This map shows the first two legs on the day one red course at the SLOC B-meet.

How would you do these legs? If you ran at the event, how did you do them?

-- Michael (meglin@juno.com), March 13, 2000

Answers

I quickly decided to attack from above and took the left route choice on #1. I did not see the faint trail... I think the 4 inches of snow somehow obscured it. Used the trail bend as an attack point. #2 was the same thing. Up to the trail, skirting the reentrant, then off the trail at the slight trail bend.

Now that I look at it, I could have chosen to be 'not only disqualified, but arrested' by crossing into the shooting range.

-- Fritz Menninger (fpmenninger@hotmail.com), March 13, 2000.

I wasn't there, so here are guesses at what route I may take.

1. I would stay on trails for a while because I bet the woods are just a bit thick and maybe rocky. The trail to the south of the line looks most attractive but I don't think there would be vast time differences between various possible route choices on this leg. I would head to the control from somewhere along the parallel and closely-spaced trail sections.

2. I would go NW between the light green and yellow areas, reach the trail and run along the ridge until the top of the reentrant where the control is. It cuts off just a bit of climb and possibly green compared to a straighter route.

-- Mook (everett@psi.edu), March 13, 2000.

Start to 1: I ran on the trail to the right. I saw the left alternative, but thought the approach to the control was better if I took the right trail.

1 to 2: As I left the first control I went up the spur to the small trail, then took the large trail toward the second control. On my way to the first control, I'd noticed that running in snow-covered reentrant bottoms was much tougher than running on snow-covered spurs. So, leaving the first control I ran on the spur.

-- Michael (mike_eglinski@kcmo.org), March 14, 2000.

Remember that the woods may have been rocky, but covered with a cushioning layer of four inches of fresh snow. It was commented that a week or two earlier the oak leaves made running quite a challenge. These only added to the cushioning, what with the snow... or maybe our feet were so frozen...

-- Fritz Menninger (fpmenninger@hotmail.com), March 15, 2000.