Category: Cycling

With the Walton High School gym, our normal venue for WCH club circuit training, closed for half term, Cath organised another Tuesday night ‘orienteering in the dark’ mini training event on the Wildwood estate in Stafford this week. This time we were to be using the fruits of a her winters nights of OCADing a brand new A3 1:4000 map, complete with every house, fence and wall plus the surrounding parkland.

My calf not being 100% for running and it being very low key (15 runners) I decided to go off last and use my bike (and be very careful not to run anyone over). I started well but at number 3 smelt trouble as I dropped the bike to punch a control on some steps going down to the playgrounds and sports pitches.

A large group of youths were on their way, bottles in hand, to get smashed in the park. Most walked on but as I rode away I saw two getting quite intimate with the control. At over £100 each I took the decision to bin my ride and go and get it. I got a fair bit of catcalling but just rode off ignoring it but got a loud cheer when I couldn’t get a gear on a steep bank and had to get off. Returning the control to Cath about 400 m away at the finish she told me there was another one at risk on the shorter course, so I had to return to rescue it from where it had been thrown. This time I got a lot more abuse and started to feel a little intimidated, but I managed to get it out of the tennis court and away to safety. I then had to go and stand at the previous control on the short course to tell runners to miss out the ‘youth’ control, but I didn’t manage to catch one runner who had a nice chat with the youth as he hunted around for it!

Unfortunately we also lost one other control, I suspect by the same group of kids. At £100 to replace it was an expensive training session, but we will leaflet the few houses around where it went missing to see if it ended up in a garden !

The weather forecast said snow, in fact Sheffield had enough for snowballs and sledging on Saturday. After checking the event was still on, I left the house with the car thermometer showing 6 degrees. Slowly, as I climbed up out of Ashbourne towards the event, the temperature started to drop. Parking up in Biggin (glad I don’t use satnav so I didn’t make the mistake a fair few other people made by going to a different Biggin some 15 miles away) the temperature had got down to 2 degrees and a cold wind was blowing from the East.

The penultimate round of the Dark and White Winter series 2010/11 had brought us right down to the more rolling South of the Peak District again, but we noticed from the map samples before hand that some of the deceptively contoured hilly terrain around Yougreave was included. The key to navigation in this area are the several long distance cycle trails, which wind themselves around hugging the contours. Although gravel and not as fast as the roads, they are relatively flat and good for getting around quickly.

The foul weather of the previous few days had taken its toll on the car park so we all had to park on the roads around the village. A control had also been removed from the course as it was a quagmire, apparently.

I got ready but had this nagging feeling I had forgotten something. Rolling up to the start line I realised what it was – map board. Muppet, it was at home, still on my other bike.

After 20 minutes of stress and phaffing trying various DIY options, I eventually decided just to carry it in my hand.

I started stressed, and, not being able to see the complete map unless going very slowly, I immediately picked a daft route to number 1, not noticing a quicker way up onto the Tissington Trail, but after than things went OK. I rode one handed a lot, I stuck the map in my mouth and down my shorts a lot, but I didn’t lose too much time to it.

The wind wasn’t strong, but it slowly sucked the energy out of my legs and I felt I was not riding as strongly as normal. The mud in places was horrendous. Other competitors noted afterwards that my lack of mapboard had resulted in my face receiving more than its fair share of muck, and I struggled at times with it getting in my eyes more than normal (I don’t wear and glasses whilst competing as they seem to steam up, perhaps I should try it again).

After a couple of hours my map situation was becoming desperate, the plastic bag muddy and the map scrunched up inside making it more and more difficult to navigate and even more difficult to plan ahead more than a couple of controls. With 30 minutes to go I had to take a risk and go for another loop north on the old railway line. I gave it everything but my legs were really starting to tire. Turning for home and number 8, I had a nightmare. I found the tape marking the site but not the SportIdent timing box. After checking the descriptions and looking about for a couple of minutes I had to eventually assume it had gone missing and head for home, but the control had seemed a little out of place.

I eventually skidded to a halt at the finish, quads on fire after giving it all, about 7 minutes late and a few points down on the winner. Apparently, the tape for number 8 had been moved by persons unknown so hopefully I will, like a few others, be credited with that extra score.

Another well planned event from Dark and White and with just one more challenge left the league is very close, so an exciting finale awaits.

Update:
D&W have now released revised results – http://www.darkandwhite.co.uk/results/2010DWWinterLeagueRnd5shortv2.html

showing me winning M21 and 2nd overall behing Killian Lomas, perhaps I should leave my mapboard home more often 😉