Discussion: Route to #6

...looks a bit out of the way...

I was surprised to see that you ran almost 2km more than what I did on the same course - but still beat me of course ;)

I´m very slow for the time being but had no mistakes - all spikes - except I lost 2.30 on a 180 out of #6 :(

those 2km are a good example of a rare case where i can balance out some stupidity with enthusiasm. i guess i had been working on running fitness more than orienteering skill for the past few months, and it shows! here's to hoping extra speed doesn't just make for getting lost in a hurry.

my route to 6 was mostly a crime of opportunity. i put up a quickroute to make a little more sense of it. the first half - up to crossing the road - made sense. then i got funneled west by some barbed wire, ended up on that stone wall, and figured i'd follow that in. when i got to the corner of the stone wall i didn't like the look of the rest of it. i saw i was right next to that big fat trail and figured i'd go with the dumb, long, easy way. good chance to read ahead a bit and plan.

it was my first long - and distance isn't my specialty. i probably should've run red (or blue, yikes!), but wanted to focus more on good orienteering than endurance. and i won a spiffy mug for being over-conservative! i get reminded of it every day at work.

With the QR map to look at your choice makes a bit more sense. It definitely makes for an easier attack to the control. Still a bit long though - considering that running over that big hill straight to the control was much better than the green on the map would imply. Catching features ahead of the control were also available , i.e. narrow ridge and swamp (that was close to swimming...).