Category: Competitions

I have kept the running to a minimum since the niggly injuries I got in October, but I needed to keep my orienteering hand in and the chance to run on the little used Swynnerton brought the dob spikes and thumb compass out of the cupboard.
The torrential rain of the previous week had left everywhere saturated and Swynnerton was no exception but many of the paths and roads were tarmaced.
At 9.3 km and the area being a flat ex munitions factory and military training area I knew the race would be fast and furious with a few long legs of pure running but most of the course was quite technical, and certainly was testing. The undergrowth was fairly man eating so path routes were favourable to trying to cut through in most cases. I had a good run with only a small error at #6 caused by a misplaced control, but this only lost me 10-15 secs or so, and a larger error on the way to #11 where I seemed to exit the wrong corner of a car park losing about 30 secs before I picked up what I had done.The route to #19 was quite eventful with huge berms, banks and walls to negotiate, I suppose all part of the old munitions installation. My hips and knees were sore as I punched the finish but was very satisfied at download to see I was in the lead, which I kept until fellow Chaser Rhys Finlay Robinson pipped me by couple of minutes.
The other reason for running was a bit of a recce to see what it would be like for MTBO if we could negotiate permissions. The bottom line is that it would be a fantastic venue for a sprint or middle race so 2011 perhaps, watch this space ?

A weekend at my parents in Somerset gave an opportunity to go back to an orienteering area of my youth, Staple Hill. Only about 7 miles from home it takes the form of a very steep escarpment forming the side of the little known Blackdown hills, which always lose out to the the popularity of their larger cousins of Exmoor and the Quantocks. Castle Neroche and Staple Common have undergone alots of changes since I was last there including the obvious felling and growing but less obvious grazing by long horned cattle and a new accessible bridleway which snakes its way along the ridgeline.
I got an early start and was prepared for it to be tough . The route to #1 certainly gave that. As soon as I left the path I was threading my way through fallen trees, dense bits of woodland and the inevitable marsh and bogs caused by the cattle. I had a fairly clean run only making a couple of errors but the course was challenging with few path options and plenty of rough tough forest. The roughness was OK though as it was not all bramble and brashing, more fallen trees, tussock and bog.
As I moved towards the end of the map before the turn I noticed blobs of flour. Crossing the openland I then heard the familiar cries of On On coming the the ridge. I crested the ridge after #10 to face Taunton Hash House Harriers all coming towards me and it was good to recognise a few faces Ive not seen for 15 or so years.
The planner (Will Kromhout who I was in the SW junior squad with many moons ago) had one last trick up his sleeve with a nasty contouring cross country leg back through the cattle trodden thick forest. I was driven too low by the vegetation and had to climb back up but I am assured that the light green was ‘quite nice’ when you got into it. 
Results at http://www.quantockorienteers.co.uk/

On Saturday Cath planned and organised  a first in Orienteering, a Maize Maze sprint event at the National Forest Maize Maze near Burton on Trent.  The format consisted of two qualifiers (added to give a overall time to decide start order for the final) and a final which was run in the dark.
Our club was also organising a traditional low key event on the Sunday at Birches Valley at which I was running the timing. Unfortunately Cath’s car broke its cam belt last week so we have been struggling with hire cars and lifts from friends which complicated matters further.

We had had a trial Maize Maze race in September for club members which seemed to go well and looking at the pre-entry list, it consisted of approx 100 orienteering connoisseurs, many travelling a great distance to take part. To make life even more complicated on the day I got a puncture in my car as well !

I managed to run both qualification races, where although I had obviously an advantage having seen the map and run there before I was pleased with my times only a minute off the pace. Working out the start times for the night leg in Excel got a bit frantic and I had to escape to a quiet hidey-hole to concentrate, though still with Cath’s choice of ‘Maze’ songs playing over the tanoy…. ‘Wurzels, I’ve got a brand new combine harvester’ and’ The Great Escape’ to name a few.

The event was very well received with many blog articles and forum postings praising this new event format. Well done Cath ! www.walton-chasers.co.uk – full results and maps etc available here :http://www.walton-chasers.co.uk/results/2009/Maize2009/Maize2009.htm

 

 

Sundays event was a less stressful and I managed a run on the brown course. My legs and particularly my knees were aching from the day before so after a fast start I settled back into a steady run. Other than a mistake near some unmarked paths I ran clean until I stumbled on a track near the finish twisting my ankle and fell heavily on the gravel, ending up with the classic schoolboy playground combo of deep knee and palm grazes. I fluffed the next control by about 20 secs wincing from my knee as I ran but finished OK in a respectable 7^th with mostly ex British Squad members in front of me.
Stafford St Johns Ambulance were great, not faffing and just giving me some sterile wipes and the water I needed to clean myself up.
So a busy weekend but I hope we have started something and other clubs jump on the Maize Maze wagon.

It was whilst wandering round between the showers in a Maize Maze near Cambridge with some friends a couple of months ago that Cath came up with the idea of Maize Maze Orienteering. There are Maize Mazes up & down the country set up by entrepreneurial farmers looking for an alternative income to crops. Some mazes are quite straightforward, others are more tricky and there are a number of professionals who design the maizes for the farmers, too. The mazes also provide rudimentary maps which can act as a base map for foot orienteering.
Tuesday was the ‘warm up’ and ‘shakedown’ event before a full blown event in a few weeks time. Walton Chasers runs a Domination series throughout the summer for its club members. It takes the form of a league that covers all the main disciplines of Orienteering : Sprint, Score, Classic, Cross Country Running. This years sprint was the Maize Maze.
I started really well and was very pleased with the way I was running, however then came a lesson in concentration. I discovered a SI box that was programed incorrectly and after running back to the finish with it I then blew the next 4 controls finally accidentally missed two out – Muppet.

Many were sceptical about this novel new form of orienteering but everyone can back saying it was one of the most intense orienteering experiences they had ever done.
see http://www.maize-maze.com/ for your nearest Maize maze, which are normally also a great family day out !

The ‘real’ event is on the 3rd OCT – see advert right

A chance comment by Mark Garside reminded me on Saturday night that on Sunday there was a novel event involving a Sprint and a Middle race on the same area, organised by Adrian Bailey. Having enjoyed the sprint action in Taunton I informed Cath at midnight when she got back from her Coldplay concert that we would all be up early to travel down to Wombourne, just south of Wolverhampton, she was mightily impressed !
The organiser was back from his antics on the empty plynth in Trafalger Sqaure and put on a great days orienteering. First was a sprint, well short race really but it was fun tearing round the parkland surrounding Himley Hall. I ran clean except for #13 which had  an interesting control description of copse inside ! Everybody lost time(me about 2.5 mins) so not a huge problem but not a control site I would have used.  A quick drink and a muffin from the cafe onsite and we were ready for the 2km walk over to Baggeridge Country Park where the middle race was being held. This rough sort of country park is exactly the sort of thing I generally avoid in West Midland foot Orienteering but it was fine for a middle race. The planner packed 24 controls into the 6.0km and other than bashing my leg at one point I had a really good run only losing time on #12 after checking to see if blood was pouring from the place on my leg that hurt so much ( should be a nice bruise there in the morning) put me off. So Cath and Holly are Black Country Champions (W10 and W35) and we had a great morning out on a simply organised local event, exactly what we need lots more of, its just a shame it was not as well attended as it should have been.

When the chap who got me into the sport I love nearly 30 years ago, Roger Craddock my old Physics teacher, gave me a ring asking a favour I was delighted to say yes and help out Quantock Orienteers. As a junior QO didn’t really exist and I was a member of Devon OC growing up. QO are now thriving and have an awards for all grant which they have spent on Sportident kit and promotion via a series of town/street/park races this autumn.

Staying with my parents I first spent Friday evening teaching all the QO committee and a Devon member all about Sportident use and in particular AutoDownload the event software. It went very well and I think gave them the confidence to move forward into bigger events with it now.

The sunny Saturday afternoon saw my second duty , playing the celebrity with GB squad top on posing for the camera with QOs grant check for the local paper. I also helped them with any issues they had with there first use of AutoDownload.
I blasted round the Vivary park map courses which all took approx 2-4 mins each before, after much chatting with another old teacher (John Fisher who taught me to canoe and introduced me to AutoCAD, now part of my job,  in 1989) and several oreinteers I’d not seen for ages, I thought i’d better have a go at the main ‘sprint’ course.
I knew someone had done 22 mins so I decided I would like to try and break 20. I stormed off only to lose perhaps 30 secs on #1 as the flag had been nicked, I was about to comeback and report it and then start again when I found the SI unit still on its wire. On the way to #7 I realised I had gone out a bit too hard and eased back a little but ran the rest clean and drew a few strange looks from the locals as I flew around the residential area and thoroughly enjoyed the race.  I love this sort of simple orienteering, but you do need to be going fast to make it a real challenge. I downloaded to find I’d done 19.18 so was very chuffed winning by a couple of mins.
I supervised the saftey check in Autodownload, shook lots of hands and headed back up the M5, luckily getting a phonecall from Cath advising me to divert through Bristol to avoid the Avonmouth part of the motorway as it was a car park. Im sure in my 20 years of driving that bridge that they have been digging it up for about 15.

Well done QO for a great event and good luck with the rest of the series, its a good template and I will think about something similar up here in Stafford.