Orienteering race 3:45:00 [4]
slept:2.0
When I got up in the morning they'd calculated my score at 1500, which I didn't really pay attention to at the time, but was definitely not correct (they'd counted some controls twice on my card). However, I would learn later that my third led was the all important one as this is what pulled me into first.
For my last leg I was trying to figure out how I could get all the the remaining controls (well except 44 which was to far out of the way to consider), but no matter what I tried the distance just seemed too far. I ended up planning a route that I knew I could do and then at the last minute decided to do it in reverse so that I'd grab the highest controls first rather then waiting until later. This turned out to be a race safer for me later on.
First controls went smoothly and I found myself on the edge of the map moving along a property boundary in some great wide open woods. At this point I was having a lot of fun. I was still feeling good and I was just enjoying the fact that I was in the woods in the early morning with noone else around. I ended up making it back to a cut-off point much earlier than planned. So rather then going for a 34 point control I decided to run along the road for a longer stretch to grab a 66 and 33 point control. In hindsight what I should have done was grab the 34 pointer and then go for the others as I probably could have done them all, but after grabbing the 33 pointer I realized I probably didn't have enough time to come back for the 34 points. So rather then risk coming back over time I headed back to the finish line and made it back with 15 min to spare.
With everyone else in the woods I got to hang around with the organizers chatting for a bit, grab a coffee and some food before I went down for some more sleep.
Once the final points were calculated I'd scored 1771 points over the 4 stages, the controls I left out there were 44, 34 and 51. 2nd was roughly 40 points behind me. I was pretty pumped at this point given the mistakes I'd made (but I think in something like this everyone makes a few mistakes) I'd still come back and won the overall. This will also put me in 1st place for the Trifecta Cup going into the Rogaine in August.
Awesome weekend for orienteering, it didn't rain at all and there were hardly any bugs. I felt like I pushed really hard during each stage, but also also felt like I was always in control. I think M&M would be very proud of the pace I maintained during the whole event. Best race I've had in a while and very happy with the result to match it.