Bendigo Today Hagaby (26/02/2012)

Bendigo Today- Hagaby.
The first loop there were about 5 or 6 close at #1, but then a split meant I ran most of the loop with David Brownridge. He was running quite well and lead most of the way. At the map change we joined up with Kerrin and Bryan and the pace picked up. I dropped some distance to #2 and was back on my own til 7, where I met up with Bryan again. He'd had a lead of 45secs but made a parallel error. I decided to try a few mind games with the famously fragile Keely and surged past him up the steep hill to 8. He dropped off a bit but not much. I then drifted to the left to #9 and lost about 30secs, my biggest mistake of the race. Bryan then decided to put the hammer down towards 10 and I knew I wouldn't be able to keep that pace. But I caught up as he hesitated near the circle. On the way to 11 I decided to try a different route and went left along the water race whereas B when straighter and I lost about 15secs here. But I made it up with a straighter route to 12. The pace was pretty mellow over the hill to 13 and I again gave it a crack up the hill to 14 and had a small lead but then drifted a bit to the right coming into the control and Bryan got back in front. The pace picked up to 15 and then B really opened up and put a big gap on my up the slight hill to the last control and to the finish. The last few controls would have needed to be a bit harder for me to win today but otherwise happy with 2nd.

First race of the year and I'm pretty happy with how it went. Surprisingly with a month forced running break I haven't lost too much running fitness. I think I've turned into Shep of the last few years, who did mostly cycling training but still retained good orienteering form. Though I think I'll need to do a bit more speed work before I'll challenge Keely in a sprint finish. Nice work Bryan.