Porto city races

[nooomember]

Porto city races started tonight with a Night race around the World Heritage site of the Old Town, with its many steep alleyways and steps, and a very warm night.
Link to view the Finish area: http://youtu.be/0ZRv7SbC-mc
Headcam from courses to follow.
Some decent British results it seems.

[Tatty]

Men's Open - Oli O'Brien 5
Veteran Men - Paul Murgatroyd 2, Vince Roper 6
Veteran women - Sue Betts 1, Helen Chiswell 3, Sarah Francis 4
Super Vet Men - David Hunt 1, Gavin Clegg 2, Neil Harvatt 3, Keith Tonkin 4
Super Vet Women - Kirsty Staunton1, Christine Kiddier 2, Amanda Roberts 3
Ultra Vet Men - Mike Godfree1, Chris Branford 2, Ian Pyrah £
Ultra Vet Women - Liz Godfree 1, Judith Goodair 2, Kay Sayer 3

[nooomember]

quickly uploaded Day 3, Foz mini clips of Assembly...

http://youtu.be/nKGyJL4MM58
http://youtu.be/GG1Igv5FU-k

and Porto's answer to the ever popular 'Race The Castles'!

http://youtu.be/24qtGMQBz3o

Luckily Foz isnt as steep as Porto Old City for the full length urban courses.

[andypat]

Excellent weekend with three races of quite different character. The night event was particualrly challenging, with all the street cafes to negotiate. First time I've had my bum slapped by a lady in a while!
Park score race was interesting - 1000 points in 30 controls in 90min sadly my arithmetic let me down.
Porto city race was in a nice wee part of town - not so complex as the Friday night but still quite characterful in its own way.

Interesting that the were able to attract somethign between 150-200 apparent non-orienteers to the event, mostly in pairs or groups, something you rarely see in the uk.

[Barny]

You are lucky it was only the women liked your bum - I had the same problem with the men!! Plus a lot of cheering and clapping at the same time

Despite this a fantastic 3 days and lots of fantastic prizes - several British Orienteers had to book hold luggage to bring back all the bottles of port that they won - the only problem of travelling with hand luggage only

[andypat]

Oh yes - I'd a guy too but the woman got me going both ways!

[Angry Haggis]

Despite this a fantastic 3 days and lots of fantastic prizes - several British Orienteers had to book hold luggage to bring back all the bottles of port that they won - the only problem of travelling with hand luggage only

Yes - multiple tins of sardines/pilchards/mackerel (won as prizes) were removed by security by the airport

[andypat]

I take it the port didnt make it as far as the airport?

[denbydale]

My wife gave her Port to the kitchen staff where we were staying - but lost the sardines at the airport

Two Belgians had gone through most of their bottle during dinner in Sunday night in addition to the wine at the meal, and vowed to finish the bottle off before they flew home on Morning morning

[MJG]

Well our score was 4 bottles of port safely made it home packed in dirty O kit for cushioning but cost me £20 to RyanAir for hold luggage, 5 tins of sardines confiscated at security (although the sardine sandwiches were OK) from the hand luggage.

I see there are now splits for the score event so I can finally work out where I went and why I didn't get the 1000 points I had counted in my head (several recounts whilst I was running). The only good strategy would seem have been to sit for 5 minutes at the beginning and calmly mark up the map, having carefully calculated 1000 points without exceeding the 30 control limit. Although I do hear one couple went together, one navigating and one keeping score, but ended with 965 points.

An excellent weekend especially with the warm sunny weather. What a contrast back home!

[roadrunner]

No prizes for me but a very enjoyable weekend nevertheless. The night event was challenging (especially as my headtorch packed up just before the start and the replacement I bought wasn't as bright), one of the legs had me scratching my head for a while trying to find ANY route (5(41) to 6(39) on Vet M 2). The score event was good fun, an interesting trade-off between running fast and stopping to tot up the points. I was also pleasantly surprised with Foz - the courses were well planned to make best use of the area, and you certainly had to read the control descriptions carefully to avoid ending up the wrong side of uncrossable barriers.

[Mrs P]

We got our port, sardines, soap and mackerel safely home by putting one bag in the hold. (The biscuits in the hand luggage were useful as we got no free food on the Iberian airline!) However, my headlamp in the carry on bag caused us an awful lot of hassle at Heathrow as the battery and wires, packed in one of my shoes, apparently looked as if it might have been a bomb. Although we quickly explained what it was, security insisted on going through everything in the bag with a fine toothcomb, causing us to panic that we might miss our flight up to Edinburgh (we didn't). If I take a headlamp on as hand luggage again I will try to remember to keep it separate to show the people at security.

[andypat]

Wires and battery inside a shoe? Perhaps with hindsight....

I had a sudden panic about taking my headtorch in hand luggage for that very reason and ended up buying a small one out there which was good enough.

[Simon]

Photos mainly of the prizegivings (Brits collecting port, etc.) and some from the start of the relays.

A really good weekend away.
I seem to have done fairly well on the score, despite my earlier comment about not taking it too seriously. (And I even got to dip my toes in the sea partway round.)

[Mrs P]

Wires and battery inside a shoe? Perhaps with hindsight....

Yes OK Andy, I guess it does seem a bit obvious. Perhaps the surprising thing is that it wasn't picked up by security either at Edinburgh on the way out, or at Porto on the way back .