Results for LEI C4e, EM Gallopen, ODH, Old Dry Hills, 16/02/2003

Results for LEI C4e, EM Gallopen, ODH, Old Dry Hills, 16/02/2003

Result set created on 16/02/03 at 15:55

Due to more than 50% of the SI Boxes failing before the event (possible cause extremely low temperatures overnight) the only way to provide any results from the event has been to process based on start & finish times only. No split times are available from this event.

Leicestershire Orienteering Club apologies for any inconvenience or lack of enjoyment, however these circumstances were out of our control.

Select results, Organisers Comments Controllers Comments Planners Comments

Results software provided by Michael Napier, e-mail mnapier@cix.co.uk

Organisers Comments

The day turned out better, weather wise, than one could perhaps have hoped. I hope you enjoyed the sun, a prelude to what is about to come?

I didn't receive any complaints, despite the awful problems we had earlier with failing controls, so I'd like to thank my team for their hard work in making the "domestic" side of things go smoothly. I did have a concern about the numbers we could shift with the mini-bus, but I don't think any one was unduly delayed at any time. Many thanks go to Sue Bradley for her stirling work behind the wheel all day!

Andy Portsmouth

Controller’s report

Sorry about the SI punching debacle – I have asked LEI to let me know if they find a reason for the failure of about 50% of all SI boxes on the morning of the event. Battery failure seems favourite. Whatever the cause I hope it didn’t spoil your day – thank you for being so understanding!

Apart from that, I felt it was a really good day’s competition. Old Dry Hills (has an area ever been more inaccurately named?) is a tough and technical area and it demands accurate navigation. The important thing to remember is that if it is slow for you, it is probably as slow for everyone else! I thought Roger’s courses made really good use of the area – there was plenty of route choice, a number of controls that required fine navigation and we managed to avoid the worst of the brambles and thorns. We tried, as much as possible, to keep you off the muddy tracks (hence the short legs in the most runnable parts of the woods) – obviously this wasn’t possible for white and yellow courses, but from what I could see, none of the youngsters competing minded getting muddy feet.

The distance between the car park and the start/finish was well managed by the use of a minibus – the flexibility in start times is one area where SI punching comes into its own. Nevertheless, the attendance for this event was disappointingly low and I would seriously question whether the (great deal) of additional work that is caused by using SI punching is worthwhile for this type/size of event. What do you think?

Mike Capper

Planners Comments

I had planned a small event in this area last the summer and I knew some of the things to avoid this time, i.e. ditches and brambles. The area has stretches of slow run, so courses were on the short side of the guidelines, so the odd very fast time is not surprising.

The shorter courses were designed to avoid paths blocked by overgrown or fallen trees and to keep the mud at a tolerable level. There was not much choice. The medium courses were an attempt to use the area west of the enclosure. This made the Orange second leg ambitious, but there was a safe route although quite a bit longer than the straight line. After this the courses were often of the control picking variety rather than complex route choice.

The Technical courses were arranged to start in all directions. Then early on to provide a long leg, with at least three route choices, to the North West . On the day, people found at least five! Map corrections gave some runnability indicators to attempt to make the route choice fairer/harder. Long courses then returned though the runnable wood land in the North East and/or South east. There were a lot of short legs to encourage use of the woodlands, rather than the muddy paths.

Mike Capper made a lot of useful suggestions, thanks.

The big problem on the day was obviously the failure of a number of the SI boxes; all spare boxes were used up on the short courses. So far we have found no obvious cause(s); cold weather or mobile phones are two possible candidates. We did attempt to get create some replacement boxes on the day, but were not geared up to re-programming the failed boxes. Sorry!

Roger Edwards