11. Warralong - Yallambie

The most notable point about this map is the lack of river crossing at the south end. There were only 3 controls on the eastern side, but I thought they were worth getting first and then worrying about coming back home along the west side.

I started off the run very flat. I had trouble deciding whether to get the slightly out of the way #1 first before heading over the river, and decided not to. Then I lost track of my location heading through the thick vegetation towards #8. Then a lonely run heading north towards 20 -- 12. Trying to work out which 8 controls to get on the way home, I just couldn't seem to find a good route. Controls 4 -- 16 -- 7 -- 2 were too tempting being along the river in relatively flat conditions, but in order to get the other 4 controls, I would have to head up to the road and back in between.

I didn't want to venture too far into the streets as I wanted to avoid as much uphill section as possible, so after #16, headed up to #15 before heading back to the river and 7 -- 2. That left 3 controls to get and I still tossed up which ones to get. At this point I was practically back to the start and having to find a small loop.

I considered 6 -- 17 -- 1 but went instead for 13 -- 6 -- 1. At this point each of the 3 remaining controls required a degree of double-backing, which wasn't ideal. I also wished I had taken #1 at the start so I could finish directly from #6. This would've saved me about 400m as it turns out.

I have since noticed the two bridges directly south & north of # 16 that may have saved some distance and enable me to get an extra control on the leg heading north. However, the route to get there from #20 is a bit of a detour as it is, so I was probably right to take the long way to #12. My route took in a total of 6.5km and 50 minutes, a slightly slower effort than recent runs.

I certainly didn't run as well as I have in recent weeks, mostly because I wasn't confident with my route choice. Results for the event aren't available yet, probably due to the absence of the organiser all week, but I certainly don't think I was near the top of competitors for C-course.

I expect the Brunswick course to be quite flat next week, although it looks like there are more cut-through reserves than last week's Fairfield map.

10. Westgarth - Fairfield

A flat course and accomodating weather was a nice change from recent weeks.  The course offered more busy roads than normal - usually there's no more than one major road, most have none. The Westgarth map is set in a fairly built up area and the start/finish area was located right at the train station. There would need to be some decisions about how to cross the railway line also. There were 6 crossings in total, but really only 4 in play, one of which was a pedestrian overpass at the station.

At first, the route seemed quite simple. I decided to cross the track immediately and head to the north-east part of the course. There were 4 controls there and I could get them all in a nice loop heading down towards the track again. After I did, I worked out the rest of the route to take in 7 more controls. They very much jumped out at me. It was quite obvious which controls to get, so it was just a matter of concentrating on running. In order to avoid crossing across the track and back another time, I would need to get 7 -- 19, but they didn't lead well into the finish, so the pair of 20 -- 2 was the best option.

The flat course help me run pretty much the whole way, with a couple of stops to regain bearings and plan the next section, but I can see improvement in my stamina. Looking at the map now, I can see I could've possibly done #2 at the beginning and finished with 20, but I'm not sure it would've made much difference. I finished 3rd for the C-course, but at least 3 minutes behind the first two runners.

Looking at the map, route selection didn't seem to be an issue for any of the courses, with clear options for everyone. I do appreciate the effort the course-setters go to in planning each event and it's clearly not an easy job all the time. Maybe combined with the flat terrain, this made the event not one of the most challenging one, but still, everyone still has the chance to make it as competitive as they like.

Yallambie next week. There's bound to be more off-road running with the proximity to Plenty River. And only a month of events to finish up the summer series.