Sprint orienteering training is always a good time. The maps are accessible and often very accurate, the courses are easy to set and it is a great way to get intensity into running while retaining the orienteering specific elements of a session. To make a sprint o session even more relevant it is best to have courses that cover different areas to ensure that navigation is done off the map, not from memory. As with any training session they are even better when there is a group taking part. Sprint Auckland Day was born from trying to create a session that optimised all of these elements.
Back in April 2011 a group of us ran the first Sprint Auckland Day. Check out the story at https://thomasreynolds.wordpress.com/2011/04/11/sprint-auckland-day/ and https://thomasreynolds.wordpress.com/2011/04/12/sprint-auckland-day-part-2/ . Ever since then we have wanted to run another. Over the last fortnight we began to plan the second edition, with a different mix of maps to keep things varied.
We started bright and early. The foggy morning didn’t deter us as we began a warm up before stage 1 at Massey High School. Matt and Gene both attended Massey for high school so had a little local knowledge. It felt unusual to be running a sprint race at high speed on a Saturday morning while rugby and soccer were taking place out on the school fields. The opening leg was taken by Matt. I felt rusty as I had to double back down a couple of dead ends. Luckily I would have another 14 runs to improve on!
From Massey we began a traverse of West Auckland. We took in some of the schools around Henderson. These maps were pretty small, with large buildings generating some route choice. Running at 1:2000 makes map contact really important, and it did take some resetting of natural distance judgement to feel smooth. The small scale was a little frustrating at times, as it never allowed you to open up and get some pace on – even long legs were under 45 seconds.
The small scale may hurt the running side of things. It does however allow detail to be shown that would be difficult to represent on a 1:4000 map. Cue Rangeview Intermediate. This compact little school in Te Atatu sits on a slight slope. The buildings nest around each other and are joined by tight alleyways. The tightest of these needs a big deep breath in to allow runners through. After Rangeview racing was tight, with Toby, Matt, Duncan and I all covered by less than 25 seconds.
Rangeview concluded the West Auckland leg of the day. From here we jumped on the motorway and made tracks to the North Shore to continue the training. Enthusiasm was sky high and we were only 1/3 of the way through!
Tom Reynolds 