??? 1:27:35 [3] 9.5 km (9:13 / km)
First day of the Big 5 South African Orienteering meet. Its a huge difference from Georgia as its nearly 100 degrees today, or at least it felt like it, and its almost a desert with sandy ground and low bushes that all have thorns. Today the race was inside a game reserve with only herbivorous animals. Thankfully this helped out a lot because the animals made lots of small, tight paths going through the thorn bushes so i didn't have to try and fight through them. About halfway through my course a herd of Wildebeasts ran a couple meters in front of me and I had to wait for them to pass. It was both scary and really cool and afterwards I had to get back into the racing mindset because it definitely took me out of it. My brother ran too and I was kinda jealous because he got to see giraffes while he was out there. Overall it was a good first race. I didn't do as well as I wanted but I also ran in the the elite category now since I can no longer run as a junior. It helped that it was really flat today because I haven't been running hills but I think that will catch up to me later in the week.
