We look forward to seeing you at our next events. These are:
* Saturday Series: 5th January, at Kings Wood, near High Wycombe
* Chiltern Challenge, Level B event: Sunday 17th February, Penn Wood, near High Wycombe.
Shotover
Level C
2nd December 2018
RouteGadget Please do add your route; the planner is always keen to see where competitors went, and competitors find it useful to see where others went.
Please refer any queries with these results to John
Planner's Comments
Shotover is a great area for orienteering and is challenging even for people who have run there for many years. My first thoughts in the planning were to keep the start and finish close to the car park, just in case of bad weather. On the day the weather was kind, but in any case it made sense to keep the shorter courses in the flatter Brazenose Wood and let those on the longer courses take on the more challenging terrain. It was a pleasure to work with Mike who picked up a few howlers before they actually led to a problem and with Martin who made a lot of improvements to the map, continuing until just 2 weeks before the event.The vegetation on Shotover had died back quite well for early December and I was pleasantly surprised that the vegetation in Brazenose Wood was less aggressive than in previous years.
Dave Kingham
Controller's Comments
Every controller wishes for an uneventful event, and this was it - once the loos had been delivered!Dave's technical courses were pretty well spot on from the first draft, which gave us time to sort out all the little details that make all the difference on an area like Shotover with its myriad of similar features. Each time we visited the vegetation improved, so by the day of the event many people were pleasantly surprised by the amount of corner-cutting they could do. By far the most common comment at the Finish was "(gasp) enjoyed that (gulp) thanks". Many thanks to Dave for planning, to Gary and the TVOC team for their efficiency, and to Martin Ricketts for making late updates to the map, including some Dave and I hadn't noticed.
Mike Bennett, HH
Organiser's Comments
From the feedback I got everyone enjoyed the courses and event we put on at Shotover on Sunday. Thanks to everyone who contributed, all the TVOC teams worked brilliantly as ever. We should give special thanks to our planner Dave Kingham, Controller Mike Bennett (HH) and my deputy organiser Ali Kempson. It made a real difference having Tom & Julie’s food van in the car park, it makes a great focal point for post race chats.A special thanks to BMW mini Oxford who allowed us to use their car park, also thanks to Oxford City Council who gave us permission to use Shotover Country Park. There were no injuries for Abingdon Venture Rescue to deal with but they were certainly very chilly having forgotten to bring the side panels of their Gazebo.
From my side all I will say is I’ve never been so relieved [pun intended] to see a pair of plastic portaloos, I hope you enjoyed them as much as I did. [For readers’ benefit, toilets had been booked for delivery on Saturday afternoon, but did not appear. Gary only had a landline number, which was not answered. So we nearly had no toilets. By chance, someone was in Taplins’ office on Sunday morning, and could sort out a rapid delivery!]
Gary Mills