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Orienteering @ St Davids

17 February 2019
Orienteering Urban Event #3 at St David's Marist Inanda, Sandton


I started my morning off with a 10km Club Run at Randburg Harriers, so my legs weren't 100%. It was also a pretty cold morning - the first blue skies and sun we have seen in a week, but there was a cold breeze in the air. We arrived pretty early to the event as we drove straight from the club run, and noticed that the organizers were only just starting to put controls out - this was now at about 7:45. Knowing that controls were still going out, I decided to put my start time as 9:30, just incase of anything.

I went to the start at about 9:15 and saw that there was a 9 minute gap between me and the person ahead of me, so I changed the time to 9:21. Starts were then delayed as it was found that not all controls has been placed, despite people already out and running on the course. 



Starting off I knew which direction to go as I saw all the women heading across the field, through the car park and left. The first control was actually easy, just the other side of the carpark, but it didnt give me time to plan my next control. 

Control #2 I took my time navigation wise as I was thrown a bit by the map and on initial glance, the control was just surrounded by dark grey buildings. The correct symbol for corridors was used, something I am not use to seeing. On this leg I set off, but kept stopping as I wasn't confident in where I was or where I was actually heading to. I was too busy trying to slowly find my way that I didnt look at the route to #3. 

I also stumbled around a bit going to #3 - my confidence was lost. After that, I was able to read ahead and controls from #4 to #13 were pretty straight forward. I tried pushing myself as they were mostly running legs and reading ahead was easy. 

I lost time again on #13 to #14 - this was a map flip and #13 was not marked on the other side of the page, so I wasted time trying to find where I was, to get to #14. 
The rest of the course was straight forward. Looking at the map, I could have gone back from #17 and run across the corridor and exited from the right side of the building, it might have just cut down a few seconds. 



Overall it wasn't a bad run. On the prelim results I was 4th, finishing within a minute of Tania (2nd) and 25 seconds after Elaine (3rd).
Final results have me in tied for 2nd, after they took out the controls that were not placed - these just happened to be the controls I bombed out on.
My average speed was 5:57, with my fastest speed as 3:25 to the finish control. 

Now to prepare for the night series, first one in 2 weeks time at Eagle Canyon.



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Location: 36 Rivonia Rd, Sandown, Sandton, 2146, South Africa

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