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| Saturday 21st March 2009 West Midlands League 2009 Malvern Mini-League 2008/09 Event 5 Eastnor Park & Malvern South |
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Planners Comments The aims were This led us to plan the shorter courses round the woods in the centre of the park (rather than round the lakes and fields at the bottom, as sometimes used for the schools event). The path network in the centre of the park is indistinct and liable to change, under the influence of deer, Landrovers and forestry, making the planning of failsafe white and yellow courses a particular challenge. Special thanks are due to Alison Sloman, for detailed map updates, and our controller Katy Dyer, for her help and advice, to make these courses work - as well as their help overall. For green, blue and brown, we aimed for the nice un-vegetated parts of the woods and less steep slopes as far as possible. Midsummer Hill, in the SE of the map, and Swinyard Hill, in the NE, are some of the prettiest parts of the Malverns but the best bits are near the top. Hilltop views were within range for blue and brown, but not for green - perhaps we can start nearer the top on another occasion. Judging by finish times and competitors' comments, the courses all worked much as intended. We were greatly favoured by the weather, which was fine for the majority of our planning outings and, most importantly, lovely on the day. Neil MacKenzie (HOC) and Ashley Ford (HOC) |
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Controller's Comments I have thoroughly enjoyed working with Harlequins Orienteering Club for my first controlling job. With not a lot of time available to complete the planning for this schools and WML event, Neil Mackenzie and Ashley Ford worked quickly to produce some very good easier courses in Eastnor Park, which were suitable for schools and those runners who run the lighter coloured courses. They then added the new dimension of the Malvern South map to create challenging Blue, Green and Brown courses. Both Neil and Ashley were prepared to review control sites and technical aspects of the courses, taking care to consider the problems posed by the steep terrain and the need to prepare safe and fair courses. A good White course needs as much attention as a good Brown course. Neil spent a considerable amount of time drawing up the maps and control descriptions, checking and rechecking. Results in the main showed the sort of times we expected, though the times for the Orange course were perhaps rather long. There were a couple of mispunches on the White and these competitors may have been mislead by a control near their correct one. But I hope that the children will have learned the lesson to check control codes. In retrospect on the harder courses, there were a couple of controls which you ran into and out of the same way- a perennial planning problem. But many people really seemed to enjoy their run in almost ideal conditions. A great contrast to the wet and windy day spent checking and taping control sites. I was very impressed with Mike Farrington's work in organising the event and between us I think we produced a Risk Assessment which British Orienteering would be proud of. The rest of his hard working organising team helped to make the day a real success. Thank you. I hope that BOK and HOC will work together again very soon. Katy Dyer (BOK) |
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Organiser's Comments This event was something of an experiment, as it was the first time that we have combined a Malvern Mini-League with a full West Midland League event. As 230 runners turned up to try the courses planned by Neil and Ashley I think we can say it was successful. What was interesting was how many independent runners attended the event, and how many of our e-cards were used - over 100! Hopefully those of you who are not regular orienteers enjoyed the experience and will come again - we will be delighted to see you at Frith Wood, Wellington Heath on April 18th. I apologise to those competitors who picked up a Brown map rather than an Orange one. This was totally my fault, as I had failed to provide labelled boxes for the three extra courses being run over the usual Malvern Mini-league Yellow, Orange,Green and Blue. The start team had to improvise, which resulted in the Brown maps being put into the box usually used for Orange maps, to the obvious confusion of regular Orange course competitors. My thanks to Neil and Ashley for their efforts, to Katy for taking on the controlling at a very late stage, and to all the other HOC helpers who made the day possible - particularly those who helped at the schools and night event as well. Mike Farrington (HOC) |
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| Lost Property: One pair of black socks. Please contact the organiser to reclaim. |
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