Training Log Archive: Sandy

Course on Gould Run. 2:09 for the 4.4km course. Boy am I slow these days!

Clean to 1, messed up 2, 3 and 4, good on 5, 6, 7 and Finish. All three misses were because I was too far left and went right by the control. Then I had to stop try and think what happened, where I might be and how to recover. For 2 I was thinking I was probably too far left since I hadn't seen a small reentrant that I was expecting to see and sure enough when I headed to my right on about the same contour I eventually saw my boulder. I was really close to 3, but again a little to the left. I got too far up a hillside, figured I had gone too far and was trying to decide how to relocate when I saw Glen coming up the hill and figured out where he must have come from. This one annoyed me since I thought I had been careful on the attack. But every time I checked my compass I had to correct to the right and I guess those slight wrong directions added up. On 4, I again missed to the left. This time I could relocate from a trail though so that was easy. The other two were on somewhat bland hillsides. Again I didn't miss by much. And again frequent compass checks always had me drifting slightly left. You'd think I'd learn. I guess I did eventually since I was okay for the rest of the course. I was too far left again on 7, but that was on purpose since the woods seemed a little nicer where I was than on the straight line to the control.

Nice visit with some folks afterwards at my new house.

Met Greg at Shickshinny for an O course. I was doing fine but it was slow going - the blueberry and ferns were thicker than I remember. Then I made a goof to 7 - went too far - and realized I wasn't really paying attention, just sort of winging it. The next control was down many contour lines and I decided to not bother and call it a day. I also didn't want Greg to have to wait too long for me since he had graciously agreed to wait for me to get out of the woods. I switched it over to score-o mode but only bothered to pick up a couple controls just off the trails on the way to the finish. I was about 30 minutes to get to the start, 43 minutes on the course from start to #7 and then the rest of the time was the hike back (almost all on trails) to the finish and the parking.

Time for a new watch I think. :(

Don't know why the track stopped where it did. That's a bummer.

I went to check out one of Greg's newest maps, Merli Sarnoski park. I thought it was going to be rainy all day today but after doing some morning errands it seemed like it was going to be actually fairly nice. I was originally planning to go to the park tomorrow but then had to schedule some workmen, so was thinking I'd have to put it off a week. But decided at the last minute to head there today. Unfortunately, it's a bit of a drive to get there and I didn't decide to go until almost noon so it was about 2pm when I started. I also realized as I started that I never put the course I designed into UsynligO. So I decided to just hike the trails and cut through the woods occasionally instead of trying to orienteer.

The park seems really great. There is a huge network of trails that wiggle their way across all the slopes. They look to be designed for mountain bikes but I didn't see any bikes while I was out. But I didn't see any people except near the parking either. Probably gets more use on the weekends and in nicer weather.

I meandered around on the trails and checked out the terrain a bit. It looks fantastic - lots of rock features just about everywhere I went and decent contour features in spots. The woods seemed pretty open as well. I only hit the terrain closest to the lake - there's a lot more terrain: a small hill to the south and a giant one to the southwest, a couple swamps and some interesting contour stuff to the southeast. I actually cut my outing short as it started to pour about 3:15 so I just headed back to my car.

I can see spending a lot of time in this park! I agree with Greg - definitely worth thinking about mapping.

i had thought about going to Colonel Denning yesterday and even registered on-line ahead of time. But the 2.5 hour drive each way and the rain/thunderstorms in the forecast convinced me not to. And then I didn't manage to do anything else either. So this morning I made sure I got out the door early before the rains swooped in.