Occassional thoughts about orienteering
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| okansas.blogspot.com Occassional thoughts about orienteering |
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Wednesday, December 15, 2004 Very easy running in the forestHolger H-J wrote a bit about training on a Norwegian discussion page. I thought it was quite interesting and touched on something I was thinking about last weekend. Here is a rough translation of some of what he wrote:One difference between orienteering and running is that we run in the terrain and up a lot of hills. It demands a different kind of strength. Runners have a different "rhythm" and run with the same stride all the time. Orienteers have a lower cadence, each step is different, the push off* and surface vary the whole time and balance/coordination is entirely different. Speed is also much slower for an orienteer. Do you really need to be able to run faster than 35 minutes/10 km to be nordic champ in Notodenn? [Notodden hosts the Nordic Open Champs this summer] ... Runners would consider a lot of the training I (and many other orienteers) do "junk miles" because of the low speed. The heart is working relatively low (I often average under 110 h.r. on a long training session). But the training is in steep terrain on trails with lots of rocks and roots. These easy sessions give me specific strength training. I used to feel that if you're going to run in the forest, you ought to run at a pace that you race at. But that was when I didn't do much running in the forest. When I lived on a map, I began to do my slow/easy runs in the forest, too. I began to do almost all of my running in the forest. I can't manage to do all my runs in the forest these days. But, most of my runs (at least in the colder half of the year) are in terrain that is somewhat relevant. I try to run on trails or the woods, but minimize roads and the track. A serious American orienteer could probably gain a competitive advantage over most of us by doing the majority of their training in the forest. *"Push off" is a real guess on my part. The Norwegian word is "frasparket." posted by Michael | 7:31 PM 
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