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Previous Issues: 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, Volume 24 No 1 January 2003
Off to CompassSport Cup!SYO go to Yateholme on March 16th with a depleted team as CompassSport Cup clashes with an International competition.
We have made representations about this (see letter on inside pages).
The up side of that is that you may be able to score for your class!!
That's provided you are entered. That should be done via Mark Chapman.
If you haven't let Mark know you want to run phone him NOW.
Treeton has been a bit of a nightmare really. We paid for a professional remap of the area using Peel Land Surveys and then Rotherham Council refused permission to use the area on environmental grounds. They had never done this before so we were dumbstruck. Representations to the Chief Executive managed to reverse the decision in our favour. Nevertheless the organisation for the event was now behind schedule. Then Ruth Hambleton, the organiser, had a stroke and there was no-one to take over her role.- we already had no controller on the day! This forced us to postpone the event. Apologies to anyone inconvenienced.
Our best wishes go to Ruth and we wish her a speedy recovery.
Karl and I started planning this event about November 2002, just three months before the actual event.
Karl
was the planner and I was the controller. Mike Rosser was the organiser.
The planner's job is to plan the courses and put out the courses on the day. The planner is responsible for everything after the Start. The organiser is responsible for the on-the-day arrangements up to and including the start ( i.e the car parking registration etc) and for pre-event publicity.
The controller's role is to act in the interest of the competitor to make sure that everything is fair. This largely means checking the work of the planner to make sure the planner makes no mistakes.
To start planning three months before the event is not ideal but both of us knew the area well-Karl had planned a colour coded course here four years ago and I have planned a badge event on Rivelin. It is also on my backdoor step and I had helped draw one of the versions of the map in 1993.
If you were planning an event from scratch you would probably need to start earlier than three months and spend some time getting used to the area.
As it was the first thing was for Karl to run round the area and check it against the existing map for changes. What he found was that the map was still fairly accurate but that most of the white on the map was covered in bramble. We decided that we didn't have enough time to resurvey the map and that these changes could be dealt with on a Map corrections board.
We then had to liaise with the organiser to find where the carparking would be because that would determine the start and finish and the shape of the courses. Mike had managed to establish that we could use the car park behind the Sportsman.
The
next thing was to find out if there were any out of bounds areas. Guy Seaman,
SYO's Permissions expert - on the Finish at Rivelin - told us that we were
not allowed to use the moor-it is privately owned and the owner, Mr Archdale,
had stopped us from using it in 1994. I decided to talk to him again but got
no joy. We were also told that the area between the dirt road and the reservoir
was out of bounds!
So Karl was left with a narrow strip of land to plan on, an area made even more difficult by the location of a house in the middle of the map, the area behind which you are not allowed to run because it is their water catching area.
Now Karl knew the extent of the area and where the car park was he could start planning in earnest.
December The first thing was to draw out some rough courses to show me.
Having
done that we got together and I checked his ideas and looked to make sure
that his courses would be of the right length, technical difficulty and physical
challenge. There is a fair amount of physical challenge on Rivelin and I was
keen to make the courses relatively short because of this. At this stage we
were able to identify exact spots on the map which could make good control
points. Karl went away and drew up seven colour-coded courses.
Saturday
4th Jan He drew up a master map of control points and a master grid of
control descriptions. He went out on to the area and taped all the control
sites with yellow tape at the spot where he envisaged the control kite being
hung. He sent me copies of everything.
Saturday llth Jan I went out and checked his tapes and walked the courses on the ground. I suggested some alterations to a couple of descriptions and to the white and orange courses.
So Karl then sent me another set of descriptions and altered maps. This time they had the correct control code numbers on-he had found this out from Phil Haywood the Equipment Officer.
Wednesday 22nd I was happy with these so initialled them and had them duplicated. The planning was done now for the preparation.
Friday 24th Karl then had to collect all the kites and punches from Phil Haywood.
Saturday 25th We decided that we would put most of them out on Saturday afternoon-those that were not in the public glare-and then put the rest out on Sunday morning.
Meanwhile I met up with Mike Rosser to show him where the Start and Finish would be located.
I had taken responsibility for duplicating control description sheets and Master maps so I gave them to Mike Rosser the day before the event.
Sunday
26th We started putting out controls as it got light at about 8 am and
everything was in place by 9.30. Karl put out a selection and so did I. We
were both confident that we knew the correct location of the control sites
that we did not check each other's sites. (If I had done the job correctly
I would have made Karl put the kites out and I would have checked behind him).
We had organised helpers to bring kites back in so that all kites and punches were in by 3.30 pm.
There was no vandalism of any controls.
Done and dusted!!
CompassSport Cup 1st Round 2003
Sunday 16th March
Yateholme, Holmfirth
Entries via Mark Chapman
JK Relays 2003
Monday 21st April
Bloom and Horton Wood, High Wycombe
Entries Seniors £8 Juniors free. Entries via Mark Chapman
British Championship Relays 2003
Sunday 18th May
Greno Woods Sheffield
Entries Seniors £8 Juniors free. Entries via Mark Chapman
Scottish Championship Relays 2003
Sunday 25th May
Aviemore.
Entries via Mark Chapman
CompassSport Cup Final 2003
Sunday 1st June.
Thetford.
Entries via Mark Chapman
Harvester Relays 2003
Saturday/Sunday 14th/15th June
Longshaw, Sheffield
Entries Seniors £5. Entries via Mark Chapman
Entries for CompassSport Cup have probably already gone in. Phone Mark Chapman
if you think you want to run and haven't got a start time. Tel. 2685670
Entries for JK by March 10th
Entries for BOC by April 4th
Entries for Scottish Champs April 4th
I originally wrote a captain's message back in January but I failed to send it to Colin in time. I have updated this as of 18th February but it seems things go out of date as soon as you write!
This year I spent my apres Xmas with Dave and Jenny, the previous chairpersons for those who are new, in Brussels. They make great hosts and live just a km or two from some great oing areas. I also went over for the Christmas 5 Days'. This is a Belgium organised race with two days in Holland. It was an excellent series of low-key races in incredibly fast forests. The weather was very mild and generally dry. Had it been worse then the organisers had this in control as the changing area was in a different bar each day (yes bar - beer! And they were serving!). Why don't British events do this? It's great to meet up with club mates in a dry warm place. It's also important to intake sugar very quickly! I am sure Ultrasport or whoever can subsidise the use of indoor facilities as they will probably sell more goods.
I have tried emailing everyone in the last few days about the Compass Sport Cup and the relays. I am not sure if this reached everyone but I am sorry if you are reading this news for the first time. It's now this time of year where the keenies are all gearing their training regimes to peak for the British Champs and JK. SYO were very successful last year but could still do better. With the British being local in Wharnecliffe and Greno, we should do very well in all categories as there is no reason for missing this event.
I always think the JK is the top relay as Britain's best orienteers tend to turn out for it but alas I hear on the grapevine that some of our stars are not attending due to competition/travel overload. On the plus side, we have a new British Team member joining from Shuoc, Oli Johnson -Welcome to your new club. The JK this year is based near Reading and will generally be fast terrain and should be quite interesting but not too taxing.
Two other major team competitions are the Harvester and the Compass Sport Cup. Firstly, the Harvester is an overnight relay for 5 or 7 persons but more importantly my contacts tells me its taking place on Longshaw in June. So keep that date free.
The Compass Sport Cup will be on March 16th. The venue is Yateholme, near Huddersfield. I know already that SYO have lost 18 runners so far due to various reasons including an English International. SYO had a disaster in this competition last year and we need to do better this year. I need to start entering these races from the end of February. Hopefully you'll find a form attached to this newsletter. Please fill this in and get it back to me asap with fee. At last year's Scottish relay's, we had a vast number of non-attendees. The club shouldn't end up paying for those who don't run for whatever reason. Thus no deposit means no run.
Have fun out in the forest.
Mark Chapman markincrookes@onetel.com
A cold day. Too cold to spend a lot of time socialising. Pity really- you get so little time to chat to other people at events.
We travelled to the event with Ted Morton in his car. An otherwise uneventful journey was marred by finding that the last two miles of road leading to the park was closed!! Ted likes to be early to events and the thought of having to find a new route sent him into mild panic. Even the discovery of a "Diversion" sign didn't help as it led us and lots of others up a cul-de-sac and into a farm lane. Ted was all for having a go at the farm track which seemed to lead in the right direction but fortunately sanity (me!) prevailed when I pointed out the barrier across the track 100yds ahead. We turned on our heels to find the correct alternative route.
As
it was we arrived in plenty of time.
All three of us had reasonable runs in this typically NOC area with plenty of path runs. This was Doreen's first event for a year-her last event was Clumber Park in Feb 2002-just before I broke my hip so it was a special day for her.
Colin Best
I had said that I would never ever go to this area again! The last time I ran here it was just so physical, the brambles so bad, the paths and rides so overgrown, the terrain so sodden that I had reached the finish thoroughly grumpy.
Nevertheless the combination of a bitterly cold wind and rain turned us against the run we had planned over Derwent Edge. So we opted at the last moment, a moment of weakness, to face the challenge of Whitesprings again.
Actually I did the Green and quite enjoyed it. The planner is to be thanked for scaling down the distances and keeping us out of the real grot. Even so the Green took me 60 mins to do 4.3k.
Colin Best
Classes (a) M/W 18- (b) M/W18 to 40 (c)M/ W45+
Entry fees: £2 per race
Each event will consist of one course, orange/light green In Standard with an estimated winning time of approximately 20 mins.
Overprinted, bagged maps.
June 5 Valley Park, Rotherham 1:7500
June 12 Bingham Park, Sheffield 1:7500
June 19 Clifton Park, Rotherham 1:5000
June 26 Graves Park, Sheffield 1:7500
July 3 Concord Park, Sheffield 1:10000
July 10 Myers Grove, Sheffield 1:5000
July 17 Norfolk Park, Sheffield 1:5000
For more information and to enter contact Colin Best email colinallanb@yahoo.co.uk
Four months after my first event at Clifton Park comes my biggest challenge yet - writing this article! My reasons for trying orienteering in the first place are varied:
- I'm not really a sporty person although I do have a running background. Up until having a family I regularly competed in half marathons and 10K events but my favourite runs were fell races, trail runs and off road training.
- My running career dwindled to virtually nothing over the last few years with the time restraints put on me by raising a family, working full time and running a small business
- Injuries and weight gain meant that I have recently never been able to run for more than a few training sessions before yet another set back.
- As a Geography teacher and keen fell walker I enjoy using Ordnance Survey maps to plan routes. In fact, on holiday, I prefer studying maps to reading novels!
- I work with Malcolm Cottam (SYO member) and he persuaded me to try orienteering and gave me a fixture list of local events. So three days later...... Although the course at Clifton Park only took 14 minutes to complete, I enjoyed it so much, I just had to enter another event.
The next course I tried was at Thieves Wood, where I enjoyed running through woodland on tracks and paths. Despite getting lost and failing to spot a vegetation boundary I still managed to gain Red standard, (just down the road at Worksop, the half marathon was being cancelled by the police at the last minute because of Hurricane force winds).
E-punching was used at this event and it was amazing to get the results on the Web later that afternoon. The real attractions of orienteering to me are being able to run in pleasant, varied terrain (mud, streams, slippery leaves and all);
be competitive but perhaps not even see your fellow competitors;
and the intense physical and mental stimulation as you negotiate difficult legs of the course.
I continued to get a buzz over the next few events, especially upon the successful location of a control point.
One difficulty I am slowly overcoming is the colour coded shading used on the maps. I am so accustomed to seeing white representing open ground and farmland on O/S maps that I have run past clearings because they were coloured orange.
Likewise, running through a white wooded area is taking some getting used to. Twelve events after Clifton Park I have now competed at Green standard and done my first Badge event at Sherwood Pines. Hopefully, with improved fitness, I'll be doing longer, more technical courses before the end of the year...
Talking of which, I'm also looking forward to wine making in Autumn, I know some great places for blackberries! I think I've found my sport.
Ian Coates
BOF Fixtures Secretary
Riversdale
Dale Road North
Darley Dale
Matlock
DE4 2HZ
Dear Sir/Madam,
CompassSport Cup 2003 - 16 March 2003
As a club, we wish to register concern at the choice of date for the first round of this year's CompassSport Cup challenge.
March 16 is the date of the Interland International in which many top orienteers from clubs all over England will be running, and therefore will not be available to represent their club in the CompassSport Cup This affects SYO quite considerably as I understand five of our best runners have been invited to take part in the England team. I am sure that other clubs will also be affected in the same way However, the impact will vary on different clubs. SYO are due to compete against EBOR, AIRE and EPOC at Yateholme. Will they lose an equal number of their best orienteers?
CompassSport Cup is the only inter club competition of its kind and has been re-organised to only take up two Sundays in the whole year. It would seem perverse to then put an international event on the same day as one of these two Sundays.
I also understand that other dates were offered for the international fixture but clashes with Dutch international fixtures meant that these were turned down. Why did we not turn down March 16th?
The opportunity that the Cup challenge would normally give to all runners to compete and score for their club is lost and the challenge itself downgraded. The result will also not give a true reflection of the relative strengths of the competing clubs.
It is also disheartening for a club to enter a competition with one hand tied behind it's back, to feel that it is not fielding their strongest team, to feel that the club competing under a handicap. This has a ripple effect on other club members who may feel that their efforts will be wasted without their strong runners.
Yours faithfully.
Doreen Best
If you are a member of SYO only and not of BOF, this does not apply to you. This only applies to BOF members.
Still here? Then read on.
Two significant things happened regarding full BOF membership in the last year. Firstly, because of a deficit due to lack of income because of foot and mouth in 2001, BOF membership fees rose by 50% (now £22.50 Family, £15 Senior, £3.50 Junior). Secondly, as you may have read in CompassSport, like other regions YHOA last year voted to become an association of clubs rather than individuals.
Why do we still need YHOA? Among other things, to co-ordinate fixtures, organise a Junior Squad, put on courses for Controllers, Planners etc, have reps on BOF committees, and co-ordinate and maintain regional epunching equipment. All this costs money which is why a proportion of what you paid to BOF fee was then sent to YHOA (unchanged at £5/£4/50p) as well as to SYO (also unchanged at £5/£4/£l). In the new scheme, the fee you pay to BOF is split between BOF and SYO only, but the SYO element should include the YHOA fee. When you got your BOF renewal form in December you may have noticed that the amount was pretty similar to the previous year's even though BOF fees had gone up 50%.
This is because it did not include the YHOA element and this is because your committee did not inform BOF prior to the renewal notices going out that, although the SYO-only fees were unchanged, the SYO fee should have now included the YHOA element.
In March SYO will be required to pay YHOA around £400 (based on our numbers of member types) but we will not have received this from BOF when we get our club fees refunded from the monies sent to BOF.
Therefore as a once only exercise this year, could BOF members please send the missing amount to SYO? That is, £5 for a Family membership and £4 for a Senior membership. Juniors are excluded, SYO will pay the missing 50p's.
Please send cheques payable to SYO, to our Treasurer, Dave Heath, 82 Cantley Manor Avenue, Bessacarr, Doncaster DN4 6TN
We apologise for this happening, and assure you that it will not be repeated at next renewal time.
The Committee.
- see the Fixtures page.
Last modified: July 25 2003 10:21.
