Big 5 O - D3, longer distance, good run

It stormed all afternoon - big time torrential downpour - and poor Nic and Ian out putting out controls for today. Power went out late afternoon and is still off this afternoon. But, day dawned beautiful with good temperature and a clear, blue sky.

I'd been looking forward to today's course because of the longer distance and being in the forest.

It was fabulous and I had a pretty good run. It felt way shorter than even yesterday's course and reaching the last few controls I kept thinking, "Man, this can't be it!". I would probably have enjoyed the men's course, which was a few kays longer.

Terrain was reasonable and runnable in places; not runnable in others. I could have done with running more. For most of the course I was with some of the other girls on the same course with me, which isn't my favourite - I like to feel alone in the forest. But, we shared the work and took turns leading into the controls.

I was really happy with my nav today - good hits on the controls. #16 was my only odd one in the crags. I went in to the correct part and walked around the cliff but not far enough. Then I thought I had gone to the wrong one, which I hadn't. As I started to move to another section I saw a runner leaving from near where I'd been so I went back and found the control a few steps on. Crags / cliffs can be tricky.

The more straight-line runs are on good terrain; the deviations and wiggles are usually where I'm getting around something or trying to find a more smooth surface with less branches to trip over!

So, here's my map from today (if you click on the images I'm posting you'll get a bigger image than what you can see here). I'm just waiting for Sarah, who is out collecting controls, and then we're off to Sabie. Another long distance event tomorrow - yeeehhhaaa!