British Long Distance & Relay Championships 2012Lake District, 5/6 May
There were mixed fortunes for ESOC at the British Champs in the Lake District.
A select band of ESOC members attended the British Championships. The travel arrangements, university exams, Tio Mila, or perhaps the higher than average costs, combined to give a lower ESOC entry than might normally be expected. This is a pity, as it was an excellent weekend on quality areas, with good weather to boot.
The individual event, on Saturday 5 May, was at Dalegarth in Eskdale in the western Lakes, and involved parking at Ravenglass and taking a coach to the assembly area (except for those whose accommodation was in the valley). This worked much better than I feared, with no hassle at all.
The courses, being a British Championships, were longer than a SOL but as it was largely open fell, and reasonably runnable, didn’t lead to excessive times. Best performance was by Claire Ward who finished 3rd in W21E, narrowly missing the win with a mistake on a long leg back across the map.
Other good ESOC performances in the top half of their class were
M35L (21 competitors) - Ray Ward 11th
M55L (66) - Crawford Lindsay 30th
M65L (67) - Roger Scrutton 22nd, Ian Pyrah 25th
W18E (17) - Rona Lindsay 4th
W45L (45) - Helena Nolan 16th
W55L (45) - Janice Nisbet 9th, Sally Lindsay 16th
W60L (41) - Mary Williams 19th
W65L (26) - Eleanor Pyrah 5th
The relays were held on Helsington Barrows, an area of upland limestone just west of Kendal, with parking on the old racecourse. Both here and assembly had great views of the lower part of the courses.
The terrain was very fast underfoot and had several large walls which had to be crossed at the correct crossing point. The end part of the course was sprint-like, with several controls in the lower part of the assembly field before a rather cruel uphill run to the finish.
ESOC had only 5 teams, one of which had 2 members from other clubs.
Hopes were high for our Men’s Short team, ESOC Cheetahs, and they didn’t disappoint, with Andrew Dalgleish coming back a close second on first leg and handing over to Ray Ward, who maintained that position before handing over to Claire, who overtook the leading team before the first control. She was somewhat surprised not to be announced coming back up the run-in to win; the reason being that Ray had punched the wrong penultimate control in the field. Bad luck to the team, but they didn’t seem too concerned at their narrow miss.
The two Ad Hoc teams, ESOC Dingoes (Eleanor Pyrah, Crawford Lindsay and Simon Firth) and ESOC’s Short of Competitors (Lindsay McMillan [HOC, formerly ELO], Brian Yates and Eileen Maxwell [RR]) had an exciting tussle on the run-in, with the ‘guests’ team just getting the upper hand to finish in 16th place with the Dingoes in 17th place, out of 46.
Our other teams both finished in the top half too:
W50 - ESOC Anteaters were 7th out of 17
(Janice Nisbet, Sally Lindsay, Margaret Dalgleish)
M60 - ESOC Bisons were 9th out of 25
(Roger Scrutton, Ian Pyrah, Les Dalgleish)
Full results from the individual event are available in the British Orienteering Results archive, here.
Routegadget (which includes results) is also available:
Individual
Relays
Crawford Lindsay
Club Captain
Other entries categorised under: Event Reports