Course 6 - M40L
11.9Km, 325m Climb, 26 Controls
Start @ 13:35
Woke up to another scorcher. The forecast was for more of the same hot weather from the previous day, and this year, the course lengths were very long - on paper, I had 11.9k and 350m climb ahead of me - ouch! The last time i had a course that long was IOC the previous year, and that had been super tough (I didn't finish it after running 12km, and making a few bad mistakes.)
Arrived good and early, setup the club tent with the rest of the Irish contingent, and watched the early runners go and return, bringing tales of nice running in open forest. Eventually, got changed, and wandered up to the start (very close to the arena) with the kids. Got them started, setup my watch, and queued trough the start boxes. Nearly picked up wrong control descriptions, but thankfully realised my mistake when I looked at the course length (14.8k).
Clock beeps, start my watch, and I'm off. Running alongside Brian Corbett, who seems to have a very similar first set of controls to me. Start steady enough, pacing myself, very aware of the long distance ahead. First few controls are fine, settling into the map nicely. Follow the path to number 1, up the hill and right along the path, then down the edge of the green to 2, straight line to 3, passing the green blobs on the way. Veer a little to the right on 4, but correct quickly when i see runners on the path, trot over to 5, and then enjoy the complementary minute to cross the road to number 6 (it would be removed from overall time later) - so far so good. Feeling happy at this point, time is ok.
So, 6 to 7 was the first long leg. I took a route using a series of paths looping round to the right, which was relatively easy to follow, and avoiding unnecessary climb. I almost went wrong at one point around the middle of the leg where I wanted to take a sharp bend to the right, but turned too early - realised quickly when the next junction to the left didn't appear, and fixed myself up. Felt myself flagging a bit along here, probably needed to slow down - the temptation to run faster on paths was high, but I wouldn't have had the stamina for later. I ain't that fit!
To 8, we had to wriggle though some strange little country lanes with residential houses on them - people out mowing the lawn, etc. When I re-entered the forest, I was heading towards a nice sturdy gate to cross the fence before it became uncrossable, when I was accosted by an elderly couple. They were adamant that I wasn't to cross the gate, and that the forest inside the fence was private property. I apologised, ran out of sight, then hopped the fence - if it ain't marked out of bounds, I'm going there. Anyways, I'm pretty sure this was the intended route - the alternative was a long detour past number 16. 8 to 9 was just a matter of using the crossing point (since I was now inside the uncrossable portion of the fence), then following a nice path through some horse paddocks, and then heading across some nice open bluebells forest to the control, on the side of a large pit. Had a gel along the way, even though I actually felt pretty good at this point. Elephant tracks through the bluebells led directly to 10 and 11, so no navigation required - easy legs anyways, as the forest was very open at this point.
Heading to 12, back along the path to the horse farm, cutting through a field into another lovely bluebell path through very open forest. Followed paths and rides to a big clearing, then plodged through some swampy stuff to the control. Back out to a quiet road - considered going around and following the stream up to the control, but went straight instead - green forest turned out to be fine, and hit the stream a little below the control. Followed the re-entrant up to the path, then headed west towards 14/15 - the area at the end of the path was a little fuzzy, but got 14 alright, depite my unsureness that I was on the correct little path. 15 was my first proper mistake, lost about a minute looking for the end of the knoll, that turned out to be a slightly raised lump of ground in the middle of a much larger and well defined depression. Pretty obvious route to 16, following the paths that led past the edges of some large fields in a strip of forest. Was caught at this point by another runner (Andy Glover of LEI I think), and we stayed together for a few controls. Came at 16 by going north around the top of a large building.
At this point, I'm pretty tired, so I have my second gel. Started to 17 by crossing the hill after the crossing point, then a combination of paths and straight lines through some scrappy forest (lots of small fallen branches). Turned left onto the big open path and then took a line up through the forest, past the clearing to the control. Continued north out of the control, using paths to get close to 18. Through the forest to 18 was steep, marshy, and branchy - I was slow here and veered to the left, thankfully correcting myself near the top of the slope. Easy run out to 19 across a quiet road with a marshall.
Last section now, just focusing now on not making mistakes - fairly clean so far, and happy enough with my time. 19/20/21 were easy short legs, just kept it clean. We had another free minute to cross the road to 22 - I took advantage of every second to stand and rest beside 22 (my split was 1:01). Set off to 23, having planned to follow a nice looping path around the hill to it. (looks like Andy had some issue here, losing 20 mins on this leg). No issues for me, back up the paths to 24. Some brambles here (first of the day) getting out of the circle at 24 to the path. I'm running faster now, I can hear the announcers in the arena. Down the path to 25 - I hesitate slightly to check the map fearing a last minute sneaky control, but its right in front of me. Pushing down the hill now to 26, turn the corner into the arena, and all I can hear is "Come on, daddy!". Final push to the line and its over.
Its the longest orienteering race I can remember finishing in recent memory, and I was pretty happy with my performance. My final time was 1h47, having covered just under 15km and 330m ascent. The JK results are a bit up in the air, but I was around 20th out of 40 or so, middle of the table. My navigation was good, happy with most of my route choices, only thing that could have been better was my speed - but that's just a matter of training. Overall, great success for me.
No comments:
Post a Comment