Summer Series @ St Joeys

After a week off from Summer Series during my sojourn in the USA it's back to the map and this week not too far from home and I think in vat_man's backyard! Missed out on the planned short recovery run this morning.

The start was at St Josephs Sports Ground (for those not in the know St Josephs is one of Sydney's more exclusive private schools and has a lot of boarders from the country. Luckily today there was a decent breeze blowing which kept things a little cooler. The map area is bounded by Victoria, Pittwater, Ryde and Burns Bay Roads, mostly centred around Tarban Creek back up into Gladesville.

Here's a link to a copy of the map and my route

http://www.users.bigpond.com/dmbray/villa%20maria.jpg

Started off pretty well, downhill to 13, then 3. A little wobble on 2 and then ran past the drop down to 21. Up hill to 11 and traversed across to 14 pretty happy so far! Finish the loop and cross the creek for 6, another little relocate and then ran out the wrong way (not up) to cut across to 22.

Now I really came unstuck at 24 confusing myself with stone fences and completely overshooting which means a climb back up, then manage to miss the cleared bush approach to the creek crossing at 7, prefering to bash through pretty green and thick creekside bush. That little section really soaked up some time. Back on track up to 4, across to 23, 17, 10 and 19. Still too many points further out and running low on time but continued on to 27, 29 and then up to Tarban Creek bridge to cross over for 30. Looking to run a fairly direct route back so it's 25,9,16 and then 5.

At that point time was pretty much up but I opted to pick up 15 and then run along to 1 only to realise 1 was on the other side of the fence. Another bit of time wasted before I eventually find a way under the fence, across to 12 and back to the finish.

Ended up with 53:48 and 490 points so a 90 point penalty gives a net of 400. Distance was 8.4 km at 6:22 min/km. Thats what happens when you stuff up a couple of controls!

Still not a totally bad scoae but will probably end up around 68 points, one which I'll need to drop in the overall pointscore.

Used my new Trance shoes acquired at the Brooks outlet store for a bargain and no blister problems, feeling more confident each day that I might have sorted them out! Of course now I'm icing up as both LH and RH adductors are a bit tight