Orienteering race (District Event) 1:03:04 [3] *** 8.5 km (7:25 / km) +240m 6:30 / km
spiked:16/21c slept:7.5 shoes: £20 Lightweight Running Shoes
Ran Brown at a SAX District Event at Knole Park. Not too hot considering the time of the year, the clouds kept the conditions pleasant to run in. But yuck, I didn't like this area when I was last here, and I still don't. The course was badly constrained due to the golf course, and there were a lot of nettles and bracken everywhere. On one particularly painful control, where I was having to go back and approach it several times, I got stung everytime. My legs are now "buzzing" with the stinging sensation. Some of the control placements were just mean, there was no way to get to them without being stung, and for plenty of others, you had to go back the way you came, or else you would disappear into a sea of bracken and nettles.
The winning time was 52:41. I doubt I would have been able to run it in this time, even if I had had a mistake free run, and not lost heart and slowed down about half way around, when I realised the remaining 13 controls (!) on my course were down one long road, and back up another. Saw some baby deer though which was nice. I finished 7th in the end, of 32 runners.
For my GPS trace, see Yepsport. I've also uploaded it to the Routegadget on the event's website. I got a good signal around the whole course, and the Google Earth resolution for the area is high. You can almost see the nettles! You can certainly see my crazy routes trying to avoid them.
Mistake analysis:
To 1: Poor map-reading (30s)
To 4: Poor route choice (30s) - trapped by nettles!
To 16: Poor feature recognition (1m 30) - hidden by bracken!
To 17: Poor feature recognition (3m) - hidden by nettles!
To 20: Unforseen hazard (45s) - trapped by nettles!
Cycling warm up/down (To/From Event) 1:06:00 [2] 18.4 km (3:35 / km)
In lots of stages. To Cannon Street station, then from Sevenoaks up big hill to Knole. Then back to Sevenoaks station (hit 50.5kph going down the hill!) Then from Charing Cross to the Tate Britain, then Tate Britain to the City, finally back home from the City.