Race 35: MTBO Sprint, Driffield Airfield, 25/09/2011

A dreadful race, I am really bad at orienteering! It was an MTBO sprint at Driffield airfield. I was looking forward to it because it was a sprint with lots of complicated tracks. But in the end I just got confused and felt like I'd just come out of the washing machine, I had no idea what was what anymore! It's the first event I have ever done where not all the controls are on paths. that made it interesting too.

It started well, I got the first 5 without too much bother. I went through some very deep puddles though, ones where I had to get off and pull the bike out. It was all white mud stuff that completely covered me by the end of the race. It started to go wrong on the way to number 6. 5 was off piste around the back of a bunker. I was feeling pleased with myself that I found it and was going along a grassy track when my front wheel went down a massive crater hidden in the grass and I went straight over the bars. I got back on and a couple of metres later it happened again! Straight over the bars, two times within 2 mins. I wasn't happy so I ran the rest of the track and there were the holes everywhere! I lost quite a but of time on that crazy track, with the crashing and everything.

I did a few more OK and then got completely disoriented on the way to number 11. It was a disaster, I was seeing tracks and they weren't right. So I found the road, found the corner of the wood and went back in, looping right until I got to a tarmac area. All good, but it wasn't there! I couldn't understand it. I wandered around for a bit & finally went back to the road for another go. I spotted a small tree off piste which I recognised. I checked the number of the control and found I was in completely the wrong area! I have no idea how it happened. On analysis of the map when I got back, there were two woods of similar size, both next to the road, both with tracks that beared right and came to a tarmac area. What are the chances of that?!

I did the last few controls pretty quickly and finally finished. It had taken me 17 mins to find number 11 on a 2 min leg. How bad is that?!

Afterwards Alan helped me out, we went into the complicated part and he told me how he would get to the next control. His way is totally different to my way, much better, probably the proper way. We did 3 controls and I felt like I saw the light. But the controls were collected in and it had started to rain. Next time....

Unbelievable! Where on earth was I going?! All the wandering around is from 10 to 11 via 6, 4 and 9 then around the road....

Race 34: NYMBO MTBO Score, Dalby Forest, 17/09/2011

This race was quite eventful, it resulted in a trip to casualty! I hadn't done a NYMBO MTBO score since March so was a bit rusty at first, as was Dean, my mixed pair, because he hadn't done one before. I changed my chain in the morning and stupidly threw the old one away. When I got on my bike I got chain suck on the small ring just riding out of the car park! I got to work with the file but the teeth weren't really very hooked so it didn't make any difference. It was big ring for the whole race for me today!

We paused at the start to find a nice loop but missed a 20 pointer early on due to rubbish route choice. After that we found our stride and the route we took was spot on. We just didn't have time to get two 15 pointers at the end, which was a nuisance. We did rack up the points very quickly though and ended up with 435, my highest score ever! It was quite an easy course though I think because Andy Conn cleaned up (525 points).

On one of the climbs Dean was going up on his back wheel faster than I was going up with both my wheels! But he fell out of the back door and landed with a thud on a stony firetrack. I could see a red sticky mess on the back of his rather posh new looking Assos shorts. He didn't pause, simply carried on but I could see the area growing and it turned out that there was an inch long, pretty deep gash, which we had to go get stitched up afterwards!

The route is clockwise in blue