I approached this Easter with a little confidence after some very accurate races on Korong and Kooyoora, but knowing the last month had been exercise free other than three orienteering events. Injury fears.
A quick scan of the field whilst on the trip to Molong lead to a conclusion that the best I could expect was 7th place if I navigated well, and 14th was likely if I navigated poorly. Anything better than 7th would require superior fitness.
So the first event was on a weird sandstone ridge. Lots of detail on the ridge and nothing much elsewhere. The sort of country to make little mistakes in profusion, but major getting lost was not possible. Lo and behold, I held the navigation together up until the spectator control, in 7th place. A blood mark on the map looked like a clearing and i used clearings to navigate to a control. The map was making little sense. Stuffed three controls in a row, dropped to 12th and there i stayed. Two control errors seemed about par for the course. I had four. That was one 7th place thrown away.