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As usual, the West Midlands relays were a good, fun event, this year ably hosted by the Chasers. I met my objective of running 10-minute k’s and our team came 4th in the ad-hoc category. In the other HOC ad-hoc team, Alex Mitchell was the star performer, beating most of the adults on his leg.
I spent a large part of Saturday afternoon and night watching Jukola 2011 – the women’s and men’s relays live from Finland on internet TV, so I was a bit sleepy yesterday for the event in the Wyre Forest. With my ankle still being bad, I opted to take Catherine round the Orange. She’d enjoyed it at Baggeridge, but this was a different kettle of fish. I enjoyed the course very much, the legs were quite technical and it felt like the Jukola in miniature 
But Catherine got quite upset – a reminder that it’ll be a couple of years before she “enjoys” running through brashings, brambles and nettles – and I need to get her back on the paths before she goes off orienteering altogether!
Having said all that, the news that we’d won again cheered her up considerably at the end!
Among the highlights of my TV-viewing were Riina Kuuselo’s performance on the 3rd Venla leg (3rd fastest out of 1,014 runners), the last-minute win for Domnarvets, and the performances of Thierry Gueorgiou, Lauri Sild and Mats Haldin on the 3rd, 4th and 5th Jukola legs respectively. Tero was justifiably dubbed “king of the night” after his amazing run.
There were some great British performances too, from Pippa Archer, Helen Bridle and Douglas Tullie among others. The Scottish men came a creditable 51st out of almost 1,500 competing teams.
Venla replay, highlights, news report
Jukola replay: part 1, part 2, news report
On Sunday morning I travelled up to Sheffield for the British Orienteering Relay Championships. Harlequins had 13 teams, most of which, like mine, were in it for the fun. For, apart from participating, there’s the excitement of watching teams starting and finishing, and going through the spectator controls. (Cheekily, our club tent was set up right next to one of the spectator controls, so we had a very good view!)
It’s a good job my team wasn’t meant to be especially competitive because I didn’t do very well. Not quite as badly as back at JK ’08, but almost. The big mistake I made was at 7.15 in the morning, when I decided to wear my new contact lenses. I’m very short-sighted and though I could read the map when I was in the car, when I was in the wood it was a different story: I just couldn’t work the features out at all. If only I’d done what I’ve been meaning to do for a while, which is wear one of my wife’s lenses in one eye. She has a weaker prescription and might’ve been able to focus. As it was, at one point I had to resort to pushing one of my lenses behind my eyeball…
The worst two legs were the shortest two. With no dotted path line to go by, I set my compass and hoped for the best. Luckily, having missed #7, I eventually hit a control that I needed later in my course, so I was able to relocate. As far as #10 is concerned (almost 10 minutes to cover 80 metres) I can’t have missed the control by much, and I found at least 3 other controls that I didn’t need. In the daylight afterwards I could work out what features they must’ve been on, but in the half-light in the woods there was nothing but frustration.
Hey ho, 70 minutes in the forest was good value!
Aston Park has recently been remapped as part of COBOC’s development programme, I’ve been in discussions about hosting the West Midlands Park Championships there on Sunday 17 July. In fact, I got permission from the city council yesterday. Today a certain video turns up and I find someone else has had their eye on that date…
Hopefully some of the participants in the Harvester won’t be too knackered to pop by on their way home to come and have a go, but that’s not really the problem. The problem is me! Now I won’t be able to enter the Harvester. 
I’m glad renewed effort is going in to making it a major event; it’ll never come anywhere close to the equivalent events in Scandinavia, but I would certainly encourage people to go – night relays are brilliant.
Down on sandy and popeless Hartlebury Common this morning for the West Midlands Relay Championships. Catherine came along and spent most of her time alternately stroking or running away from dogs. I finally got my run at 12.45 and got back at 2 pm, just after the prizegiving! It’s a challenging little area, which accounts for the fact that out of 21 controls I made 7 mistakes. Not a happy ratio, and clearly I need to focus a little on improving my technique…
Results. Thanks to Menzies Stourport Manor Hotel for use of their car park.
Of course it’s quite handy that Catherine’s school is so close, but from the training point of view it might be better if it was further away – it only takes me four minutes to jog there. (It’s 1k, btw)
Yesterday morning I was up at 4.30 am to go and help out at the Peter Palmer Junior Relays in Sutton Park. I couldn’t find my headlight or a decent torch** so I had some fun/trouble navigating from the Start to a suitable area to patrol, but eventually I plonked myself down on a log by control 77 for a while and had a pleasant time deep in the dark, peaceful wood watching headlamps come and go. As I said to Gerry, it was like watching the Tiomila on my PC. The only thing missing were the split times on the bottom of the screen.
In fact, it would’ve been great if there had been a camera at that spot, transmitting live pictures back to the arena (and to people at home). I imagine that these days the technology to do it isn’t so expensive, but what do I know…
Congratulations to the planners and to Gerry, COBOC, and the helpers from OD, HOC and elsewhere for a great event. The weather also helped, of course. There were 33 teams and the results show that the lead changed hands several times before OD eventually emerged victorious.
**I did have something with me that was surprisingly effective, once I’d realised. What was it? (Correct, Mrs H
Up to Cannock Chase for the West Midlands Relays. Not a huge turnout, but a good atmosphere. And a run-in that will go down in O lore as one of the toughest ever. The last 200 metres was straight up hill – 50 metres of climb!
I was running in an Ad Hoc team with George Chambers and Julian Green and we came a respectable third. My time was 44 minutes for 3.1 km, which I was pleased with, considering there were five climbs altogether. Another Harlequins team, Hoc Chocolate, came first. Well done, guys! here they are, Lester, Nigel and Laura:
Congratulations also to the Hoctegenarians, Colin, Barry and John for winning the men’s Supervets contest. This year’s Men’s Open Champions are Michael Barnby, Mikey Hopkins and Iain Stamp of Walton Chasers, who completed the 16 km in 118 minutes.
My route:
My first-ever relay event, and what a dismal performance! Just under 75 minutes for just under 5 km… It was interesting seeing how the whole thing worked, and exciting to watch the mass starts and the handovers. But oh dear, I shan’t be looking forward to going back into that little wood again.
It was the closest thing to an orienteering version of The Twilight Zone that I’ve experienced for a while. Somehow I got lost on the way from control 1 to the open area, and later on the same thing happened exiting from control 5. In both cases I lost minutes just making it from the controls to the major track. Other mistakes too: I drifted to the right after #2, disturbing a small herd of deer in the process, I couldn’t find the fence on the way to #5, and I overshot #7, caught by the lake at the top of the hill. But by that stage at least I had the excuse that I was running in a blizzard and the little path had been obliterated.
To be honest, I was too sloppy… It was a shame. Despite the weather and the mud I actually felt pretty good and I’m sorry that I let Alison and Russ down. My mistakes cost us 15 minutes, leaving us back in 53rd.
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