Ås by Night & Fog Cup #5 (03.02.2015)

Another very snowy Night-O race: When passing open (logged) areas I had problems with very deep snow, sometimes dropping down to the middle of my thighs.

Very easy start to the first control, then I lost confidence towards #2, moved very slowly but stopped just before the control, thinking I was too far south. Lost 2 min here.

I decided on a route choice to #3 which intentionally passed through #10, thinking this would give me some tracks to follow and make it easier to find the control when I came back. OK.

Also OK to #4, managed to run most of that leg.

As my track shows I managed to just miss the path towards #5, if I had gone right as soon as I hit the ride I would have saved at least 2 min, which would have given me a winning split time.

OK to #6, just stay near the edge of the logged area and look for the reflex marker.

OK to #7 as well, except for stopping at the cliff where it should have been: After spending some time here I found some tracks and followed them to the control which was misplaced near the NE edge of the control circle.

OK to #8, this was the only place where the forest was actually runnable!

I decided to avoid the logging on the direct route to #9, instead I returned almost to #7, then found a very nice path up the hill, but when it disappeared completely I ended up going over the hill and retracing my path through #5. Near the end I probably left the path a bit too soon.

I tried to go direct to #10, thinking I would recognize the control area, but I ended up turning around just 10-15 from it, then ran (i.e. postholed) back north until I spotted the cabin and returned for a loss of at least a minute.

The big problem with orienteering under these conditions is that it takes so much longer to get anywhere that even small (in distance) mistakes can cost a lot of time!