orienteering race (Osgiliath Wood) 1:44:53 [4] 8.6 km (12:12 / km)
shoes: Inov8 X-Talon
Same distance as yesterday but a lot tougher. Not to start with, which was in nice pine forest although even softer underfoot and I was glad that I have been doing some core exercises. About 2 controls in a Swedish woman appeared (presumably she started 2 min behind me?) and for about the next 10 controls I kept seeing her on and off - she was running faster than me but often less precise; although I had a consistent tendency to bear to the right it meant I knew for certain which direction I was approaching the control from, and the incentive to run faster helped.
Control 10 was the first in the macrocarpa (AKA spiky cypress with very low horizontal branches) and here I saw the really fast little Swedish girl who was the eventual winner, but she wasn't exactly confident of the depressions. The next few controls in the low-vis stuff I was seeing a number of international runners on and off, but disaster struck when we left this and headed west onto the open dunes, towards 17. I couldn't (still can't) read the vegetation; wasn't clear exactly where I had come out of the forest but thought I ahd made the thickets of coastal wattle fit. Couldn't make all the little thickets fit until I realised that sometimes the lupin was mapped. Couldn't read the contours at all, and the green stripe 'slow run, good visibility' didn't actually confer any visibility when you were in the bottom of a basin with head-high vegetation. Others had run much further south, but I was pretty much on the right line, just didn't realise that I needed to go further west to the open dunes. A few of us converged on this at the same time and chased each other to the next beach control, then it was another diagonal (my least favourite leg in this stuff when it crossed about 4 different types of vegetation) all the way to the radio control which I actually popped out onthe track about 100m north of then had to skulk back into the bushes in case anyone saw me.
And another diagonal, through the macrocarpa and hitting the 'open' stuff from a ridgeline, looking down and wondering which of the pine trees evident in front of me were mapped with a distinct tree circle or not and furthermore, which one of them hid my control? I should just have followed the men in front of me at that point rather than standing & wondering for a couple of min. 2 more controls in the macrocarpa, back out to the beach (sigh). It was really hot in the sun and we'd had only one water drop through the whole course, which I think is poor planning. Not thinking very clearly by now and bleeding time all over the place. Starting to check out controls which I saw other people punching because I didn't trust my distance estimation. Back into the macrocarpa after some slow-bashing through the grassy basins. Duck, weave, check bearing, cross gully and repeat. Thankfully only 3 short legs to go, and a lap of the dam for completeness.
Ended up 9th to my surprise. I mean, it was a very different field to yesterday, but also a very different course, and everyone made mistakes including those at the top. Disappointed at how much time I lost; felt like about 15 min altogether, and the woman I had been running with earlier was 12 min ahead of me. The gap to the next place ahead was 10 min though, and I'd really need to have remained completely focused to achieve that. There was a tight bunch just behind me, so I won't quibble top 10 :)