Training Log Archive: Thompass

Focused on bearings. Most of my bearings were fine, but on every mistake I was consistently not only off to the left, but my bearing was consistent for the entire leg, meaning there is something going consistently wrong when I am taking a bearing.

Current thoughts are that it's a mental flaw. I have a feeling that I am less likely to be strict with the needle when it is to the right of the north lines than when it is to the left. This would not be so different from right and left handedness. I think that instead of having essentially a window of accuracy centered along the north line, which would be ideal, my personal window is only the right side of that ideal window. It almost feels like I have stronger internal alarm bells when I'm straying right than when I'm straying left.

This could be paired with a preference to turn my body and/or head to the left. On that note, I also have to consider the possibility that when I look up from my bearing, I am looking slightly left rather than perfectly straight ahead. Occam's Razor would probably support that idea.

It's just a starting theory based on what I've seen so far, but I'll see if it goes anywhere and if it's something I can adjust.

Highly focused on sighting bearings based on Pedley's comment, which did feel much better. Would like to integrate it into my normal process, would be a huge step forward; not active enough today in my map reading, which was apparent in my mistakes to 22 and perhaps 19, which should have been avoided fairly easily. I'd like to focus my upcoming orienteering trainings on this aspect.

C • Bearings 1

C • To the left 1