South East Veterans winners
| Women |
|
|
|
| 1 |
Jackie Chapman |
SLOW |
45:02 |
| 2 |
Chris Jepson |
SO |
50:16 |
| 3 |
Kate Thomas |
SLOW |
52:11 |
| Men |
|
|
|
| 1 |
Mike Murray |
SLOW |
42:22 |
| 2 |
Peter Chapman |
SO |
43:32 |
| 3 |
Vince Joyce |
SO |
44:23 |
Families Competition
The results of this are arrived at by accumulating
the percentage of each participant’s time relative to the par time for
their course, so the lowest total wins. There were two entrants this year
and the results were as follows:
Chapman/Hooper (SO) 333.76
Andrews (CROC)
369.93
Planner's Report
Planning an orienteering event, like life, is about
compromises. Because I have no motorised transport, the area I could
manage was limited, so Colley Hill was out. I had also wanted to minimise
the need for runs across the large open area towards the north of the
map. But the fact that this was a December event, with uncertain weather,
suggested the need for start and finish to be close to the parking and the
pavilion. The terrain itself is also patchy: densely intricate earth
features in parts, surrounded by wide, fast expanses, with many fewer
usable features. I hope the compromises worked. There didn’t seem to be
too many critical comments, although control 187 (the bracken-surrounded
pit on Blue and Brown) was mentioned frequently. It had apparently been
used, and caused problems, at the previous event here. Apologies to any
who thought it unfair; and also for having left out some tapes on similar
features in the same area which were not used. Despite those, and any
other glitches, I hope that you enjoyed your runs.
I wish to thank all those who helped make sure the
planner’s tasks were fulfilled, in particular control putter-outers and
collector-inners. Special thanks go to Chris McDonald, who acted as
mentor and my good conscience throughout the duration of the planning
period; to Philip Gristwood, who stepped in as controller at the last
minute and also made the maps happen; and to Simon Ling, who realised that
carrying large quantities of kit by bike can be difficult, and took charge
of planner’s logistics, in addition to everything else he had to do in his
double-header over the weekend.
Organiser's report
It was far from certain these events would actually
take place until fairly recently mainly because of the lack of a
controller and also because of difficulty in obtaining permission for the
use of the Cricket Club Pavilion. However it all turned out all right in
the end, although the lack of advance publicity was probably responsible
for the relatively low numbers of competitors.
I would like to give special thanks to Philip
Gristwood for controlling so cheerfully and helpfully, as well as printing
all the maps for us, especially as he had only recently completed a major
planning task at Ash Ranges.
Thanks also to Graham Sutton for planning the
District event despite not having a car, and Mark Cheeseman the night
event despite not being available on that day due to work commitments.
At least the weather was kind and the Common looked
spectacular in the low mist, so I hope you all enjoyed yourselves.
Congratulations to Mike Murray and Jackie Chapman, both of SLOW, who are
the new South East veterans champions; and to the Chapman family of SO who
won a close families competition.
Simon Ling Controller's
Report
Having volunteered to assist by controlling our own pair of events less
than 2 weeks before they took place did not give any opportunity for
pre-checking control sites, or making any significant alterations to
courses. To make things more interesting the SENiLe had only been
planned on paper and the planner was unable to visit Banstead again,
even for the event. Luckily I have run on Banstead a few times over the
years and I had actually planned a score event there in 1991, my second
go at planning, so visualisation was not a problem.
As well as armchair checking the courses I also let myself in for
OCadding the night course so you could all have pre-printed maps. There
were a few minor tweaks and I would like to think a number of
improvements made to control descriptions and circle and line placing
and cutting. Although I had not planned to actually check the controls,
I later decided that I could find time to do it. I checked all 32 night
controls (Mark had been very generous and had completely different
controls for all the courses!) and all 43 day controls before each event
started, running a total distance of 21 km. Saturday was a bit
miserable with rain at times, but Sunday morning was bright and frosty
with a few deer around and was great.
Luckily Mark and Graham had got things pretty well right and only 2 or 3
controls needed to be repositioned a little, most of you seemed to find
the correct ones. The night courses were a little on the easy side and
this was reflected in generally fast times. Had it been foggy like our
last SENiLe there it would have been a different matter. Sundays
courses seemed to be just right looking at the results. Times on Blue
were very fast but this was probably due to all the fast Vets having to
run it instead of Brown.
Philip Gristwood
|
Mole Valley Orienteering Club