But, today I was out there and feeling great! I had a bad run with coughing and flu pre- and post-Swazi Xtreme so I've only really begun to feel good again this past week.
The terrain out at Hennops is grassy and rocky with patches of scattered and dense vegetation. The Hennops River runs through the place too and there are a number of dry ditches to add some interest.
Although I'd wanted to run Brown course (the longest), we had such a great turnout that we ran out of maps. I was starting almost last after helping with registration, so I dropped down to the Blue course, which was technically the same but 600m shorter in distance (as the crow flies). My run was mostly great - just two errors. I won ladies on the Blue course.
Problem was basically that I came out of CP5 through the grassy, open area and hit the road. I wasn't sure exactly where on the road I was. Lots of junctions here because of the 4x4 tracks. I headed down and dropped too low, very quickly. I realised I'd come down the first 'loop' and not the second. It was a bit of a clamber up some rocks to get to the CP. When I look at this track... well, stoopid error.
Like a horse bolting for home after a good run, I lost concentration and contoured too much around the hill. I had my eyes set on some vegetation (the wrong vegetation) but I was also confused because I felt too close to the hill, which I was. Also, I had wanted to hit the road near the CP; I hit a road but it was the wrong one. I realised this when I saw the fence. Took me a few moments to pick up my error - luckily it was a quick downhill run to the control. I met up with another guy at exactly the same point; he'd done the same thing. Really silly mistake, but that's errors in orienteering.
Track mapped by an igot-U unit and worked up on the map by QuickRoute orienteering software.
No comments:
Post a Comment