Hawse End Galoppen

[RJ]

What a magic day we had for the Hawse End District event!! The day after the Northern Night Champs! This is why you need to orienteer in Cumbria in the early part of the year. Never mind August and crap open fellside. Get up here for the springtime!!!!!

Photo tells it all.....

[Barny of Blandford]

Did you swim to it??? Direct line route.

[Wayward-O]

Hi. We got to the event quite late, having been slowed somewhat by the mist that seemed to cover a large part of Cumbria. How was the mist for the early runners?

[RJ]

interesting!!!!

[IanD]

Never mind August and crap open fellside.

Looks great, but don't knock open fell tops (above the bracken) in August.

[RJ]

Just so long as you know the diffence between running over the high fells (above the bracken..... that'll be in the clouds then!!) and running through the Lake District terrain in the early part of the year when the vegetation is well and truly dead. Bouth, High Rigg and Hawse End events were prime examples.

But you have missed those events!! There are a whole lot more coming up, including short races, technical series and C4 and C3 events. It is worth travelling for those rather than wait till August. Just keep an eye on the weather forecast and make good(!!) choices. The events need competitors to travel up here.... not just to provide the financial stability for the future of the sport, but for the competition against which Cumbrian orienteers can judge themselves!!

[DM]

Never mind August and crap open fellside.

Looks great, but don't knock open fell tops (above the bracken) in August.

The last Lakes 5 days, in August, used Bannisdale, Swindale and Angle Tarn Pikes. I don't recall coming across much braken, maybe routes were well planned to avoid it or it wasn't there. I saw more braken in Graythwaite. And I enjoyed all the days, so I don't fully understand RJs comment.

If you Lakes guys are so keen on getting "outsiders" up there to compete, how about one of you answering the question I posed recently about membership of second clubs making runners eligible for gallopen points.....

[RJ]

Don't know which part of Bannisdale you ran on, but I spent most of the time in bracken.

Anyway.... my point really is that the Lake District isn't about running on high fells, avoiding the bracken. If most of the UK orienteers have only run up here during the Lakes 5-Day then that event is doing a real disservice to the area. Competition in springtime is unbelievably good, when the technical terrain can be attacked hard and run through with confidence. Enjoy the areas during spring and then tell me that August is a great month!!

Check out the fixture list, keep an eye on the weather, and plan your trips to Cumbria. A lot of the events are in the south Lakes and will blow your mind!

The galoppen!! The points are awarded for Cumbrian clubs only, and they compete for the Borrowdale Trophy. It is entirely possible to have a separate set of points and a separate league. The results can be posted on another website and another competition created. The results will stand with or without scores. If there is interest in having another galoppen scoring competition, just create it on a web page and declare winners!

It would be worth considering having all the non-Cumbrian club runners lumped together and consider them as a 'club'. You would still need five scores to count for an individual 'total'. Needs someone to rework last year's event scores and create the league.

However, my general invitation is for competitors to come and compete in the Lake District springtime events, for the simple reason, that it is superb orienteering.... and not because there might be a few galoppen points available.

[Ed]

I'm not sure about second membership of an open club, but certainly having a closed non-Cumbrian club as 1st club (which appeared on results) and an open Cumbrian club as 2nd club (which never appeared on results) it used to be possible to get Galoppen points for the 2nd club - although you probably need to tell whoever the scorer is nowadays, preferably in advance!

Not sure whether the same would apply if both were open clubs - competing for both probably falls foul of a BOF rule or two...

[DM]

RJ,

I still don't have a clear answer to my question, if I joined a Cumbrian club, would we be eligible for Gallopen points? If you took the trouble to work out who I am and how many entries I plus family have had in the past year or so you might understand why I ask the question. We would make the 5 events you talk of. Manchester isn't so far really, 2 hours max, especially if you have a base in the region and make a weekend of it. (Does this qualify us a "local people" to run in "local races"??)

Ref Bannisdale, I was on the open heathery bit for all except the run in to the finish.

And yes we do come up all through the year so we appreciate all the variety you are rightly talking up.

Ed,

You come closer to an answer (which is what my understanding was) but can anyone give a definitive answer?

[DM]

Had a few minutes to work out how many Galoppens we attended last year.

3 did 7,1 did 6 (stuck in Dusseldorf for #7, sorry). Looking at the Gallopen results this is quite a few more than many "locals" managed. Another junior coming on line this year.

2 events in April, 1 May, 2 October, 1 Nov and 1 dangerously close to August in July.

All were good events which is why we keep coming back! We'll be there at Bigland and Hampsfell very soon.

[keever]

DM if you enter the event under the name of your cumbrian club there's no reason for you not to be included in the galoppen scores. You should join LOC

[deebee]

Or Warrior, possibly the cheapest orienteering club in the country

[RJ]

Yes.... there is the dilemma!! Which club should these competitors join? The tendency might be to join the biggest and that way reap the benefit of your performance. But the smaller clubs, Barro, WAROC and BL would then be disadvantaged.

Better if we just have a NCOC (Non Cumbrian O Club) for all those people. However, some good news.... the statistician Pat McIver has reworked the files. Will attempt to get them online fairly soon on the http://www.lakes-o.freeserve.co.uk site. A day or so!!

It is an interesting debate.... but hopefully will involve more input than just from DM.

[DM]

RJ,

Look forward to seeing the reworked files (thanks Pat), even if we become instant members of NCOC we can still see how we are doing against a good number of other runners. The numbers entering and the level of competition on a typical Galoppen Brown is greater than many regionals I have done.