I went down to Yellowwood Saturday for the ICO orienteering meet. I knew from Michael Sapper that the blue course was going to be especially tough. Long, with lots of climb. So, I actually did what I guess was a little bit of taper the week prior to be as rested as possible with the hopes of putting in a good run. Felt good the morning of the event and I got lucky with the weather as the rain and freezing rain had just transitioned to full on snow right before I started.
The course was hilly for sure and I found myself walking more than one of them. I only had a few spills due to the conditions and thankfully none of them were too serious. The Salomon Speedcross trailrunning shoes are great on the steep hills. Saw lots of the "locals" out there and it looked like everyone was having a blast in the snow.
Anyways, I had a pretty good run and as I was finishing I figured I had lost maybe 5 minutes in nav blunders and dropping my compass once, (gotta get a new thumb compass). I didn't feel like I had run as hard as I did at the EC West Side meet, probably due to bigger hills, but I didn't slack either. My time was around 1:48 and as I finished the guys told me I had finished in 2nd place.
I wasn't surprised. I actually thought I might have come in around 3rd or 4th. After rattling off the names of the people I knew that I thought might have out run me (with no responses to the affirmative) I guessed that it was the "guy in black that looked like he knew what he was doing", that started just a bit before me.
It was in fact that "guy" that was faster than me. And not only did he put up a faster time, but he put one up TWENTY MINUTES FASTER than mine. Seriously? I'm no track star, but I'm not exactly slow either! How did I lose 20 minutes?
At first I couldn't figure out how it was possible that someone ran that course that fast, but the more I think about it, the more I realize how much room for improvement I have. The biggest lesson learned for this meet is reading my map while on the run. I usually slow to a walk to read my map so I can see it better, and to avoid that oh-so-common O-Meet Face Plant. However, I know that competitive orienteers can read their maps at a full run, and do it well. That alone would have been good for another 5 minutes on a course of this length. So, there's 10 minutes right there.
And I don't even have to get any faster to get that 10 minutes... (Just smarter and more coordinated.)
Big thanks to Sapper, James, Cristal, Ryan and Kirk for directing this meet, it was a blast!