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We had a good day in Shropshire – cold but mainly sunny, with mist drifting in and out to increase the challenge. It seems difficult to get good turnouts at events south-west of the conurbation and Sunday was no exception, even though the hill is one of the most interesting areas available for orienteering in the region. I enjoyed my run – the rough open land is tussocky but is almost all runnable, which is more than can be said for some areas! – but made a couple of small navigating errors and ended up 21st out of 42 on Blue.
On Tuesday I came first on the middle course at the first event of this year’s Night Street League, 54 minutes for 6.1 km. Though I know the town quite well, I don’t think I’ve run round Walsall before, and don’t remember having come across the windmill, which was one of the controls.
At both events I was being careful not to jar my left knee, after the trouble it gave me at Fineshade, but it seems fine. I did make a point of trying to keep to the grass alongside the tracks on Titterstone – there’s not much cushioning in my O shoes!
Yesterday morning Catherine was sent home from school after being sick on the classroom floor; soon after she got home she fell down the stairs. Not a fun day for her, or for Marti, who was feeling under the weather herself. So it was kind of them, soon after I got home, to let me go for my Thursday evening run – at Mike Baggott’s event in Redditch. But the family stars must’ve been in misalignment. I hit my right calf on a thin rootstock just after the first control, and it was a bit sore but I thought I’d run it off as usual. Bad idea. Running uphill to #4 the calf went bang and my race was over. “Calf strain” doesn’t sound too serious but I can hardly walk and I’ll be out of action till June…
Oh, and when I stopped on the way home to buy myself a treat, I discovered that one of the two quids I’d got at the event in change was a fake. Never rains…
Got home at 5.30, checked the event details: “Registration closes 6.40; courses close 8.00.” Eventually left the house at 6. North Birmingham to Bromyard in 40 minutes would be tricky at the best of times, but in the rush hour? A couple of times I thought of turning back, but I really did want a run, especially as I hadn’t had a chance at the Brockhampton event back in October, and the mild, wet conditions were ideal.
After my fight with the Worcester southern bypass, I rolled into the car park at 7.15. Mike looked ambivalent, but 3 minutes later I was off. Could I get back by 8?
Start-1: Took me a few seconds to realise I had to run up the drive I’d just driven down. Belt towards the row of trees in front of the fence. It helps to be tall and wearing an old pair of joggers when negotiating a barbed wire fence… Came into the wood a bit to the east of the control but soon spotted it.
1-2-3: Refreshing downhill runs through bemused sheep and cows
3-4: As I was running along I got the idea 4 was on a spur and tried to decide between the quick, steep ascent from the west, or the run round to the east… When I got there I noticed it wasn’t a spur (!) and opted for the eastern approach with simple attack point. As it happens, when I got close I was distracted by John Bennison coming down from the other side and came off the path too soon. Never mind, I quickly hit the ditch and followed it to the control.
4-5: I usually favour the path routes, but it seemed to make sense to go direct here. Turned out the stream was in a ravine, half of which I rolled down, landing in the mud at the bottom. Then, after clambering up the other side to the path, I discovered about half a dozen hides, none of them with controls on! Could Mike have collected it in? But I tried a bit further east and there it was.
5-6: I opted to attack from above, and found it okay, but collecting the controls in later I decided I should’ve just contoured in from the path junction to the south.
6-7: Half the controls done, half my time gone. I decided on N – W – NE. Another full stream to cross, surrounded by a field of whiffy wild garlic. As at #1, on the way out I discovered the way most people had come in.
7-8: More cruelty. In the gloom, the mini-flag was just about visible from the path, but it was quite a palaver to get to it, the stream junction being blocked by fallen trees.
8-Finish: Ten minutes to go. The meat of the course polished off, the rest was straightforward. I was going to make it. I pushed myself to run to 11, but could only walk to 12. I punched the finish at 7.59.25. 
Knackered but strangely refreshed, the next minute I was off again to collect 4, 5 and 6, 10, 11 and 12. Then I could finally get out of my muddy clothes and sopping shoes and retire with Mike, Carol, the Houghtons and the BOK guys to the Live and Let Die, a fabulous pub hidden on Bringsty Common.
Hi to Sue, the landlady, and Bob, the retired ex-athlete who I got talking to at the bar.
It was a bit difficult justifying the expense of a solo trip to Loughborough tonight – a total non-elite like me can hardly claim the need to practise before the JK sprint on Friday – but the fact that it was a chasing sprint swung it. In fact, the organisation was mind-blowing for what was an “informal” event. Kudos to Peter Hornsby for the lovely map – a fantastic resource for the club and the university.
The prologue was a gaffled (or butterfly?) mass-start. Ah, jargon! What that meant was that we were all escorted to the start, and when the starter gave the word we all started together. But so that we didn’t just follow each other, our maps had the controls in different orders. There were a few people who had the same order as me, so I got used to seeing them as I dashed around. I did okay: 12:05 for the 1.7 km (winning time 8:51) losing a bit of time (like most people) going up a dead end to #8, and by forgetting at the last punch that there was also a finish control to go to!
When it came to the chasing start, I discovered from my place in the queue that not that many runners had been quicker than me. Unfortunately quite a few of them overtook me over the 3.2 km, which took me 26:01. My legs are still feeling heavy – over the next few days I need plenty of sleep, plenty of liquids, and to get rid of this cold. Still, it was weird: I was running virtually on my own for most of the race, with most of the overhauling taking place towards the end.
Results (I thought my 17 seconds for leg 14 was good, but now I see that the best time for it was 1 second!)
About chasing sprints: why not send the runners out in reverse, with the slowest first? I suppose there’d be a lot more following, but it’d be fun!
One negative about the event: all the SI boxes were held in place with cable ties. This meant that sometimes they were dangling awkwardly and/or hard to get the dibber into. Something that needs to be worked on, but a small price to pay for an excellent show.
Photo: Rob Vickers
For the first, and probably the only time, I’ve come first in an orienteering competition! Last night the final round of this season’s night street league took place in distant Malvern and I needed to come at least third and beat Peter Langmaid. Well, Peter made it easier for me by running a different course, which was a shame in a way since a showdown would’ve been exciting, but instead he’d lined up a few ringers to try and deprive me of the points I needed. 
Needless to say I pushed myself hard and completed the 5.8 km in around 44 minutes, several of which were the walk up through the town centre! First place, ten points, trophy. 
The other champions were John and Jacky Embrey. Thanks very much to Brian Hughes for running the league, and to the MacKenzies for planning/hosting last night’s event.
Of course, relatively speaking what I did wasn’t that impressive. Some of the runners on the longer course were doing 8 km in under 50 minutes, and I suppose I’ll have to move up and try my best to compete with them next season. Meanwhile, I could have a try for the summer league trophy, but there is only one men’s trophy and for someone like me to win would require 12 well-placed runs on the medium course and an absence of consistent runners (e.g. Richard Dearden) on the long course.
While trying to savour the moment, I’m depressing myself by trying to remember any normal (daytime cross-country) event ever that I won…
Well done to those West Midlanders who ran well at BOC today. Foremost among them are new national champions Andy Hemsted (M60), Sheila Carey (W60), Jane Christopher (W65) and Hilary Simpson (W70).
Meanwhile I’m here in Birmingham saving up my brownie points for the JK weekend! It’s been a relatively quiet week – I ran in Stourbridge on Thursday night, another good run, and last Saturday I took Catherine to Coventry for the busy event at the scout camp there. OD are rather generous in their course classification. The “yellow” course we went round was a very pale shade of yellow indeed!
Update: successes in the relays… OD 4th and 5th in the men’s and women’s premier respectively; HOC 7th and 4th in the men’s short and M40 respectively. OD 1st in mixed-12, M14, W14, W40 and mixed-60. Congratulations – the Droobers maintain their winning ways!
Although we Harlequins aren’t as competitive, the club has an excellent participatory spirit and I’m looking forward to being part of one of our eleven teams at the JK.
I think this is the most I’ve run in one week since the JK. 6k at the Lickeys (77 mins), 6k at Donisthorpe (47 mins) and 6k tonight in Weoley Castle (47 mins). My knee has felt a bit sore after each event but hasn’t given way during any of them, so I’m really happy. It could be that the solution to my knee problem is more regular running rather than taking it easy. (?)
And I climbed a mountain this morning. In preparation for the Carneddau event in July, Stuart Rees gave me a guided tour, followed by a very late breakfast at the excellent Seven Stars in Aberedw. Surprise, surprise, the main headache in organising the event is the carparking. If (!) we have a wet summer, plans will have to change. But it is a beautiful area so we hope to entice as many people as possible to make the trip.
Fancy a ride to Milford on Sunday morning?
Out today in the freezing sunlight, getting details for the map and courses on Tuesday night. The brave souls who try the long course will be taken off the streets a few times into the parks and open spaces but the first course I came up with measured over 13 km (straight-line distance)* so it’ll need a bit of pruning!
Hard to believe, but today was my first ever foray into Queslett Nature Park – some of you will sample its damp delights on Tuesday. If my memory serves me correctly, there was supposed to be an event in the park a few years ago but it was cancelled, so perhaps there’s an O map for it somewhere?
*If you really do want to run so far (the actual running distance would be around 18 km), just shout and I’ll do you a map!
(Just noticed this is my 100th post!)
My calves! 48 hours after my jog round north Brum, they’re still sore. Serves me right for going out for a four-mile run after a month off! The first night street event of the winter and I had home advantage, seeing as Andy’s house is only 3 miles from mine. The running was surprisingly easy – the cool, damp weather helped – and full of interest…
Control 3: I’d been here just a few days before, visiting a Hungarian family; control 5: a bicycling policeman stopped me here and asked me what I was up to; control 7: cries of “Brake! Brake!” and then came the inevitable Crash; control 12: a menacing-looking dog in the middle of the pavement, tied to a car full of young gentlemen.
On Cannock Chase today for the grade 3 organisers’ course, ably led by Robert Vickers and Carole Sparke. (I had already done this course back in 2004, but since I haven’t planned any “proper” events in the meantime I decided a refresher wouldn’t go amiss.) Robert gave me back the folder of stuff from the Sandwell Valley event he hosted for me back in August, so I can begin to piece together what happened that evening. First, I can see from the control cards that either (1) many of the competitors were in tears or (2) conditions were wet. Second, the event went like clockwork. Robert used his finish timer, and the printout shows a remarkably smooth flow of finishers, with everybody back by 7.30.
Night’s best results prizes: Richard Dearden (blue), Bob Scott (green), Jenny Uff (orange). Richard’s run was especially impressive, blasting round the 7 km in 53:52.
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