Emma: Segrare Etapp 3!

"U-Ringen SEGRARE ETAPP 3 D10 2006"

That's what it says on Emma's very first first place prize for winning an orienteering race. The wording on the plaque translates to "2006 U-Ringen Winner Stage 3 - Girls Under 10".

Maybe it was the new "O" shoes, or perhaps it was meeting Mats Troeng yeseterday (one of Sweden's top orienteers and OK Linne member) and getting his autographed photo (see picture below), or perhaps it was running 6 orienteering events in the past 11 days or maybe it was that Snickers bar she ate just before tonight's event...whatever the inspiration or reason, Emma won her first orienteering race tonight (by a mere 2 seconds).

At the finish Emma said, "I'm very glad that I didn't get lost." "I thought it was very funny that all of the controls were very close together (except 6 and 7)! I stopped and checked the map along the way and that made it easier".

She ran the 1.69km course in a blistering 15 minutes and 50 seconds! This was a regular Under 10 course, no happy or sad faces or parents to help her along the way. Way to go Emma!!!!!!!

Full results here.

Brrrrr

We think this picture says it all.

+8C and raining and a north wind!

Apparently it is > +30C and very humid back home in Canada. We'll take that over this very cold spring in Sweden.

Orienteering at Lunsen

A short 2.5km jog from our house is the largest and best orienteering map in the Uppsala area. The famous LUNSEN. The area is very flat with small hills (2.5m contour interval) between large forested and open peatlands. The hills are mainly open rock. The map below is a control picking exercise set up by OK Linne that Chris Piller and Mike did last week. This exercise required constant focus. Unfortunately for Mike he was reading his map while stepping into a peatland pool - going up to his waist in water. You think with the amount of time he has spent out studying these ecosystems this spring he would have figured that out by now. Anyway, if you are ever in the Uppsala area you need to go orienteering at Lunsen - a real orienteering challenge.

Swedish 101: Farthinder

We continue our Swedish word of the week.

This word is a favourite of Emma's.

FARTHINDER.

What do you think it means?

Answer: Traffic calming (reduce speed due to narrower road or speed bumps).

Orienteering Heaven!

This weekend we went orienteering in Hälsingland. The first races were in Voxnabruk and wow was the terrain ever awesome. Wide open forest along a river valley (lower map) and then a very rocky and detailed hillside (upper map). Photo coming soon. Emma took part in inskolning each day and placed in the top 5 each day. She won a toy plastic horse key chain, a gym bag and some sea animals building kit. Mike won a lobster tool kit. ;-) At the end of the orienteering weekend and on our way to the Zoo we ran into Emma Engstrand and she gave Emma two autographed photos. Emma och Emma part 2!

Järvzoo

We used orienteering again this weekend as an excuse to explore a different part of Sweden. This time it was Hälsingland (a few hour drive north of Uppsala). Unfortunately the weather was once again not on our side (cold and wet) but with toques and fleece jackets on we visited the Järvzoo. This Zoo only has animals found in Scandinavia and the setting is fantastic. It is located on a large hillside (the same one that we ran up and down in the orienteering earlier in the day) and completely in the woods. A 3km long (2m wide) boardwalk was what we used for our "Zoo-ropa Tour". We joked that this Zoo should have been called the TranqZoo as almost all the animals were just lying around or sleeping. We saw bears, wolverines, moose, owls, deer, wolves, falcons, cranes, and many more. Here are some of the pictures.

Vasaloppet

The Vasaloppet is the World’s largest and most famous cross country ski race. During our visit to Dalarna we stayed in Mora – the town where the Vasaloppet finishes. The picture above is the finish line of this 90km challenge.

Here are some facts:
Largest race: 44,000 skiers in the various races in 2003
First race: 1922 (136 participants)
Length: 90km
Fastest: Peter Goransson in 1998 (3 hours, 38 minutes, 57 seconds)
History: Click here.

Next time we visit it will be in the winter (better start training).

1000's of Horses

1000’s of horses!

We visited one of the only two Dalarna Horse factories in the World last weekend. The other factory was across the street.

The factory tour took us from blocks of wood, to the carved version, to the painting and final glazing. 1000’s of horses.

Tomteland

Last weekend we visited Tomteland (Santa's Village) near Mora in Dalarna, Sweden. Tomteland is normally closed in May but it was opened for the Mora 3-day orienteering race we took part in. Here is Emma's story:

Last weekend we visited Tomteland. We stayed in a little cabin by a lake. We all went orienteering 2 times. We were all tired when we came back. I did Inskolning the two days. One had 11 controls the other had 7. It was raining the 2 days and we were very cold (brrrrr). I got a water bottle and Emma E. signed it and I also won a milk shake.

Mommy and Daddy's orienteering course went through Tomteland on the last day. In Tomteland there is the Troll's house and Santa's house and Santa's sleigh. There is a gift shop and a mini restaurant.

Weekend in Dalarna

The Wadd Squad spent the weekend in beautiful Dalarna this weekend. Dalarna is famous for its great outdoors, hiking, swimming, orienteering, skiing.... and of course the Dalarna Horse (Dalahäst).

The Wawa Canada Goose or Huskie the Muskie from Kenora is no match for this monster Dalarna Horse (Yes that is Emma in the picture).

Over the next few days we'll write about our weekend (which was wet and cold).

Emma och Emma

Emma has met many orienteering stars this year. Earlier this year she got a KOK jersey from Sandy Hott Johansen (when Sandy stayed at Emma's house). Then in Estonia she got a signed postcard from Holger Hott Johansen.

While we were in Estonia and then again this weekend Emma heard the name Emma Engstrand many times and thought it was cool because they have the same first name. But then when Emma found out that Engstrand was one of the best in the World she just had to get Engstrand's autograph.

Check out the photo off Emma W's water bottle autographed by Emma E!

Europe's Wild West?

Is Estonia Europe's Wild West?

Well there were certainly some things that seemed a little outside of the law while we were there and our experience renting a car was well interesting. When we arrived in Estonia to pick up our car there was no AVIS booth. So we went to the information booth instead and the lady phoned up the company.

"Do you see that cafe behind you?....I'll meet you there" said an Avis rep. This was a bit odd but it was a nice morning so I told the guy I'd be outside. A half hour goes by and our tourist time in Tallinn was dwindling. A few minutes later a person holding an Avis clip board appears and she and Mike sit down to fill out the contract. Despite being a Preferred Avis member this took a long time. But before the keys could be handed over the car had to be taken out of the parking lot. But we couldn't do it - the Avis rep had to. The last words of wisdom from the Avis rep (and our first thoughts of the Wild West) was "Make sure you take the car registration and insurance information with you everywhere...don't leave it in the car". Hmmm, could car theft be big in Estonia? And if that is the case, why did they give us a Mercedes SUV???

So we are on our way and we haven't been on the road for more than a minute and a taxi is racing in behind us and honking. Mike nicely waves to the taxi driver before we notice that the Avis rep is hanging out the window with our car's registration and insurance information. And with a move right out of a BOND film we grab the insurance from the lady in the taxi.

A few days later we went into Tartu to help the other team members return their car rental. Mike Smith was told to just return the car to the VW dealer. But when we got there there was nobody there except a security guard. This guy spoke no English and was grabbing for the keys. We didn't seem too confident that the person would look after the car but there was no way to communicate. Or was there? Suddenly Jon Torrance starts speaking in broken Russian to the security guard. "He wants us to leave the car with him...but he doesn't seem to want to answer me when I ask what his name is" Jon explained. Sketchy eh! After a call to EuropeCar we left the car with the guy. Hopefully it made it back to the right people... Who knows. The car could be in Moscow by now. Fortunately for us, nobody stole our registration papers or insurance and we made it back to Tallinn (despite the wild car driving skills of the average Estonian). I guess the reason we made it back OK is because the Wadd Squad is one mean looking family (see below). And nobody in Europe's Wild West would dare mess with The Wadd Squad Gang.

Fyrishov Bad is Good

The Wadd Squad misses our hot tub back in Hamilton. Our apartment doesn't even have a bath tub soooooo we go to the Fyrishov Bad once in a while. This swim area has several pools, a couple hot tubs, sauna, lazy river and water slides. Mike used this an excellent opportunity to do some DWR (deep water running) - to rest his sore feet, while Emma raced all around the indoor water park. The highlight of Fyrishov Bad are the water slides. The goal is to get down the water slide in under 7 seconds (a timer shows each person's slide time). A weekly visit to this water park is in order at least until the lakes get warm enough to start swimming in.

U-Ringen

The O-Ringen is the World's largest orienteering race and is held in Sweden every summer. The race attracts over 15,000 participants for the 5-day race. In Uppsala every spring they have their own mini version. It is called U-Ringen where the U stands for Ungdom (Youth). Yes, a 4 stage all kids competition. We missed the first stage when we were in Estonia but stage 2 was today and the race attracted almost 200 kids under the age of 16.

But for the Wadd Squad this event was extra special. It was the first race that Emma did on her own. No string course, no inskolning and no parents shadowing here. She had a great time - and this course was not easy (see below).

Swedish 101: Bjork

Today we begin our random posting of Swedish 101 words of the week. We start with....BJORK!

Swedish for birch.

Spring has arrived in Uppsala and the leaves are out (and so too is the birch pollen - sniff sniff). Here is a picture of the remains of a birch tree that had fallen over in a peatland. Looks like some moss is starting to grown inside the remains of the birch.

Peatland Workshop

The last three days Mike has been taking part in a peatland ecohydrology workshop in Uppsala. Researchers from Uppsala University and Queen Mary University of London are meeting to discuss different research ideas and methods. It was a good time to get together with his good friends Andy and Erik (seen above discussing our new GRL paper).

Tallinn to Stockholm

We drove to the Stockholm harbr and got our tickets and got on the boat. It was a long ferry ride. But we enjoyed it and there was a ball room with a slide and I played there for a little wile. Then we had diner at a buffet and went to sleep on the boat. The next morning we wok up and went out side to take some pictures. It was a nice day. We arivde in Estonia and looked arowd Tallinn and drove up to Utepaa. The week past and it was time to go back to Sweden. So we got back on the ferry and went to Stockholm on the ferry and I played in the ball room and got a cat panted on my arm. In the room there was buck beds and then we went to bed and wok up the next morning and took some more pictures. Then we drove back to our house. By: Emma

World Cup Relay

The relay concluded the week of racing here in Estonia and what an exciting race it was - 7 teams within 11 seconds of the winner!

Mike anchored Canada's top team (Mike Smith, Brent Langbakk and Mike). Not the result the team was looking for but we gained important experience for the World Championships in Denmark.

Mike picked up two spots on his leg and was within a minute of catching a few more teams. Sweden won the men's relay and Finland won the women's relay.

Endla Nature Reserve

The Endla Nature Reserve in central Estonia is the site of a Ramsar protected wetland complex. Within that complex is the Makrijarvi peatland (shown above). A short hike past several pastures of horses we found a large wooden boardwalk that takes you out to the middle of the peatland. This peatland has excellent ridge and pool patterning which (for whatever reasons) seems to get Mike really excited (he took about 50 pictures). But what makes this site so interesting is that there is a 10m high viewing platform in the middle of the peatland allowing one to get excellent views of the site.

Bowling!

Our visit to Estonia wasn't just orienteering. We did some sightseeing as well and also some other recreational activities - like bowling. On the rest day we went bowling with our friend Chris "The Big Lebowski" Piller.

Bowlers the four us are not...but it was a lot of fun and set up nicely for a team movie night watching what else but The Big Lebowski.

World Cup Long

The Long distance qualifier was an interesting race. Here are some post race ramblings from Mike.

THICK WOODS
Many of the big names of the sport had troubles. The woods were well - THICK! Poor runnability and poor visibility. We are used to this in Canada and so instead of whining I viewed this as an advantage. The terrain had similar contour detail to Long Lake in Whitehorse but had similar vegetation to Northumberland Forest near Cobourg Ontario. We are quite lucky to have such varied terrain in Canada. While we may not be specialists in any particular terrain we know what to do in almost everything that we see internationally.

IN GOOD COMPANY
I came 24th (to go along with my 25th in the sprint and middle) in my heat. But look at the people around me in the results list:
22. Tore Sandvik (Norway) - former World Champion
23. Niklas Jonasson (Sweden) - former World Champion
24. Mike Waddington (Canada)
25. Andrey Khramov (Russia) - current World Champion
That is a surprise!

MAKING EXCUSES?
I think this terrain caught a lot of Europeans by surprise and some big name athletes have called it the worst terrain they have ever run in and others have stated that the woods were too thick. Are they making excuses for their poor performances? Making excuses is an orienteering tradition and it is certainly a very Canadian thing. If I had a dime for every excuse I have made the last 20 years racing for Canada I could retire a rich man. But one of the themes of the National Training Camp hosted by Holger and Sandy Hott Johansen earlier this year in Hamilton was "No excuses". We as Canadians have often qualified our International performances by making excuses. Examples: 1) We work harder and longer at our job in North America, 2) Our maps aren't as good, 3) We don't get Government funding, 4) Our forests are too thick yada yada yada. Well, yes, lots of these things are true but the point made at the camp is that we can do things about them. Work less, take time off work, approach sponsors, take out a loan, travel to good maps and faster woods, etc. OR, we can flip those old excuses around into advantages. Yes, some of our forest is thick but as I stated above for today's race being able to relate to running in thick woods was a big advantage.

POSITIVE ATTITUDE
So you can see that having a positive attitude is the theme of today's blog entry. A positive and fun attitude is essential for International orienteering success. My buddy and team mate Brent Langbakk told me of an interesting exercise to do after my disappointing performance 10 days ago at Tiomila. Katarina Smith told him this exercise. Write down what the positives were and what needs improvement from each race you do. It is a very healthy exercise. BUT I think this can also be done by examining overall team performance as well. Instead of focussing on a "STRIKE OUT #3" performance here in Estonia (3 strike outs I guess since we didn't make and finals in all three races) it would be more positive for us as a team to think of what the team positives were and what team things needs improvement. I can think of several things that need improvement but I can also think of several positive headlines as well. My favourite is:

"Chris Piller makes World Cup debut!" Chris is the first cross over athlete from adventure racing in Canada to represent our country in International orienteering. I know several other Canadian adventure racers that want to follow in Chris' footsteps.

EESTI
The Estonians have performed very well here on home court (see photo above). The quality of this World Cup is very high and we have been very impressed with the organization.

I will skip the Long B Final to have a work day and family day with Starr and Emma....but I'm looking forward to finishing off a fun week in Estonia at the relay. I'm racing with Mike Smith and Brent Langbakk.

-Mike

World Cup Middle

Coming to this World Cup I thought that making an A final was an impossibility for the Canadian men. I knew that Sandy Hott Johansen could do it after her 9th place last year at WOC but unfortunately she has been injured. But Canadian men have not had much success making the finals at World Cup races recently. Why? Well each country can enter two athletes per heat and only the top 17 from each heat go to the final. Compare that to top 15 in each heat going to the final at WOC with only one athlete per country per heat. Much better odds at WOC. BUT after a few days here at this World Cup in Estonia I am very confident that "WE CAN DO IT". Sure, no Canadian men made the final of the sprint or middle distance and a person looking to criticize would call it being 'shut out' but it is clear to me now that we have the ability to make the final and I think several others on the team feel the same way.

A perfect race by a fit Canadian will get them into the final of a WOC or a World Cup. Period.

I am very pleased with my middle distance B final result (10th). This is the distance I have been focussing my training on. The terrain suited me well. Similar to some areas in southern Ontario. I had too much hesitation in some places but also had a lot of good 'flow' and pushed hard. The B final was very similar to the A final course so it is possible to compare legs and split times. There is some very encouraging information in those splits. I now know what it is going to take to meet my middle distance goals at WOC. This World Cup has not been a 'shut out' but a great learning experience and I know what to do to be my best when it really counts in August in Denmark.

-Mike

World Cup Sprint

The first races for the World Cup in Estonia were the sprints. Two races in one day. First the qualifier and then the finals. Although Mike didn't qualify for the finals he was only a half minute away from doing so and really enjoyed the race. The qualifier started in a town then moved into some fields and finished with some forest running. Forest sprints suits Mike quite well and if he is able to get some more speed before July he might consider running the sprint races at the World Championships in Denmark.

The sprint finals took place in downtown Tartu. Mike and Mike Smith enjoyed the afternoon by skipping the B final and resting the legs for the middle distance race. They had a table in a cafe right on the finish line.

Tallinn, Estonia

On Friday we drove into Stockholm and hopped onto the ferry to Tallinn, Estonia. The car rental nightmare will have to be a story for another day....

Anyway, we reserved a cabin for the three of us on the boat and enjoyed a great buffet of food. After dinner we went onto the deck of the boat to watch the boat navigate through the Stockholm area archipelago.

We spent a few hours wandering the streets of Tallinn. Tallinn is a very beautiful city. We enjoyed seeing all the very old buidings there. How old? Oh late 1100's, early 1200's. Tallinn, means "Danish Town" in Estonian and was one of the Hanseatic League trading centres. The Danish and Scandinavian influence is every where.

Our House...

We have an apartment in a townhouse (you can see it in the photo). In the area there is a swing and a sand box. It is about 2km south of SLU-Ultuna (the Agricultural University) and about 5km south of downtown Uppsala and Uppsala University.

The other day Mike and Emma explored the forest, fields and rocks behind our house in Uppsala. Lots of rocks to jump on and enjoy the sunshine. Sunshine? Yup, the temperature finally went above 20oC.

Gamla Uppsala

Gamla Uppsala means old Uppsala. This is where the original town was built and those hills in the picture are burial mounds. Who (or what) is under those hills is still up for debate. Also up for debate is use of the word 'new'. You see the church in the background of this photo is the new church at this site. Built in 1284!

Sprint On...Sprint Off

While Starr and Emma were in school (see last blog posting), Mike did some sprint orienteering training. The training was set up by our friend Boris from NYC. Three sprint races with 5 minutes rest in between. In this picture Mike is doing his best Karate Kid acting. Sprint on...sprint off.

Skola i Stadskogen

Today Emma had school in the city park called Stadskogen. Her teacher today was Mrs. Waddington (Starr). Some days her teacher is Mme. Leriche (Starr) - it depends on the subject. They spent an hour exploring the woods while Mike did some sprint training (see next blog entry). Uppsala (like most Swedish cities) is well designed. There is a high density of housing and then large parks adjacent to these small communities. After 'school' we went downtown for ice cream. Swedes certainly love their ice cream. I think we counted 5 stores in 2 blocks that sold that yummy stuff.

Training with OK Linné

On Tuesday night the Wadd Squad attended a training night with one of the local orienteering clubs - OK Linne. It is the largest orienteering club in the city and has many top runners. The size of this training night was bigger than your average weekend "B" meet in Ontario.

Emma ran two courses. The first course she did with Daddy and the second with Mommy. There were lots of boardwalks and Emma liked jumping over the rocks. Emma saw lots of kids on the course and beat them all up the finish line. The training was at the famous map called Lunsen. This is an amazing area. Flat and detailed. It is the top area to orienteer in Uppsala. Interestingly on the way to training we noticed that one of the other orienteering clubs in town was also training on the same map. Now that NEVER happens back home in Canada.

We have only been in town one week but it is easy to see why OK Linne is such a successful club. They have a wonderful balance of family, kids and elite programmes (they have about a half dozen Swedish A and B team members). Lots of volunteers and a fantastic clubhouse on the edge of yet another huge map.