Here is the Relay Champs '07, 4pt Anchor Leg map, and here are my routes.

Mediocre race. Was way to cautious. Was running not to lose rather than to win. Did gain a place, tho. (Well, technically I went out 5 seconds ahead of JF, but I'm not counting that). My goal when I went out was to gain the one place I thought I could, on the ROC team, and I did. Passed their anchor runner in the area of the third control, and did not lose that place. Overall, we were 4th, which I feel was our best possible outcome. I think everyone else on the team did better than me, tho I certainly did not do badly.

The problem was, once I gained that place, I really tightened up. I don't really like racing in those conditions. I was so cautious to not make the train wreck of a mistake, and while that was appropriate relay strategy given the conditions, and I was successful at it, I didn't enjoy it that much. This tightness led to a sort of bobbily/wobbily approach, as I had no flow. Another thing that disrupted my flow was to have to constantly unfold the map to look at the codes and descriptions. This is the same for everyone, but it really does hurt my flow, and when I have bad flow and timing, I pull up short on features, and wobble/bobble before getting it right.

My lack of focus was evidenced by confusion over where to put the map at the map exchange. There was no box, and I didn't want to just drop it on the ground, since tons of runners were running both ways thru this control. So I handed it to Spike. I didn't know what else to do; this goes to show how poor my focus and concentration was, as I was thinking about all this at the time. I hope he didn't think I was too weird. (Well, I am weird, but I like to think it is in a good way).

Well, fine organization, course setting, venue, atmosphere, weather, etc. No complaints on that end except the request that code numbers are printed on the map after the control numbers. But I always whine about that.