What is it with the North East?

[CJW]

Comment by Hocolite re Kyloe National - 'It is essentially a NE regional event'.

So what is it with the North East?

Whenever major events are staged in the Region, entries are low or plummet compared to years before/after: eg Fylingdales National, British on Simonside, Harvester in Dipton. Going further back to the last JK in the NE in 1996, the year before in YHOA land, there were 1500 teams in the Relays at Gilling - the following year 500 teams when the event was in the NE - but only some 35 miles further north!!

[gross2006]

Must be something correct about NE as I see Carsten Jorgenson is on the start list:)

Also Kyloe is (or at least was) a very good area... no technical reason not to run there. First time I ran in Kyloe was at the Blue Star Trophy in 1973:)

[Becks]

Must be something correct about NE as I see Carsten Jorgenson is on the start list:)

Tis the JOK AGM weekend so his other half is coming over.

[awk]

A few possible reasons jump to mind:

1. Most big events attract a substantial "local" population (local in orienteering terms!). The North East is one of the smallest associations by membership.

2. Whilst the area is good, it isn't going to attract people on reputation.

3. Distance - if it's 2 hours away for people in the north of one neighbouring region, what's it going to be like for those from major orienteering centres of population.

3. The term "National" event has limited pulling power - what is being offered above and beyond a regional event?

4. It's mid-November.

5. Possible experiences in recent years: Fylingdales is highly unlikely to ever feature in a short list of 'great areas', and Simonside was pretty grim (I had a big gripe with the planning, but that could well have been course specific).

[King Penguin]

5. ... and Simonside was pretty grim (I had a big gripe with the planning, but that could well have been course specific).

My biggest concern with Simonside was that I felt the younger junior classes should have been kept to the lower wooded slopes at that time or the year and not taken "over the top" - esp. as the conditions turned out.

[Klebe]

Most people have no idea about the North East in general, never mind the orienteering!! Simonside would have been a brilliant event, but for the weather. Something outside the control of any association.
Unfortunately you are looking at a four and a half, five hour journey to Kyloe just from the midlands. (Took me 3 1/2 hours to get to the N\castle v Brum match last Saturday )
The north east is wonderfully friendly people, fantastic beaches which stretch for miles and miles, superb history and legend. The Kyloe event is a brilliant excuse for visiting Lindisfarne (or the Holy Island if you prefer). If you are going up there you need to travel on Saturday, do the sights, then orienteer on the Sunday – unless you live no further south than say Sheffield. (Unfortunately there are no games this weekend so a visit to St James Park is not on.- unlike Simonside where it was straight from the event to the ‘hotel’ for a wash and brush up then off to the match!
To put the whole thing in context, I have had numerous 5 hr and more, journeys back from the Lake district ( two and a half to get there) due to the diabolical M6 on a Sunday. Travel north and extend you horizons, it is well worth the journey.
I am surprised there are so few, if any, of the Edinburgh mafia on the start list. Where are you all ??

[badger]

They shall be mostly training up in the hills that weekend. Or at the Walton Chasers event.

[rob f]

Ok Lets Put It This Way
Regions and High Rep Areas
SW Penhale, Forest Of Dean
SC New Forest, Chilterns, Star Posts
SE Leith, Winterfold (and others, i don't really know that region)
EA None With Huge Reputation (Hatfield or Beeston Maybe)
EM None Except Maybe Sherwood Pines/Forest
WM Brown Clee, Cannock Chase
Wales Newborough, the one on cader idris, the Myndds, And the south sanddune areas
NW Bigland, GRaythwaite, High Dam ETC
NE NONE
Scotland STACKS

ok. lets look at these areas and groups of areas which have high reputations.
( I may have missed some) The EM/EA are close to large areas of population, and rarely have very big events. The North East does have Newcastle but unlike say Derbyshire, which is situated in the centre of the west midland/north west/south yorkshire conurbations, it just isn't close to any large areas of orienteers. Many more go to the lakes and scotland due to these areas having a better reputation for orienteering


Best of luck to everyone at Kyloe, hope you enjoy yourselves

[FatBoy]

Rob - it's a little unfair to call Star Posts (to pick on one) a "high rep area" and then not include Kyloe in the NE. As for EM - Sherwood forest isn't maybe classy but is up there with many on your list - I would parallel with the New Forest for example. If I read your list and select the ones I would actively travel a long way for I'll only be Orienteering in Cornwall, Wales, Lakes and Scotland!

I suspect AWK has the reasons covered. How many have actually run on Kyloe? I suspect those that haven't are put off by recent trips as AWK says. I've already said I'm not going to another NE event on an unknown area!

[HOCOLITE]

Awk's reasons were probably spot on. The NE and particularly Kyloe is periferal for the majority of orienteers. Welsh areas suffer in the same way unless they are close to M4 and England! Like Penhale and others. Orienteers remember previous experiences and make rational descisions. Mid November- after the clocks change, likely to be wet/windy or even very cold. These are travel condition considerations as opposed to orienteering. Decisions of course can be wrong Cornwall in May...... Well 1 day was great wasn't it

[Ed]

I've already said I'm not going to another NE event on an unknown area!

I don't see how any area can be "unknown" - check out the 1:25,000 map on the OS website and you can pretty quickly work out whether an area's going to be any good...

as for the NE - there's some really good areas that compare favourably with many of those in Rob's list. There's also some areas that aren't as good as they used to be (significant felling taking the best bits out), and admittedly some (many?) that have never been and will never be anything other than mediocre at best. Mainly I think NE suffers from distance to major O centres (although Edinburgh's not that far away) and a poor image, probably partly because big events in the NE always seem to end up in March or November when the weather's liable to be bad (probably access problems I guess)

My subjective list:
quality NE areas (in no particular order):
Cook's Country/Hutton Lowcross/Roseberry Topping (an area with many aliases - JK96 day 1/BUSA 99 area)
Mulgrave Woods
Kyloe (although is often out of condition due to felling/windblow/etc.)
Duke's House
Simonside (not everyone's cup of tea, but I'd take it over most areas in Forest of Dean or the New Forest (not that I've ever run there!) anyday)
Bewick Moor (again, I happen to like open areas and there's some nice bits in there!)

areas not as good as they used to be:
Dipton (felling of many of the nicest bits)
Slaley (actually, I've not been there for a while - it may be starting to get into a better condition again fairly soon)

really painfully bad areas:
Boltby (I went to a second event there, and regretted it doubly)
Spen Banks (don't worry, it's too small to try having a major event on it)

[RJ]

really painfully bad areas:
Boltby (I went to a second event there, and regretted it doubly)

I went to Boltby in 1977 (23.10.77) and found the bracken montrous in all areas, hard going (notes made on the map!). Course A, 8.4k 280m. Map produced by Patons OC. Results also show members from LO running. Two O clubs now gone! No memories of the event though.

[Supersaint]

Ok Lets Put It This Way
Regions and High Rep Areas
NE NONE

that may just be because you haven't run on any! when i travel to other regions it's usually to a major event, and regions try to put their 'bigger' events on decent areas - therefore when you travel to other regions you are usually sampling the best they have. I am personally looking forward to the event in the NE this weekend as it looks like a great area (having dug out my BOC '91 map).

[mharky]

Star Posts, high rep area??? If you mean high reputation as in many people don't want to go there, than that would be right. It's not like people would flock there from other sides of the country. Unless of course it was the JK or British that is...

[neil m37]

[quote="RJ} Map produced by Patons OC. Results also show members from LO running. Two O clubs now gone! [/quote]

LO (Lanchester Orienteers) renamed itself Northern Navigators - a club still going strong. Patons (I think) was a forerunner of Cleveland OK. And Boltby is horrible, but is really a Yorkshire area. The north east has plenty of reasonable orienteering - Kyloe is better than anything on offer in Yorkshire and certainly better than Kilnsey. It is just a very long way away.