Race Evaluation
US Short Course Championships: Blue
Tundra/Desert
| 1. | The route will be here. | ||||||
| 2. |
Did not like map +00:35 | There were four cliffs, not 3 as mapped. And, the third cliff bent exactly as the control feature showed. I stopped. There was no place else to go, so I continued and found it on the fourth cliff. | |||||
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| 4. | |||||||
| 5. | I hurt my knee on the steel rail crossing the road. | ||||||
| 6. |
Confused parallel features +00:45 | I dove into the unmapped green off the trail, and had to go further sort of parallel to the trail to get around some deadfall. Once I did get around the deadfall, I corrected deep into the woods, and found a piece of rock, it looked like an abandoned chimney piece, bricks and all. But, it had no control on it; it was the knoll directly SW of the stone wall piece. | |||||
| 7. | I was shaky approaching, having misread the knolls uphill from the slope break, but got there with not much time loss. | ||||||
| 8. | |||||||
| 9. |
Did not read control description +03:40 | I realized right away this would be the decisive leg, as it was the only one that was really technical. I simplified the terrain, identified the shelves correctly, and dove onto the correct cliff with confidence. Except the control was not on the cliff, as I had hoped (not having read the description). It was on a boulder above the cliff. With the way my map was printed, there was no possible way to discern the boulder from the major cliff, the minor cliff above the boulder, nor to disentangle the slope tags of the major cliff from the other boulder in the circle. I got to the foot of the cliff, no control. I looked around and saw the trail and a boulder right next to a cliff. Alas, this boulder was completely covered by the purple circle, so I thought it was the large boulder to the E. I attacked from there, having read the control description by then, and ended up just short of Control 12. I thought about quitting right there, but decided that I needed more mileage for the week. I identified the part of the slope I was on, turned around and "nailed" the control. | |||||
| 10. | As I was approaching through the clearing, I saw Jon Torrance leaving the control. He only had 2 minutes on me. | ||||||
| 11. | I hurried and caught up with Jon. | ||||||
| 12. | Followed Jon. This was the only leg that I did not navigate by myself. | ||||||
| 13. | Ran straight to the control. This was another instance on which an important feature, a slope tag, was covered by the circle. It was impossible to discern that the cliff was facing away from the major slope until you got all the way to the control. | ||||||
| 14. | I bombed down the trails, then huffed up the hill to get to the control ahead of Jon. | ||||||
| 15. | I went wide left, then corrected through the edge of the marsh. This was a longer route than the straight one Jon took, but I was completely confident throughout. I got there at the same time as Jon. | ||||||
| 16. | I read all the topography as I was running down on the trail, so approached with confidence. Passed Jon right before the control. | ||||||
| 17. | I followed Jon but he turned left as we crossed the trail. I went straight, found the little knoll and got to the control ahead of Jon. | ||||||
| 18. | But he was not too far behind. I still got to #18 ahead. | ||||||
| 19. |
Bad route choice +00:35 | But I had no chance against Jon on the long uphill paved run. Actually the down-and-up route was pretty bad, but I most likely went this way because I had confused the finish with the last control, and there were some cliffs to cross if going high to the finish... but none, to the last control. | |||||
| F. |
Total Time Lost - 00:05:35