Plan for the day - conservative pace, safe route choices.
S-1 - started with PG on Brown - followed him to the triangle, then opted to take the trail all the way around and read the map a bit to get a feel for things before venturing off into green woods - a good choice. Hopped off the trail one reentrant too soon, but corrected quickly and gracefully hitting control cleanly with numerous others hunting in the circle
1-2 - long leg, up trail a ways to get to whiter woods, then careful bearing and jogging aiming for the pond on trail just N of line, did well for that distance, coming out on trail about 100m S of pond, but knowing exactly where I was, behind pond, follow reentrant up looking for second marsh - hesitated as there were actually 3 distinct marshes long this reentrant and I paused to make sure there were no flags on the second one before heading further up and hitting the third. Feeling confident so far.
2-3 - first instinct was to go to trail for safe attack. But straight went over top of hill which seemed distinct enough from the area of #2 - so opted for the straight shot - hill quickly became very indistinct and a lot of unmapped rootstocks make the going slower than hoped. Found myself hunting and decided to head uphill to relocate from road or pond - must have been lower than I thought because it took a while to hit pond, from which the control was simple. Should have gone with Plan A.
3-4 - Original plan was to run trail to clearing beyond pond then stay above rentrant system until I got to distinct spur then attack carefully from there - instead a number of folks were going into first clearing and picking up indistinct ride so I opted to try that instead, down along stream then cross to NW side and run to reentrant junction. Should have been a short 200m bearing, but I must have screwed that up as I'm pretty sure I got too high, nothing matched and I hunted a bit, decided to relocate off pond to S and headed that direction and lucked into the control enroute. Once again, should have stayed with the original plan
4-5 - down past pond, out to road and attack from water stop - easy to do from that angle, but extra distance and climb involved - but safe...
5-6 - up road to trail junction with another water stop, then up trail to end of open area then up the hill through white woods shooting for white gap at hilltop - worst case I hit trail. White gap quite evident, so crossed trail and went 80m into woods and contoured so I wouldn't miss the reentrant too high - spiked it. Nadim (started 2m behind me) coming in as I'm leaving.
6-7 - trails all the way around, coming in via field from N very clean attack and spiked it once again - Nadim still behind me, but gaining ground (different route as I never saw him on trail)
7-8 - out the way I came in, trail to clearing S of control, then veg edge down hill and spiked it just ahead of Nadim.
8-9 - slow climbing hill to water stop, Nadim passing me on the hill, then find myself on the same trail I started on enroute to #1 - cut off trail, across reentrant and spiked the rootstocks. No sign of Nadim
9-10 - long trail route up the hill - ran most of it - Nadim visible in distance on early part, then I lost sight of him - either he outran me, or cut in earlier. I ran all the way to parking area and distinct edged pond, around in open, the rides/trails and hit marsh in the middle - read clue of NW end, looked NW and there it was, about 20m distant in the shade. Cool...
10-11 - quickly out to road, down to clearing just before pond, over hilltop and down spur and spike - no sign of anyone
11-12 - sweet run down spur, staying above reentrant to L, then across stream shooting roughly for the water drop, but just hoping to find safe passage through the vague green marsh - hit some open water, but found a fresh beaver dam to get through the worst of it and climbed up the hill to trail popping out just as Nadim coming up the trail from the W. Only about 50m from the water but not much energy and I had to stop for a drink so I let him go. After watering myself, up trail then across through white woods and down to pond - a slow, but satisfying leg given the various chances for messing it up.
12-13 - opted to head S to nearest open hoping for mown fields and easier running as the cramps were bristling beneath the surface. Not so much - pretty thick and slow - then into the narrow white woods, second field mown and faster.
13-F - down the hill and done. nuff said...
Decent run I think, my only major fubars were deviating from my original plan and taking risks. I certainly wasn't running fast, but I haven't done much O this year at all, and my running has either been weekly long slow runs (spring) or intermittent periods of faster, short runs.
RouteGadget