Over lunch at the IBM office one day I had managed to get myself on to the reserve list for the Software Group team for Holmenkollstafetten. This is an annual 15 person relay around the streets of Oslo which, with a total distance of just 18km, manages to attract a massive entry. If you live in Oslo and are not running yourself you almost certainly know someone who is. As predicted, the drop out rate in our team was pretty high and in the week beforehand I was called up.
Archive for the ‘Sport’ Category
Holmenkollstafetten
Sunday, May 11th, 2008Active week
Friday, May 2nd, 2008It’s been an active week so far. Tuesday night was an Oslo City Cup race at Godliaparken on the west side of Oslo. A 1:5000 sprint race map again with a mix of fast woodland and open areas around the school and flats. My biggest mistake of the night was at the third control where I was a bit to the right. This cost me a whole 23 seconds but was enough for the guy who started 15 seconds behind me to catch up. I then spent the rest of the race desperately clinging on – my legs tired from two hilly runs at the weekend – only staying in touch by avoiding his small mistakes. Although only less than three minutes down on the winner, I’m still in the middle of the results. I think I’d be pushing it to run 3km in 13 minutes in terrain even if I didn’t have to find 19 controls!
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Svalerød shocker
Sunday, April 13th, 2008
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Shopping, sights and snow
Saturday, April 12th, 2008
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Training slipping
Thursday, April 10th, 2008I failed to make it to club training tonight. I was going to blame it on the traffic around the city centre but once we’d got past the car broken down in the Ekeberg tunnel it was a clear run home so I was back in plenty of time. It wasn’t even really the pouring rain (which proceeded to stop as six o’clock came and went). I just felt tired…
Sognsvann revisited
Thursday, April 10th, 2008It was back to Sognsvann yesterday evening for my second crack at the lake. I had a chat with the organiser beforehand and he remembered my e-mail and said he would have another look for my time from last week although he looked a bit hassled. My legs weren’t as fresh as last week and it was bitterly cold (my hands didn’t warm up until after I’d finished). I didn’t have anything left for the sprint finish this time and slipped down in to fifth place. I looked at the results the next day as they weren’t giving out any times and could see why the organiser might have been a bit stressed. There appears to be just one guy listed! However, if I search the database for my name, then someone with approximately the right name, appears to have completed zero laps in 11:17. I timed 11:26 on my watch (as I wasn’t taking any risks this time) so presumably it took me just 9 seconds to do the one lap?
Oslo City Cup 1
Wednesday, April 9th, 2008
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O-Training
Friday, April 4th, 2008Yesterday evening I went along to a training session of our local orienteering club – Heming/NjÃ¥rd O-Lag. The training session was held on the 1:5,000 map of the area surrounding Rikshospitalet, just 10 minutes run from home and conveniently also the area to be used for the first Oslo Cup race next Tuesday. The club is relatively small but has a strong junior section, particularly in the girls. There are no elite men and the older members seem happy devoting their time to training the younger club members. Tonight was mass start/relay training and consequently I found myself lined up for a race alongside the club’s finest.
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