III Trophy of Mondego

Hello!
This weekend Joana stayed at home recovering (she was sick during Christmas holidays), Mariana stayed at home too resting from de POF trainning Camp and also making the last things to school, that starts tomorrow. Isabel went to a Regional Competition, not very important, but always nice to train orienteering. This Competition was in Quiaios, in the Centre of Portugal. Like it wasn't very important, it was for trainning, Isabel ran in WE. Her opinion about he competition:

"We left home very early on Saturday so we had the chance to visit a small montain called Serra da Boa Viagem, wich means Mountain of the Good Trip. We took amazing photographs and we had lunch right on the top of it. It was so beautiful.

Saturday, 7,2km

The race was very tuff because there was a lot of wood in the ground, if you decided to run in the forest, and a lot of sand in the paths. So the basic problem was to decide if you wanted to go straight ahead and face a lot of green and a LOT of wood on the ground, or run in the paths with sand so soft, like when you are on the beach. I lost some time in the 3rd control, because I couldnt understand the terrain very well so I took some time to decide when I should leave the path. Control no.10, I was looking to the long lenght so I run right to the control but I didn't saw it. Also very close to control no. 11 I didnt understand very well the details so when I got to the path I realize where I was. I also lost some time in control 15 because I didn't know exactly where I should leave the path. You can see the map with my route choices and the splits:

Sunday, 6,7km
I knew the map was going to be the same so the night before when I was drawing my route choices and analysing my race I decided that next day I would try to be perfect when I was in the forest, and run the fast I could, because of the sand, in the paths. I started very well, although I lost some time to the 3rd control because the path between the greens some times "disappeared", and I got to the 11th when I was trying to reach the 3rd. The same thing happened in control no 7 where I got to the 12th first. I was very tired so I started to lost a few time in each control because I couldn't get focus. I lost some time again in control no 12. The last part was terrible because I just needed to run in the sand the fast as I could. I made 1h 13. After two days running in the sand and with a lot of wood on the ground I was first in Woman Elite :)

Tomorrow school stars for the three of us wich means that our orienteering trainning days ended :( Now we have to go back to the books and study to have the best marks, keeping trainning orienteering at weekends. For Mariana next goal is Norte Alentejano O'Meeting, for Isabel and Joana that are going to be in the organization that weekend, Portugal O'Meeting is theirs next stop.

Bye Bye,

O-laranjitas