Archive for the ‘Sport’ Category

Illusive hotel

Tuesday, July 6th, 2010

I’d missed the last couple of runs at Beaulieu Road Station whilst on vacation and with the arrival of a new month, the venue had moved to Nomansland. Sadly, no-one who knows where they’re going turned up so we had to rely on Neil. 😉 Having poured scorn on Peter for being unable to find the Bramshaw Hill Hotel from Fritham, we then proceeded to miss it again on tonight’s run. All due credit to Neil, following a dash along the road through Bramshaw he recovered his sense of direction. All in all a good run if a little long at nearly 80 minutes elapsed time (if only about 60 minutes running).

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Welsh Holiday

Saturday, July 3rd, 2010

869I’m just coming to the end of two weeks of vacation of which we spent the first 10 days on a family holiday to Wales. We originally had had various plans for an overseas trip but, apart from anything else, we’d failed to get Duncan a passport! In the end, we spent a week in a ‘lodge’ at a place called Timber Hill near Broad Haven in Pembrokeshire and then, because the original plan had been to find some mountains, up to a cottage in Llanberis for 4 nights.

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Sprint weekend

Monday, June 14th, 2010

866We had a fun weekend of orienteering blessed by some good weather. On Saturday it was the Winchester Urban Race. This started and finished at the Rugby Club and the 1:5000 map stretched south to the Cathedral and Wolsey Castle. If you think city racing is all about tricky route choices influence by narrow cut-throughs, dead-ends, and control sites where the side of the feature is all important, then the event wouldn’t have disappointed you. (more…)

Trailing along

Thursday, May 13th, 2010

Another run from Canadian War Memorial on Tuesday night. I wasn’t on top form which I put down to my cold/ear infection. Not even sure whether I should have been running but it was a nice evening with a warm sun offsetting a cool breeze. Decided not to go to the pub as a) I had lots of work to do and b) I’m not sure alcohol would mix well with the paracetamol and anti-biotics!

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Hard of hearing at Harvester

Monday, May 10th, 2010

854Having failed to respond to a call for runners from SOC for the Harvester night relays due to it being my Dad’s 80th birthday on Saturday, I rather guiltily agreed to step-in and complete a team for JOK. The (unwritten) rules state that JOK members should run for their first claim clubs in preference if needed and consequently Jon Cross moved up to the FVO team at the last minute. Fortunately John Embrey was then able to locate a replacement ex-Oxonian at the last minute and the team was once again complete. That is, until Saturday, when Helen Gardener fell foul of an illness. With Jon Marsden prepared to run two consecutive night legs, we were able to complete all seven legs but sadly that would make us non-competitive.

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Good turnout for underpasses

Thursday, May 6th, 2010

With the change of month we moved to a new venue for Tuesday night’s run: Canadian War Memorial near Bolderwood. There was a good turnout which befit the sunny skies. The route was the (eastern) two underpasses clockwise. I declined to run any of the optional extras, partly through tiredness from the weekend and partly due to the onset of a cold.

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Two seconds at the British

Monday, May 3rd, 2010

851After a bit of indecision, Christine finally decided that she wouldn’t run on the Saturday of the British Orienteering Champs due to a calf injury but we would all go up to Cannock Chase for the weekend and she would still run in the relay. This meant I could move my individual start to a late time and we could drive up to Rugeley on the Saturday morning rather than having to stay up on the Friday night. This probably meant we missed the worst of the bank holiday traffic and we actually had a very smooth journey arriving in pleny of time.

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Fairwell to Fritham

Thursday, April 29th, 2010

Tuesday was our last run of the month and, as is tradition, we ran the route that almost everyone can do with their eyes closed: the Six Ponds. It was a lovely evening and a shame that we didn’t have a bigger turnout. In particular, we were treated to a fantastic moon on exiting the pub. It was slightly odd to be joined by someone who we used to coach orienteering to as a junior, haven’t seen for about 4 years, and is now a student at Southampton. Needless to stay his young legs fared him well!

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