Örebro for O-Ringen! Unfortunately, no tehcnical training, because the map was miserable and it cost 50 SEK. Exaggeration!

Day 6
Short physical training with Photo Orienteering as a part of it. Really nice to look for some small features in the city centre;)

Day 7
1st stage of O-Ringen. 10,7km. 92:34. Started quite good, but lost concentration after some stick stuck in my shoe near the 4th control. What's more, the map near the 8th control seemed just impossible to read for me... Afterwards wrong direction and not using the path on the long leg to the 12th one.

Day 8
2nd stage. 4,2km. 44:10. Great time, wasn't it? I spent so much time walking in the green area just before the 7th control that my only dream was to finish the course since that moment. Obviously, I didn't manage to avoid making mistakes later on...

Day 9
3rd stage. 11,4km. 99:07. Technically, the first half of the course went relatively well. Then, Gustav Bergman caught me at the 8th control and I took advantage of him towards the 12th control. I could have followed him till the end, but I decided to make my own race and let him go. Suddenly, I started to feel dizzy and terribly exhausted. I had problems walking on my own legs during the last part of the course...

Day 10
At last a day off! Generally, we did nothing. We only tried a combination of badminton and tennis - called speedminton.

Day 11
4th stage. 11,3km. 77:23. Certainly, it was my best performance at this year's O-Ringen. 36th place....... Matthias Kyburz caught me at the end of the long leg to the 15th control and showed me how to orienteer in this type of terrain. He is fucking fast, I must say! However, he lost some time to the 18th control and I kept my 'lead' till the finish line. Half a loaf is better than no bread;)

Day 12
5th stage. Handicap. 11,4km. 106:55. There was no transport to the arena because we were told it was within walking distance from the camping. Yeah... more than half an hour to the event centre, 2,5km to the start, almost 2 hours in the forest and more than 30 minutes of coming back. I had enough! My race? From the very beginning my only wish was to reach the finish line.
In the afternoon to Karlskrona by car and then a night ferry to Gdynia. At last!

Day 13
Waiting some long hours in McDonald's for the beginning of the official JWOC 2011 training camp.
And the first technical training. It seemed to be nothing special, but for me it was like salvation. I regained my lost motivation and power in my legs - brilliant!

Day 14
Morning: quite a long course on a map with scale 1:15000. The course included nice butterflies.
Afternoon: map with contours only. Unfortunately, there was no control flags in the forest - ridiculous... And the funny thing, I was sure I found controls no. 42, 38 and 37, but realized I had not after I got completely lost on my way towards the 43rd control. The biggest and most long-lasting parallel mistake in my life!

Day 15
M: a classic race. Our goal was to run the even controls fast and to rest at the odd ones. Very nice, but horribly exhausting training session!
A: some short and boring course in a flat terrain.

Day 16
M: middle distance with lots of butterflies. I could not understand the terrain properly. Fortunately, there is still much time to learn before JWOC 2011;)
A: just some stretching with all the people and taking rest before tomorrow's looong.

Day 17
M: 13,6km. I took this training very seriously, as a competition. I felt really well during the whole course and my technique was close to perfect. I only regret misinterpreting the map at the end of the longest leg and losing some time at controls no. 4 and 15 due to some new fences in the terrain.
A: a very interesting lecture with dr Jeremi Ściepurko. Really worth listening to!

Day 18
M&A: 2 technical training sessions in flat terrains. I started understanding this kind of terrain much better and feel more self-confident right now;)

Day 19
M: middle distance on a map with no tracks. We were bound to run with a competition pace. Unfortunately, I had problems understanding the map in some places and lost far too much time. Nevertheless, my running speed was promising;)
A: sprint in Rumia. I know this map well, cause I took part in some competition there in April this year. So it was only about the fast legs and Papuś was faster by 6 seconds that day.

Day 20
M: I wanted to run the long distance course that day. However, I was forced to make it shorter, because I had a really bad day and was not able to focus on map reading.
A: sprint in Wejherowo. The map quality is ridiculous... Furthermore, we had some closed gates and had to run around or climb up the fences. Moreover, I found a new gate in the terrain (while going to the 2nd control), by sheer coincidence. After all, the sprint was very nice and I had a really good race despite all the adversities.

Day 21
First legs training. Unfortunately, the controls situated in the forest weren't proper to set an interesting and FAIR course. I was far behind Olej already after the first double forking, but didn't give up. However, after losing plenty of time near the 106th control (where the map was just awful!) I decided to jog...
Afterwards the whole team left us and it was only me, Nati and Olej who decided to spend 2 more days in the JWOC 2011 terrain.

Day 22
M: I had a nice freestyle technical training with Olej. I was in my element while running in this forest.
A: We had a short course on a 1:15000 map 'Rogulewo' drawn by AP for us. I couldn't find the appropriate rhythm during this training session.

Day 23
In the morning Nati set controls in the forest for me and Olej. Thanks to her we had an opportunity to take part in a nice memory training. 2 times 3 courses with 2 controls on each of them.
Just after it we picked Hewi from Gdańsk and started our journey to Baniocha, because... Jolanta was organising a party there. It was a fancy dress ball and I decided to be an unemployed;) The party was outstanding!

Day 24
You should know what people tend to do after parties;-)

Day 25
We made our way to Przeworsk in order to take part in this year's GP Polonia.
On the very same day we competed in the 1st Unofficial World Orienteering Championships of Tied Couples. My partner was Nati and we became vicechampions! Incredible success:)

Day 26
1st stage of GPP. I made an enormous mistake (just the same as last year) and lost chances of winning the competition. However, I decided not to give up and finished 2nd in men's elite. Funny;)
In the late afternoon there was a sprint qualification race. I agreed to run in my 'unemployed' shoes (from Jolanta's party) and proved that shoes do not run, because I achieved the 3rd place only some 6 seconds behind the leader, Hewi.

Day 27
2nd stage of GPP. I just loved that forest! It was flat, only with some small hills and the runnability was brilliant. I made an average performance, losing only 1'35 to Włodar - nice!
In the evening the time came for the sprint final. The course was very tricky and interesting. Because of that I took wrong route choices 2 times and lost more than 40 seconds. I should have been angry at myself, but I wasn't, because my speed was awesome that day (winning 5 out of 10 splits) and I lost only 22 seconds to the unbeatable winner, Włodar.

Day 28
Last stage of GPP - sprint. Men's elite class was the last one to start that day, so we had a great opportunity to have a good laugh waiting some 2 hours for our start. The course was really demanding and I made an awful mistake while running to the 7th control, because I didn't see the black wall and had to turn back. Moreover, number '7' is situated in a wrong place on a map, because I thought that a gate under this number would be open... Nevertheless, my time loss to the leader was huge (14 mins) and my time advantage over the 3rd place was big (6mins), so my only goal was to finish the course not being disqualified. Somehow I managed;)
Then, I was ready for the bus journey to Łódź. That night I slept at grandma's.

Day 29
Finally, back at home!!!