2011 best of..

[mikey]

Missed some big races this year, but here is my best of (UK races only) -

Best course

Urban – Nottingham
Forest - Culbin (Moray Mix)

Most enjoyable race
Urban - Lossiemouth (Moray Mix)
Forest - Torinturk (S6D Day 4)

Best O Moment – seeing TG and the French team win the WOC relays – amazing!

[frog]

I don't really have a best course award, probably because the "best" course is usually one that flumoxed me, had me going round in circles, so I try to forget it as quickly as possible so I don't stay pissed off with myself for still being so crap.
My favourite event of the year was the Tinto twin, just because I like the format and the atmosphere. The Moray mix was a close second, but lacked owls and soup, although it did have seaside and better terrain..

[AlanB]

I enjoyed the Tinto Twin, but after the soup it all seemed to go downhill.

My favourite (as in the one I did best in) was the Scottish Sprint at North Muirton.

[frog]

Forgot about Oban, seems much longer than 4 1/2 months ago. That's vieing ?vying with Tinto twin for best orienteering "experience". I'm not sure which course I'd pick as "best" though, probably should pick my worst performance which was Torinturk, but that was one stupid mistake and I think I preferred Ardchattan.

[housewife]

As ever dispite travelling widely in the uk nothing comes close to the scottish o leauge races for great planning in fabulous areas. the first 2 sols this year are the reason why i orienteer in a nutshell. Just amazingly good fun. in the rest of the uk the british long and relay was good oing and hambleton was fun.

[Gnitworp]

Southern Nights at Bordon was one of the most challenging night events I've run. Lost time in the barracks at the end because I'd switched to 1:4/5000 mental urban mode but still had a 1:10000 map!

[graeme]

SOLs have the edge on terrain, but they were a bit too familiar to me this year. And I'm always keen to praise top planning ahead of top terrain. So...

Best forest event: Hambledon. Good fun and planning to make the best of the area.
Best urban: North Muirton. Constantly technical, and the closest racing of the year (I finished 1 sec behind 11th and 2 sec ahead of 13th).

Most enjoyable West Point (USA) 8 am first start, and an hour in nice woods without tracks or seeing people, then a final 40 mins of head-to-head. Perfect
Not that I like getting up or running early, even without jet-lag

Best multiday: Moray Mix
acknowledging I'm probably biassed here from being ill at the JK and injured at the 6-day

Not eligible: Edinburgh Street Race and JOK Chasing Sprint. Both brilliantly used not-the-best terrain, but even though I wasn't heavily involved this year, you'd probably accuse me of bias.

[brooner]

Well, you can pick apart event faults to thousands of posts but you can't give praise to a few of your favourite events... I know there is another week left to 2011, but c'mon people!

A lot of the races that stand out for me this year have involved head to head racing, last night's Brighton City Race was a lot of fun, SLOW's Blood Race at Hankley recently was really enjoyable and very well planned, the Irish Relay Champs & Guildford Long O were really good too.

Moray Mix was probably best weekend's orienteering of the year for me, great mix of urban styles & forest in Lossie, and a long (for me anyway) day out in Culbin is always a treat.

The following weekend at Jukola was fantastic as ever, looking forward to a top 300 challenge next year!

[greywolf]

Looking back I've just realised how few events i completed competitively this year...

Edinburgh was brilliantly planned and great fun (until I mispunched ) the Culbin SOl was a blast (if only it was always that easy ) and my best performance of the year was Ardnaskie - the map almost made sense most of the time.

However the most fun was probably both the fastest and the lowest key: watching (from a rapidly increasing distance) the SED Squad running mixed sprint relays round Hill 99 on a lovely sunny day in March...

[Big Jon]

The most enjoyable event I've run recently was Deeside Night Cup event at Glen Davan:
http://www.marocscotland.org.uk/home/maps/
a nice wee area used admirably by Peter Craig.

My mind gets fuzzy going too far back - but I did really appreciate the British Relay area (even if I didn't run very well and struggled to read the map scale) - a lovely small area of intricate contours and natural tree cover.

[seabird]

JK Sprint - great atmosphere and good course.
Irish Relays - the peat cuttings produced amazing courses in bleak surroundings on a bleak day.
Burbage Boulders - brilliant map of the boulders and overall excellent planning.
Venice - because I hadn't done it before and the sun shone and it's Venice.
And all the local mass start night score events for the atmosphere.

[Simon]

I, also, enjoyed the Irish Relay Champs, which finished off a good holiday combining the JK, Irish Champs, and some other orienteering.

The other event I'd pick out is the LOK Ultrasprint, which was good fun.

(Of course, the best event of the year will be my club's boxing day event!)

[Taybank]

Best run was JK day 2 on the dune course.
My only mistake was forgetting to check my SI unit had registered at all the controls.
But than again, there was a good little run at Speyside - a midweek Basoc event.

[andypat]

I think Day 6 of the 6 days was my favourite run in terrain- with most of it downhill I had a brief experience of orienteering in terrain at speed - wow!

London City race probably for me was the best in terms of big occasions - felt a bit like going to the world championships of urban races with all the people.

The urban part of the Moray mix was great - missed the SOL with injury though

Really enjoyed the pressue of the JK sprint too.

[Mrs H]

I thought The Harvester was very enjoyable for all sorts of reasons and i thoroughly enjoyed my CompassSport Cup final course.
Multiday - well obviously SinS for the great social
Urban - London (if I can't choose Venice)