Sal Chaffey in praise of Portugal!
POM, as it is known, is a 5-day event that finishes on Shrove Tuesday – a day of national celebration in Portugal. Dave and I have been three times now: the first by train in 2020, when there was one case of Covid in the whole of Portugal; the second was last year when we flew to Faro for POM on the Algave, and this year when we flew to Porto in the rainy north.
Last year was memorable for its mud – some of the days being on a former orchard that’s now used by the Loulé trials bike club. This year was memorable for the sand – lightly vegetated dune ridges with acacia in blossom. Sand got in our eyes on the first couple of legs of the Sprint in the quaint resort town of Mira.
Some of the alleyways near Control 14 in Part 2 of the map were just 60 or 70 cm wide, and it felt like running through someone’s back yard! The main road was taped across just north of there, to send us through the alleys, but I hope they warned the residents!
When driving to and from the events, we saw cockle-pickers on sandbars in the lagoon, and sardine fishing is another local tradition.
Friday was the first of the forest stages, kicking off with a middle distance race. The Arena was the same for all 4 days, but each race had its own part of the forest. There were no major contour features, and the dunes were intricate, with 2.5 metre contours. All green apart from the very darkest was passable, being mainly acacia saplings.
For the first Long race, we rotated to the north-east in an area with extensive puddles from the recent storms. Dave and I were knee-deep at times, Sarah and Sally Calland were waist deep!
The next day was a second middle distance race, followed by a fun Night Sprint. Chasing Start positions were calculated from the results of the two middles and the long (i.e. all the terrain events), and I was starting in 19th position in W60 with a gaggle of Brits. It was good to say hello before the Start, as we often know rivals’ names from the results, but not faces! I had a great run and pulled myself up to 13th over-all.
After POM, we took Sarah back to the airport and had two days of sight-seeing in Porto, including a port tour and tasting at the Calem distillery. I’d really recommend the friendly atmosphere of Portuguese orienteering as well as the delicious and cheap food!
