Elite Rankings Out.

Hey people, Greg has compilated the year end ranking lists again, thanks Greg awesome!

Big winners Karl and Thomas in the mens (I'll ignore the statistical anomaly of the Fornicator), with Lizzie the real star in the womens topping the rankings for the first time, closely followed by Greta. Will be awesome to see the rivalry between you two develop over the next few years! Makes me excited about the womens elite at Oceania, the young flyers facing up to the more experienced racers with particularly Tania and Penny returning after missing some big races!

See the womens here, and mens here.

Carstens latest email

Hi There All the Squad Stars!

Hope you're all good and training well and enjoying the nice warm weather that has been hanging around lately. This is a very short version of the normal emails I send out.

INOV8 First thing is INOV8 orders are received until and including Friday the 21st of Nov for handover at Oceania. $90.00 was the price for a pair last time and I believe it still is. Here's the link for the INOV8 homepage: http://www.inov-8.com/ - I'll need to know your shoe size and shoe model with your order.

COACH trainee at JUNIORcamp If you're interested in being a trainee coach at the coming JuniorCamp then please let me know straight away. There are up to 3 spots available and it is going to first in gets to go. The JuniorCamp is taking place at Scoutlands close to Wanganui on the 14th-19th of Dec. Further information at http://nzorienteering.com/

TRAININGCAMP after OCEANIA There is going to be a combined open D-squad NOS and Aussie training camp following the Oceania (the week afterwards) with trainings down and around Dunedin in the beginning and then ending up in Christchurch. James Bradshaw is coordinating.

SUPERSERIES 2009 Round 1 Oceania South Island (Oceania Champs events and a mass start at Naseby on sunday) Round 2 JWOC trials (PalmerstonNorth/Masterton) Waitangi Weekend Round 3 Nationals Auckland Round 4 QB 3days Central District

These are the 4 rounds in the SuperSeries 2009 and further information on the exact events and how many counts towards to overall and so fort will arrive in an inbox close to you.

Yeps, that was a short update - please get back to me with INOV8 orders and if in case you're interested in coaching and training at the JuniorCamp. And any other questions / feedback is also welcomed!

All the best with training and life!

Tane Mahuta Lord of the Forest

Squad Email

hey as acting squad cc, thought I better keep in touch. Has been awesome keeping an eye on you dudes over at the World Cup and JWOC in the last month or so. Its great to have you over there representing us all. I wrote this next bit a while ago,

"Lots going on recently. Ross and Bryn representing in Europe, great effort guys, and a real succesfull QB weekend final of the superseries, some great races, particularly that night sprint thanks to Carsten and Tessa and some interesting results. I am blown away by the talent that there is coming through at the moment, Lizzie, Tom and Scott to name a few that just get better and better. Keep it up people with hard training and cunning thoughts theres no shortage of people in our squads who could beat the best in the world.

A few psychological things I've been talking with people about recently:

I went for a run with Carsten the other day and we were discussing the attitutude necessary for success at WOC. We both agreed that an important approach was not to think of "peaking" at WOC at least not in a navigational sense. In WOC (or JWOC) you should be trying to cut out your normal performance not some mysterious super performance that people seem to dream of. This normal performance is the level that you perform at regularly during the super series and of course the key is doing all you can to make your normal performances as bloody brilliant as possible.

Perfect practice makes perfect. I remember reading about Nouredine Morcelli (a great runner a few years back) and how he cried when his training sessions didn't go well...it was so important to his performance to meet his goals in training. This is even more important in orienteering where habits and decision making are so important. Perfect decision making creates perfect decision making by encouraging the right pathways in the brain. Crappy decision making perpetuates crappy decision making. Don't ever forget this, there is a fine line between learning from your mistakes and continually suffering from them.

On this point. At the D Squad camp at Naseby a few weekends back I was thinking about the problem of how to coach "danger signals" into those speed demons that haven't yet mastered speed control. I experimented with running along behind someone, just stating one word "danger" whenever I thought there was a navigational issue that needed to be dealt with, they then had to explain what the issue was and how they were dealing with it. A variation on the old verbalisation exercise but focussed on specific decision making moments that you can think about, have a go with and adapt.

The "Zone". This damn mysterious zone thing, its a curse. As discussed with Tom recently...if you starting thinking "wow, I'm in the zone" during a race alarm bells should ring. Any zone that there may be can only ever be conceptualised in retrospect otherwise you're thinking about the wrong stuff.

Whats next: well heaps of you have wicked missions planned world cups/champs/university games....awesome!!! Go hard!

The others staying at home, well I'm still real keen to try and make the Squads Camp happen, maybe in Vegas around the weekend of the tough guy, which is 19/20 August see http://www.toughguyandgal.co.nz/ anyone interested in coordinating this get in touch with the Carsten.

Oh and I noticed some photos from the qb party at Ambers facebook page http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=579723174#/album.php?aid=27948&id=579723174&ref=mf Thanks to those that made an effort, great to do something at orienteering that didn't involve talking about sport, or shit talking or training or orienteering....gotta keep your mind open to different influences you never know it might somehow give you a competitive edge."

And yeah still looking for someone to organise a bit of a get together, physical training weekend in the north island when everyones back, if this persons you get in touch with me or Carsten.

And one other thing I was thinking of the other day is the need to have a real good plan or at least strategy for making the most of the post JWOC/WOC/big trip training time. Its way too easy to let a little rest turn into a big one, a few ideas to get you thinking

- have a recovery period training programme good to go before its needed - change tack a little bit, try and achieve something in one of your cross training sports, whether thats mtbing or whatever - keep that core strength through gym work or whatever it makes it much more pleasant getting back into training again. Awesome.

and by the way I can still run, started a race we stumbled upon in Singapore this evening and felt strong and sweaty. Looking forward to racing youse all again soon.

Take care

Jamie

Google Images Chris Forne...

and come up with...

Latest Email...

Yo,

Final message about the end of season gathering this weekend...

First some hardout running through the forest searching like wackos for little plastic boxes to ram our sticks into, them some crazy running through the Massey campus likewise, then another run through the forest. Then the king and queen of the superseries will be crowned by our pet Danish court jester.

Remember that the races will probably assist selection for the test match in September, so psych up and bring your A game. Lots of running like the wind in a straight line and desperately trying to keep in control, or notice when the brain fade kicks in!

Then I've organised a party, show up or I'll feel like a dork, the venue is 619 Waitarere Beach Rd, starts afternoon after the event, we'll sort out some activity like hanging around like bogans and goths and scaring the locals...bring meat and beverages.. and by popular demand the theme has expanded to include those urchins of teen angst "emos", so you've got a choice between bogans, goths and emos, something there for everyone. Check out the squad blog http//osquad.blogspot.com for information on emos, videos of Goths and an example of the minimum kind of emoish allowed courtesy of Kenny Pain!

also stormers and other people staying in our bach please pay $26 to MADeventz 06-0637-0235704-00, cher, and other stuff.....

Naseby Weekend

Awesome to be back at Naseby last weekend with James, Tane, Rita and several of the D Squad, its always a wicked challenge, thanks James for making this happen.

Squads Weekend

After the inaugural weekend last year in Taupo we all thought it was a good idea, so keen to make it happen again this year, one idea was in Rotovegas at around the same time as the Tough Guy/Gal, great fun race. As I'm out of the country would really like someone to volunteer to put it together, happy to help out as much as I can, let me know this weekend if you are keen.

Cool see you there

Jamie

Kenny Pain and friend

squad newsletter.

Kia ora guys, Hope all is well with everyone and training is going good. Especial thoughts to those of you on the other side of the world and those preparing for the international season. A few practical things in this little email so read on. Queens birthday: Looking forward to catching up with people at QB, should be a great event. I have booked some accomodation at Waitarere Beach primarily for southerly storm people, but probably have a few spare places to sleep. Would be awesome if other groups from around the country could organise to stay in the vicinity.Theres a campground and stuff there as well as bachs. I think we should have some sort of end of season party, since socialisation is good. It will be on the Sunday and it will have a theme, I think we will make the theme "Bogans and Goths", just for a laugh. You should all come dressed up to amuse me. It will start at our bach straight after the event, bbq provided, beach nearby. Sweet. Training Weekend Naseby: To the best of my knowledge James is still organising a training weekend at Naseby later this month round 24/25th ish. Should be awesome. I'll be there keen to do some coaching and some exploring of the wickedness of Naseby. Recent Events: popped past the South Island champs, looked like everyone was having a great time, one of those intense weekends with lots of races. Cool innovation holding a night event, from all accounts some peoples night orienteering techniques need some work! Sounds like Auckland Champs was good quality too. I went over Tanes maps with him last night and looking at the classic course it seemed really well planned with lots of route choice and short legs and scary stuff. Go the Aspins! If anyone is interested in writing up some articles about these events for endurance sport or web sites, please give me a bell as wriitng up stuff on events you didn't attend is kind of hard. Acting Coaching Co-ordinator: yep thats me. As discussed with the squad at Nationals I am keen to step back a bit. I was hoping that by volunteering and stepping forward I might help to generate more positive action and cooperation from the elite community. This didn't quite happen as the majority of elites focus is firmly on their own performance. I'm happy to accept this as the way things are. The problem is this puts a lot of responsibility on the NOS CC, who is unable to give what the individual athletes require. The theory is a NOS CC arranges coaches for athletes, rather than coaching them, but who has the expertees/time/desire to coach an elite orienteer? With my vision thwarted I'm stepping back so if a magnificent saviour NOS CC comes along they can pick up the reins. In the meantime I plan to continue working behind the scenes, keeping people in touch, organising the occasional training weekend, updating the squad blog now and again and doing some promotion etc. I am also happy to help any individuals that may think my knowledge or skills may be of use to their orienteering performance, just get in touch! World Cup Team: Great to see the World cup Team announced (check the NZOF site) Lots of people going lots of cool places! Kia kaha to you all. Sweet, expecting to see most people at QB, and don't forget Bogans and Goths people in civilian clothing will have to do something horrible to get in!! Jamie