Northern Tablelands Orienteering Club

Armidale NSW Australia

Graeme Cooper set an interesting 1 hour score event for the Xmas event this year. After consistent rain in the days prior overnight it was a surprise to see sunshine and a half warm breeze trying to dry out what was otherwise a very wet forest. The myriad cycle tracks in the eastern part of the forest have made the area easier and trickier at the same time. Most of the juniors had difficulty with the area despite the controls being near or on tracks.

The scoring for the Xmas trophy was handicapped so that Red runners got 2 points a flag, Orange 3 points and Green/Blue 4 points. The one exception was the Xmas tree control where the handicapper , SantO, reversed the points.

There were several Red orienteers who got all the flags – lead by Kasimir Gregory who got all 19 flags in 31 minutes followed by Don Barker in 49 mins and Maurice Anker in 56 mins. Boahden Gregory was back in 47 mins but left out a flag.

However the Orange and Green orienteers took the first 3 places.

Byron Smith, a strong cross-country runner, whose only orienteering was at school, entered as an Orange orienteer and got all flags in 50 mins. Orange orienteers Elsie Baker and Rowena Childs got 15 and 14 flags respectively.

First time orienteer Peter Thomas from Tamworth walked around as a green course orienteer and finished equal with Rowena on points. Great effort.

Eric

Full results

Sunday dawned bright and sunny at Gara Gorge. I should know - I was out hanging flags! Since the river had been up over the footbridge earlier in the week, your event organiser was concerned that further rain might make the northern side of the river inaccessible. Consequently he procrastinated about courses, until it was clear that Noah wouldn't be sailing by anytime soon!

Coupled with not allowing enough time to play with the new equipment, I found myself hanging controls by torchlight on Saturday evening, and still having about half the controls to put out on Sunday morning. This resulted in a number of control descriptions being incomplete (and one just plain wrong!), for which I apologise.

It was a shame to have no starters on the Green course, but Zoe & Disa (& friends) were very pleased to have a Blue course they could do without the need for parental concern. People adapted very well to electronic punching and remote starts, however Eric achieved the unique distinction (for a club event) of a DNS (Did Not Start) when he made a parallel error on the way to the Start and failed to find it.

The two loop red course seemed to work well - people could choose to do either or both courses, so there was lots of coming and going as the Long Red competitors came in to download split times, have a drink, grab a new map and head off again.

One leg on the Medium Red course gave the option of crossing the gorge or going the long way round (via the finish). I warned most competitors about the dangers of crossing the gorge, as the roar from the water seemed quite intimidating. However several competitors managed to cross regardless. Results from this leg (about 250 metres in a straight line) proved very instructive - to cross the gorge, Don took 22:30, Garry took 27:20, and Felix took 30:21, while going around the long way took Boahdan 8:30 (yes that's right - eight and a half minutes!), and Graeme (who wasn't in a hurry) about 25 minutes. To be fair, Kasimir took 10:37 to cross the gorge - much quicker than the others, but it was the only leg on which brother Boahdan beat him, so the wrong route choice probably cost Kas 3 - 4 minutes!!

Night watch

Using electronic punching will allow course setters to be more creative, and means we can introduce side competitions like the finish chute sprint (time from a common last control to the finish). However finish chutes will need to be carefully positioned to avoid accidents. At this event the last control was at the far end of the metal footbridge. Maurice tripped (he blames the pressure of too many spectators), and fell heavily onto the footbridge, gashing one hand badly, and grazing his knees. His hand now sports four stitches, but amazingly he can still play the violin!

Footnote: it was interesting the way the usage of the National Park changed during the day. At first we had it all to ourselves, then picnickers and paddlers occupied all the tables and the easily accessible spots beside the river. When I returned from collecting flags (about 4:00 pm), the car park was full, but there wasn't a soul to be seen! However there was a lot of clothing, towels, shoes etc. lined up on the river bank just below the foot-bridge, so apparently a large number of people had taken to the water and gone down the gorge (as Garry nearly did earlier). This would explain the screams and yells I could hear coming from the gorge while collecting flags!

PS - the little cutie in the picture was sitting quietly in a tree beside the track on Saturday evening. I hope it wasn't the one found dead on the track barely 200 metres away by several competitors!

Alec

Blue course

Green course

Orange course

Red course

This was our first club event using sportident punching and it proved to be very popular as well as efficient in the start and finish procedures. The school/training kit certainly works very well for small events and without the need for a computer.

On the green course, James Symons did very well to just pip newcomers Ryan Davies and George Garvey. Not satisfied with this performance, Ryan and George backed up to tackle the orange course and achieved a very creditable third place behind Michael Smart and Matt McKenzie. Murray Scown's absence on a mountain bike ride meant Kas Gregory faced little competition on the red course to take the lead from David Symons and Don Barker.

Green course

Orange course

Red course

Green course

Orange course

Short Red course

Long Red course

Fourteen hardy individuals and teams braved the showers and cool breeze at Dangar Falls on Sunday. Early starters found it rather cold, but missed the heavier showers that came later in the morning.

Einar & Tumi Thorsteinsson were fastest over the Blue-Green course, followed by Michael & Disa Smart, and Zoe & Felicity Barker-Smith. The Bruhl family also deserves honourable mention.

Karin & Torsten von Strokirch started late on the Orange course and sadly saw their map disintegrate in the rain. Commiserations!

Three veterans competed on the Short Red course. Eric Baker was fastest in 53 minutes, with Jenny Hawkins close behind in 62 minutes. [She may have paused too long admiring a lyre bird....] Apologies are due to Eric for the amount of uphill out of the 7th control.

The Long Red produced the closest contest, with barely a minute separating the first three finishers. Maurice Anker (75 minutes 20 seconds) was just 30 seconds faster than Peter Merrotsy (.....would that Peter had set off more rapidly from the start......!!). Don Barker was third, in 76 minutes 35 seconds. Clearly Don's error at Control #1 was more serious than Maurice's error at Control #2..... [see routes - ed] We didn't have a chance to ask Peter what errors he made....

Alinta Merrotsy was the only female contestant on the long red course in a worthy 99 minutes.

The course setter apologises if the control at the southern pit (#78) was seen as a bit unfair. In mitigation: he would have had more options for placing it, had the string on the control been longer.......

The remote start (and the weather) made things a bit complicated on the day. Special thanks are due to all those who offered to help. A specially warm thank you goes to Vicki & Graeme Cooper, who braved the cold wind at the registration & finish throughout the event.

Bob Hawkins

Green course

Orange course

Short red course

Long red course

A beautiful sunny New England winter's day greeted the 33 participants who made their way to Oakview, 20km west of Armidale, on July 24th. The Rocky River was crossable this year, although some rock-hopping dexterity was required in order to stay dry. This meant that the full map was able to be used for the courses.

Axel and Bethany Jedlicka were fastest around the Blue/Green by a five minute margin, followed by Sophie Schütz with Zoe Barker Smith and then James Symons. That run took just enough of Sophie's energy for her to be pipped in her second run, on the Orange course, by Sandy Watson. The large hill on the south side of the map provided for some route choice legs on the red courses, and it seemed that left, right and straight over were all chosen on the day, Bob Hawkins took the honours on the short red and Kas Gregory left all in his wake on the long.

David Symons

Blue/Green course - 2.1km 11 controls

Orange course - 4.6km 11 controls

Short Red course - 3.9km 8 controls

Short Red course (modified)

Long Red course - 5.7km 13 controls

Blue/Green course

Orange course

Short Red course

Long Red course

A mild and sunny day emerged, despite a somewhat doubtful weather forecast. The first challenge for some orienteers was finding the start! Since we used this start area for the first time, I should have placed a sign in the middle of the wheel tracks, rather than assuming people would read the instructions or see the sign in the tree at the turn-off.

Almost 30 runners assembled during the morning and went forth on their respective courses. The Blue/Green course offered a special challenge to the first team out, Disa & Zoe. Even with the help of Thorsten they were unable to locate the second control flag, which I thought was placed very visibly. It turned out that the cows I startled when setting the course were taking more notice than I expected: They had a go at orienteering with interesting results - see attached photos! Michael went to the rescue of Disa & Zoe and they were off on their course again, while I gave them a 40 minute bonus on their course time. However, they were still beaten by Sally & Rumi, who won the honours on the blue/green course

On the Orange route Thorsten (with Dad Michael in shadow) showed competence on the course. However, the surprise for me were second place getters Clarence & Ryan who completed the course unassisted and competent in very good time.

There were 3 red courses on offer, a traditional 11 control bush course with route choice as the challenge and a short, (also 11 controls) course with an emphasis on careful map reading. The third red course was a combination of the two courses above. A total of 16 runners competed in the red class, with 6 participants tackling both courses. First place went to Kasimir, who once again showed his splendid form and blitzed both courses. Ross, a visitor from Canberra came second, thanks to a very good time on the short course, and Don in third place due to a good result on the longer course. Very closely behind was Peter Merrotsy, who also beat Don on the short, but lost time on the longer course. Special mention must go to Eric, who is still recovering from serious illness but managed to get a respectable time on the short course; and Jane who managed to startle a snake - the only encounter reported.

Overall everyone seem to have had a pleasant time and we hope to do it all again on 26 June at Mount Brown, 40 km west of Armidale.

Cheers

Felix Burkhard

Blue/Green course - 2.4 km

Orange - 3.4km

A perfect autumn day greeted runners in this small but beautiful patch of New England forest. The field included a mixture of youth and experience with Kas Gregory blitzing the Long Red Course (40:37) and Sally and Tumi Thorsteinsson taking the honours in the novice Blue/Green class (63:00). Alec Watt made the best of the Short Red course (49:33) while Matt McKenzie put in a solid performance to record the best time on the Orange course (66:47).

Participants were generally pleased with their efforts and while some grumbled about the climb, especially into the finish, many others enjoyed the beauty and runnability of the forest once they climbed a bit and got away from the lower parts of the map.

It was great also to welcome Bill and Michelle who made the trip up from Tamworth and we hope to see them again soon.

The organiser has also learnt to co-locate registration, start and finish for future events!

Peter May

Long Red course

Short Red course

Orange course

Blue/Green course

Sunday 13 March was a glorious Northern Tablelands autumn day. The earlier forecasts of showers proved to be wrong, and 34 competitors enjoyed the blue skies, beautiful sunshine and warm but not too hot temperatures perfect for orienteering. They were well tested on a couple of challenging courses on the UNE campus.

Alinta set the Blue/Green course, and felt a bit restricted by the long grass around the dam behind the Sports Union. The shorter version was hotly contested between Callum, Darcy and Disa, and several others ran around this course after they had completed the Orange course.

The Orange course led the runners through the maze of university buildings, but to get to and from there required some thoughtful route choices through some tough vegetation. India did very well in her first event running and navigating by herself. But honours went to Jane, who navigated extremely well to edge out several strong runners.

Most of the club members who compete in the Red course were otherwise engaged, or found themselves so. Welcome to Brian, who travelled from Barraba to enjoy our hospitality. Alec made it back from Tenterfield just in time to stop Alinta from collecting the flags so that he could win the Short Red event. Don and Alinta were left to battle it out in the Long Red. ‘Were left’ is the operative term. Brent’s fence-climbing skills left him hanging: the self-sacrifice of his spouse and bairn saved him from an unknown fate; rescuers were called; and Sue and Boahdan altruistically chose to ‘dnf’. Gee, I would have finished the course first, and then … . Brent has survived the ordeal. And Don was not all that far ahead of Alinta.

During the day, there was also an opportunity to acknowledge Disa Smart’s very fine performance in the Christmas Five Day events, and she was presented with the Club’s Christmas trophy. Congratulations, Disa.

Peter and Alinta Merrotsy

Short Red course

Long Red course

Orange course

Blue/Green course

Dumaresq Dam is one of our older maps and has been worked on by numerous mappers in the 25 years of its existence. In spite of this, or perhaps because of it, there are still numerous errors and inconsistencies in the mapping. This caused some difficulties for both the green and the orange courses:

• The first control on the green course was not in open land (as shown on the map) but behind a rather large, newly grown thicket, making it more of an orange control.
• The rather nebulous rock detail around the third orange control had been updated recently, but unfortunately an earlier version of the map was inadvertently used. This caused several people to lose time and was the cause of Murray's DNFTP.

To add to the difficulties on the orange course, the controls were marked by small squares of toilet paper, which were more difficult to see than normal flags. Also two competitors didn't realise this and hence wasted time on the first few controls until they got the idea. Thus Erica and Karen took 10-15 mins longer than might otherwise have been the case.

To cap it off, the barbeques at the picnic area were not working and hence the organiser had to make a special trip to town to get one.

Nevertheless the event provided some valuable training and an enjoyable evening around the barbeque.

Eric Baker

Long Orange course

Short Orange course

Green course

Green Course 1.3 km

Orange course 1.7 km

A course - 20 controls

B course - 15 controls

C course - 10 controls

There was something a little different for our opening twilight event of the year. Known as a scatter event, the objective was to find, as quickly as possible, a specified number of controls out of the total number 'scattered' throughout the course area. In this case 22 controls were set and there were three courses with targets of 20, 15 and 10 controls each.

This format has all the organisational and course-setting advantages of a score event, with the additional advantage that competitors do not need to carry a watch. The event was received very favourably by competitors and the organiser was pleased to note that no two people did their courses in the same order.

In the A course, Kasimir was delighted to be in front of Murray, albeit by a small margin, and Peter narrowly edged out David, showing that he had not lost any competitiveness in spite of indulging in a few weeks of training on german beer and Black Forest cake.

Likewise Alinta had not lost her touch during her continental sojourn and easily cleaned up the 15 conrols in the B course ahead of Rowena and Felicity. The C course was surprisingly closely contested with Tom and Rachel, Zoe, and Disa all finishing within 90 seconds of each other.

Maurice Anker

A Course (20 controls)

B Course (15 controls)

C Course (10 controls)