Scottish Championships 2024Craig Leach & Roseisle, 25-26 May

Credit: Chris Smithard
Inverness played host to the 2024 Scottish Orienteering Championships, with the quality terrain attracting over 350 competitors including a fair few pilgrims from south of the border. ESOC managed a turnout of 30 competitors with ages spanning from 12 to 80 years old, who admired the bluebells, enthused about the quality terrain and courses, and animatedly compared tick counts (totals ranging up to "about 200" and "it took me 45 minutes to remove them all" and "have you tried Rhona's sellotape technique?"). Individual results featured 3 Golds, 2 Silvers, and 4 Bronze medals, whilst in the relays a superb trio of runs from Alison Harding, Helena Nolan and Kevin Harding gave us Bronze overall in the 23+ points age class and as first team from a Scottish club we came away the 23+ points Scottish Champions!

Credit: Alison O'Neil
Saturday's Individual competition was organised by Inverness Orienteering Club (INVOC) on the hilly ridge of Craig Leach and Craig Dunain. A carpet of bluebells adorned the hillocks of Craig Leach which comprised the main part of the shorter courses, whilst the longer courses were gifted some additional climb and MTB trail maze navigation on the steep slopes of Craig Dunain. Post-run reflections were positive:
- "lovely forest, interesting course, fine weather, downhill finish!" (Sally Lindsay)
- "Great to run on Creag Leach again after 25 years. Quality area, good planning on my course (6), and weather & coffee van a nice bonus. Tick count lower than Dundurn which I still view as the tick capital of Scotland" (Richard Oxlade)
- "many subtle features with few paths which needed good compass bearings and pacing - excellent Scottish orienteering" (Mary Williams)
- "Courses were very tricky and long. Team Daley were fighting over who had done the worst. We were very much at the bottom of the pile on all of our courses, but it didn’t quash our enjoyment of the weekend." (Fran Daley)
- "The first bit was indeed very lovely. But lost 10 mins at 25! I was so so lost..." (Helen Bridle)
- "I really enjoyed it - sun shining, lovely underfoot and beautiful bluebells. I didn't get any ticks but just removed about 200 ticks from Megan! But Keith had more! Keith is a tick magnet and helps to clear the forest for the rest of us, it's a public service!" (Judy Bell)
Many congratulations to our three Scottish Champions: Alison O'Neil W21E, Sally Lindsay W65L, and Eleanor Pyrah W80. We also managed 2 Silver medals (Helen Bridle W21E, Margaret Dalgleish W75L) and 4 Bronze medals (Finlay Ross M55S, Judy Bell W55S, Mary Williams W70L, Ian Pyrah M80).
ESOC results in the top half are shown below (see also the full results and the courses in Routegadget).
W45L (16) - Martin Quirke 7th
M55S (7) - Finlay Ross 3rd
M65L (16) - Richard Oxlade 6th, Kevin Harding 8th
M70L (17) - Les Dalgleish 7th
M80 (8) - Ian Pyrah 3rd
W21E (6) - Alison O'Neil 1st, Helen Bridle 2nd
W55L (13) - Katherine Kirk 7th
W55S (6) - Judy Bell 3rd
W65L (12) - Sally Lindsay 1st
W70L (6) - Margaret Dalgleish 2nd, Mary Williams 3rd
W80 (3) - Eleanor Pyrah 1st
![Scottish Champs 2024 M/W65 podium. Sally Lindsay takes the win for ESOC ahead of Trish Coombs (MAROC) and [not pictured] Christine Patterson (CLYDE). Podium also features the leading M65L: John Tullie RR, Donald Petrie CLYDE, [not pictured] Mark Saunders BOK.](https://www.esoc.org.uk/images/general/2024/2024-05-25_MW65_Podium.jpg)

![Scottish Champs 2024 M/W80 podium. Eleanor Pyrah takes the win for ESOC ahead of [not pictured] Adrienne Sowood (INVOC). Ian Pyrah takes Bronze for ESOC behind Neil McLean (GRAMP) and [not pictured] George Reynolds (INVOC).](https://www.esoc.org.uk/images/general/2024/2024-05-25_Scottish_Champs_MW80_Podium.jpg)

Credit: Alison O'Neil
Sunday's Relay competition was organised by Moravian Orienteers (MOR) on the forested sand dunes of Roseisle. Famed as an uber-runnable but intricately contoured orienteer's paradise, the area largely lived up to our high expectations, although recent forest thinning meant some small sections in the later part of the course had the temerity to present brashings to the hitherto blissfully buoyant orienteer.
In the Women's Open, Helen Bridle, Rona Lindsay and Alison O'Neil came in 7 minutes adrift of EUOC to claim a Silver medal, shortly ahead of our Edinburgh neighbours Interløpers in 3rd. Our junior team of Calum, Emma and Megan was unlucky to miss the podium by just 12 seconds, placing 4th. The remaining 21 ESOC relay runners were organised into 7 teams according to the handicap systems, fighting it out in the 23+ points age class competition (if you want to know more, see the Scottish Champs relay rules). Our star team of Alison, Helena and Kevin duly came out top both in the ESOC competition and of the Scottish club teams, although 2 English visiting teams topped the podium, placing us 3rd overall.
ESOC results are shown below (see also the full results).
Women's Open (6) : ESOC Executioners 2nd (Helen Bridle, Rona Lindsay, Alison O'Neil)
Junior Total BOF Age 44- (9) : ESOC Exterminators 4th (Calum Robertson, Emma Daley, Megan Brown)
Age Class 23+ points (27) :
ESOC Express 3rd (Alison Harding, Helena Nolan, Kevin Harding)
ESOC Espresso 5th (Sally Lindsay, Keith Brown, Richard Oxlade)
ESOC Eccentrics 7th (Ian Pyrah, Finlay Ross, Ron Nolan)
ESOC Extraordinaires 12th (Margaret Dalgleish, Crawford Lindsay, Maja Robertson)
ESOC Excursionists 14th (Peter Halling, Fran Daley, Les Dalgleish)
ESOC Extortionists 19th (Eleanor Pyrah, Mary Williams, Katherine Kirk)
(DNF) ESOC Explorers (Judy Bell, Roger Garnett, Hanne Robertson)



This event was the fifth in the 2024 Scottish Inter-Club Championships. For further details and the league tables, see the Scottish Orienteering Championships page on the Scottish Orienteering website
The Scottish Champs was the 13th event in the 2024 UK Orienteering League. There are more details about the UKOL, including the league tables, on the UK Orienteering League website. With the scores for these events included, ESOC is lying 9th in the club league. The latest score for each club is calculated automatically from the 15 best club members' scores (across various age class groups) - so the club members whose scores are included may change as the year goes on and more events are included.
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