British MTBO Championships 2024Callendar/Devilla/Beecraigs, 7-9 June
Credit: Keith Dawson
Over the weekend of 7th-9th June, Scotland managed an unfortunate fixtures clash between Taylor Swift's debut UK concert at Murrayfield and our own 3-day festival of fast and furious pedalling round the forests of Falkirk (Sprint @ Callendar Park, Long @ Devilla Forest, Middle at Beecraigs). However - with great areas, great maps, great courses, great attendance, great fashion choices, and pretty good weather, our mountain bike orienteering British Champs was the place to be! This was also a round in the World Masters Series and attracted competitors from nine nations including locations as far-flung as Turkey and New Zealand. Whilst current & ex stars of GB's international MTBO team came and showed us how it's done, we also managed some age class ESOC success, with Mary Williams claiming the British W70 Champion title!
Credit: Keith Dawson
Friday kicked off with a Sprint in Callendar Park, with a parkland, forest and urban mash-up that required constant focus to quickly interpret and negotiate the underpasses, fences, and stream crossings, whilst choosing between routes with varying levels of track/path rideability and climb. Unusually for MTB events, the Final Details invited us to cycle anywhere including off-path, but the reality showed this was largely a bad strategy! Courses were won in approximately 20 minutes with Janine Inman and Ian Nixon taking the British Sprint Championship honours. It was great to see lots of smiling faces and no Bad Blood after this opener event.
ESOC results are shown below (see full results for the Callendar Park MTBO Sprint on the BMBO website).
- Course A: Martin Quirke 11th
- Course B: Alison O'Neil 12th, Terry Johnstone 13th
- Course C: Richard Oxlade 2nd
- Course D: Karena Hanley 3rd
- Course E: Mary Williams 1st
Credit: Alison O'Neil
We progressed on the Saturday to the main course with a Long course at Tulliallan & Devilla. This was a proper long distance with most riders out for a good 2 hours, and a map flip for the longer courses (in fact 2 map flips for the A course!). There was little climb but plenty of physicality - we zig-zagged across the area with every permutation of route choice decision, tracks ranging from smoke-inducing fireroads through to dubious jungle-like paths which presented a real obstacle course challenge to navigate both bike and rider along (yes, I'm looking at you, innocuous-appearing path to penultimate control 21 on Course B! - I Knew (not) You Were Trouble). Janine Inman and Ian Nixon once more emerged victorious, taking the British Long Championship titles.
ESOC competitors finishing their courses were enthusiastic:
(Mary Williams) "I really enjoyed the W70, M80 course. It was made special by Keith's gold star bike which went like a dream. I took just over 2 hours to complete the 18.7 km optimum route, but probably did more like 20km after making a few mistakes in missing very small paths."
(Ron Nolan) "Really enjoyed today. Every time I passed Alison I was going in the opposite direction 🤣🤣"
ESOC results are shown below (see full results for the Devilla MTBO Long on the BMBO website).
- Course B: Alison O'Neil 11th, Terry Johnstone 14th, Ron Nolan 16th
- Course E: Mary Williams 2nd
Credit: Alison O'Neil
Sunday's finale was a chance to Shake It Off, with the more classical MTB trails of Beecraigs Country Park for the Middle Distance race. This time we had one-way paths to respect (note the purple arrows on the map) with currently-injured Keith Dawson ably policing a key section and photographing any opposite direction culprits. Janine Inman and Alistair Powell took the British Middle Championship titles.
Richard reflected afterwards on the tricky nature of the course and is already planning a duathlon future: "I certainly went round in circles today at Beecraigs and felt like I’d gone backwards after going from 3 to 10 to 4. Duh! I blame it on an 8am start time😂 Been a great weekend of foot and bike orienteering. Many thanks to all involved. And hats off to duracell bunny Alison - MTBO+SOL black+control collecting. Anyone up for an O- biathlon?"
Mary also expressed her thanks: "The mountain bike orienteering is great fun with quick decision making on route choice needed. I am definitely up for it again. Thank you to all the organisers, planners and volunteers."
Keith pronounced his verdict on the 1-way path marshalling experiment: "I enjoyed my morning hiding in the bushes on my crutches, with camera paparazzi style marshalling/policing a key stretch of one way track. It was good to see you all enjoying yourself. Only a couple of DSQs but the experiment worked as a deterrent I think. 👍"
ESOC results are shown below (see full results for the Beecraigs Country Park MTBO Middle on the BMBO website).
- Course A: Martin Quirke 7th
- Course B: Alison O'Neil 10th, Terry Johnstone 12th
- Course C: Richard Oxlade 4th
- Course D: Karena Hanley 3rd
- Course E: Mary Williams 1st
As sole W70 to complete all 3 days, Mary Williams took the title of W70 British Champion - very well done to Mary!
Many thanks to series coordinator Tony Brand-Barker, weekend coordinator Bob Cherry, and course planners Bob Cherry, Steve Smirthwaite and Arnie Saltums. See also on the BMBO website an official report on the MTBO Champs, as well as a newcomer's perspective on the MTBO Champs (from Helen Hooper).
These events were part of the World Masters Series and results will be updated in due course here.
Other entries categorised under: MTBO