Wet Summer Series @ W Lindfield

Things were looking grim this afternoon as massive thunderstorms ripped their way across the Sydney suburbs. At work it got progressively darker outside from 3:30 and by 4:30 it was absolutely bucketing down. I left just after 5 with not much hope of having a run as it was still raining very heavily and there was thunder/lightning still going off! But by the time I got home there were patches of blue sky visible to I headed off to West Lindfield.

Todays map was based near the CSIRO Measurement Centre and took in West Lindfield and also the eastern side of Lane Cove National Park. Some nice suburban street running mixed in with more technical bush sections. I opted to head north first taking in the streets to hopefully let a little more water drain off before hitting the bush.

Pretty simple up front then with 5,13,12,2 and 11. While it was tempting to head down in the bush here I know from previous runs along the GNW at this section it would not be fast going. So instead kept up high and polished off 3,24,14,23 and 15. Making very good time with only around 15 minutes elapsed so far. In the rush to get out of the house I left behind the GPS receiver and HR so all I had was the timer.

Into the bush now crossing to 25, and then down to 16. First mistake here, I should have bush bashed down to the track coming out near 26 but instead ran away and down to 7 leaving an in and out track run to 26. Fairly smooth running although now a little slower to 28 and then onto 9. Here I decided to short cut as time was ticking down so across to 19. Back on the streets and up to 18 followed by 8. Into the nature strip behind the houses for 29 and then missed the straight trail leading to the exit for 27, running the slower fenceline route. Uphill finish after 27 with 6 on the way home.

Ended up back around 4 minutes late and missed around 160 points at either end of the map. Net score then was 400 which I was fairly happy with. In reviewing my route here :

http://www.users.bigpond.com/dmbray/West%20Lindfield.jpg

perhaps the only better thing I could have done would have been to not go to 2&11 (30 points) and have used that running time to get 30,20 & 10 (60 points).

Anyway the top guys only got 460 so I get a nice 87 points, although I do lose 2nd overall spot now in the season pointscore.

Back home the map wheel said around 8.5km in 48:41, avg pace 5:44.