Dark & White Winter Series #4 – Hope
The area surrounding Hope and Castleton in the Peak District is one I know fairly well, from both previous Dark and White events and countless New Years celebrations in Castleton as a student. Oh, and I had my stag do there, but the less said about that the better (I did, however, notice that the trough outside a pub that I ended up in now contains flowers, not water and goldfish!).
The day was cold and crisp and the ground fairly dry with no recent rain, so it looked likely that conditions would be fast. I duly pumped up my tyres as hard as I dared and set off.
I always prefer a downhill finish so headed off up the Edale valley on to tracks I knew fairly well, whilst sorting out the rest of the route as I went.
The rocky descent down into number 10 had me wishing I hadn’t put quite so much air in my tyres as I bounced around, trying to keep a smooth line, but luckily a sheep track alongside the main path made the re-ascent a little easier. I always love riding the bridleway that goes via today’s number 8 as I seem to come across lots of recreation bikers, mostly on very expensive full-suspension machines, either slowly picking their way down the steep rocky descents or off and pushing on the ups. It’s a nice feeling to blast past them, up or down, on an XC race bike and watch their faces.
The planning was very good and I was struggling to see a good route to hoover up the controls to the S
south. There seemed no way to circumnavigate the course without some vicious climbs.
The one up to Chapel Gate was cruel, the only plus being it could have been so much worse if not frozen, but my poor overshoes took a pounding, as, like everyone else, I was off and pushing/carrying at times up to the top of the 250 metre ascent.
Moving south I had a decision to make: to leave number 7 in Bradwell or not. I knew things were going to be tight and in the end, although only 750 metres off my route, I decided not to descend and get it. Given I was 4 mins late this was the right decision, but winner Mark McPhillips, who took the same route as me did get it.
The views out over Castleton and the Dark Peak to the north were stunning as I climbed over towards Mam Tor before dropping down into Castleton. I have never ridden the bridleway down from Hollins Cross before, and I will probably avoid it next time. It was slippery, steep and un-rideable in places, making me slower than planned hence being a little late back.
After getting the last control, it was a 2.5km blast back along the road to the finish in Hope punching in 5 minutes late. There were lots of big names about today and I felt sure, although I’d had a good ride, that I’d be down the leader board; but download showed me equal second with Killian, another great result and showing that my continued concentration on strength this winter is starting to pay off.
Thanks Dark and White for another great event, and also great to see Steve Heading back on a mountain bike after his shoulder injury last year (and yes he did ride from Matlock, do the event and ride home again – legend)
Stats: 52.8km, 1200m climb
Results available here : http://www.darkandwhite.co.uk/results-cross-country-fell-races.asp
Preview – MTBO – MOD Stafford
The first round of the national Mountain Bike Orienteering League comes to Stafford at the end of February.
After loss of permissions on the original area, I have managed to negotiate access to MOD Stafford, a huge ex-RAF logistics depot. The area gives a mix of dense urban-style paths and roads, open land and small patches of forest, promising exciting competition. More details and online entry soon at www.walton-chasers.co.uk
Hurn Forest MTBO
Driving into Dorset to get down to Hurn forest, the venue for the first round of the newly formed MBO South league, I was greeted by huge flocks of presumably migrating birds wheeling in the sky. I have no idea what they were as birds are not my thing, but they were fantastic to watch. Impressive, too, was the huge statue of a stag perched above an arch on an entrance to Charborough Park on the A31 after seemingly miles of estate boundary wall.
The Hurn Forest event was heaving with people when I arrived, the MBO South advertising doing its stuff attracting lots of bikers (over 70 competitors). They were also offering map board hire which went down very well.
Hurn is another one of those orienteering areas that is so mediocre on foot but perfectly suited to MTBO, and although a little small, looked great. It is also flat as a pancake, which suits me!
I went off hard from the start, splashing through ice covered puddles and immediately started having gear problems and very cold feet. I couldn’t get big ring at the front and a couple of the small cogs at the back were still slipping on the new chain, meaning I had to manually flick the chain onto the big ring and leave it there, grunting the big gears, grinding the chain on some ratios not designed to work well, the mud from the puddles adding to mechanical mayhem.
I rode well and cleanly not making a mistake all course, only losing a little time on one control (number 9) where I picked a safe option on the bigger track, which turned out to be just as slow as the more direct line on the smaller path.
After winding my way around the map I eventually crossed the line in 38.5 mins, winning by 30 seconds, a great start to the new season and especially pleasing after my pre-Christmas illness.
After a long break to try and warm up frosty feet and far too much chatting ,I competed in the second of the three events Wimborne Orienteers were providing that day, a schools league foot orienteering event. I enjoyed a well planned green course which avoided the majority of the grot but the plantation furrows were energy sapping, always just that bit too far apart to run across comfortably, but nicely stretching those hamstrings.
After a fairly straightforward series of legs I was going to take a direct line from 12 to 13 through the open next to the OOB marsh but one look into the woods had me heading round on the tracks, avoiding a mushy bramble fest!
Downloading for the second time that day I was very pleased to see I had won this, too!
With the night event start a good few hours away and a hot shower and a slice of cake beckoning at some friends in Romsey I decided to keep my headtorch in my bag and head for home, a happy Stodge.
Footnote: It is interesting to compare the two maps above, one with MTBO symbols, the other a tradditional foot orienteering map, it shows the differences well.
Results available here http://www.wimborne-orienteers.org.uk/wim/11%20Hurn%20Forest/hurnresultpage.htm
MBO South Report here http://www.mbosouth.co.uk/MBO_South/Welcome_files/Southern%20Series%20Round%20One.pdf
Preview Hurn Forest MTBO
A new umbrella organisation for MTBO in the South of the UK http://www.mbosouth.co.uk has its first event of 2011 next weekend (22nd Jan) at Hurn Forest. Combined with some foot O and even night orienteering it looks worth the long drive.
more details at http://www.wimborne-orienteers.org.uk/wim/11%20Hurn%20Forest/Hurn%20Forest%20Jan%202011%20Flyer.pdf
Walton Chasers Club Championships
It was nearly a case of going down stairs on my bottom on Sunday morning, the New Years Day score event of the previous day having taken its toll on my calves and quads. In fact I had to force myself to walk down them properly carrying the box of SI kit.
Leading up to the event I had decided not to run, so soon after being ill and not wanting to pick up a silly injury at an event not important in my MTBO training, but I was leant upon by Cath and a couple of other club members to support the event and run (this quandary may make an interesting blog item in the next few weeks, watch this space).
I stretched and stretched, warmed up and stretched some more before starting steadily, legs like lead, but I swept through the first 4 steadily before my first encounter with the huge linear marsh that runs through the valley that bisects the southern part of the map. Although the wet bit doesn’t extend far it is surrounded by man eating tussocks and reduces all but the most determined to a comedy walk.
I made a little error grabbing the wrong track on the way to 7 losing perhaps 30 secs but ran cleanly through the rest of the first map, getting lucky off-track several times with good bunny runs through the terrain speeding things up.
I made another error coming out of 13 losing about a minute and a half going too high and overshooting the control before bouncing back to it, but got a lucky break on the way to 16 with a good elephant track across the dreaded marsh. After 18 I started the final climb for home. My legs had had enough by this point and it was all I could do to keep running up the track to 19, but kept it going to the finish.
Given the state of my legs I was happy with 3rd some 7 minutes down on Iain Stamp and a minute down on Mikey Hopkins.
For those looking at the map thinking it would make a great MTBO area, it would, but it is unfortunately covered in bridleways: http://www.streetmap.co.uk/map.srf?X=405165&Y=311172&A=Y&Z=115&ax=405130&ay=311130
Results and photos here: http://www.walton-chasers.co.uk/results/2011/clubchamps/index.html
New Years Day Score -Twemlows
This years New Years Day mass start score event was held at Twemlows, an old overgrown old Army/RAF base near Whitchurch, Shropshire. In fact its only 3 miles from our old house near Market Drayton and would have been our closest orienteering area but it wasnt mapped at the time.
After the usual hung over phaff to get a club team sorted we all headed off to the start a few hundred metres away. This year a new concept was to be tried to get rid of the mass packs that form when 150+ people start at once. In fact, last year as I turned back from my first control I met 100 people coming in after me.
So to counter this we all had to go to the control code of our age class first. Being an M35 I had to run the full length of the map to number 135 before I could start hoovering in the controls. There has been some discussion post race as to the fairness of this approach, it particularly penalising the women and favouring the older junior classes but its an idea that can be improved upon for next year.
I nailed all the controls on the first map but took a daft route coming back up to the map exchange losing some time to an out and back on 118 and 112 rather than sweeping through them before going back towards the start.
I was a little worried when I came across my 7 year old coming out of 137 a control way off the path but left her to it, knowing she couldn’t stray too far.
After the map exchange my legs started to get heavy and tired, having gone off too fast at the beginning, and made a small error losing 30 seconds on 132 thinking the boulder marked on the map was an unmarked ‘fire bin’, but essentially I started to slow.
Turning for home I entered the finish field with leaden legs, struggling up the run in and ended up =5th fluffing the finish punch and losing a place, very unlike me.
A mass start score is a great way to use a small area like this and an event on New Years Day is a great way to start the year. Looking at Holly’s splits afterwards Cath and I were gobsmacked and more than a little proud to find she had got control 123 on the second map too !
http://www.wrekinorienteers.co.uk/res/twemlows2011/team_laurie_bradley_trophy.html
Happy New Year everyone
Cough Cough Cough Cough!
I’m very aware I am not posting very much on my blog at present, having been ill and don’t want to be too negative but thought I’d better do a little update.
It started with a small calf strain following the snowy street orienteering event at the end of November. After a couple of days rest I stupidly took the Singlespeed out on a recreational ride round Hanchurch Woods. At the end of this my calf was worse than ever so I was forced to rest it. I then caught a stomach bug from Holly, followed by full on Flu. It wasn’t that man flu thing where you sniff a bit, I was flat out on the sofa for two days, finding it hard to do anything. The cold from this flu then went to my chest and I’ve been trying to cough my lungs up pretty much since.
I had been looking forward to the Military Challenge, and by all accounts it was a classic, won by Ben Plowman in a little under 3 hours just 47 secs in front of Ifor. Full results and maps available here
http://www.emituk.com/results/2010/101229_baoc/index.htm
The turn out for the event is a little disappointing, there usually being far more competitors when it is on the weekend before Xmas.
So what next for me, well I tried a 30 min recovery ride on the turbo last night which didn’t go particularly well, forcing more coughing a wheezing, so it was definitely the right decision not to go down to Longmoor.
Today (30th dec) I feel a little better so I might do another turbo recovery ride tonight and perhaps a slightly longer MTB ride on New Years Eve. I am meant to be running in the New Years Day score foot O event, and the club champs is on Sunday. Hmmm a bit too much too soon I think……..