Orienteering race (Middle Qualifier) 31:00 [4] 3.6 km (8:37 / km)
What an amazingly HOT weekend! I started at 11:30 and was just frying in the sun. So not ready for such heat.
I was kind of feeling like crap up to this point. The whole past week was spent studying every waking moment, without any time to run. I had taken wed and th. off of work to study, which meant no swimming either. All this hard brain working out stuff culminated Friday in the PE exam, an all day test that resulted in foggy brain, foggy vision (focusing on white sheets of paper 8" from my face all day!) and super dehydration. (Can't waste precious test-taking time peeing!) After this exam, i met up with my parents and we drove to boston to stay with Tora in the city. Which of course meant going out to eat. and drink. and go to bed late. Ahh, city life.
This was a great distraction that kept me from dwelling on all the problems that I got wrong on the exam!!
But, so after a long week of doing jack and then having a night like friday night, i felt like such the fat kid. I decided that, considering all that, and the heat, that I would just take it easy and see if I could remember how to orienteer. Turns out I can still run and nav, even at the same time. I came out of this qualifier in 1st, despite a few small bobbles and otherwise feeling like I was running quite slow. Now, we wait and wait in the hot sun for the final...
Orienteering race (Middle Final) 41:00 [5] 5.0 km (8:12 / km) +150m 7:08 / km
Finally the final races started (my only gripe of the whole weekend...the middle and final should've started earlier, and perhaps with less of a gap between them.) but anyway.
I started 2mins back from Pavi and was surprised to catch her by CP3, this, however, totally distracted me and i messed up 4 and 5, losing over 2 mins. Ran hard down the rail trail to 6 to catch up and kind of toasted myself doing so. my head and feet felt like they were going to explode in the sun, but I had to keep running in order to get that little breeze. I only allowed myself to walk in the shade or up the steeper hills. Running back along the trail to 13 i just wanted it to be over so i set a good pace for myself. Collapsed into a heap at the finish, but had to get up quick to prevent the cramping that I could tell was coming. Quick, take shoes and socks off, douse water over head... ahh, much better! not ready for THIS heat yet! At least not for running around in!