Christmas in Trondheim

The autumn in Stockholm was nice, and after the competition season in orienteering ended my time was filled with training, working and seeing friends. I can not remember a single day with minus degrees or snow, so the conditions were great both for general running training and orienteering in the forest. IFK Lidingö have got several new runners the last month, and we have a big group of both boys and girls who are training well and having fun together.

The last one and a half week I have spent Christmas holiday in Trondheim. The weather has been variable, but the skiing conditions have been stable and good, so I have been skiing a few hours almost every day, in addition to some longer runs, interval sessions and strength training. It has also been nice to see my family and several old friends, and the days in Trondheim have passed too fast.

WOC training camp in Switzerland with IFK Lidingö

Last week I spent in Switzerland with my club IFK Lidingö. In five days we did 8 training in relevant terrains for the World Orienteering Championship 2012. The camp was well organized with help from our Swiss runner Ines Brodmann, and challenged us in all the types of terrain we will meet next summer. I am glad I am running for a club that priorities to help the runners to prepare well for the international championships like WOC and EOC, and not only focus on the big relays.

Friday Night we participated in the first race of the night orienteering league Bern by Night. The terrain was steep and the fog made it difficult to have a good overview. I did a quite stabile performance, and was in the leading group until the second last control. There I lost 3 minutes in an area where the map was a bit strange. My club mate Filip Dahlgren handled it well and won the race. Results

In my Digital Orienteering Map Archive you can now find maps from all the training. On some of the long distance trainings we were testing route choices and I was not always running where I thought was fastest. Some places the vegetation had also changed since the map was made.

Øystein trives i VM-terrenget, Orientering.no

Smålandskavlen

Last weekend I was running Smålandskavlen in Mariannelund, my last competition of the season. IFK Lidingö won the relay last year, and we wanted to perform well also this year. Unfortunately we lost some time on the two night legs on Saturday and I started 10 minutes behind Kalevan Rasti on the restart Sunday morning. I missed the second control with more than one minute, but ran well the rest of the leg and could keep the distance to KR and catched up several teams. Filip Dahlgren and Fredrik Johansson ran well on the two last legs, and we could finish as 9th team, 7 minutes behind KR, after being the fastest team on the three day legs. Results

Blodslitet in Fredrikstad

In the middle of October I was running traditional race Blodslitet in Fredrikstad. This year the Open Norwegian Championship in Ultralong distance was included in the 25 km long mass start race, with 3 forked loops in the beginning and a long common loop in the end.

I did some mistakes in the forked loop, and was running alone the last one and half short loop. On the long last loop I stared out 5 minutes behind Anders Nordberg, and 1-2 minutes behind a group of several good runners like Olav Lundanes and my club mates form Lidingö Filip Dahlgren and Fredrik Johansson.

I stared quite offensive on the last loop, and held the same speed as the runners in front of me for a while. But after running a long time without seeing any other runners I started to loose some motivation. I was also really tired, since I have only been able to do a few runs longer than one hour since July because of the trouble I have had with my back. I finished as 12th runner, 13 minutes behind Nordberg who won with a big margin. Results, GPS tracing from the forked loops and the last loop

25manna

The second weekend in October I participated in the big relay 25manna for my first time. The relay was held in Södertälje, south west of Stockholm, and I was running the second leg for IFK Lidingö. Flip Dahlgren sent me out as 2nd runner. I stayed in the leading group for the whole leg, and changed over as 3rd runner. My only mistake was that I was running in 90 degrees wrong direction out of one of the last controls. After 25 legs Lidingö finished on a 6th place, 6 minutes behind the winner Tampereen Pyrintö. Results

October – World Cup, WOC training, 25manna, Blodslitet, EOC training and Smålandskavlen

October has been a busy month for me, and the last five weeks I have been participating in the World Cup final and two different WOC training camps in Switzerland, 25manna in Stockholm, Blodslitet with Norwegian Champs in Ultralong distance in Fredrikstad, EOC training camp in Mora and Smålandskavlen in Mariannelund.

Maps from all the competitions are now available in my Digital Orienteering Map Archive, and during the coming days I will try to write a few words from each of the different activities.

World Cup final and WOC training camp in Switzerland

After the World Cup in Liberec the Norwegian team went directly to Switzerland, were we had a training camp in relevant terrains for WOC 2012. We were training both in the Jura Mountains, Mittelland terrain and a nice old city.

The first weekend in October the PostFinance Sprint with World Cup Final was held in La Chaux-de-Fonds.

In the middle distance I missed the first control with almost two minute. The rest of the course went well, except a mistake to the 11th control. My result was a 32nd place, 5 minutes behind Thierry Gueorgiou. Results, splits and GPS tracking

The sprint was the race I had the biggest expectations for. But unfortunately my shape has not been the best this autumn, partly because I had problems with my back for more than one month after WOC, and I did also several small route choice mistakes. My result was a 27th place, 1 minute behind Daniel Hubmann. Results, splits and GPS tracking

In the overall World Cup I finished on a 22nd place. Daniel Hubmann won for the forth year in row.

After the WC final five of the Norwegian runners participated on a sprint training camp in the area around Zurich organized by the Swedish team. In 3 days we had 6 sprint trainings on different maps. 3 of them in competition speed. In total we were running 14 courses, with lengths from 1 to 3 km.

World Cup in Liberec

Last weekend I was running World Cup in Liberec in the Czech Republic.

Saturday it was a normal Middle distance. I did several smaller mistakes, and my shape is not the best at the moment either. In the end of the course Pasi Ikonen, who won the race, passed me by 4 minutes, and I ended on a 35th place. Results, splits, GPS tracking and replay of the video streaming.

Sunday it was a Long distance with chasing start. Both my technical and physical performance was a bit better, and I was able to finish on a 31th place, 12 minutes behind the winner Marc Lauenstein. Results, splits, GPS tracking and replay of the video streaming.

In the overall World Cup I am in 18th position before the World Cup Final in Switzerland the coming weekend with Middle distance and Sprint.

Swedish Champs

Last weekend I was participating in the Swedish Championship in Middle distance and Relay. The stiffness and pain I had felt in my back since WOC was much better, and I was again able to run quite relaxed.

In the Middle Qual on Friday was important to do a stable race, since only 6 runners from each of the 7 heats quailed for the Final. I did an OK performance, and avoided any big mistakes. My result was a 4th place, 1 minute behind Anton Östlin. The course was in a nice mix of different types of terrains. Results and splits

Already on Friday I felt a bit sore in my throat, and on Saturday it felt worse, so I decided to skip the Middle Final. It was a bit frustrating to be home while the others was running, but it was cool to watch the GPS tracking and that my club mates were running so well. Filip Dahlgren was in second position when he passed the arena as last starter, and had a good chance for the victory since Audun Weltzien and Peter Öberg did big mistakes to the 11th and 12th control. Unfortunately Filip also lost 4 minutes to the 11th control. Jonn Are Myhren lost some team in the begging of his race, but did a perfect last part, and ended up in second position, only one second behind the winner Erik Rost. This result was really nice for Jonn Are, since he has had a lot of problems with his health earlier in this season. Results

Sunday my throat was a bit better, and I decided to run the Relay, where I had been selected for the last leg in Lidingö’s second team. Unfortunately my shape was not as good as I had hoped, and I lost also quite much time on my routes to the first two controls. It was anyway a great day for Lidingö, since the women’s team won and the men’s first team finish 4th, less than a minute behind Rehns BK. Results

NM Middle distance

Last weekend the Norwegian Championship was arranged north of Oslo. Because I have had problems with my back the last month I skipped the Long distance, but since my back improved very much the last days before the race I decided to run the Middle distance.

The qualification went quite well for me. It was the first time since WOC that I could run relaxed in the forest, without being stiff in my back. I lost some time several places, but had no big mistakes, and finished 1 minute behind Carl Waaler Kaas. Results and splits.

In the Final I lost 30 – 40 seconds to both the 1st and 12th control, and had also some other routes that was not optimal. My result was a 16th place, 2 minutes behind Lars Skjeset. Normally such a performance should have given a top 10 result, but it was many runners doing good races this year, and it was really cool that Lars was able to win (with only 1 second margin to Carl Waller Kaas).

My back was OK also in the final, and I have not been any worse after the race. But I got more tired physical then normal, probably because I have not been running much in forest since the end of June, both because of my preparations to the WOC sprint and my back problems. Results, splits, GPS tracking and replay of the video streaming.

After the Norwegian Champs the full team for the World Cup Final in Czech Republic and Switzerland was selected:
- Jakter gode opplevelser i neste års VM-terreng, orientering.no
Luckily I was already pre selected because of my 13th place in the overall WC.

This weekend I am running the Swedish Championship in Middle distance and Relay, and you can follow the races live with online results, live streaming and GPS tracking.

Norwegian Championship – live GPS tracking

The Norwegian Championship in orienteering is arranged just north of Oslo this week. The first race is arranged today with the Long distance, and the race can now be followed live with results, speaker sound and GPS tracking (from 12.45).

I have as I wrote some days ago had problems with my back the last weeks, and I will therefore unfortunately not run today. But my back has been better the last days, and I will hopefully be able to run the Middle distance with qualification on Friday and final on Saturday. I will anyway not run the NM relay for Wing OK on Sunday because I will run the relay for IFK Lidingö in the Swedish Champs next week.

Live centre for:
Long distance Tuesday
Middle distance Qualification Friday
Middle distance Final Saturday
Relay Sunday

The weeks after WOC – back injury

After the WOC Sprint in France I was watching my team mates running their races in the forest. On the resting day I was also running (part of) the spectator race held on the same map as the first part from the long distance. Unfortunately the results in the Championship were not as good as expected for the Norwegian team, even if we got some medals the two last days. But it was a really nice week in France, with great weather, as you can see on my pictures (I will publish on Wednesday).

The week after WOC I felt tired, and I guess it was partly mentally, since the highlight of my orienteering season was over. The weekend I spent in Helsinki, celebrating a friends wedding. It was really cool be there together with a lot of happy people. I was also able to go training on the neighbour map to next years Jukola.

The last weeks I have had problems with my back, and it has not been any better. After the last hard session three days before the WOC sprint I felt some pain in my back, and it got stiff. I don’t think it influenced in my WOC performance, even if I felt it during the warm up and after the race. When I came home from WOC my back was even stiffer, and I was not able to run relaxed. I got treatment for it several times, and got less stiff, but could partly still feel some pain.

Yesterday I was running my first competition since WOC, when the District Championship in Relay for Stockholm was arranged in a really nice terrain in Värmdö. I was running the first leg for Lidingö’s second team. In the beginning my running went OK, but after some time I felt stiffer in my back. That made it also difficult to focus on the orienteering, and I did several smaller mistakes. To the changeover I was 3 minutes behind my club mate Fredrik Johansson, who had a big lead. I was however less time behind than I had expected after the bad feeling I had during the race, so my shape is probably not too bad, even if I felt like an old man when I was running. Järla won the relay after a strong last leg by Olle Boström.

After the race my back got very stiff. Today I have got treatment and it feels a bit better, but I can still feel some pain even when I am sitting and walking. At the moment I don’t think it is smart of me to run the Norwegian Championship in the end of this week, at least not Tuesday’s Long Distance. If I want to be totally recorded to the World Cup Final in Czech Republic and Switzerland the end of September it is probably best to take a period without running, before I start with easy training.

Norwegian World Cup Selection (The rest of the team will be selected after the Norwegian Champs.)

WOC Sprint

Yesterday the Sprint in the World Orienteering Championship in France was arranged. My performance was far from as good as I had expected, and my result in the Final was only an 11th place.

In the Qualification in Aix-les-Bains in the morning I was not pushing maximum, and also lost some time on my route choice to the 8th and 11th control, but qualified easily for the Final after a 6th place in heat A. Results and splits

In the afternoons Final in Chambery I never got a good flow in my running. I took the wrong route choice and hesitated several places. To both the 1st, 5th, 12th, and 14th control I lost around 10 seconds, and my result was a 11th place, 1.06 behind Daniel Hubmann. Results, splits, GPS tracking and video from the whole race on SVT Play.

Last year I came on 4th place, only 3 seconds behind the winner. This year I felt better prepared, and thought I had a good chance for a medal. I was only 10 seconds from a top 6 position, and 36 seconds from a medal. But that does not help anything for my result, and I am at the moment really disappointed with not performing better in the most important race of the year.

Norsk nedtur i orienterings-VM, NRK (Only possible to watch in Norway.)
Kvaal Østerbø på etterskudd i VM-sprinten, Orientering.no
Liten feil i starten stoppet Egseth, Orientering.no
Norsk skuffelse på VM-sprinten, Aftenposten

Ready for WOC Sprint

Last weekend the World Orienteering Championship in France started with Qualification races for Long and Middle distance. Tomorrow the WOC are also starting for me, when the Sprint will be arranged in Aix-les-Bains and Chambery.

The last three weeks before I travelled to France I spent in Trondheim. My Norwegian club Wing OK helped me with great preparations, and arranged two relevant sprint trainings with high intensity every week. Most of them were on maps from WOC last year. It was nice be some weeks in my hometown Trondheim, and both see my family and other friends.

In the end of last week I travelled to France, and Saturday I had my last training with high intensity when I was running four orienteering intervals in Annecy. Today we were running the Model event in Chambery. Tomorrows Sprint will have Qualification in Aix-les-Bains in the morning and Final in Chambery in the evening. My preparations have gone as planed, and I am now starting to be really excites and looking forward to the competition.

You can follow the race on the organizers live page. The men’s Final can be watched live on the main Norwegian television channel NRK1 from 16.15, and women’s race in replay afterwards. The Swedish channel SVT Play will send both Final’s live from 14.55, and should be possible to watch in all countries.

Med gull i siktet, Adressa
Sin egen VM-sjef, Adressa
Klar til kamp om VM-medalje, Orientering.no
Gode forberedelser skal gi Egseth VM-medalje, Orientering.no

Hittaut.nu/Lidingo

During the summer I have not only been training for WOC. Most of the time I have spent working with the project hittaut.nu/lidingo, which I am responsibly for on Lidingö. The goal for the project is to make a big orienteering map with 90 permanent controls. In the middle of September it will be distributed for free to all the 40.000 inhabitants on Lidingö and all the 40.000 participants in the world largest cross country race Lidingöloppet. A virtual map will also be available on the website hittaut.nu/lidingo.

My main work has been to make the map covering the whole Lidingö island. 75 % of the island has previously been covered by 3 big orienteering maps. 4 sprint maps are also covering some smaller parts, but I had to convert them from 1:4000 maps with 2 m contour interval to normal orienteering maps, with not too many details. For the rest of the area I had to make a new map. The work with the map has mainly been done in Ocad, since I had good base maps and aerial photographs, but I have also done some fieldwork.

Several competent persons in the club have helped me with different parts the project, as for example getting sponsors, put out the controls and have contact with media, but I have also done parts of the work with designing the printed map, including text, pictures and advertisements. The last weeks we have completed the final version of the map, and it will be sent to printing this week. So the coming week I will have full focus on WOC.

Summer in Stockholm

After the WOC training camp in France in beginning of July I went back to Stockholm and Lidingö, where I started my last training period to be in top shape for the World Championship. In that period I have been training less hours then earlier this year, but more and tougher sessions with high speed.

On Lidingö we have several good sprint maps, but the best training was probably in Gamla Stan, on the map from Nordic Tour last year. I guess this is the most relevant area for the WOC sprint you can find in Scandinavia, with a lot of narrow streets, like it is in Chambery.

In the middle of July I was also running a nice two day sprint competition in Norrtälje called Skärgårdssprint. The first race was mostly in forest. I did no big mistakes, but lost some seconds on several legs and came 3rd, some seconds behind Josef Nordlund and Gustav Bergman. The second race was mainly in streets. I did a good performance, and was able to win both the race and overall in front of Gustav Bergman. Result from race 1, race 2 and overall

Last WOC training in France

July has not been a typical holiday month for me, and I have been busy with both training and working. The coming days I will try to make a short summary of what I have been doing, and I start with first week of July, which I spent in France on the last WOC training camp with the Norwegian team.

During the one week long camp we simulated all the WOC distances, and I was running full speed on the Sprint and the Relay trainings. The trainings went well, and in the Relay training I managed for the first time to run a full speed training in forest without any bigger mistakes, and was only beaten in time by Anders Nordberg. In my DOMA you can find maps from all the trainings (Category: Training)

On my birthday the 7th July I got an unexpected present from the team; paragliding over Lake Annecy. A great gift, and some of my team mates were also trying. As you can se on the pictures it was quite airy.

The coming days I will write more about what I am doing the last period before WOC.

Nordic Tour and Jukola - WOC next

The two previous weeks I have been competing in the Nordic Orienteering Tour (NORT) that has been arranged with races in Finland, Sweden and Norway. NORT was counting as the 3 first races in this years World Cup. In Finland I also participated for IFK Lidingö in Jukola; the world biggest orienteering relay.

The first stage of NORT was held in Poorvo in Finland, with two races in one day. In the morning it was a Middle distance (on sprint standard map in forest). I was felling tired during the race and lost also some time on less good route choices and small mistakes. My result was a 23rd place, 3 minutes behind Olav Lundanes. Results, splits and GPS tracking

In the evening it was a normal sprint race in the old city centre of Poorvo. I did and OK race, but lost time in parts of the course by being passive and taking a bad route choice on the first part of the leg to the 8th control. I was still feeling very tired, and my running speed was not as it use to be in sprint races. My result was a 14th place, 52 seconds behind Matthias Kyburz from Switzerland. Results, splits and GPS tracking

After the races in Poorvo I travelled an hour further east along the coast to Hamina, where I meet my team mates in IFK Lidingö for participation in Jukola. We had a strong team, but unfortunately we got some health problems on the forth leg, and lost a lot of time. I did not run a good race either, and did some bigger mistakes on my 6th leg. My team finished only on a 42nd place, but the girls ran great and came 3rd in the Venla relay. Results, GPS tracking and TV broadcast

NORT continued with a Knock out sprint in Gothenburg. In the morning it was a normal sprint course, and the 30 best qualified to the different finals later the same day. After Jukola I got a sour throat, so I was unsure about my shape, but the Qualification went well. My running speed felt actually better than in Finland, and I came 7th, 25 second behind Matthias Müller. Results and splits

In my Quarterfinal all runners in my heat except Alexey Bortnik lost 20 seconds on a bad route choice to the 7th control, but I was still able to qualify for the Semifinal after a strong finish. Results and splits

The Semifinal was held from Götaplatsen in the centre of Gothenburg. Matthias Müller set a high speed from the start, and was tight followed by Jerker Lysell and Frédéric Tranchand. I had to give them a few seconds gap, and was never able to catch that, even if I tried another route choice to the second last control. So I finished 4th in my heat, and was not able to qualify for the final as lucky looser since the times in the other semifinal was faster. GPS tracking and TV broadcast

Jerker Lysell was really strong, and won the Final in front of Daniel Hubmann. Results, GPS tracking and TV broadcast

The final stage of NORT was a Chasing start arranged in connections with Norway’s biggest orienteering event O-festivalen, this year held on Nesodden just south of Oslo. After 3 tough sprint races in Gothenburg my sour throat got worse, and I did only one short and easy training the day before the race. I started as 12th runner, with several runners just before and after me. On the long leg to the 3rd control I was alone on my route choice, and could advance to a 9th place. But I could already then feel that my body had not recovered after being sick, and I felt really tired the last half of the race. I did no big mistakes, but was not able to follow runner who caught me. I finished alone on a 19th position, 7 minutes behind Daniel Hubmann. My club mate in Lidingö Annika Billstam won the women’s class. Results, splits, GPS tracking and TV broadcast

I think NORT is a great concept, with cool types of races like Knock out sprint and Chasing start. But the different races have been spread out on a too long period, with only 3 stages in 10 days. Next years program looks better, with 5 stages in 8 days, and by having the tour in September we avoid the conflict with Jukola coming in the middle of the tour.

This week the Norwegian WOC team was selected, and I will at least run the Sprint:-) Tomorrow I am travelling to France for the last one week long training camp before WOC are held in the middle of August.

Elitserien Sprint in Falun

Today the last of the Elitserien and pre EOC race is Dalarna was held with a Sprint in Falun. It was a nice area for sprint, with a lot of tricky map reading in high speed. The first part of my race went well, and on the spectator control I was on a 2nd place, 2 seconds behind Jonas Leandersson. The second loop started also well, but on the long leg to the 16th control I took a route choice to the left, and then started orienteering to the 13th control. I lost more than 40 seconds because of this mistake, and finished on a 9th place, 59 second behind Leandersson, who did a great race and won clearly. Results, splits and GPS tracking

Kvaal Østerbø løp fort, men orienterte feil, Orintering.no

Elitserien Long in Mora

This long weekend three races in the Swedish Elitserien are arranged in Dalarna, as a pre EOC before next years European Championship.

The first race was yesterday, with a 20 km long mass start in Mora. The terrain was very nice, and made it possible to run really fast. Olav Lundanes showed again how strong is, and won clearly. After a strong finish I came on 5th place, 4 min behind Olav, and less then one minute from the second place. I was satisfied with my performance, and did only a few 15 seconds mistakes during the race. But in the middle part where I was running mainly alone I did not managed to keep fast enough speed, and on the long leg where I was running on paths to the left I lost almost one minute compared to the ones running straight. It was a good day for IFK Lidingö because Fredrik Johansson came 3rd and Annika Billstam won the women’s class. Results, splits and GPS tracking

Elitserien continues tomorrow with Middle distance, but I will not run that race since I want to some good training this weekend and found 3 races too tough. The Middle distance can be followed live from 11.00 – 13.30 on Saturday. The last Elitserien race is a Sprint in Falun on Monday.

This weekend my Norwegian club Wing OK will arrange Trondheim Open. Sunday’s chasing start has GPS tracking that can be followed live from 12.00.

NM Sprint in Arendal

Last weekend the Norwegian Championship in Sprint were arranged in Arendal at the south coast of Norway. Both the Qualification and Final had finish in the city centre, which was a great place for a sprint race.

In the Qualification I found it difficult to find out where you could run on several legs, since the map had many small details and narrow passages. To the 2nd control I thought I could pass between the pond and cliff just before the control, but had to give up and lost more than one and a half minute, since the organizers had put up some stripes and I was afraid to be disqualified. I ran OK the rest of the race, and could still qualify for the afternoons Final. Results and splits

In the Final I did a quite good race, without any big mistakes. To the 4th and 8th control I lost a few second on my route choice, and to the 17th control I almost ran up some wrong stairs. Olav Lundanes finished 7 seconds faster than me, but got disqualified because ha had passed a forbidden are just in front of the 5th control. The forbidden area was smaller then the standard and almost impossible to see on the map, so I found it not so fun to win the race that way. Elise Egseth won finally her first title in a Norwegian Championship, so it was a great day for Wing OK. Results, splits and GPS tracking

Sunday a Middle distance in the Norwegian Craftcup were held from Myra, north of Arendal. I did an OK race, and lost only around 15 seconds some places. My result was an 8th place, 2 minutes behind Anders Nordberg. Results, splits and GPS tracking

Today I am going to run a 20 km long mass start in the Swedish Elitserien in Mora, and the race can be flowed live from 13.00.

Stafettdrømmen kan ryke for Østerbø, Adressa 30th May 2011
Hvem disket Olav og er det ok?, Halden SK 31th May 2011