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# When Caution Cost Me
- URL: https://www.scottsemple.com/when-caution-cost-me/
- Published: 2018-01-19T08:19:37.000Z
- Updated: 2026-03-13T15:24:33.000Z
- Description: I planned to ease myself into skimo racing, doing things only when I felt ready. Caution has its advantages, but perhaps not with learning.
- Author: Scott Semple

At the beginning of December, I raced in the [Vert 180](http://vert180.blogspot.ca/?ref=scottsemple.com) for the first time, a lapped race at Canada Olympic Park in Calgary. I hadn’t done the race before because I thought that I wouldn’t like the format. But I was dead wrong. It’s the most fun race that I’ve done.

And not doing the race a long time ago was a tactical error that cost me this year.

The format of the race is as many laps as possible in three hours. I held back for the first half hour because I wanted to finish strong. The race went well, but I held back too much in the beginning, and it cost me an extra lap.

When I got home, I looked at my splits. They were gratifyingly negative, with the average lap time trending lower and lower throughout the race.

![Chart of lap times versus average](https://i2.wp.com/scottsemple.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/Vert-180-laps.png?ssl=1)

But the second two laps were way above the average. I had missed the cut off for another lap by only two minutes, but holding back had cost me three.

I didn’t do as well as I could have because of ignorance. If I had done the race years earlier, I would have been familiar with the format and could have raced a lot smarter this season.

By waiting until I felt ready, I missed out on a tactical opportunity.

My caution cost me.