World MTB Orienteering Championships 2013

Rakvere, Estonia

The WOC week kicked off with a great sprint around the military town of Tapa. The organisers had spend months preparing a complex track network in an area of rough open terrain. The paths here were bumpy, tough to ride, full of wheel sized holes, not to mention technical orienteering at speed! Most athletes were unable to read their maps here while riding so those with good map memory came through strongest. The courses then had a loop around the ski hill, heading to the top twice, before going into the town through the parks and around the urban buildings.

The sprint started off very well, as I cruised through the early controls to take the lead at the first radio control. Once I hit the urban section I realised I had a problem with my bike, as it seemed to be ‘snaking’ along the road. The problem progressively became worse, and I lost 50 seconds as a result. At the time 5th was my second best WOC result so I shouldn’t have been disappointed, but I knew that I had lost my opportunity to become World Champion. In the end I was disqualified for riding through an OOB area with 60 other athletes. It didn’t even cross my mind as I was biking, such was the distraction from the bike issue.

After the sprint I felt I had to have a good race in the middle. All the signs were there that I had potential to take a medal in the sprint, and given that the middle was the focus of my race prep (due to the unpredictable nature of sprints), I was feeling confident that things could go my way.

As I started the 3 min countdown procedure I heard my wonderful boyfriend being announced as leading and only having a few minutes until the finish. It's nearly impossible to ignore the commentary at this point, and HJ crossed the line just as I started, so it was mildly distracting!

The early part of the course was moderately flat with fast tracks. After the half way point came the technical controls. Sizeable hills compared to the flat north, with a multitude of ski tracks and MTB trails. The controls in here were well planned to balance the great trails and fast riding.

During the final loop all I could do was to keep riding and keep pedalling. My legs were screaming to stop or slow down, but after a near perfect race there was no chance of my brain letting that happen. The hills by this point were unrelenting, and I rode up the final steep climb with soft dust making the trail harder. But from there it was downhill. The final control couldn't come soon enough, and then HJ was yelling I was in the fight for medals, so I sprinted harder to get the fastest finish time.

As it turned out, it wasn't a fight for medals. I was safely in silver with none of the 5 starters behind me close at the radio controls, so I could instantly celebrate silver. It was short lived when I was told I had to pee in front of someone, and 2 hours later I finally managed to be hydrated enough to manage my first doping control. Unfortunately, I then didn't stop running to the toilet for the next 3 hours!

The final race of the week was the long distance, and boy, did it promise to be tough! With winning times of 90 minutes for the women and 110 minutes for the men, the long course lengths implied to the team it would be fast terrain. Typical Estonian terrain with short, sharp climbs, flatter marsh sections and a combination of tough physical riding with fast sections on the long route choices.

I knew the race would be one of pain for 90 minutes, but with 12km less than the men, I also thought our winning times might be longer than expected. I was motivated for this race, partly as a trial run for next year to see if I want to include the long distance in my preparation and focus, and partly because I just wanted another medal.

I was riding well from the start and my speed enabled me (along with a handful of others) to set a gap to the rest of the field. I was undecided on the long leg and choose to take the southern route over the marsh rather than head north. I felt my route was a little shorter, but in the end it was 30 seconds longer. Slowly I had to regain places again but a technical butterfly helped.

Coming out of the butterfly we had some long transport legs south, I had to keep pushing on and now things were really feeling tough. At the finish I was exhausted. My first long race I have been properly motivated for since 2009, and it was 17 minutes over the estimated winning time, and 5 minutes down on the leader Hara FIN. Silver was reachable, 2 minutes ahead, and bronze certainly attainable with a few better routes.

I’d really like to thank SWOA and Wimborne Orienteers for their support in helping send me to WOC. As always, the support I receive from sponsors is hugely appreciated and the willingness of sponsors to support is always touching. I am pleased this year to bring home a 2nd and 4th (and potential 5th), which actually makes it my best WOC yet. Last year I took two top 10’s, this year 2 top 6’s. I already have a training plan in place for 2014, and with World Cup rounds in Denmark, Sweden and WOC in Poland, I am aiming for 3 more top 6 places.

The World Cup in Sweden is in the 3 days immediately prior to O-Ringen, so it will form part of the O-Ringen experience. I know many SWOA competitors are likely to go to race O-Ringen, but it would be amazing if you could spare an extra day to come and cheer the MTBO World Cup/Team GBR! If you want to give MTBO a try, there are also 3 days of O-Ringen MTBO during the O-Ringen week, with start times allowing you to compete in MTBO and Foot-O on the same days.

Emily Benham