okansas.blogspot.com Occassional thoughts about orienteering
Sunday, October 05, 2003
After the first week of my 30-minutes-a-day map study experiment I've got a few observations.
My plan was to spend 30 minutes studying O' maps each day. I missed one day. I never got around to looking at a map yesterday.
30 minutes is a fair amount of time to spend looking at an O' map. I can't stay concentrated for the entire 30 minutes, so I usually break it up in two or three shorter sessions.
I'm already noticing the effect of studying maps, or at least I'm noticing things that I wasn't before I began my map study experiment. When I was running on Thursday I was looking at the terrain and "picturing" how it would look on a map. I wasn't trying to do that. I just happened automatically. The same thing happens when I've been fieldchecking.
Looking at old maps brings back some memories. I was looking at a map from a race I ran in 1984. I have very clear memories of some of the legs. Looking at the leg nearly 20 years later, I can remember deciding how to run the leg and what I used to navigate. My memories seem to be strongest from legs where I planned and executed the leg well.
Some memories from old maps are gone. For the map from 1984, I don't have any memory of the weather or how I placed or who else was at the race or how I got to the event. I don't remember if the boulders on the map were large or small. I don't remember if the green was very thick or thorny.
I'll continue studying maps for 30 minutes a day at least through this week.
posted by Michael |
6:02 PM
