Good winter!

EOC on home ground in May is a great motivation. So no wonder the training has been pretty tough last many weeks and fortunately it goes very well so far.

Christmas

I come from Giant mountains in Czech and Christmas has always been connected with proper load of kilometres on skis for me. The plan was the same also this year but the weather had a different plan so I had to keep my skis in the cellar. On the other hand I could make some nice spring running on the tops of mountains. I made two long runs also on New Year days with my friends in Horní Mísečky. It is one of the best places for x-country skiing in Czech. This time mountains were full of runners and tourists. Nice anyway!

Guardamar del Segura with KR

The town of Guardamar near to Alicante, Spain, is a classic winter destination for orienteers. I've been to Southern Europe many times before but it has always been Portugal. Hence the training camp in Alicante was my first time in Spain ever! And I have to say, it was wonderful!

The whole training camp was organized by Thierry. We stayed in Camping Marjal, it means great location and great services. We started most of the trainings just from the accommodation. Other trainings were up to 15min by car. The terrains are typical beach forest. From sandy beach through sand dunes through thorny bushes to fast pinewood.

We had possibility to train 4 times a day for 8 days. We started every day with a nice jog to the beach where we made some strengthening and enjoyed colourful sunrise. Thierry prepared 3 map trainings every day, most of them not too long and I haven't seen a full map many times during the training camp. It means corridors, compass and contours trainings. You can check most of the trainings here. I couldn't publish any of the trainings on a new map Guardamar Sur and maps from Lorca O-meeting and Costa Cálida though.

We left the coast for 2 days and visited the hilly area around Murciá. Some stones, bushes but especially erosion gully are the most challenging features there. Lorca O-meeting is held in those terrains next weekend and I can only recommend it. Especially the WRE long distance with mass start will be rough and awesome!

During one easy sprint training I hit my knee and had to skip almost one whole training day. But still the training summary is quite nice: 8 days/ 21 hours/ 170km/ 70% in terrain. We were lucky to have over 20 degrees in Spain. We were unlucky to have -10 in Czech when I came back. Finns were even luckier to have -28. 50 degrees difference, that's tough for the body. I was taking vitamins and fortunatelly I survived it.

January training camp with the Czech team

One week after I came back from Spain there was a first winter training camp held in Borohradek.

The training camp was a bit affected by physical tests on treadmill in the clinic of MUDr. Pozdíšek

The testing was held in Mohelnice on Thursday and Friday. 40min running from easy speed to max speed. Every 4 min they take a blood drop from your ear and in the end you get the lactate curve in dependence on the heart rate and pace. My turn was on Thursday afternoon and the first training was on Friday evening. I felt good so I decided to add one long terrain run on Friday morning. The plan was 22km from Hradec Králové back to the accommodation. We didn't plan it properly so it was 26km after all and 140min in snow.

In the evening it was 12km in terrain more and I had a feeling I overestimated my power. Saturday morning was full speed middle distance. Saturday afternoon long distance in hilly terrain. Tiredness together with not eating very well before the training resulted in a state of my body I've never felt before. After 70min I started feeling really weak but I went on and it was a mistake. Suddenly in one uphill I was not able to jog anymore and I was cold like hell. I was really happy to get back to car walking and freezing. After eating 4 bananas and sitting for 30min in the shower I felt ok. It should never happen again, the feeling was really scary and I was lucky to have gps tracker on my back so I knew they would find me if I hit the ground.

On Sunday we ended the training camp with a sprint distance in wonderful snowy Opočno.

Future plans

The winter prep goes well so far also thanks to my physio Jarka Pochmonová. I don't wanna repeat the last season when I had knee problems for many months. Exams are done now. Full focus on EOC now. Let's see if my top10 dream is possible.