Jafa QBD Report

It’s a great feeling when it all comes together, when your work is finally cashed in, but the return on the investment often comes in sudden steps. Despite consistent training week to week, I often notice a very sudden increases in performance separated by long periods with no change. It’s hard to put a finger the possible cause for the sudden increases, but it would be great if I could understand the causation better. My most recent jump in performance occurred 2 weekends ago, on day 2 of the JAFA Queen’s Birthday Orienteering event. My training paces for the previous 3 weeks had remained deadpan, no gains, and after racing at the expected speed on Saturday, I hit the start line on Sunday with inexplicable energy. I attacked the whole course, start to finish, and if I ever took my foot off the gas, I felt as fresh as a daisy in moments. I maintained this form through Monday’s race also, destroying the competition. Let’s hope I can at least maintain this form for WOC in 2 months, if not experience another dramatic level-up.

Physical fitness aside, let’s take a look at my technical performance over the 4 races. The general feel is that I’m planning ahead a lot better than I have been in recent times, and almost always had a good sense of what to expect next in the terrain. Looking at the first race of the weekend, a middle distance on Saturday morning, you can see this in action best when I made small directional errors. Some examples include legs 1, 5, 6 and 8, where I have veered off the straight line unintentionally, but since I had the expected contour features planned in advance my relocation was quick and confident.

Once I was out of the lower visibility area I was confident that I would have a smooth ride to the finish but this was not the case. I made a pure error of judgement coming into 14. I was referencing from the obvious hill top to my left mid leg and decided confidently that I was the right distance from the hill to be close to the control and so got confused when the contours didn’t match those close to 14. I was supposed to be about 50 metres from the hill and was only 20 according to my GPS. That’s a 150% error! I did reassess my distance from the hill top, and was still satisfied, so how could I be so wrong? I call this a genuine technical mistake because despite my concentration and correct process, my conversion of map to terrain was straight up wrong.

This type of mistake is distinct form the type of mistake I made on the next leg. To 15 I blatantly followed the top Australian of the day, Brodie Nankervis, who I caught earlier in the course. It doesn’t make sense to say that I made a navigational error to cause this mistake because I wasn’t even navigating! Instead I made a process error, where I was thinking about something other than absorbing information from the map. I caught him only to find he had lost contact with the map so we took another minute to sort ourselves out and this was my biggest mistake of the weekend. I think this distinction is especially useful when you are trying to perfect your technique, because forcing yourself to do more and more orienteering is not going to improve your navigation if it is distractions and concentration that are preventing you from employing your well-practiced technique. Instead, mindset and concentration need to be examined more to improve your orienteering.

I managed to shake off the mistake and finish very strongly, and then race even better in the afternoon’s chasing start middle distance. I had the middle distance beast, Matt Ogden, starting 1 minute behind me, but I stayed relaxed and raced as if I was the only one in the forest. I felt tired from the morning’s race and gave in to the idea of being caught, and in doing so felt no pressure. I had plenty of mental space to absorb the map and concentrate on my execution.

The first 6 controls on this course were make or break, some of the hardest orienteering I’m likely to do this year. The visibility is this area was low, despite being white on the map. It’s probably more of a patchy light green, but with thick cutty grass and low branches pushing you around. Just look at how wiggly my GPS is through these controls compared to leg 7 and onwards. To get through with only a 20 second mistake at 6 was good, and the rest of the course unfolded quite easily. I was pushing hard and moving well, but Brodie took the fastest time of the afternoon. We were running at a similar speed on this day, but as I mentioned in the first paragraph, I was about to go next level overnight.

On the Sunday, I had a 9 km race on the Hedley Dunes map last used for NZ Champs long distance. On that occasion I was victorious, but not in great fashion. I hit the start line this time around quite relaxed, and quickly got into a fast rhythm. After 10 minutes it was clear that my form was a whole level above that of yesterday and I ripped into the terrain with full enthusiasm. Aside from poor direction heading into 10, and covering some extra distance to 20, I was in control the whole race. My best piece of navigation was from 16 to 17, where I saw every little contour shape I could in the low visibility and maintained rock solid direction the entire leg. I identified this a dangerous leg which could cost dearly if I wasn’t attentive, but I left nothing up to chance on this occasion.

I finished in a very satisfying 54 minutes, 3 minutes ahead of Australia’s ever consistent Simon Uppill and another 3 ahead of young Tommy Hayes, delivering the goods in his first year out of the junior ranks. For me this also comes as a relief as I have broken the psychological barrier set by my burnouts [] last year and reached peak form once again.

I hit the start line of the final race, 11 km on Hedley Dunes, much the same as with the previous day, relaxed and confident in my physical fitness and in my technical ability in this terrain. My concentration was great and I think the sense of confidence was helping me to sustain the concentration. I had the feeling that the way I’m navigating, on my own terms, is working for me. This is in contrast to the feeling of self-doubt and frustration that is so common in much of my racing.

I basically dissected the course and left it splayed on the table. My only notable mistake was a bad exit direction from 10 where I lost 20 seconds. The course by the way, set by Matt Ogden, was one of the best courses ever set in Woodhill Forest, action packed from start to finish. I finished in 63 minutes, a solid 7 minutes ahead of 2^nd placed Scott McDonald and another minute back to Simon. This was a good performance and I’m proud to have done it. It has been a while since I felt quite so competent with map and I hope I can continue in this direction leading up to WOC in 2 months.