The wrong direction

Helegant

At the top of the slope up the Golden Mile in Blackpool yesterday, the route turned left to go down onto the white concrete. All I could see were a lot of bollards, some metal portable fencing, and groups of people standing around. I duly turned around and yelled, "Where do I go?" Thinking about it afterwards - to anyone standing around on the day, it's obvious. To a hot and tired runner who loses all sense of direction (it has been known for other runners to grab my shoulders and point me in the right direction) it was quite bemusing. Luckily there were enough folks left around to yell back so I found the slope.

Two weeks ago I managed to get lost in the finishing area of the St Albans Half and missed all the goodie hand-outs.

If anyone sees a short bemused looking woman in a URWFRC vest wandering around at races, do take pity on me and let me know where I should be going.

Meanwhile I'm wondering if it's just me, or if other people also lose their sense of direction? And if so, has anyone ever got lost?

Jj

¦oD

You are not alone! I get lost almost every time i go out! I run through the local common, which isn't an open bit of grass as you'd imagine, but huge, rambling beechwoods with hundreds of paths going here there and everywhere.

I ALWAYS make a wrong turn somewhere. Hubby still laughs at a Sunday morning phone call he received from me: 'Um - how well do you know Downley?' I asked him. And he had to get in the car and drive several miles to find me.

[Deleted User]

LOL Helen.

I got lost week before last when staying out in Leeds, and my short gentle run to unwind after a hard day's course turned into an 8 miler. When staying in Norfolk, a 6 miler turned into a 14 miler in the broads, and I only realised I was running in totally the opposite direction when I found some road signs. When I used to work in Hampstead and ran on the Heath in my lunch break, I got lost just about every time I went out.

[Deleted User]

Helen, a few years ago I ran an offroad race with two start points (Sandstone trail?), the idea was that the fit people would do the full distance (about 15 miles I think) and the rest of us would start further along the course about an hour after the others had started. We lined up in a field as the top athletes ran past on the road. I assumed that we would run onto the road and join them, realising that this would be a squeeze I decided to start near the front. As no-one around me seemed too bothered about the race I started right at the front. Two strides into the race I realised that everyone else was running the other way! (We first had to cross the field before joining the others, presumably to avoid congestion). The trouble was that I couldn't just turn around as my wife and children had positioned themselves along the road to see me on my way. I carried on to tell them what had happened whilst the organisers were trying to call me back. Oh how we laughed...

Helegant

DavidB, I like that story. Nice to see you were kind enough to keep your support team informed of changing directions. A lesser man might just have turned around and joined the race :-)

cougie

Tee hee hee. I obviously need to run further in order to get lost. Not that real men ever actually get lost, we just need to go a bit further to er, get our bearings.

Helegant

Cougie, it's during races that I get an idea of what it must be like to be a man as all the blood leaves my brain... :-)

cougie

Tee hee.

HEY !! Just got that !!

Why I oughta....

Nicko. Hdau

Where am I ??????????????????

[Deleted User]

Hels u shud ask Tired Legs for directions!!!

RD

[Deleted User]

It would've added another 3hr to her race.

Dan get back to H&E so i can kill you. ;-)

[Deleted User]

Helen - Last year I ran Myrtle Beach (SC). The course turned right about mile 13 or so, but one man continued straight. The course was well-marked, so he was zoned out. Since I lacked the energy to chase him down, I yelled until I got his attention.

I have not gotten lost. My reasons are two-fold. One is I am never in the lead, so someone is always in front of me. The other is I am anal about the courses, so study the course before I run. Have a great day. Have fun!

[Deleted User]

I've followed some one the wrong direction & last week I spent sometime zigzagging across a field to try yo find the way out )

[Deleted User]

Helen. If you are good at getting lost. Don't do the Fairlands Valley Challenge. You wouldn't stand a chance!!

cougie

These Triathlete wallahs seem to do it all the time. In the swim. On the cycle. Anyone see London Tri on Tv last year where the leading girls went up a dead end road ?

Ooooops !

Aardvark

Believe it or not, I once managed to get lost running along a canal path. I hadn't been running long, and I didn't know the area very well, and all the bridges going off the canal looked the same...

My planned 15 minutes turned into about 45. Doesn't seem like much now, but very nearly killed me at the time.

[Deleted User]

often get lost as i have just moved house.

[Deleted User]

If you don't like getting don't run with me.

Plum

Supervet and my sunday runs are a voyage of discovery. We both have the sense of direction of a roundabout and have visited some strange exotic places, problem is we can never find them again. We end up running for miiiillleees just to find out where we are.

[Deleted User]

There was a post here last year from a forumite who got lost in the final stages of a marathon and ended up doing over 28 miles or something. Not funny!!

[Deleted User]

my motto is if im not lost i havnt run far enough.

[Deleted User]

TP,how did you get on sunday.

SHADES

Got lost doing the Clarendon Way one year when the wind blew the direction arrow away, we ran down a hill and ended up in a quarry works, we were looking for a way out when a police car arrived. Got a lift in the panda car back to where we had gone wrong, I had to sit in the back with the policeman's briefcase and hat on my lap.

Helegant

ooops, and I'm seriously considering Fairlands... Will RRR and Meerkat help me to stay on the straight and narrow?

Pammie*

Got lost a few years ago (ok it was the late eighties) I hadn't run more than about 5 or 6 miles up to that point) i took the turning found myself on a dual carriage way and ended up doing about 10 miles. when i got back to base camp all my friends had arrived long before me, but at least i could laugh about it.

Aardvark

I got lost running in the Lake District with a friend in April. We'd planned a roughly 10k route with a map, but of course we missed a turning and got lost. Asked for directions at a farmhouse, and were told to cut across a field, following a fence that turned out not to exist. Finally ended up at a T-junction where the road stretched out for miles in both directions. Took a guess and, about 2 miles later, ended up back at the place we'd got directions. Followed the road back home from there. By the time we made it back, our "10k" had taken 2 hours 4 minutes. Is this some sort of a record?

[Deleted User]

Helen. Re Fairlands Challenge. I am a fairly good map reader, and my running partner often goes on walking hols and is mean with a map and compass. Yet we still got lost on the challenge, and ended up taking more than one wrong turn, and having to double back! Must have done near enough 2 miles over the intended 18.

Doubly Bionic Ironwolf

Actually no, Helen, I seem to have a sort of direction finder in my head and always know at least which direction I need to run in to get back to my starting point.

However, I've got lost many times during orienteering races, especially in Switzerland, go figure that one out! I think it's being too eager to get to the next control point and not bothering to count how far I've gone, or else going direct cross-country on a compass bearing and not paying proper attention to 'drifting' left or right of the bearing. It's amazing how alike heather bushes on a mountainside are!

greyhound

When training for my first marathon I planned a long run of 20 miles a few weeks before the race. You guessed it, I got lost - seriously lost - and ended up doing 28 miles instead. I don't think I'd ever felt so bad before, or since. But it was a good experiece in the end - the marathon itself was a pushover by comparison!

Monique

Ooh haven't been lost since Tuesday when I went wrong in a club summer series had some calf difficulties so was slower than normal and lost sight of the runner in front who turned off somewhere.
I like getting lost on training runs it adds to the excitement and bumps up the mileage.

Helegant

I have no problems map reading and navigating normally, just that when I've been running for while my brain seems to lose all it's normal abiities. Goes with the odoema I suppose.