Archive for the ‘Orienteering’ Category

Winchester treasure hunt

Thursday, July 27th, 2006

Many thanks to Steve Pullen for organising an excellent SOC social this evening. The treasure hunt involved answering questions based on visual clues in the vicinity of Winchester Cathedral. Despite turning up late, somehow Christine and myself managed to win although having just one question sheet between the two of us nearly saw us in the divorce courts. What I found most interesting was that, in 90 minutes, we must have covered only a couple of kilometres. Just imagine how much detail of our surroundings we must be missing at a normal walking pace!

Capricorn epic

Monday, July 24th, 2006

127I’m absolutely shattered from a weekend trip up to the Capricorn, held near Ingleton, North Yorkshire (not Ingelton, County Durham where Hedley, our chauffeur for the weekend, was going to take us). The Capricorn is a mix between an orienteering event and a mountain marathon: it takes place over two days and the course lengths (and climb) are high but you return to base between the two days and hence don’t have to carry camping equipment. We were also joined by Matthew Whipple, another SOC member.

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Fellow bloggers

Monday, July 17th, 2006

Thought it was about time I recognised a few of my friends and colleagues that blog (I shan’t comment on who fits in to both categories and who doesn’t!).
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Relay disgrace

Sunday, July 16th, 2006

We had to rush away from our hotel this morning – fortunately without a hangover but with less sleep than one might have liked. The occasion to drag us from our bed? The annual Furrow Hoppers relay organised by Wimborne and, this year, being held at Blandford Army Camp.

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Sunny champs

Sunday, June 25th, 2006

We can now breathe a collective sigh of relieve as the Junior Inter-Regional Champs came and went this weekend. Things didn’t get off to a great start when we returned from control hanging to discover that start times had been put back an hour due to transport problems (two squads missing minibuses and a third stuck in traffic). Fortunately the extra wait didn’t result in any controls wandering away and, indeed, we didn’t suffer any vandalism all day.
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Jukola post-race analysis

Tuesday, June 20th, 2006

Went to the TracTrac site to relive the excitement of the last leg of Jukola over again. Then, for the reader’s amusement, added my own route to the RouteGadget map.

JOK triumphs at Jukola

Monday, June 19th, 2006

105The pressure was on this weekend as JOK had laid down the gauntlet to other British clubs at Jukola, the seven man night relay held in Finland each year. In addition to some familiar faces in the LOK team (mostly from Happy Herts), this had encouraged a team of fresh-faced youngsters from Nottingham to enter. To increase our chances, Jon Cross had done a fantastic job in pulling together three JOK teams plus four women for Venla, the women’s race.

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SCOA sprint

Friday, June 16th, 2006

At the cost of having to listen to the two England goals on the radio, we went to the SCOA AGM this evening. Normally this is an event that I’d be happy to give a miss but Christine is currently JOK President and consequently obliged to attend. On top of this, Allan Farrington (the SCOA Chairman) was promising a sprint event. This turned out to just consist of a run round the permanent course contained within the grounds of the Worthy Down army camp but it was still good fun. Controls could be taken in any order and I think my route choice was less than optimum. My time of just over 20 minutes also wasn’t helped by overshooting three controls and taking some time to relocate in amongst all the buildings. This was three minutes slower than the course record held by Richard Barrett of BAOC (albeit with a different starting point).