Training Log Archive: bishop22

BFLO Mini-Rogaine at Ellicottville Ski Area / State Forest.

With the heat, I figured I could wear myself out in 3 hours, so I didn't sign up for the 5 hour option. I grabbed C2 quickly, then went after C12, but I guess I left the road at the wrong stream (even though there was only one on the map) and followed if farther than I should have, distracted by others, including Walt and Brig on the same stream. Finally cut over to the east and followed another stream down. Apparently I didn't learn my lesson there, because on the way to C13, I found a stream (only one was on the map, and no other reentrant was visible on the map - turns out the contours are definitely overly-smoothed on this 1:20K map) and followed it to a clear end, but no flag. I bailed to the east and actually stumbled on the flag - not at a stream end, and not really in much of a reentrant.

I ran down and got C20, after spotting the proper reentrant on the way down the hill. C24 was very clean. Here I made a big mistake. I chose to play it safe and run the trail all the way back up to C6. When I got home, Nate pointed out how stupid that was, and I had to agree, since I ran back past C6 later on, and it was a long way around getting to C21 (although it was almost all trail). I did pick up C18 on the way to C21, although that was not my original plan, it just seemed to inviting along the way.

I had to skip C25, and picked up C19, but lost some time. I planned on skipping the water, so I cut in to the newly mapped trail, but I got confused at the junction, so I had to step out near the road anyway (but did not find the water in the field!), to get a proper read on the trail that led to C19. I went all trails to C27, and knew it was time to head back, starting with a serious climb.

I aimed for C17 on a bearing, thinking I would do a fly-by and hope to get lucky. It turned out I got a good location crossing the road, and continued on, spotting an unmapped reentrant before I got to the trail above 17 and guessed that it would turn into the mapped stream below the trail, and it did and the flag was mine. I continued running alongside the stream to the trail and grabbed C10, and it was time to hustle back. I stayed on the trail past C6 and at the end, I tried to go just south of west to the dirt road and in, but I hit a trail instead, right near a junction. The way I wanted to go turned and sent me the wrong way and I got confused. Eventually I just ran down something that was going mostly south, hit a dirt road which turned out to be N of where I thought I was, and couldn't make the 3-hour limit, although I hustled back quickly downhill.

Since I was 5 minutes late, and I figured the penalty was 1 control per minute, I decided to switch to the 5-hour category, but that's what they already had me signed up for. It turned out the penalty was just 10 points per minute, and I had 540, so I could have scored 490. Instead...

... I grabbed a Blue and walked up to C11, then grabbed another and walked over to C1. Saw Walt and Brig approaching, so I checked in, just in case they had as many points as me (590 now), but they just had 380. No one else had any serious points, but there was still 1 person out when the rain chased us on out of there.