Discussion: Contours

I use contours to navigate by, what do you use

This leg is common on courses 1, 2, 3
Here are the other times under 12 mins

Evan 8.16
Warren 8.38
Toph 9.18
Liggo 9.25
Scammell 9.33
Bruce 9.57
Blair 10.14
Dave Rowlands 11.52
AJ 11.57

After leaving the control I didn't ran through the clear bits mostly on the right of the watercourse. I didn't look at my map untill I got to the rocks on the fence below the cliff.. I lost time on the slog up the hill due to fitness.

Bottom route (which I took) is 1.3k, Top is 1 k. Both have about 40m climb. The traverse is about 1k with 15m climb but lots of green. I decided the botom was safer. In retrospect, it probably wan't much different in risk, just longer. Strangely, course setter believed bottom would be better.

reasons I took my route:
-I was feeling strong on the hills, and was eager to head straight for them.
-shorter distance
-Jimbo's coaching the night before.
-The clearings and flat rock were a good attack point leading into the checkpoint, and they were a lot more comfortable looking than bashing uphill through green.

Looks like I missed out on some good courses.

Dropping down and then going up the watercourse is safer and has the same climb.

you're looking at it in the opposite direction

Rob, thanks for explaining what Stewy was on about, I couldnt work him out

alright, I 'd go the same way in reverse, and play wheel of fortune at the end.

i took essentially the same route as you rob. but i stayed lower early on and climbed straight up that major gully from the big boulder at the bottom, it looked like it was more free of rock than the rest of the area and would be easier to run up. from the top of the gully i went the same way as you using those clearings as a line of attack

yeah I looked at that, but then I thought the white with rocks would be faster than the semi un rocked green.

was also more direct?

to tell the truth, my initial plan on leaving the checkpoint was just to run toward the top of the hill

If you took the bottom of hill option, the navigation was easy, but you had to pick the open leads and bare rock to keep up a good speed. Get it wrong and you would have a slower time than over the top. I think in retrospect over the top was better. I originally chose that, then changed my mind because I was worried about navigating downhill to a spur. I must report that as I climbed up over the last rise to the control, I saw it dead in front of me. So navigation was facile from that direction. Evan was standing about 20 metres up hill looking at his map. Then he saw me. I don't know if I gave anything away or if he was already onto the control. I commented that it was an interesting route choice and he said it was easy over the top. I told him he was standing when I saw him so it must have been a bit harder and I heard him say as he disappeared into the distance... 'that was only a few seconds'. I heard him crashing and bashing for another minute.

How come north is at the bottom of the map!!!!

I actually thought it was really easy coming from the top- slow steady down along the grey, and the little spur was pretty obvious, I didn't see the stand until I'd left the rock.

I still think my route was the most creative :-) running around the grey slabs on the hillside. I think only Steve Key, Alex Tarr and I had even been to some of these spots on this hill. The mapping was a bit confusing, so I spent a minute or 2 standing still before I committed to dropping down the hill.