5/12/2021 Regional - Twigmoor Middle Distance

Report
Controller's Comments:
Twigmoor is always a challenge. It's a challenge for the organiser to make sure it has toilets, parking and the map is up to date. It's a challenge to the planner to make sure that courses use the interesting features of the wood and not just a lap of the (attractive) gull ponds. It's challenging to the competitors, of course, who try to interpret the detail of the brown, green and blue map features.
Wayne's courses provided an excellent middle distance challenge requiring all orienteering skills to be utilised, often in quick succession as the leg differed and the demands changed. Those who started later will have enjoyed sunshine and the woods at their best, with bracken brown and crunchy, leaves on the ground and just the right amount of wet features where they should be (mostly). Well done to those who were successful, I hope those who mp or dnf still enjoyed the challenge and will return another time.

Planners Comments from Twigmoor –

The task of “planner” was accepted with 4 weeks until the event start, with permission to use the woods / assembly issued.

Twigmoor is a wood of 2 halves, the complex area to the south, then the runnable open to the north. The aim was to keep as many of you in the southern area, as this makes a good middle distance event. Several hours were spent trying to make it as complex as I could. The estimated winning time was calculated from the recent delayed 2020 CSC at Tankersley. I considered this area to be on a par with Twigmoor; the planned “black” elite winning time was 35 mins, therefore all course ratios built from this. If you found your course short/long, too complex/too easy, please let me know through the organiser.

Thanks for attending this event. With a week to go the entry numbers were quite low 30 to 40 people. We debated whether it was worth holding the event; putting out controls on the Saturday & Sunday (50 of them) for just a few participants to use them. As it turned we had many more entries by Thursday midnight.

See you in the woods…. Wayne Byrne – Planner (RAF Orienteering)

Organiser's Comments

This event was staged in the nick of time. The controller was available on site from Wednesday. If I had been printing with ink-jet then you would have found the ink on the map just as wet as the woods. We had a month to plan the event and therefore Wayne must be praised for his excellent courses given the number of visits to the area limited because of work commitments.

The good thing is that there were many participants who came to download with expressions of praise for the courses. Wayne was at the finish and was available to discuss the complexity of the control siting and route choices with competitors.

Thank you all for supporting us and telling us that you enjoyed your run.

A big thank you to Tom Nelthorpe, the landowner, who grants us permission for the use of the area.

Brian

Full results
Full results
Routegadget