Orienteering 1:28:00 [3]
Diabolical right from the start.
Felt fine at the start line. Followed the ditch towards 1, but then being unused to the 2.5m contours, I dropped far too low and over shot the control, eventually climbing back up to it.
Then got a long stick caught in my shoe and went head over heels down the hill, tweaking my calf muscle in the process. Should have known it wasnt my day and called it quits then!
Hobbled on to #2, 3 and 4. messing around towards the circle on the first two. then long leg 4-5, i bashed out the back of the circle to get to the track and headed around. About 500m down the track I just hit the wall and was very very tempted to walk...not brilliant when you're barely into your course! Hit the river, where I had an excuse to walk cos the sand was so soft, then lucked out finding a way across the marsh. That was as good as it got though. Crawled up the hill to 5 and was very surprised to see Aislinn as I entered the control.
That made me push for a few controls, although we were still very slow. track route to 6 wasn't the best but I didn't have the strength to go straight. Despite all my mental willing, my breathing got the better of me as we entered 9 and I had to stop and get it under control.
Overshot 9 and Aislinn was well gone by the time I got it. 9-10 was an easy long leg, but I was extremely light headed and nauseous. So bumbled along, got hemmed in by marsh, but eventually found my way to the track. Tried running down that, but had to stop and walk again when I hit the flat as breathing was ragged as.
Decided I could manage a jog once I got to 10, and we were heading into the more technical stuff so couldn't go too fast anyway. Caught Aislinn again, along with Anna, through 12. But then pushed it too hard with them around me, trying to get through the rubbish on the ground. By the time I hit the track going to 13 I was in a bad way. Anna came past and I mentally succumbed to a panic/breathing attack.
Immediately sat down to get it under control. Tried to stand up and walk but was too light headed so sat down again. Studied my map to find the easiest way back to the finish. But a straight line back to the finish pretty much took me through the remaining controls anyway, so after a couple of minutes I decided to walk to the next control atleast and take it from there.
But from there I recovered enough to Manage to jog from 13 through all the controls in the tin mining. Still made some mistakes and got caught in green stuff, but was going at a low enough intensity (walk-jog) that my breathing was ok.
So yeah. Shite. And extremely frustrating that I obviously haven't solved this breathing/panic attack type problem. I've felt fine the last couple of weeks in NSW and VIC champs, so why now?!
Off to the Dr again this week. New best theory is that I have something hanging around from that horrible flu in August, as that's when this problem surfaced.
So overall very disappointed with Aus champs. not the courses. Not even my placings really. But just that I couldn't go and give the races what I know I'm capable of. Having seen the results from the previous weekend I was looking forward to giving Grace some close races, but my body didn't give me a chance.