Orienteering long (billy goat) 2:57:48 [3] *** 12.54 km (14:11 / km) +473m 11:56 / km
ahr:149 max:187
I ended up skipping 16 and 17 because I didn't want the others to wait for me too long.
It was nice to be out in the woods, but honestly I think I could've done much better, both speed and navigation wise.
I often got into the circle or hit my attack point and then I messed up. Also, all of my bearings were off by a bit (like, I hit 8 instead of 7, but I wasn't really following that bearing as much as others). I seemed to always end up being a bit to the right of the control.
And speedwise, of course I could run more and train more. But the things that I think slowed me down most from what I could have been able to do at the physical fitness I'm at now is that I had a few anxiety attacks on the course because I was stressing myself out about the time. Several times I just had to stop and breathe because I was getting real negative in my head and it felt like I was being consumed by fear about making it back really late and the others being frustrated with how long it's taking me. On my way to 17 (I was planning on skipping 16 anyways) I freaked out the most, because I saw I was nearing 3 hours on the course and I knew the others probably made it under 2. So I just went straight to 18 and then ran into the finish.
I wish I could go back to it again on my own sometime and be able to fully focus on the course without worrying about the time. It was a really fun course.