The most demanding sprint race in my career?

I think there's no need to write about all the things from the past. I should have plenty of time to describe all the races, trainings and O-adventures since 19th April. Moreover, these hoary old chestnuts aren't interesting  any more!

Now I am in the beautiful city of Alicante in warm Spain. Only some hours are left before my first start in World University Orienteering Championships. I skipped the yesterday's long distance race and today I am going to compete in the sprint competition.

The preparations went quite OK for me - I managed to avoid any serious injuries or training breaks. I did some really good sprint training sessions. Obviously, it might have been better - like always... However, I feel pretty well prepared, I am healthy, I feel no pain. My last tough physical training took place 5 days ago, so my muscles aren't sore and I am ready to take the challenge!

The first man starts at 16:30, the last one at 18:10 (regards, 'cwelu'!), whereas my start is at 17:24. One of the main favourites - the Czech guy, Stepan Kodeda - starts one minute behind me. I would love not to be overtaken by him. I will do my best! I have a really good attitude and am looking forward to running an interesting course in the sprint paradise, called Alicante.

The prestart area is on the top of the Santa Barbara castle - amazing place! The course is 2,8km and includes as much as 135m of climb! 20% of the race is going to take place in some (probably hilly) parks and the other 80% in the city alleys. I just have to leave these parks as soon as possible and then I'll be in my element!

P.S. I totally recommend: http://biegnaorientacje.pl/!

Jeg suger kuk.

That's one of the most important Norwegian expressions and it means 'I have been to the shower'. ;)

There were some highlights of the preseason after coming home from Portugal. Let me write something about them.

'The fat wixxxa, Agata and Witek's sweet 18th' - got a bit cold afterwards and had problems with my Achilles tendon. 2 in 1 is always better than 1 in 1 :)

Short camp with Raumar in Dresden (Germany) - 4 trainings and 2 competitions in just 3 days. 63km altogether, quite exhausting, must admit... I managed to take the 2nd place in unofficial German Night Champs (not really championships, but the most important night competition in Germany throughout a year). However, the O-performance was quite poor during the race.

Mixed long course in Barkowice - a very nice and fast technical training. Well... technical might be a too big word. Physical, let's say :)

Mecsek Kupa in Hungary - a two-day competition with WRE long distance as the second stage. 14,8km and 710m of climb. Not yet prepared for that kind of challenge!

Polish University Cross-Country Championships - didn't feel well before the race (some stomach problems), but tried to do my best and had a very steady and solid race. 32nd place (4 places up comparing to the last year's result). The course was the same, but the weather was much worse, awful!

TIOcamp in Sweden with Raumar - great chance to develop technically (it was my main focus). I am really satisfied with the technical shape in Sweden. I am not sure if the terrain was easier than the ones I had tried orienteering in Sweden earlier or I've just become a better orienteer in this type of Scandinavian terrain? Hope it's the second version.

How to do it?

NIGHT


                                                                                         DAY

How to mess it up?

Unfortunately, I got a bit ill due to freezing weather and icy marshes there in Sweden. I took 3 days off and on Friday I had my first easy jog. On Sunday I competed in the 10k street race. Nice topic for another post;-) Afterwards I headed for Szklarska Poręba for a short physical camp with Dominik and in just some days the first nice 3-day competition in Poland is about to begin. Really looking forward to it!

Har du røyka sokka dine?

The title is one of the most useful Norwegian expressions (apart from morra di) I managed to learn some days ago. The time between 16th and 26th February I spent in an orienteering PARADISE called Portugal! What's more, it was my first camp with my new Scandinavian club - Raumar Orientering.

Some facts about Raumar:

• all of them can easily speak English
• they fight to get as many 'silly points' as possible
• the head coach Ståle is one of the funniest and most spontaneous coaches in the world
• his daughter Caroline is as crazy as possible
• Torben is a Facebook maniac and listens to all kinds of music (try it loud from 2:02)
• the taller Eirik is a sprint specialist and behaves quite similar to Jacek M.
• Alex (newcomer from Germany) used to be fast like a shark (5000m in 13:38 - eee?!).

In Portugal:

• I ate the most expensive dinner in my life (16,5€), but not the tastiest one...
• we slept in a *** and a **** hotel (with no hot water, from time to time)
• we had a nice photo session at the Atlantic Ocean.

Portuguese O-training diary:

16 II - arrival, just a short jog and some stretching

17 II - long distance training (map), my time limit was 75mins, so I had to shorten the course a bit, running slowly all the time, the terrain was covered with stones, rocks, stones and rocks and stones, didn't manage to find the 29th control, wrong direction, loser!

middle distance training (map), I was supposed to run fast and I tried to, however, it was not that easy due to huge climbs and dense vegetation, awful mistake to the 8th control...

18 II - POM long (map), not allowed to run fast, so I focused on my O-technique, had problems finding the 12th control (a really tricky one!), apart from that - I handled the terrain quite well;

POM night sprint (map), congratulations to the course setter! the 3rd and 4th controls were very interesting, I managed to spot the right route choice to the 3rd one, but got caught at the next one - I should have gone the way I had begun to run and then up the stairs, really difficult to notice while running at full speed! all the way I had problems with my headlamp, which did literally everything to get out of my head... 5th place - nice one;)

19 II - POM middle (map), my aim for this race was to run the 3rd, 6th, 9th (and so on...) fast, I succeeded in winning 4 (out of 6) these splits, to the 6th I took the wrong route choice, I think, and to the 12th one I went too much down... ridiculous mistake to the 10th control (the slow one!), I realised that I found the 14th control (instead of the 10th one), but was not able to find the 10th one anyway...

night training (map), this forest was a real jungle! the mistakes to the 29th and 4th one shouldn't be named 'mistakes', just look at the 12-16 part, I think it's a big favourite to win the AMBA of the year 2012 competition;-) funny that I got to know about a different map scale only at the end of the course...

20 II - POM middle WRE (map), it was the most important competition of POM for me (for all, I think), I could not find the right rhythm at the beginning, then I caught a good flow until the spectator control, afterwards I got really tired, stopped thinking and lost almost 4mins on the last loop, shit happens.

sprint training (map), if you had had no control descriptions, you just shouldn't have entered this training session, I got disqualified at the 11th control (not the right side of the fence, even if I had checked it, strange...) and made a huge mistake to the 14th one, almost all of us had problems finding the entrance to the 16th control from the street (it was funny looking at the others' confusion there:))

21 II - POM long, chasing start (map), the most interesting course and terrain of the whole stay, I think, fortunately, I ran at low speed, so I could easily see all the features in the terrain, had only problems on my way to the very 1st control because of the aforementioned low speed (I just couldn't recognize the distance), moreover, much more stones in the terrain there than on the map;

sprint training (map), another amazing city for a sprint distance! unfortunately, the map was wrong in the area of the 3rd control (at the bottom of the stairs), very bad route choice to the 4th control (not planned before...), the rest of the course went flawlessly.

22 II - leaving Viseu (rocky mountains area) and moving forward to Quiaios (sand dune area)

technical training (map), Vetle made the courses for us, there were no controls in the forest, so we had to be really concentrated all the time, only some minor problems;)

23 II - Quiaios Hotel relay (map), I ran the 2nd leg in Raumar's 'foreign' team, managed to jump up 8 places, forgot to start my Garmin watch and realised it just after leaving the 7th control and then a huge mistake to the 8th one - seems so easy to lose concentration (watch out later in the season!), the terrain was incredibly fast! note that Scott Fraser ran this course (6,6km) in 30:30, I did it a bit (4mins) slower;)

middle distance training (map), one of the most pleasant training sessions, such a nice terrain it was! use your compass and have fun:) I had!

24 II - contours (map), my favourite training session of the whole camp! I ran it from the behind and if it hadn't been for the 12th control, it would have been a perfect workout;

shortened middle distance training (map) - I ran the first part with Nati and tried to teach her a little bit, from the 6th control we split and I made my own race, on the left side of the map there begins the... Ocean!

25 II - XIII MOC long WRE (map), was a bit afraid of the distance (18,7km) on the last day of the camp, but it turned out to be no problem for me;) the terrain was so magnificent to run that I enjoyed every second of the race, made only 2 major mistakes to the 8th and 17th control (about 1'15 each) - not that much taking into account the running time of 1:48:36, got a really satisfying 5th place and beat the other Raumar boyz!

MOC night sprint (map), we were a bit late for a start, so I didn't manage to make an appropriate warm-up, however, I felt quite well (I think I had warmed up long enough in the morning!), this one was the easiest sprint of all I ran during this camp, made almost no mistakes and placed 3rd - 1st international podium place as an 'official' elite runner:)

26 II - 17 hour long travel back home.

To sum it all up, during these 9 days I did almost 137km with a map in my hand and spent nearly 15h in the bushes.

Last but not least, I must (want to) admit that it has been one of the best camps in my life so far! I had a wonderful time. The trainings were really challenging and the company was brilliant! Nati, Anne, Marie, Line Maria, Caroline, Ståle, Torben, Alex, Eirik, Eirik, Vetle, Anders - thank you very much for those amazing 10 days!

Takk for your attention:-)

Quick catching up!

Short JWOC 2011 summary (individual races)

I analysed my races precisely, counted my mistakes and got to know that if I had technically superb races, I would have achieved following places:
sprint - 5th
long - 5th
middle - 7th.
So my physical shape wasn't enough for the medals. Was it because of my preparations? Was it due to my little illness during JWOC? Hard to say right now...


Media

Thanks to achieving gold medal in relay I was able to be interviewed on TVP3 (during sports news, live!) and on Radio Łódź. Moreover, I was invited by the mayor of the city of Łódź, Hanna Zdanowska. It was a very nice meeting and I was really happy to see such a big interest in our discipline!


Slovak Karst Cup 2011

I decided to run in M20, because the elite courses were a bit too long as for my holiday shape. And that was a really good choice:)

I managed to win the first 2 stages. The 2nd one was a sprint distance in Roznava, which was pretty interesting. I've never seen such a good GPS signal in a city sprint! On the 3rd day I had a really good race, but... lost the victory by 23 seconds.
The last stage was a chasing start. I was let out into the forest only 1'07 ahead of the Czech runner, Vit Braveny. I saw that the first leg s an easy, long one. So I decided to push really hard and won the split by 35 seconds! Unfortunately, I made an enormous mistake at the 5th control (100 seconds spent in the circle!) and was almost sure he would catch me. But he didn't and I could win the competition with quite a big time margin - 2'23. First of the holiday goals achieved!

Sinusoid. It's all in your head.

Fortunately, my good health let me execute all the plans presented in the last note.

My last winter training camp in Szklarska Poręba in the middle of February was expected to be quite tough. And it really was. I managed to do 21 trainings during 9 days (3 of which were technical sessions).

At the end of February my club made his way to Żelazko in order to spend some time with a map in our hands. At the weekend I got the opportunity to run 4 technical trainings (using even 5 maps, in fact). I had a really good flow and my orienteering technique was quite promising.

Then, the highlight of this training period - Portugal!

After arrival in Crato we spent 2 days training on the model event maps for Portugal 'O' Meeting 2011.

The competition itself was a great success for me. I managed to win both middle distance races and place 3rd and 2nd in long ones. In the overall classification I gained the 1st place ahead of Jan Petrzela (CZE) and Olej. It was unbelievably satisfying and boosting to defeat the previous European Youth Orienteering Champion. I felt that everything is on the right way!

Afterwards, we trained for some 3 days in a bit different terrains and prepared for the coming competition - International Meeting of Arraiolos.

Despite making some silly mistakes, I managed to win the middle distance again. Nevertheless, I had no mental power for the last day - long distance of 13,7km. At the first 4 controls I lost a total of 11 minutes! 5 of them already at the 1st one... And the rest of the course I jogged. At the end I remembered about my bet with Olej concerning the finish. Although it was very muddy, I decided to run the last 300m as fast as possible and... won this split with the advantage of 5 seconds over the next competitor (not only in my class, but in all competition classes). Funny;)

One week later I took part in the popular cross-test in Ruda Pabianicka. I achieved the time of 28:58 on the course of 8,08km (3:35/km). Looking at my last year's result, it was 51 seconds better! However, Olej was really fast that day and beat me by 27 seconds - congratulations and recover!

Last weekend I took part in the Danish competition, which is considered as the opening of the orienteering season - Spring Cup. The night relay on Friday was a real fun for me and I enjoyed the mass start very much. Nonetheless, the most important race for me was Saturday's classic. Generally, I made an awful performance and lost as many as 6mins due to my mistakes! It wouldn't have been that bad, if I hadn't lost more than 10 minutes to the winner - Eskil Kinneberg from Norway. In my opinion, he is the best junior right now, but losing so much time is not acceptable! I must have had a really bad day...
This painful failure made me lose my motivation, self-confidence and belief completely. That's why I had no fun running the 1st leg of Sunday's relay and came 7 minutes behind the leading group (making no more than 1min of mistakes!).

My mental state during the last days was so poor that I wasn't able to find any motivation for running and my life was so dull... I don't mean that I avoided trainings. I did them, but with no commitment and willingness. On Wednesday I was close to tears when I finished almost all the intervalls behind the runners who are actually not faster than me. At the same day I had a long talk with Łukasz and it must have helped me really a lot, because - although the beginning of my Thursday's training wasn't good - I managed to overcome my problems and ran with a huge smile on my face!

THANK YOU, ŁUKASZ.

International end of 2010 O-season

On 25th October I began quite a nice period of the so-called cooling down.

However, I could not stop competing at all, because I was chosen to run the 3rd leg for my Swedish club - Nybro OK - at Smålandskavlen in Tranås.

Interesting thing about this competition is the fact that the first 2 legs are night ones and there is NO mass start. There's interval start, I mean.
The rest of the competition (legs 3-5) is held during the following day and the 3rd leg is the one with chasing start.

My leg was the shortest one (6,85km) and I had a miserable race...

I made 2 awful mistakes:

127 - I wanted to be more cunning than my companions and ran mindlessly forward, 2'10 lost;

143 - I ran up the hill and suddenly my compass needle turned around and I completely didn't know what to do, 1'00 lost.

1 considerable mistake:

33 - poor 'in' (attacking this control) and poor 'out' (leaving the previous control), 0'25 lost.

And 7 minor mistakes:

88, 49, 48, 42, 135, 128, 144 - 1'20 lost in total.

It was not possible for me to be satisfied with my performance (50th leg time and only 1 place up at the changeover). However, I was really happy that I got the opportunity to be the member of Polish relay (Mały, Olej, me, Lupek, Włodar) in Swedish club. Finally, we reached the 44th spot (118 teams took part).

Last orienteering journey of 2010

It consisted of Polish Championships in Superlong, technical camp in Rumia with the Danes and Baltic Junior Cup in Lithuania. Oh, I should also mention that it began exactly 4 weeks ago...

The day before the last PC race I took part in Sulejów Cup. The map fell short of my expectations. However, the terrain was very nice and pretty fast;) Everyone took this competition very easily, but I decided to run at full speed and I do not regret it! I managed to win the men's elite class and got... a bottle of wine. Such a prize was worth an effort:)

On Sunday I wanted to pursue one of my pre-season goals: achieve 5 out of 5 possible medals from the individual races during Polish Championships. After a constant and solid performance at this tiring superlong distance I did manage by winning the silver. Rino had a brilliant race and totally deserved the title of Polish Champion.

The funny thing is that this year in M20 class the podium looked the same in all individual PC races: Hewi, Rino and me. We only exchanged the colours of medals sometimes;)

Only some hours after this exhausting competition Pałka, Olej and I made our way towards Rumia in order to take part in JWOC 2011 technical camp organized by the Danes. We got to know really nice people and made friends with them. There were not only the Danes, but also two Swiss girls and Norwegian superstar, Eskil Kinneberg - probably the best junior at the time.

We had lots of interesting training sessions, two of which are especially worth mentioning:

~ O-intervals with mass start and no forkings - we got a great opportunity to compete with great juniors from Scandinavia and made a wonderful speed and strength training!

~ long route-choice course - the course was really demanding and challenging, but the weather was even more difficult to put up with: it was raining, the wind was blowing and my hands froze over...

THANK YOU for all the maps & courses and nice time spent together!

As soon as on Thursday afternoon Olej and I had to drive to Warsaw so as to head for Baltic Junior Cup the following day. The national team was strongly experimental and I was the oldest member of it, I felt pretty strange about it;)

As for the races, I made quite a solid performance during the long distance course of 13,4km. I gained the 5th place, 38 seconds ahead of Olej. Unfortunately, I missed the podium by only 1'33 and felt disappointed about it. If it hadn't been for my tired legs...

The next day the well-known mixed relay awaited us. I was chosen to run the last leg in our first team. My starting position looked quite promising: 5th place, 2'04 to the podium and 1'39 ahead of the chasing teams. Already on my way to the 1st control I passed the guy from the 3rd (!) spot. Then, I made a close-to-clean race (losing only some 35 seconds) to the spectator (12th) control. While attacking the 15th one, I saw the guy from 4th spot and succeeded in passing him at the 17th one. Unfortunately, control no. 19 was a real disaster for me. Olej (who ran the 1st leg) told me about this particular place before the race and I stopped thinking on my own... I lost so much time there (1'15!) and lost my dream bronze medal position:( Later on, I was not able to calm down and lost my concentration completely. On the way to the second last control I decided to do my best to win at least the 5th place for my team and ran as fast as possible. I managed to run away from the other competitor and had 'only' to find one of the easiest controls of the whole race. Being really close to it, I lost my mind and went left to the wrong field. When I turned back, I saw the afore-mentioned guy reaching the control... I ended up on 6th spot, but it turned out that the Finnish team got disqualified and we eventually took the disappointing 5th place.

All in all, my performance at this final leg was terrible and I am very sorry for the whole team. On the other hand, I gained lots of invaluable experience! That's why I am really satisfied with that O-weekend.

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!!!

It is really possible! (the end of JWOC story)

Useful rest day

We really deserved this one-day break after a very tiring long distance race. The organizers prepared a model event for relay that day. Firstly, we started laughing while looking at the map, because it seemed to be too easy and almost useless. However, it turned out that these open fields (yellow areas) weren't covered with grass but some pricking bushes, which made running much more difficult. The relay race on Saturday was going to be really tough...

Solid middle qualification

I felt that I wouldn't have forgiven myself if I hadn't managed to get to the A final. So I just decided to do my best to qualify and thanks to it I had an almost clean race with quite a good speed. The terrain was unbelievably easy and fast. I only had some hesitations at the beginning (1st and 4th) and probably took not the best route choices at the end (18th and 19th). All in all, it was a wonderful feeling during the long finish when I already knew that I would compete in the A final the following day;)

(Bad) luck during the middle final

Bad luck? The first part of the course (6 controls) was very tricky. Unfortunately, I lost too much time at the beginning. Small hesitation while running to the 1st control... Running too much to the right while approaching the 4th control... Running much too far and looking for the 6th control near the wrong hill... 5+20+55=80secs, whereas I lost 73 seconds to the podium place. That's a pity!

Luck? Just before the 4th control I managed to catch Vetle Ruud Bråten from Norway, who started 2mins ahead of me. Thanks to him my speed and self-confidence were much higher later on and I could be happy with a TOP 15 result in a JWOC individual race. 14th!

Analysing the splits, I got to know that my time in the easier (forest) part of the race (from the 6th control till the end) was 15secs better than the one of the bronze medallist Olle Boström from Sweden. I became convinced that it is really possible for me to get a JWOC medal next year!

JWOC diploma in the relay!

It was an unbelievably hot day and the courses were extremely exhausting due to many open areas and huge amount of climb. I stood in the first row (thanks to our team's 8th place last year - Jacek, Jancia, Rino) and expected an incredibly fast mass start. That's why I started quite fast as well and... landed in the lead - quite funny;)

The first double forking went really well. Then, I decided for the track route choice to the 5th control. I wasn't sure if it was a good idea, but eventually it must have been quite ok. Afterwards a triple forking came! I got a bit confused while running to the 8th control, because almost everyone went left there. Fortunately, I was brave enough to go alone to the right hill. I took a very round route choice to the 10th control, but it turned out to be quite good as well. Then, a spectators' passage and a map change for the second loop.

One more time I chose a round route choice to the 14th control - really good. However, the right one using the mountain top might have been a bit faster. While running to the 16th one, I saw a big group of about 4 runners some 150m ahead of me. Unfortunately, it seemed quite impossible to catch them and I had to run almost alone from that moment. Technically, the rest of the course went really ok, but I wasn't able to keep the appropriate speed...

I finished my race on the 8th place less than 4mins behind the leading Swedish team. It was a quite satisfying result and a good starting position for the next legs. Olej had a brilliant race and jumped onto the 5th place! Unfortunately, Rino didn't succeed in gaining a podium place. Nevertheless, he secured our 5th place and a JWOC diploma! I think all of us did their best and thanks to this magnificent team effort we could celebrate the 5th place in the world!

Saturday's afternoon and evening

Just after coming back to the barracks we decided for a short football match on the pitch. We all felt terribly exhausted, but who cares?:)

In the evening the time came for the well-known JWOC banquet. Fortunately, I was able to keep my drinking under control and had a great party with the orienteers from all over the world;-)

Quick catching up before JWOC!

I haven't written for a very long time, but now it's high time I fixed it;)


Polish Champs in Gdańsk

The sprint distance went pretty well for me. I managed to keep a really good speed throughout the race and gained the 2nd place (5secs behind Hewi). Analysing my route choices and splits, it turned out that I lost gold because of being too hesitant just after the 3rd control. However, I was very satisfied with my performance.

The middle distance wasn't as technical as it should be. Despite that fact, I didn't succeed in avoiding making mistakes. The worst one came while running to the 3rd control. I saw Drągu, who started 2mins ahead of me, got this weird feeling and misunderstood the contours completely. Eventually, I achieved the silver medal... 7secs behind... Hewi. I felt a little bit disappointed, but still very happy about my stable shape.

The most wonderful thing is the fact that on both days the podium looked the same: Hewi, me and Rino. Nevertheless, not only the people were the same, but also the time difference between the winner and bronze medalist - 21secs!

In relay we knew that it would be very difficult for us to reach the podium, but we never gave up! I ran the last leg in my team and started to the forest as the 6th runner. During the race I managed to catch Włodar (2'34) and Jacek Kowalczyk (5'16). Running with Włodar was a real pleasure, because the pace was very high and everything happened so quickly. At the very end I had a shorter forking and had the opportunity to gain some advantage over him. I managed, but he was incredibly fast before the finish and I lost the 4th by some 5 seconds. Respect!

Technical camp in Białogóra

The first two days were full of slow, easy running, because we were taking rest after the demanding PC weekend.

On Wednesday we ran a very interesting sprint in Gdynia (the map from EYOC 2002). The start interval was 15secs, what made this race much faster, I think. I took stupid route choice to the 7th control (too much climb) and lost some time close to the control, as well. Apart from that, I ran really well and lost 15secs to the winner - Rino.

On Thursday we had a really tiring long distance (12,65km). It consisted of 3 loops. The first 2 of them went pretty well, but the last one was a real disaster - due to my tiredness, all the scrapes on my feet and bent north lines on the map... Unfortunately, 2 controls were set in wrong places and I didn't find them. However, I lost some time while running around and looking for them everywhere. After all, my performance was quite satisfying;)

Kytäjä-Jukola 2010

On the ferry between Stockholm and Helsinki something really amazing happened. We took part in an orienteering competition!!! Just see the map and regret not having been there:)

On Saturday afternoon Olej and I decided to run a short technical training session to familiarize ourselves with the terrain and get to know what was waiting for us in the nearest future. Since that moment we had known that we were going to run in the most challenging terrain in our lives!

I wanted to run the 1st leg and I got the chance! The start was at 22:55 (Finnish time - sunset). Unfortunately, it was raining (what made the terrain even more difficult), but I felt really hot and excited inside. I stood in the 3rd row among 1534 other runners! The music at the start was really thrilling, I remember. And it all began...

The decisive moment was the forking before the long leg, where I lost touch with my group and had to run the very long leg with a much slower and technically worse tram. While heading to the finish, I thought I would take the 500th place. To my surprise, I was 102nd (a little less than 12mins behind the leaders). All things considered, it was an average performance, but the experience was unbelievable!


Vestjysk 2-dages in Denmark

Only some time after a long plane (2 times) and car journey we were to run the sprint. The course was really long - 4km (my watch states that I ran 6,37km!). The terrain was very demanding physically because of numerous meters of climb. The map was a little bit imprecise. There was quite an interesting route choice to the 15th one. What would you choose? I lost more than a minute to the 17th control due to the fact that the map was not made in accordance with ISSOM.

The next day we competed in a very challenging long distance race - 10,4km. I made some mistakes (especially to the 22nd one...), but I must admit that the terrain was very tricky - full of green areas and winding contours. I was very happy about my result, since I managed to achieved the 3rd spot (behind some elite runners and ahead of my peers, with whom I'll fight in one week's time at JWOC).
Note: the map was made by the Poles: Lech Trzpil and Piotr Sierzputowski.

3 days ago we decided for a middle distance. That day I felt completely out of tune, probably due to my enormous headache the previous evening. That's why my only dream was to finish the course and take some rest. Fortunately, we got the opportunity to run in the dunes. The last part of the course was very greeeeen and running was almost impossible. To sum it up, that stay in Denmark was very useful before the coming JWOC competitions and my performance during the long distance made me believe in my abilities;-)


Now

Yesterday I decided to make some blood tests and got to know that my results are better than ever! What's more, I changed my hairstyle and am much lighter now;) Moreover, I passed my A-level exams even better than I had expected. It's not a place to boast about it, but I just can't help telling you that I got 99% in written Polish (basic level, of course) - I still can't believe it, haha! Furthermore, I did 2 great physical training sessions yesterday and today, during which my legs were close to flying;)
It's all a very positive signal for the nearest future and in the future comes...


JWOC 2010 in Denmark

I am leaving at 22:10 to Świnoujście tonight and then, probably on Saturday, to Aalborg. I am going to run the long distance (6th July), middle distance qualification (8th July), hopefully middle A-final (9th July) and relay (10th July). I promise to do my best and fulfil my expectations!
All the appropriate information here.

KEEP YOUR FINGERS CROSSED FOR OUR WHOLE TEAM!