Race Evaluation
Canadian Orienteering Championships 2008: Long Course 9
iansmith
| 1. | My SI stick didn't record a control here, but I definitely went to the feature and found the control (I was rigorously checking my codes). I heard two beeps when I punched, which may have been a problem. I spiked the control by hitting the narrow marsh to the northeast, but I was moving slowly and carefully. | ||||||
| 2. | +08:00 | An unnecessary road detour; I was being too careful on this leg. I ran around on the road to the south and attacked up a stream rather than attacking the same stream from the north. | |||||
| 3. | +10:00 | A major error; I tracked east from a road; I was aiming for some streams, and in particular a stream junction as my attack point. However, I think one of the streams was dry. I ended up hitting the catching feature - a larger stream - and following that north for about 150 meters before turning southwest into a marsh that led to the control. | |||||
| 4. | I was rather pleased with this leg; I decided to attack via 13 and not trail run around (which many others in my class did). I found 13 via some cliffs, hit a clearing, then counted streams along my bearing. When I hit the third stream, I followed it north to 4. Spike (though slow running). I lost at most a minute over the trail runners, and that was more to slow running than bad route choice. | ||||||
| 5. | +03:30 | Attacked from the road (the trail junction) and missed. Sigh. An easy control, but a non-trivial error | |||||
| 6. | I was pleased with my route on this control; I ran north to the trail, and then ran a good kilometer along power lines and a road. I attacked down a stream with 250 m to go, hit my clearing, hit my marsh, and spiked the control | ||||||
| 7. | This took longer than it should have because of confidence. A huge road lay 250 m from the control; I ran to that from 6, then cautiously proceeded to it via a very weak marsh. | ||||||
| 8. | +03:00 | Overshot south of the hill; had to double back to the north. Embarrassing. | |||||
| 9. | Good control, but slow. It helped that 10 other people were approaching the same control at that time. Saw Brendan. | ||||||
| 10. | I took what was probably an unconventional route and attacked from the base of the cliffside. I hit two clearings and a stream, then attacked up a very steep reentrant. I saw a few runners who had approached from the top and were confused, so maybe the route had merit. The leaders on course 9 had times in the 7-8 minute range, so I think my choice was a good one. | ||||||
| 11. | +02:00 | An ok control; I followed rocky ground by wasn't very sure of myself. I hit two cliffs that I thought were the ones immediately adjacent to it, but I wasn't sure - turns out I was about 20 m too far to the west. Lost time being hesitant, but the route was straight. (best runner 5:08) | |||||
| 12. | +05:00 | A miss. I drifted too far north after misinterpretting the contours in this area. I drifted back to the south after realizing where I was relative to the stream. | |||||
| 13. | +30:00 | Ugh. A trail crosses between 12 and 13; my plan was to run the 150-200 meters from 12, locate on the trail, and attack to 13. However, I missed the trail. I must have passed it based on my recovery later, but I didn't see it at all after 8 minutes of running/walking. I was completely lost for about ten minutes until I ascertained what had happened and picked a safe route (east to the same bloody trail). I was most displeased. The only thing that I could have done better was tracking my bearing more carefully, convincing myself I had overshot the trail earlier, and bailing out east. I had zero probability of recovery on the hillside past the trail. Most frustratingly, I had been to 13 on my way to 4. I attacked via a stream and a clearing. | |||||
| 14. | +17:28 | Another miserable control. I think I was still irritated by 13. I deliberately overshot to the north, hit powerlines and attacked south. This wasn't a good plan because I didn't know where along the powerlines I was. I should have gone far to the west and attacked from a road via a stream, marsh, and boulders. Even so, this was a very difficult control to attack - in the middle of a nearly featureless hillside (at least on the map). Saw many unmapped boulders. I estimate the fastest I could have navigated to this control at 15 minutes. | |||||
| 15. | Fine, easy. | ||||||
| 16. | Easy | ||||||
| F. | +00:05 | Ok. My goal was to have the fastest time in the chute, but I was beaten by some M21s (18 was the best). I find it cathartic to have the best finish chute split time (which I did on the Middle) |
Total Time Lost - 01:19:03