October Oddyssey

[AndyC]

Taking the risk of what happened when I reminded everyone about the Phoenix (and I saw College Valley referred to as "The quietest place in England" on Secret Britain last night) can I point out that NATO are running the October Oddyssey this year at Beanley (nr Alnwick) on the first weekend in October.
I'm really looking forward to Beanley as we haven't used it for over a decade and it looks challenging and interesting.
Plenty of time to enter as they don't close until 24th September but I know travelling to The NE (I do it every weekend) takes some arranging at times
http://www.newcastleorienteering.org.uk/flyer/ood.pdf

The member of this board with the interesting golfing kit is one of the officials so I'm sure he might make more informed comments......?

[mappingmum]

and it doesn't clash with the Great North Run this year!

[Freefall]

The Controller (who does indeed have some interesting golf and orienteering wear) is now confident that the officials will have the courses sorted out in good time. There may even be a site visit this Friday.
I was the first to revisit the area after a gap of many years - it's very pleasant. Good enough for a hermit to have actually built a hermitage on it in fact (that will be OOB).

[Freefall]

One mapper, two planners and myself went up on the area today. It is fantastic - certainly one of the best areas in the North East with a mix of very runnable moorland with intricate rock features, open forest and a wonderful area of semi improved grassland with ancient field boundaries and walls. There is bracken (which can be avoided) and some deep heather but this latter area is going to be cut out of the final courses. The views to Cheviot today were magnificent and it was a real fungal foray in the woods (bilberries just right too).

[AndyC]

Tempus Fugit (or something like that) Closing date for pre-entry is tomorrow -so just a quick reminder if you don't want to miss the first re-use of an area that Freefall is excited about (and he has seen it and the courses so you can be sure that they will be good)

[Karen]

Has anyone found start times for the Oct Odd?

[AndyC]

Certainly not yet on Fabian or muddy.org. If Freefall is looking he may be able to give an answer as to when they'll be announced. (otherwise turn up before 12 on Saturday -that way you'll be in time whatever the start block)
BTB EOD is still available at a surcharge according to the co-organiser who I communicated with last night to agree to help retrieve controls.

[Freefall]

I have covered about 40km visiting all the control sites (over 3 days) plus one full day making comments on the Planners' courses. Big variety in the terrain - lots wonderful but of course the occasional area that had me cursing. Hope some more will come and enter on the day. Many of the controls are out and the forecast is looking reasonable.

[mharky]

car load coming down from edinburgh!

[Freefall]

Thanks to all who travelled to Beanley - hope it lived up to expectations. Sorry about the timing issues yesterday - human error caused the start boxes to switch off at 1 o'clock and in a rush to replace them they were programmed as a finish box! All was resolved by 9 at night so results were there for all to see this morning (through the mist and rain). First use of this area for about 25 years and quite a challenge for the planners to fit in two "badge" events in one area. They did a great job and with some minor tweaking as controller we managed to prevent runners (apart from maybe the Black) going over the same terrain twice. I used GIS to plot out all the courses as colour lines and then could switch on Day 1 and Day 2 together to look for shared controls or overlaps. I took the multi coloured maps out with me so I could remember the shape of the courses - not easy to remember at my age especially for 2 days. What a difference in weather over the 2 days - the sun finally came out as we drove home.

[RJ]

Beanley was a very pleasant area..... not very technical, but at speed gave a worthwhile challenge. The heather in places was tough, but there was a lot of very runnable terrain. The shorter courses certainly enjoyed very little overlap, and it was great to be able to orienteer without having to journey miles between two areas. I thought it was a good use of the terrain, finishing twice (in different directions on the two days) through that lovely woodland.

The timing issue was a mere distraction after finishing on day 1..... and a very pleasant surprise to find that all had been recovered with results up early on day 2. No doubt there were some 'panic' hours endured by the results team..... but thanks for staying calm and explaining it to all the affected finishers.

The event, which does have a 'good' brand, attracted a low turnout. This is a shame and perhaps a sign of the tightening of belts. However, a large volunteer effort was involved in the event.... regardless of number of competitors. Thanks to all of them for a great two days. It wasn't wasted

[graeme]

Bit disappointing to see mharky ducking the M21L challenge when the real runners showed up on Sunday though

[Freefall]

Graeme - what happened to James who you were running against? Seems like he mispunched? Hopefully Andrew will unravel the timing mysteries soon!

[AndyC]

Bit disappointing to see mharky ducking the M21L challenge when the real runners showed up on Sunday though

He probably (sensibly) regarded the risk of drowning as too high, but you missed the much nicer of the two days.
As Freefall said it was nice again as we finished retrieving controls but when the cloud dropped below the trig point and I was up there realising that the reports of a magnetic anomaly were plausible when my (spare) compass couldn't decide to put North in the same place each time I looked at it it was not encouraging fortunately there were some unique features around to help me.

[LostAgain]

The event, which does have a 'good' brand, attracted a low turnout. This is a shame and perhaps a sign of the tightening of belts. However, a large volunteer effort was involved in the event.... regardless of number of competitors. Thanks to all of them for a great two days. It wasn't wasted

Historically this event has been 2 regional events, which we have attended for many years. Last year, however, they changed the format to one that we as a family would not travel for. We assumed, wrongly, that this was the new format and therefore did not even look it up this year.