Run ((orienteering)) 1:05:01 [3] *** 6.3 km (10:19 / km)
spiked:23/26c
SA Middle Championships. At some point a few months ago I must have thought that entering 21E in this was a good idea. I wasn't thinking it was such a good idea driving to the event and struggling to stand up whenever I got out of the car, but managed to knock some sort of sense into myself in the warm-up and ventured out with some hope. Not surprisingly, this failed to last past the first hill (along with my back); on a lot of other days I'd have packed it in there and then, but it looked a fun area and there was, in the metaphorical sense, no tomorrow, so I decided to walk the steeper hills and jog the rest and hope that it loosened up. It didn't, but I did manage to get myself around, more or less, and the presence of Jon Sutcliffe stopped me from coming last.
This was the National League showdown, and there was a certain amount of talk beforehand about what team tactics we might deploy to distract Martin Dent (having recognised that a blowout from him was Victoria's only realistic pathway to victory). My only contribution to this was to drop behind him when he caught me up at 14 and hope that he'd miss the control without noticing me getting it behind him (didn't work). As it turned out, I did manage to distract someone in a big way - Eric, who didn't realise I wasn't running 45s today and assumed I must have got his control when I got my #21.
This was a good carnival although I was pretty disappointed with my own performances, with the relay the only run I'd consider decent. My form this year hasn't been great, but I've still had much better weeks than this (NAOC, for a start).
It's a long road back from Eden Valley to Melbourne, too (especially when you only start it after 2). Went fairly smoothly for the most part apart from a difficult stretch around Stawell with a couple of aggressively-driven trucks around. Didn't do as well as I'd hoped in finding food/drink stops along the way - I'd much rather patronise local small businesses on the highway than large multinationals, but while although the signs on the way into town proclaim "Keith Means Business", none of the businesses in question were actually open for business. (Ran into the Hatleys at the one place I found open - even the pub was closed - in downtown Horsham).
One plus of the time change is that I got home at 11.45 but it felt like 10.15.