Orienteering (Foot) 1:00:51 [4] *** 6.6 km (9:13 / km) +180m 8:07 / km
spiked:12/18c slept:7.0 weight:180lbs
QOC: Wheaton Regional Park, MD. Russ Damtoft set a course that kept us off the trails in the park. It was in the low 30's F so I got off to a quick start. Every time I run here, I have a longing for the map being brought up to the same standard as our LIDAR based maps. Most of my errors were related to map issues. Like many, I was too low going to #1, and #4. I got past #9 a bit thought I could have read it better. The new deadfall on the big hillside that the old campground used to be situated on didn't trip me up too much but it did make me more tired. My biggest error was going to #13. I came up a gully and was going attack off the top of it but once there, I was right next to a trail that was at least mapped 50m further west. Missing, I wandered for 3 minutes. I had some good runs as I encountered other orienteers. First, there was Tom Nolan at around #6. I ran a leg with Jon Torrance to #10, and managed to get there just ahead. That tired me out--my training log will show that I've not been training enough. After flailing at #13, I ran off and on with Dan Quinn and managed to finish just ahead of him. Overall it was a fair outing for me. Dealing with a poor map is a skill just like any other in orienteering and the best deal with it well. I was encouraged by being able to run through the course with my lack of training.