Orienteering race 12:30:00 [2] *** 32.9 km (22:48 / km)
spiked:14/19c slept:7.0
North American Rogaine Championships with Nate at Allegany State Park. We estimated we could cover 33km (straight-line distance) in 12 hours, so we came up with a course that covered that distance, and allowed us to have 5 "easy" controls at the end, since we would be coming in during the dark. We took the long way around to our first control, for a safe start, and to get used to the scale. It was the first of several controls that we hit directly. Then we hit 311 - lost at least 20 minutes around the control, even though we thought we had attacked from a solid location. Finally found it, but, as was later confirmed, it was not in the correct location. Next few controls went real well, but we lost some accuracy in the late afternoon - but just lost a few minutes at a few controls. When the sun went down, we regained our touch (more careful compass work and pace counting to counteract the darkness helped, plus the fact that we had saved 3 good night controls).
We wound up coming back only 30 minutes later than our original plan, having picked up all 19 controls and 1000 points. We were pretty wiped during the walk back, and decided we would limit ourselves to 3 hours on Sunday, but we were quite happy with the Saturday performance.