Orienteers get noticed in Fell running

[Lard]

Hector Haines wins the Whangie Whizz, 22 April

The 2009 Bog and Burn Series kicked off with almost 160 runners at the Whangie Whizz just north of Glasgow.
The race winner by some margin was Hector Haines of Edinburgh University. In second place was Oleg Chepelin, and 3rd was Tom Owens, (winner of Screel Fell race at the weekend where Oleg was 4th).

Also Ross MacLennan 10th.

Congratulations also to Doug Tullie - selected to represent his region in Fell Running.

[Gonzo]

What is a Whangie Whizz?

[mharky]

Oleg has also been selected for West of Scotland, nice!

[graeme]

What is a Whangie Whizz?

It's a small fell race in the West of Scotland. With a strong field compared with, e.g. the Edinburgh Half marathon where that same Ross McLennan was 4th out of 2500 !

What makes this unusual is that he actually ran for FVO, rather than a running club. Which tells us something about the recent upheavals in that sport.

[RS]

Been happening in Yorkshire for a while

[ba-ba]

yup, welcome to the bandwagon!
ShUOC is now officially (and has been since septemberish?) "Sheffield University Orienteering and Fell Running Club" - 'ShUOC' at O events (naturally) and 'Sheffield University' at Fell Races. Usually in the top 2 male teams at the big peak races - we have Dark Peak to compete with for both placings, but also runners (John Rocke, Rob Little and Neill Barton all run (and win) for DPFR usually) The surroundings do lend themselves to Fell Running a bit though...
We get a lot of newbies into the club due to the Fell Running side, then eventually we give them a map and see what they can do with that! If they don't fancy it, nay problem! From around now onwards there's usually 2 good quality races a week within 15miles of Sheffield.

This year ShUOCers Lucy Harris, Zanthe Wray and Neill Barton are all competing for honours in the F/M U23 British championship Races (Lucy was FU23 British Champ last year - and she's the only one out of the 3 who orienteers! Zanthe is currently leading the early standings I think...) - next British Champs Race - Stuc a Chroin next weekend

[mharky]

Where were you at the FRAs? We were 6th.

[ba-ba]

yeah, I'm hoping to get us a bit more involved with FRA next year.
John and Rob run for DPFR at relays, and Lucy for Pennine FR, which impacts on numbers a bit. We just didn't clock it I think.
do EUOC run it solely as EUOC, or mixed with the Haries?

[mharky]

We had 1 Harie & 5 EUOC. But as the Haries are responsible for hill running we compete under their name. To be honest, it doesn't really matter if it's hill, XC, athletics or orienteering, it's the uni you represent at the end of the day.

We have the advantage that no-one really runs for clubs outside uni. You just need to let DP know that the uni comes first so you can get a full strength team out.

[ba-ba]

aye, we tend to leave it up to the runners in question - if we actually start competing in these events it'll be easier to get more of them racing for us. Might try and see if any of the XC people can go up and down without needing to wear high viz...
Just a shame that some of our stronger 'mountain-tough' fell runners are graduating this year so can't compete in a big do with us. At least we have a 'few' people coming through who may be a little bit useful

yet to find out how many cakes we won as a whole at the race last night

[Big Jon]

There was time (more than a few years ago!) when the Scottish hill running team could have been 60-70% orienteers - the reason was that orienteers understood about peaking and limiting race numbers, hill runners didn't (and still don't). Many standard hill runners regard a good year as one when they do 60 races rather than 50 - often 2 or 3 a week in the spring/summer. With this approach common it is not surprising that orienteers can do well in hill racing.