Peaslake MTBO April 2015

This past weekend Liezl and I attempted our 2nd ever orienteering event. The first one we did back in October started disastrous. We planned a route and then decided in the last few minutes to change our route and follow the sequence Simon & Albert worked out. This was not a good move for as as we didn't have time to check where we should go and lost them.  Needless to say we got lost and ended up giving up on one of the points. There were 2 things counting against us. We couldn't really read maps and I certainly was somewhat arrogant in my approach thinking I know the area like the back of my hand - clearly I didn't. 

In November I went on the MTB-Leadership course and had to suddenly read a map, I had to take a bearing and heard of the term hanger for the first time in my life.

The knowledge from that course came in very handy as we decided which checkpoints we were going to aim for. We marked 11 and wrote down step-by-step instructions on how to get to each of them. 

We had our plan and we were going to stick to it. 

Our master plan

We had to start by 10:45 and we literally checked in whilst still making our own makeshift map holders by attaching the map with cable ties to our handlebars. 

The long hill up Hound House Road towards Pitch Hill was a rude awakening for our legs. We managed to pick up 4 checkpoints within 30 minutes. I started making calculations in my head whilst cycling up the dirt climb of Barry Knows Best and came to the realisation that if we manage to pick up our 11 points we will have an hour to spare which meant we could pick up more checkpoints. Liezl suggested that we think about that later once we had them all. 

I did have time to wrote down how to get an additional CP after the last one on our original plan. 

Everything went so well until after the 2nd single track CP. It was placed on one of the You should Goco's on Holmbury and what made it difficult was that you are not sure on which fire road you would be popping out onto on the map. We lost a bit of time on this one, but quickly realised our mistake, found the CP back at the top of the hill and carried on from there. 

One of the markers were placed on Tunnel of Love and thankfully we didn't go down it at our normal speed as we might've missed it completely! 

We picked up our 11 checkpoint in 1h40mins and had the potential to pick up another 3 points which were the closest to where we ended our original plan.

To Liezl's dismay I started getting a bit competitive and excited so pushed for the extra 3 checkpoints. We picked up 2 of the 3 easily and we knew that the last one will be our biggest challenge for the day as this was in an area that neither of us knew really well AND we knew that a steep uphill would be between that CP and the finish. We now had 35 minutes left to find the last CP and be back at the Finish Line.   

We followed our noses for a bit as we were not sure if there were an actual route down to the checkpoint from where we were at the top of Greensand Lane as all we could see on the map was a footpath leading towards the CP which were placed on Alderbrook Copse. We were contemplating taking the footpath but when I saw how steep and overgrown it was I said no way am I going down there. 

Thankfully towards the right there was another path. We started following it, and before we knew it we were on quite a technical single track. We looked to our left where all we could see was these MASSIVE crazy big build jumps! We reached the bottom unharmed and quite pumped with our new discovery. We found the last checkpoint after some deliberation. Home time, the clock was ticking we had 20 minutes left. 

This last checkpoint was located on the back of Winterfold Hill down Greensand Lane, I am sure that to the roadies amongst us Barhatch Road will bring back some painful memories. Well that is where we had to go up! Liezl had her climbing legs on her where as for me my bus doors went open and it was a real slog! 

I asked Liezl if we could stay on the tarmac instead of going back via Supernova to the finish as I knew it would be quicker and less risky as by now my brain was fading. 

We arrived back at Peaslake Village Hall at 13:47 and got a 2 minute penalty which meant we would lose 20 points from our total. 

Our aim was to get 875 with our 11 checkpoints, with our additional 3 checkpoints we were now onto 1145 minus 20 penalty points and we ended finishing on 1125 out of 1760 that could've been won if you cleared the course! 

We thought that we might've been the first ladies team and our thoughts were confirmed. We won a helmet, cycling top, 2 pairs of shoes sponsored by Howard from Pedal and Spoke and also 1:2:1 coaching session with Rich from B1KE. Two years ago we had a skills session with him and we are looking forward to have another lesson with him. 

What we have learnt and did better this time:

1. Planned (Fail to Plan, Plan to Fail)
2. Stuck to our plan
3. Looked around, observe the terrain and place names there are so many clues around by just being observant
4. We were better at map reading including contours etc

Our biggest personal achievements of the day: 

1. Trusting our map reading skills and not relying on our local knowledge
2. Discovering new ways of getting to places where we have been before
3. Not fighting once
4. As an added bonus on top of our personal achievements we won a prize :-)

Strava file below in case you want to check out route planning skills.  

https://www.strava.com/activities/293075650

Next time we are going big... we might even venture over to Leith Hill. 

Thank you Peaslake MTBO for organising this local event we love supporting it.

Prize Giving - Tango Twins take the Win

Our lovely prize - I still giggle when I read our Team name, Tango Twins, fondly given by Lizzie & Iain. 

The normal procedure for when we get back home. Bike wash and food!

Directly translated from Afrikaans, "The one hand washes the other" 

Liezl loves washing bikes and I love cooking, so she washes my bike and I make the food, it is a win-win for both of us. :-)

Peaslake MTBO 2014

I originally had other plans for yesterday, but it got cancelled so Pokkeltjie & I decided to go for a fun ride on Sunday instead. Simon then suggested this event, Peaslake MTBO that I sent out in my recent newsletter & we decided to support this local race instead and entered as a team.

Simon sent out links with tips for us to read/study before Sunday, we soon realised that our fun ride might be a little bit more serious than what we had in mind originally.

For those of you who know us, the team dynamics were more than interesting, 1 gadget map reading loving male, 1 female who rides on memory & another female who are happy to follow most of the time. :) We are all good friends and knew that this event might put a test to our friendship. I prayed that I would be 'not' myself just for a day & just follow the lead. :-)

On Saturday we had a quick catch-up meeting to talk strategy & to just get an idea of how orienteering works.

Shucks my head wanted to explode with all the route options, there were too many decisions to make.

On Sunday Simon continued to quiz us in the car. One of the questions was, if it is mid-day and the sun is on your right which side is North? I continued driving and left Liezl to answer the question. Needless to say we all knew who the weakest link in the team was before we even started ME! I can't even tell left from right, how would I be able to work that one out.

Albert joined us as a last minute add-on. He is fitter than most of us so we decided it would be best to make one female and one male team.

Simon kindly made us all some DIY perspex map holders by drilling holes into plastic photo holders which we then mounted on our bikes.

Pokkeltjie plotting points

At registration we received our maps with all 21 check points marked. We sat down and transferred some check points over to another bigger picture map of our own. This was exciting, I recognized most of the points were near areas we knew and have ridden before.

Unfortunately we didn't keep a closer look on the time and had only 15 minutes left to plan our route, decide which check points are not worth going to etc. There were 21 check points & we had 3 hours to get to all of them.

Team work, Si plotting points & Albert working out their route

Simon & Albert offered us their sequence of points and due to the lack of time we decided to go with that. Unfortunately we missed the first turn off and had trouble finding our first CP. Eventually we saw others with maps flapping around their necks and got our first CP.

I was confident that the next check point could've not been far away, it was almost in a straight line from there. But this one was the elusive one. We wasted so much time cycling up and down in the same road not finding it. So close, but yet so far. We then decided to give up hope to find that one. We have ridden for an hour already and only had one CP. We went over to the summit of Pitch Hill where we quickly got the next point. The next point was located on single track, now I know a few single tracks on Pitch Hill and didn't want to go down the wrong one as then we would need to climb back up. Thankfully Pokkeltjie was able to tell which way was North so we bagged this one quick-quick. We then hit it over to the bottom of BKB to grab some points on Holmbury Hill.

Here we bagged one of the big ones very quickly BEFORE getting horribly lost in our search for number 10. We were desperate to find 10 as without 10 we won't be able to find 11 & 8. After many junctions Liezl suggested going up a steep rocky climb. In my head I hoped that it would be worth going up there. It was! Not too far away we saw the tiny grass triangle with the bunting on marking CP10. We blitzed down the wide fire road to pick up 11 before going left in search of 8. I knew 8 was potentially going to be near one of the other memorable trees that I get teased about. Thankfully I saw some people to our right and we found 8. We took a single track section we know and did with Richard from All Biked Up back to Peaslake and got back with 8 minutes to spare.

The winners of this event have done it plenty of times before and we can tell that there are some really fit people out there that are able to combine their fitness & map reading skills very well. The Men’s Winner cleared the course in 2:10! #Machine!

I am glad we were able to support an event hosted by the community of our local weekend playground. In all honesty I think I prefer a way marked route, but it was good to do something outside my comfort zone & I am walking away knowing that I can learn the following from this event.

TC’s Tips & lessons learnt:

1. Buy the same map for each team member so both are on the same page

2. Keep an eye on the time before you start

3. Plan your OWN route

4. Teach yourself the difference between left & right, then NORTH, SOUTH, EAST & WEST :-)

5. Then LEARN how to read a map correctly

Links Simon sent that might be useful if you ever wanted to an event like this:

Some good tips in the "Techniques" section of this pdf:
http://gphxo.org/Events/Intro_to_bike-o.pdf

Simon’s Strategy Advice:

1. Accept that we have zero chance of visiting ALL checkpoints, so weigh up which are the "least bang for buck" and cull them early

2. Long uphills come at a price, so plan our route to minimise them and do them on road where possible

3. Decide on your plan A CP grouping - "definites"

4. Decide on your plan B CP grouping - "ambitious maybes" if you still have the time after done with A

5. Start with plan A and then re-assess along the way if B going to happen or perhaps a scaled down version of it

6. Key knowledge is familiarity with the fastest and easiest routes between checkpoints, which will often be at the tops of hills. Obvious, but worth thinking about.

7. Make sure the stronger person at least even if they are apparently slower with being unwell :)) has a good map and holder. This will allow them to plan the route while they wait for their partner(s) to catch up at the top of hills after clipping the checkpoint card.

All done & ready to go home!