WOC - final training camp day 3

Day 3 in Miskolc and again it looked like it was going to be a scorcher, but was just a mild 28 degrees in the end. There was some set training on a map next door to the Long Distance area, in Slovakia in the afternoon, so I took off in the morning and did some o intervals on Hollóstető, wanting to get a good final speed session in. I did 2 sets, C+D and again had some problems with the ‘40cm’ high stakes, which were mostly about 4cm high, and also with the vegetation. The distinctive boundaries are hard to see, there is a vegetation difference but I have not been able to spot the boundaries or the distinctive trees for that matter, and again the charcoal burning places shouldn’t even be mapped. I also got re-acquainted with Hungarian stinging nettles, they are not too bad but from 01 and today, any clearing is full of them. But on the positive side visibility is good and if it is not too rocky it is fast (super fast, winning times are at 5min/km).

In the afternoon, after a 2 hour drive into Slovakia, in a rental car not permitted out of Hungary, and with Chris having a small panic attack near the border after we told him he needed his passport which he left behind (all EU so of course no border control) we made it to a map called Torzó, that was mainly the karst depression terrain. The long boys went out for a mission, working out if there were any faster route., Bryn was successful, he worked out not getting lost is way faster. The routes on the map show the choices between Ross and Chris, Ross had some problems in rocky slopes (where the pen is) and also in the green where the track did not exist, but still thinks Chris’ way is faster. All in all its much of a muchness as to picking as straight as line as possible through the depressions and staying on it.

Kenneth arrived tonight so we are now the complete WOC09 NZ team, and are also making some news stories since we have Kenneth as our coach, for those that don’t know, he is the full time coach of Halden SK, one of the best clubs in Norway (and Scandi), http://www.orienteering.is/halden-coach-leading-team-new-zealand.4617848.html . Tomorrow we move into the offical WOC accommidation, Me and Bryn are hoping the beds are just as good in the building next door (where we are moving) as both think they are the best things we have slept on in ages, and in a student hostel in the back blocks of Hungary of all places, go figure....