Accomodation Booked for Wellington Champs

Low budget accomodation has beeen booked for the Wellington Champs at the Tararua Country Retreat. The Retreat is very close to Eketahuna, and handy to the other maps, as well as local attractions like Mt Bruce Wildlife park and the Eketahuna Commercial hotel.

There are numerous bunkrooms, of various sizes and camping is also good. The price is $20 per night in the accomodation, $10 per night camping. Contact me (Jamie) to book, or use the comments section on this blog.

NZ JWOC Team 2013

What a team - See them in action at the Super Series!

Dreams of Italy

I am sure there are many people that read this blog that harbour dreams of attending WOC 2014 Italy. The new WOC rules leave NZ with a much greater focus on relays and sprints and increased responsibility on those that run middle and long to claw us back up the rankings. Italy is an amazing place to visit and the terrain is phenomenal.

Making things happen

Take the opportunities as they pass for sure, jump at them,  but also make things happen for yourself and others around you. I love the AOTC (Auckland Orienteering Training Cult), what it stands for and what it achieves. Keen athletes pinning it through the forest.

A Great Blog for MTBO

Rob Garden put me on to this great blog for MTBO. Emily Benham is one of the top exponents of this discipline in the world.

There are some good opportunities coming up in NZ MTBO. Firstly, Nationals in Nelson in November, on the steep Codgers Mountain Bike Park, then an attractive carnival in the Upper North Island in the New Year, and then (hold your breath) the Australian Championships in Alice Springs in June. Finally a decent excuse to go and see some red rocks and big skies.

I must confess a love/hate relationship with MTBO. Orienteering Grinch Greg Flynn is sometimes right with his "worst of both worlds" assessment, but given the right terrain it can be a great sport. There have been some great MTBO races in NZ. Wanaka, Rotorua, Riverhead and Hamner spring to mind... but often we struggle for the right terrain.

The sort of terrain we lack in NZ

Looking at Emily Benham's blog perhaps sprint MTBO, might be the answer, are there killer MTBO areas out there we are over looking because we have the wrong mindset? (like we missed such great foot orienteering challenges before the evolution of sprint distance?). How could they be used for events?

Is Sprint MTBO a goer in NZ?

Mountain Biker, Orienteer, Doctor

One blog I always enjoy reading is Tom Reynold's. Tom is one of our best young elites, National Classic Champion is 2012. Domiciled in Whangarei he does some interesting training missions in parts of the country that are new to most. There is an inner explorer in the majority of orienteers that like seeing photos of new places, and particularly maps.

Tom has always been an allrounder, his mountain biking achievements almost equal his orienteering ones, and several years ago now he was part of a youth adventure racing team. His current priority is training for the Coast to Coast race in February. He is proof, like Chris Forne and Brent Edwards before him, that you can compete at a high level in orienteering while maintaining a varied, healthy, outdoor lifestyle.

It will though be interesting to see over the next few years whether he chooses to have a serious crack at establishing himself as a world class orienteer. He has the legs and the brains, the open question is whether he has the hunger. One senses that maybe life might be too good already... a very postmodern problem for an athlete to face.

Interview with Tane Cambridge

Tane Cambridge where in the world are you?

Czech Republic, have just been to a wedding (Czech-Scottish couple who live in Christchurch) now making my way to Germany and then Italy for at Training camp at Jonathon Wyatt's village, near to where WOC is next year

Crazy! So how many countries have you visited in the last 2 months?

4 so far, Finland, Sweden, Colombia, Czech Republic (and 5 if you count Germany which I ran just over the boarder to the other day). 

Looking mean!

So looking forward to the Mountain Running Worlds, how good is your form?

I'm not really sure, I haven't had many races to base my form on in the last two months running wise. At the World Games I was definitely on the weaker side in terms of running speed at that level. I have had plenty of time to recover from then and training feels like its going ok at the moment, apart from a stomach bug which had me up half the night spewing last night. So I guess at this running training camp I will hopefully find out how my fitness compares to the others. That all said i dont think I have got any slower from when I left NZ two months ago, so hopefully that means I have got faster!

It must be quite different focusing completely on your running rather than navigation?

Yep for sure. When there is the maps to think about alot of your spare time is put towards looking over maps, speculating where the courses might go etc etc. Running you know where you are going so you can plan ahead well before the race, so I guess its less like studying for an exam than orienteering. It is refreshing to focus only on running but at the same time it kind of feels like you are missing something in your training.

Although I guess there is still a mental element  in the mountain running, do you think there are similarities/differences to orienteering?

When its a big race whether it be orienteering or running you do go through the race in your head beforehand the same way (like thinking about how you will feel at particular points in the race, what to focus on and when, etc) so in that way its similar. The main difference is that your more focused on the physical side of things when your running- thats what I find one of the best things about Orienteering is that your mind is fully focused on the navigation and you just kind of hope you are running fast enough to be competitive

Tane in Mountain Running mode

What are your expectations for the Mountain Running Worlds; terrain, vibe, experience, results?

Well this year its an up and down course, so 3 laps, 13.8km and 823m climb. Upper altitude is around 1700m, so I expect its going to be tough going. From what I can gather the footing will be basically swept compared to an orienteering course. 

Besides knowing about the terrain its pretty hard to know what to expect. I have never done a big running race overseas so I can just imagine its going to be a fairly fast start and a tough race. 

Results wise I'm also am going in with no expectations, obviously Id like to win but the reality is that I'm not quite fast enough to do that so I would like to complete the race knowing that I had given it my best effort and held nothing back. And what would this correspond to in material terms?... I would like to think somewhere around 30th place.

Thinking back to the orienteering you have had a big year. Highs and lows I'm sure. Are there any experiences that have stuck in your mind?

Yeah, its been a reasonably big season but I feel like I'm only just getting into it now, so its a bit of a shame that there is no more big orienteering races left in Europe this year for me. 

The highlight would have to be the elite sprint at Oringen this year, it was a big race, a big crowd, and I turned up and performed to a standard which I was happy with. Other races that come to mind is the World Cup chasing start in NZ and the WOC sprint qualification this year (the atmosphere, not the result).

Lowlight was definitely the WOC middle distance qualification. I don't know but I didnt feel great the morning of the race and just went into the race blind and I just had a complete blowout and ended up with the most embarrassing run of my career. You learn much more from your mistakes and I went back the next day with the others to expel the demons which I think I took a lot out of. For some reason I could actually see through the forest this time and it just goes to show how the mental aspects of orienteering really is the glue that holds everything together.

Where in the world was Tane running here?

How about moments in your race, that you either did really well, or wished you could hit that rewind button and do something slightly differently (if you have any maps you could refer me to for this question it would be great)

Well you shouldn't really have "moments" as moments generally indicate a mistake... but if you read my answer above it is of course is yes. There was so many mistakes made on my trip this year but one that comes to mind is the World Games middle distance control 26. Getting near the end of the course and getting tired I decided upon reaching the edge of the forest to go against my plan and cut the corner. I was slow through the forest and then came out further down the track than I expected, missed my attackpoint and lost around 1min45s. From then on I continued to drop time on the following controls making small mistakes as I was orienteering re-actively and trying to run harder to make up time...

Well congrats mate, thats a damn big European summer, and give it death at the mountain running!

Thanks! 

Lizzie says thanks

Elite orienteers are not islands. Behind all are support networks, good clubs, people that care.
Great to see Lizzie Ingham, saying thanks to a few of her supporters.