South Island Long Champs. Christchurch. Course: Long 10.6 km 300 m
Bloody tough
Map
Started a bit late due to the fact that I wasn't going to run until Viv heard me say so and took a look and fixed my heal. Still hurt a little bit but different, more of a slightly bruised pain rather than a crushing pinch, hurt most push off up hill so walked a couple because of that.
Thought I play it safe to 1, realised I had missed the vege and then half way to 1 realised you couldn't use the vege to navigate on this map. Knew I was just past a re-entrant and hedged by bets and went up, worked out I was on the hill and got it easy from there, lots of others lost massive amounts of time on this control, got pushed around by the vege and a bit distracted playing go between for the injured guy and the people trying to find him, but got it ok. 3 no problems, 4 must have been the hardest I've had to work running down hill, so thick and hard, it was a pleasure running along the creek altho it seemed to do something funny towards the end and almost made a massive meal of it, but again hedged by bets and got the control. 5 again just getting pushed around a bit, but once into the depression system was sweet. 6 went out (and over) the fence, (again a South Island event when the fastest way is off the map) 7 gave me the shits and played it super safe, people who risked it were faster, then same again for 8 but really it was at the point of 2 linear features and could have gone harder, from here I started to pick up my pace and aggression a bit, as up until now I was a little reserved because of my heal but it was sweet. Got 9 good, and 10, then mis-read the contours for 11 thinking it was a hill system, and stuffed around wondering by this big hole was in front of me, got 12 sweet and I was pushing to get away from Grieg, which probably lead to the next mistake, stayed too high on the contours, sort of knew I was doing it but didn't do anything about it, then lost time just wandering into the control area. At the start of 14 I got a pine needle down the inside of my eye which took a few secs to pull it out, and also made the wrong route choice, as it was crap down the bottom, should have gone around the top, and I has seen it as well, walked up this hill due to my heal, and then got into a real bad situation, I knew which area I was in but not exactly, which ment I wasted a lot of time as I was getting closer to the control trying to find something to confirm where I was, but not actually doing anything real positive to fix it, ended up in the crappy slope just before the control, and couldn't see anything, missed the first depression, but realised pretty quick after there was no hill coming off the second and looped back to the control, I was also now feeling really stuffed (heat didn't help) so was glad for the drink and leppin. Took the easy track route to 15 basically just to get out of the shit (for this map, think of the white as green, the green as dark green and anything else as super shit) made a meal of 16, thought I was on a good compass, but getting pushed right, then hit 25 = not so good, 17 alright, 18 drifted right but knew it, 19 careful but good, 20 just sapped every once of energy out of me, again properly would have been better going around the top, also lost time looking for what I thought was a re-entrant not a spur. Slow and careful on 21, opened up a bit on 22 as I found some nicer running lines, 23 another control giving me the shits, super slow and careful, then slow again on 24 as I got beat up more by the vege, alright to 25. Got a bit of white line fever on 26 and raced down the hill and around the edge of the open, over the spur and over the creek, then didn't read my map properly and was running up and down on the small system in front of the control, think this totally cooked me as I was fucked running to the last control, felt like it took about 10 mins and had nothing left at all for any type of sprint finish what so ever.
Over all it was a pretty scrappy run, and I really felt like I lacked some top end shape and strength through the crap, but hey I was at least running and I think I was using my map and reading it more often than I have been, just some ordinary execution and a bit of being bashed about