O.O'Brien

Not wanting to lose my recently-acquired fitness from the Lithuanian races, I headed down to Esher in Surrey after work on Tuesday, on another hot (although cooler than Lithuania!) and muggy day, for a SLOW evening event. I’ve been on Oxshott Heath before, it is part of the larger Esher map. The race was in November and I remember the Oxshott Heath part being quite overgrown and brambly. So, I was a bit nervous of it’s quality in July. Thankfully the planner had been careful to avoid the worst of the scrub. The course was just 3.7km but with 16 controls – a real middle-distance sprint.

Everyone was started off at one minute intervals, and went steaming down a long track. So, inevitably, I did the same. Two minutes later, I realised I had massively overshot the first control, which had been a mere 100m away from this start. For the next 13 controls, I was running hard, able to practice good control flow technique – I could punch and leave the control site in the correct direction, without stopping running. It felt great being able to run flat out, at a much faster pace than normal. A poor bit of navigation and a bit of risk taking, though, meant I made a 1 minute mistake at 6, but it was a big blunder at No. 14 that cost me a good run – this was a long leg through a lot of bracken, I went round – then got confused by the path network and intricate contours. I ended up being led to the control by the next runner. I sprinted the rest of the race – particularly as I saw Simon E just behind. As he’d started 3 minutes later, he’d won anyway – but I went for it all the same. I ended up 8th out of 40 runners, with Simon 4th, Paul 10th and Pete 12th.

I had made suprisingly many mistakes – but then maybe I under-estimated this British terrain after the technical feast of Lithuania. Looking forward to plenty more middle distance races though – these seem to be my best orienteering discipline.

My second TVOC summer series evening event, and the seventh and final event in a busy month of orienteering. Getting to the event was a bit of a mission – leaving work at 1715, I had to get across central London, on a succession of 3 trains to Marlow, and then a 2 mile walk to the start – just made it for the 1930 start.

Bloom Wood is a fine area and it was great to run on it on a pleasant, but very warm, summer’s evening. There was very little vegetation even now in late June, and has been used in the past for a UK Cup middle distance race. The race was a mass-start, with the course arranged like a figure-of-eight, so that people started in four directions.

I made a silly mistake on the first leg, not bothering to check my compass, and was too far to the left. The first few controls were very fast and intense – my first loop was just 1km. The second loop was the big one, with a 900m leg, some tricky map detail, and a monster hill.

I saw no one going my way at all for the second loop, so assumed I was on to a very good time – I picked up the pace and powered around the course, unfortunately then making a 2 min mistake at 10, a 1 min mistake at 11 and a half-min mistake at 13. Still, it was a great run and I finished around 6th back – a much better result than at Hughenden. I beat Jon M but Rob P was well ahead of me.

Although the weather was cloudy, it was very muggy and so quite tough going. So two pints of lemonade and a huge meal at the local pub with the other JOKers/OUOCers was a top idea. Then it was just a case of getting back to London.

Thanks to the organiser for planning good courses, pre-marking and bagging the maps and choosing such a great area!

Attackpoint entry

Ran the Brown course at Knole Park. Another hot and quite humid day meant the pace was pretty slow – huge areas of bracken in the first part of the race also slowed me down.

Despite half the map being out of bounds due to tree plantations, and the other half seemingly out of bounds due to a golf course, the planners did manage to get a good course out of the map. This was really a race of three parts – an orienteering race for the first few km, then a road race, 2km down a hot, dusty road, and finally a cross country race to the finish.

I had a poor start – I didn’t recognise the crucial “small fenced enclosure” symbols, thinking they were depressions instead. The head-high bracken also confused navigation. The result was that No. 1 was my worst control – the exit was also bad, so I was slow to No. 2. No. 6 was tricky, trying to find a way into the site without getting stung by nettles. My route from 7-8 was lazy. Then the course dropped into some woodland, which was extremely pleasant after the hot sun.

I overshot No. 11, then on to the road race – 12-13 was 1km down a long, hot road, and 13-14 was 1km back up another road. Finally, some easy controls to the finish.

Finished 8th= out of 39 runners. I’m pleased with this result, I’m definitely running better now than I was a year ago.

This event is probably the last weekend event I’ll be at before the end of the season. I’ve done 34 races this season which is great.

Mistake Analysis:
1: Poor map reading.
2: Poor map reading.
3: Hesitation.
6: Difficult terrain (nettles/bracken.)
11: Poor navigation.
13: Difficult terrain (bracken.)

(Cross-posted from Attackpoint.)

(Cross-posted from my training journal at Attackpoint.)

Brown course at Ightham. A really nice, quite technical area, tough going in places due to the late-May vegetation growth, but few brambles or nettles. I had a good race, although my general pace was a little slow, especially near the beginning as I was tired from biking to the event. I picked up speed later on though, and finished with too much energy to spare.
I made just one significant technical mistake – I failed to hit a pit in a green area, to be fair it was a bit of a bingo control.

As mentioned above, my start was slow, and although I didn’t make any bad route choices or get lost, I took longer than I should have. I exited 2 poorly, not seeing a path above, and getting stuck in some green. I hit 6 before 5 – but the two were only 100m from each other, and indeed the location of 6 was useful for finding 5. I failed to pick up my intended path from 6 to 7, and hand to climb up a steep bank. Leaving 9 my direction was poor – 30 degrees too far left, which meant I had to go very slow as 10 was technical.

11 was a great leg – I beat my peers here. 14-15 was an untimed road crossing leg, which I needlessly rushed. And 15-16 was very poor – more walking up a big bank, followed by the aforementioned bingo control. From then on it was flat and straightfoward. Took a bit of a tumble as I was speeding up for the penultimate leg. Was annoyed to find I’d kept too much energy in reserve as I sprinted for the finish.

Overall, I’m pleased with the result – I just wish I’d paced myself better. A nice SAX area – I’ve been to a succession of not great areas in Kent, but this (and Eridge) prove that, sometimes, Kent does have worthy orienteering areas.

My route

Selected Results (39 starters, 34 finishers)
1st Paul Nixon 57:37 (great time!)
3rd Simon Evans 61:06
7th Simon Errington 65:35
8th Ollie O’Brien 65:59
10th Don McKerrow 71:01