Hello from Czech Republic

You’ve probably already had all the JWOC news from the OA website.

It hasn’t been a good week for Ian – except for one brief glorious moment, which quickly crashed to the worst moment of all yesterday. Going to the girl’s control rather than his own actually cost Ian some time so his time for the race was actually very very good and would have had him as the gold medal winner BUT………. Of course, he was completely shattered by this but hopefully, in time, he can see that it showed what he can do and what potential he has and it will motivate him for the future.

What hasn’t been so well reported is the more important races that are taking place – the JWOC Tour for the spectators. These have been races in the same terrain as JWOC usually in adjacent forests. This has meant long walks to the start (2km) and back from the finish (1.5km) are added to your course. One day the walk was along a railway track, as in, between the rails. 2 km of that wasn’t pleasant! All the terrains have been different from steep hills to rocky slopes to flat open forest and also a town sprint. Jenny has won 4 of the 5 races, picking up 2 prizes- a $25 voucher to an O gear shop and 2 bottles of beer plus a pen! Geoff also won a $25 voucher. Geoff has been having a close tussle with some Czech rivals. He was annoyed on Day 3 that he had only come 3rd, so on Day 4 he decided he would “go for it” and show these Czech fellows something. A warning flag should have gone up here. Last time he decided to “go for it” was in Finland a few years ago. That resulted in a 40 min error when he ran off the map! This time it wasn’t so bad but he did run straight past 1 of his controls and so scored a “mp”. Luckily for him, we are allowed to drop one day in our overall score. Today we have a chasing start and Geoff will go out in the lead by a small margin. Jenny will also have a lead but, as her start time is late she will not be able to run. We have to catch a plane from Prague at 7.30pm – next stop Finland.

We’re off to the JWOC relays now- really hoping for a good result to lift Ian’s spirits.

Jenny and Geoff