Essex Stragglers Orienteering Society (SOS)

New Year's Novelty Score Event
High Woods, Colchester
Friday 1st January 2010

Organisers report - Geraldine Russell geraldine@russell2.fsnet.co.uk

A scattering of snow overnight necessitated me travelling at 10mph to Highwoods so my helpers with the benefit of main roads were already there - luckily they waited around for me. Despite the weather the map delivery and placing controls was only slightly delayed and by 10.40 we were in full swing.

69 competitors seemed to thoroughly enjoy taking part with some travelling 50 miles or so.

It was dissapointing when the download equipment stopped working which meant most people not getting their scores or times. However, everyone took it in good spirit and we have not yet given up hope of retrieving the times off the boxes and publishing them on the website.

My thanks to all my helpers who made the event possible and to the members of other clubs who spent time trying to fix our download.

Thank you very much Lyn and Colin for the apres 'O' event social lunch at La Maison West in Dedham. It was most welcome and enjoyable with Colin's mulled wine thawing us out nicely.

Planners Report - Julie Laver

It was not easy after many years of this event being ably planned by Andrew Cordle to come up with an event which would be enjoyable to all who came whether family groups or hardened veterans. A twist to the normal run of the mill event seems to be the order of the day and I hope I managed to fit the bill.

I had experimented with the Norwegian course format at a recent coaching session so this seemed to be the obvious theme to go with. Andrew kindly mentored me during the planning process ensuring my control descriptions were not as vague as I normally manage and that the first part of the course was suitable for even the least able to achieve.

On the day I found the smattering of snow had changed the look of some of the control sites - especially 211 - and I thank Richard Barker for helping to site that particular one. Lesson - I must learn to use tags more effectively!!

On the whole I enjoyed planning this my first public event and despite the download breaking down so results were unable to be processed I hope all the participants did too.

If we manage to retrieve the results from the boxes the results will be published at a later date - if not it was a fun (if frustrating, depending how many wrong controls you visited!) morning run with good for January weather.

Rules

The rules and quiz questions are here.

Course

The correct course is here -

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