oldglutton6

GRAMP Gossip and socials

Did you get an email on 20th Jan from our new Secretary, Zoe Griffin, with the title ‘GRAMP Gossip’?

She’s started up a monthly(ish) missive partly to inform you of up-and-coming events, what’s going on behind the scenes and to set a monthly(ish) challenge, and also partly so you know that the club is still ticking over despite enforced hibernation right now and wants to keep in touch. Hopefully you do too.

(Some people have let us know that they didn’t get anything from Zoe but did get the forwarded version from me or they didn’t get anything at all – if you fall into those categories please let me know and I’ll try again. One of the things I’m going to finally get round to looking at is an alternative method of distribution so if there’s anyone out there using MailChimp or similar and can offer opinion or advice then email me soon and save me a bit of legwork. Ta! Rachel flump@care4free.net)

Still no orienteering events on the foreseeable horizon but we’d love to catch up with everyone’s news so we’ve decided to try out some socials via Zoom instead of shivering in a car park, knackered, hungry and secretly wanting to just get home at this time of year. Got to be better sat in comfort and warmth with a mug or glass of something to hand, chatting to other little boxes of comfort and warmth?

Rather than just sit staring at each other’s little boxes though we wanted make these socials activity-based to ease the spotlight effect especially on those that don’t find it so easy to chat away. As there’s no such thing as a standard orienteering personality we’re going to throw some things out there, see what gets a thumbs up and then organise more of the same for you until we can go back to shivering etc.

Wed 27th Jan. 19:00
Quizzy sort of evening with a bit of trivia, scavenger hunt, puzzles, some orienteering themed questions… whatever else Ros and Rachel can dream up and implement in a week. Bonus points for inventive answers, unusual headgear, bad jokes, or anything else we like the look/sound of.

Wed 3rd Feb. 19:00
Online Escape Room – B.R.U.C.E Project
“A freak accident results in Dr. Wilder Snr becoming little more than a brain in a jar. You must help his son to uncover the secret that will let him resurrect his father’s mind and plant it into an adorable little robot.
The puzzles are deliberately made so that your team has to work together to solve them with a mix of deciphering code, symbol/colour matching and pathfinding.”
We’ll group players into smaller teams of 2 or 3 households and need to gather names so we can arrange sufficient entries. Please reply to flump@care4free.net by Tues 2nd if you fancy this.

Wed 17th Feb. 19:00
Not sure yet but either something like Pictionary or Bring-a-Quiz-to-a-Quiz night where other members can contribute rounds/activities and gain themselves an automatic bumper bonus point haul (like DNC Organisers get 50 points for planning and organising an event in the series.)

To join in any of these you’ll need the Zoom link which is in the GRAMP Gossip email.
I’m not going to broadcast it again here for obvious reasons so if you don’t have it email me. Rachel

PS If you don’t have the technology or really, really don’t like using Zoom how about sending us suggestions about what sort of ‘offline’ social you would like to see as we’re sort of stumped on this at the moment but don’t want you to feel left out.

All activities suspended until further notice

Here we go, two, three, four…. (although I think Jilted John was referring to beats in the bar, not tiers)

SOA has tweeted that all orienteering activities are to be suspended until further notice while we’re in Lockdown again. You can still use MapRun courses for training or exercise but stick to the current rules about how far from home/boundary and how many and who can go with you.

“Further notice” may be some time yet so any requests for new MapRuns?
Let me know on webmaster@grampoc.com and I’ll see what I can do.

HHH2021 Results

Thankyou to all who attended our annual 2nd January event at Hazlehead.

Results are below –

Long Course –

1. Patrick Lang 25.00
2. Dominykas Kardokas 25.17
3. Tim Griffin 28.10
4. Sam Gomersall 29.32
5. Lesley Gomersall 30.53
6. Julian Robinson 30.58
7. Dennis McDonald 31.33
8. John Lang 32.42
9. Hugh Nicholson 34.10
10. Lynn Smith 34.38
11. Marianne Lang 37.03
12. David Esson 38.35
13. Eric Lovie 39.59

Short Course –

1. David Esson 18.23
2. Ros Nicholson 18.48
3. Samantha McDonald 28.04
4. George Esson 37.00
5. Lindsey Esson 43.18
6. Daisy Cooper 45.44
7. Magnus Huthwaite 53.08
8. Joanna McDonald 55.13
Helen Greenwood -No Time Recorded

DNC 6/1 @ Hazlehead ***CANCELLED***

Well, looks like it’s probably game over for this season’s DNC now that everyone is back in Lockdown and SOA have tweeted that all orienteering activities are to be suspended until further notice which may be March so too late for night O. Hey ho! It was fun while it lasted.

DNC 23/12 @ Templars Park ***POSTPONED***

Annoyingly, Templars Park lies just beyond Aberdeen City boundary – only 300m or so but still technically off limits to city dwellers as per Tier 3 guidance on travel for informal exercise vs organised sports and SOA confirmed yesterday that we shouldn’t be encouraging folk to break the rules by accepting entries from anyone from ‘the other side’.

We haven’t had that many entries to date and as we were expecting the bulk of entries to come from Gramps who live inside city limits, and given that it’s a bit of a novelty event rather than a full-on TD5 DNC, we’ve decided to postpone for a while. Sorry to anyone who was looking forward to it, especially any kids or novices keen to tackle the Orange. We will run it at some point in the New Year as soon as we all get back to Tier 2.

I think for the time being GRAMP and MAROC have agreed to continue running events with entries limited to those who live on the ‘right’ side of the boundary (although there’s a couple of GRAMP ones where we may have to swap planners as they live on the ‘wrong’ side to their area – and when the music stops…!) and we’ll come up with some way of adjusting the league points to discount any events which fall into the Tier 3 trap.

In the meantime, stay safe and have a Happy Local Christmas everyone!

Have you peaked yet?

“The slope of these curves varies by task. For example, in sports that rely heavily on physiological fitness—like sprinting 100 meters—the decline of the fitness curve would be steeper than in a sport like alpine climbing or orienteering, where pure fitness matters less and wisdom gained through experience matters more.”
(Outside Online An Ode to Aging)

Want to move the curve for wisdom? Then look out for news on club training which we hope to recommence next year along with more Come and Try It sessions.

Calling all speccy wearers…

Would you like to help a Loughborough student, William Smith, help you by coming up with a solution to misty specs while out orienteering? Then please take a few minutes to complete this survey to help him get a better insight into the problem (his words not mine!!)

DNC 9/12 @ Foggieton Results

Sorry for the slight delay – a weird side effect of timing we’ve not seen before meant those of us with early starts had negative times before David managed to sort it all out late last night. BTW, thanks David for your help on IT and Starts at all the Gramp DNCs, much appreciated by the Planners and also runners – it’s Wed, it’s dark, there’s David standing in the middle of a wood with a clip board and a welcoming quip – a little bit of consistency while everything is so topsy-turvy still.

Short Results Splits
Long Results Splits
RG

Thanks to Dennis McDonald for succeeding in his mission to catch a lot of us out old hands out in an area we think we should know really well by now. Why is being “lost” in a 100m x 100m patch of terrain so addictive?

Is it mapped?

Dreaming of autumn city O breaks back in the old days…. this looks like it would be fun for a Friday night race to kick off a weekend. It’s in Awaza, a luxury resort in Turkey.

DNC 25/11 @ Dunnottar Woods

Short Results Splits
Long Results Splits

RouteGadget

Crathes 6/12 Results

We misinterpreted the messages about “Guides” and “car parks” and weren’t expecting a very well supported open air market going on full swing in the Guides’ field. Thanks to Sam and Lesley for taking it all in their Organiser/Planner stride and organising some impromptu parking marshalling on top of hanging the last few controls this morning.
Did anyone go shopping after their run? (Anyone who knows me and my email address won’t be surprised to find out that I was a bit annoyed when I got home, looked it up to see what it was all about and discovered I’d missed out on a chance to purchase goodies from “Flump and Fudge” amongst others!)

Yellow Results and Splits
Orange Results and Splits
Green Results and Splits
Blue Results and Splits
(BTW, I am working on how to get the flashy SI generated html results file uploaded to WordPress but a quick search for instructions talks about editing key files in the background and I wanted to get results up asap so it’s separate pdfs again for now while I chew it over until I feel brave enough to dabble!)

RouteGadget BOF points (calculated overnight)

Invoices have been fired out – you should have received an email from Grampian Orienteers c/o no-reply@izettle.com. You need to click on the “Show invoice” button and that will then open up a browser window showing an itemised invoice (Senior fees, Junior/Student fees, non-NTS member parking fee) and a payment button at the bottom for you to pay by card please. If you have any queries about your invoice contact webmaster@grampoc.com.

Have you visited the BOF website recently? See anyone you know?

Go on – take a careful look at the scrolling photos at the top…. https://www.britishorienteering.org.uk/home

DNC 11/11 @ Crathes Results

Short Results Splits
Long Results Splits
RouteGadget
BOF results

We parked in the bottom level of the car park initially but swiftly moved up after realising that the heavy rain at ~17:30 was being beautifully backlit by the headlights of cars on the top level and making it look really, really uninviting! We were eventually shamed into getting out and getting on with it by all those kids running around having great fun in the wet and dark.

Thanks to Ian Hamilton for planning and Paul Duley for stepping in to cover tonight and David for IT/Results/Start Ticker-Off in Chief.

Scottish Women and Girls in Sport Week 2020

Have you spotted the articles going up on the SOA site highlighting the achievements and contributions of various individuals?
Heidi Ross and Marie Bernards of AUOC were in the spotlight on Tuesday. They’re doing a great job currently coaching via Zoom amongst other things to help keep AUOC fired up about orienteering and it’s obviously working as it was good to see some of their teammates out at Balmedie for the first DNC including Lucie Hamplova and Margarita Radeva.
Nice to see the lads too obviously but you don’t fit the (rather binary) W&GSW criteria, so sorry, but no namecheck this time!

Sam’s in the Squads!

Congratulations to Sam Griffin on his selection for the ScotJOS Squad and the British Orienteering Talent Squad Tier 1. Despite the lack of events this year, Sam’s been keeping fit with lots of running and cycling and we had wondered if he would be able to remember how to orienteer still but any concerns were squashed on Wednesday night when he came over to the dark side and romped round the DNC Long course at Balmedie in 5th position on his first night O ever.

Check the announcement on the SOA website to see who his ScotJOS team mates will be. And the BOF site for the Talent Squad.

So now the question is… with no cake stalls allowed at the moment how are Team Griffin planning to raise funds this time?

Nothing to do with orienteering but…

…does feature three Gramps. Can you spot them?

DNC 28/10 @ Balmedie Results

Big thank you to Julian Robertson for starting us off with two great courses threading in and out of the dunes. So nice to feel the sand between your toes again even if, like me, your rusty O skills were really given a test tonight.

Short Results Splits
Long Results Splits

RouteGadget
BOF results

Glen Dye snaps and thoughts

Well, who would have thought all that mud, marsh, bog and assorted wet stuff would have produced so many excited, grinning faces? We’re a weird bunch!

It’s been a very strange few weeks as what was supposed to have been a simple little local event firstly attracted folk from far, far further afield than we’d ever have expected normally and then got snarled up in local lockdown shenanigans towards the end. I have to admit that at various stages of the process both Pete and I thought “Why bother? It’s bound to get cancelled due to another Lockdown.” But I’m glad we did. It was just as enjoyable for me watching those grins (and listening to the traditional moans about fitness or making the same old mistakes – nothing changes that much!) and we both appreciated it when many of you came to find us to say “Thanks for a great bit of old school orienteering” or “Thank you for rebooting the sport and helping us get out again.” You’re welcome!

Although it means fewer helpers required on the day with no Registration queue, we found the main complication was pre-entry and start time allocation during the run up to the event. I was on holiday for 2 weeks shortly after entries opened so a big thank you to Kimi Raikkonen (aka David Esson) for fielding all those emails and plotting the start times as well as acting as Covid Officer liaising with SOA. This meant all I had to do was think about logistics, normal safety stuff on the day, handling the money side and volunteers.
I think job sharing will be the way to go for a while now and why not into the future as well?

Also thanks to Helen Rowlands (non-runner) for putting in a shift as chief car park attendant assisted by Paul Duley and Ian Hamilton; the Gomersalls for overseeing the Green and Short Brown Start (Lesley’s doodling shows it was quite a relaxed affair obviously); Bob Daly and Tim Griffin, Ace Control Collectors Inc; George Esson who assisted David on Download; and last but not least, Jonathan Smith for helping me fish kit out of the shed and then ferry a lot of it back again after the event to save me another journey.

Rachel

Glen Dye Results 11/10/20

Thank you for everyone who attended today. We were very lucky with the weather.

Special thanks go to Rachel (Organiser) and Pete (Planner) for putting on a great event.

This was our first relatively larger event since Lockdown was eased, and also our first proper effort using the new SI Equipment, so I hope things went smoothly enough for the competitors.

Below should be the PDF of the results and splits.

David

Results for Glen Dye -11 Oct 2020.pdf

Split Times for Glen Dye – Orange.pdf

Split Times for Glen Dye -Yellow.pdf

Split Times for Glen Dye – Short Brown.pdf

Split Times for Glen Dye -Green.pdf

Routegadget     Apologies as this isn’t the georef’ed version of the map so all you GPS gadget fans will have to tinker a bit.
(Useless but mildly interesting fact: the last time we put something on  Gramp’s RG was Glen Dye night O in March.)

BOF results page with ranking points

Thank you, EUOC!

I just wanted to acknowledge EUOC’s sensible attitude to recent announcements and to thank them for their decision to pull out of our event at Glen Dye this weekend. Technically they didn’t have to as there is no travel ban as such but they’ve obviously taken on board the recent headlines that “researchers at UCL said 86.1% of infected people picked up by the Office for National Statistics Covid-19 survey between April and June had none of the main symptoms of the illness, namely a cough, or a fever, or a loss of taste or smell the day they had the test” and decided that discretion now, even though they feel fit and well and were really looking forward to a dose of Deeside, will hopefully help avoid a second full Lockdown later as well as showing concern for fellow orienteers and anyone else they may have come into contact with on the journey.

Thanks, guys!

Aberdeen University Urban MapRun 30th Sept 2020 Results

Here’s the results from tonight’s MapRun Event.

Great to see so many folk turn up on such after such a wet day, although it did stop raining in the end. Shortest distance covered was 3.1km (I think I measured the shortest route would be 3km) whilst others got more km for their money, some running over 4.5km.

This was sadly our last Urban Event due to the lack of daylight but hopefully we’ll to see some of you at the Glen Dye Event on Sunday 11th October. And we hope you’ve enjoyed the MapRun series. [end]

Aberdeen Uni Urban Map Run Results 2020.pdf

Results for Duthie Park and Ferryhill Urban Sprint 23 September 2020

Here are the results from tonight’s sprint event, corrected for Tim Griffin’s GPS placing him on somebody’s roof rather than at control 3….

Thank you to everyone who came!

Duthie Park and Ferryhill 23 September 2020 Results.pdf

Is it mapped?

Urban-meets-classic. Even just getting there would be fun, never mind keeping track of yourself in that maze.

Urban Sprint Westhill 16th Sept Results

Results

If you want to give us your time, Ros, we’ll update these?
We trust you! 😉

Urban Sprint Danestone 9th Sept Results

Results

MapRun results page
Click on anyone’s “Track” link next to their name to get through to the MR RouteGadget and you can replay the race.

If you’re wanting back into the MapRun event to adjust your pings (now there’s a phrase you don’t hear very often?) in MapRunF HITMO function the code is 9183. The code expires at 23:00 anyway after which anyone can go in and look at results.
From now on we’ll print the code on the map.

The GPS definitely seems to work better on some models of phone or a Garmin watch. Would be interesting to find out which phones folk are using as I suspect it’s an aging tech thing even though the tech in question is only a few years old. Mine’s a Samsung J3 c. 2016 which struggles to keep up with even my chugging pace and only pinged 9 times on the way round whereas Pete’s newer Samsung A40 c. mid-2019 got all 13 pings first time tonight.

MapRunF: how to amend your results for missing controls

For the geeky amongst you here’s an advantage to using MapRunF rather than MapRun: you can review, amend and re-submit your splits to include controls that didn’t ping for whatever reason. On the grounds that many folk are self-timing and will be running straight through the control sites rather than waiting for a ping, I’m happy to trust MapRunners to do this yourselves too and adjust after. It’s all a lowkey, fun way to get us back into the swing of things after all.

Want to geek? Here’s how using the “Hey, I think the GPS missed one” (HITMO) function:

1. Reload last night’s event if necessary (no PIN required now – they expire at 23:00 on the day of the event)
2. Select “Show Results” at the bottom and then last night’s event from the top of the list.
3. When you see your trace on the screen, select the menu button top right and then “Review Results (HITMO)”
4. Tap the info button top right for instructions how to locate and select missing controls. The same instructions can also be found here.
5. Tap “Submit a Revised Result” at the bottom.

You can’t edit times though so what I suggest in future is if you visit a control and after a few seconds still no ping and you’re certain you’re in the right place then move on and HITMO at the end if necessary. And I promise to be more careful plotting the remaining courses for this year’s Urban Sprints series.

Rachel

Cove Urban Sprint

It was great to see so many old friends again tonight, tempted out for a run despite the weather threatening to dump on us big time.

Thanks for being game guineapigs and joining the MapRun Tribe. A few lessons learned, not least that I need a new pair of glasses having plotted no. 8 in the wrong place – please accept my apologies for that. We’ll see if we can make some adjustments to the manual set of results tomorrow to compensate those of you who were affected.

It seems that responsiveness varies quite widely from phone to phone. I found myself having to loiter for several seconds at some controls waiting for the next satellite to come round but it did give me time to get my breath back and plan ahead.

The most weird thing reported, by Phil, was having an icecream van drive by drowning out the sound of his phone beeping.

MapRun was the original app which gave you the experience you had tonight but required an administrator to upload courses. Then came MapRunF which also has some natty features allowing you to set your own courses or check control positions all by phone. And now there’s MapRunG for Garmin watches which Sam Griffin was trialling tonight. We’ll let you know whether it gets the thumbs up.

Danestone next week. Look out for an email from David Kirk with details and email address to pre-enter. Thanks for your patience waiting for your allocated start time or quietly slotting yourselves into a gap if you spotted it. Remember it’s all about maintaining 2m distancing between ‘strangers’ so don’t blow it by crowding round phone screens afterwards! (Didn’t think that one through when I suggested using MapRun.) As orienteers you’ll be wanting a scale so…
2m = 6.666667 orienteering kites side by side.

Urban Sprint Cove 2nd Sept Results

Results
MapRun results/RouteGadget

I’ve tried to adjust the times for those who were affected by number 8 being in the wrong position by looking at the traces on RouteGadget to see who obviously spent minutes wandering back and forth. Later starters were tipped off and self-timers would have been blissfully unaware anyway so rather than try voiding the legs (too much maths) I did some pseudo-analysis and adjustments for half a dozen of you.
(Before emailing me to complain about this favoritism, the others might want to check that they bagged number 15 the proper way i.e. by running right round into that group of houses and not just fortuitously picking it up from the grassy patch on the west side of the fence.)

You’ll notice that Sam’s time remains unadjusted as he didn’t wait that long before deciding to carry on regardless. I’ve since sussed out how you can do the same and then adjust your results control list using the HITMO function after you finish. See this post on how to do that using MapRunF (the original MapRun app doesn’t have this function but if you used it last night I think you should still be able to use MapRunF to adjust.)
On the grounds that we’re trusting self-timers to “visit” controls we’ll allow this for future Urban Sprints this year but will check your trace looks like you did actually go to the right area as shown on the map.

We had one or two folk finish but didn’t come back to Registration to report in. As we’re not downloading we need you to do that please so we can tick you off as back safe and sound.

Glen Dye 19/8/20 CANCELLED

Glen Dye has also fallen into the same trap as Crathes & Tollohill unfortunately: area OK but planner and equipment in Lockdown in ABZ DOH!

But we’re using the time to think ahead to the Urban Sprint Series due to start Wed 2nd Sept and crossing everything that ABZ will be given the all clear by then.
Just in case of further disruptions though we’re planning a wee experiment this year (everything’s so topsy-turvy anyway!) and hope to use the MapRun app for timing but will still provide paper maps for all if required and the option to self-time for those who prefer. We’ll still need you to pre-register and allocate start times to comply with BOF/SOA Covid precautions same as we were going to do for the Summer Series.

More details to follow soon.

Crathes event 5/8/20 CANCELLED

As the local Aberdeen Lockdown has just been implemented and the Planner and many competitors live in the City and can’t now travel that far we’ve had to cancel the event at Crathes tonight.
We may be able to rearrange it for later in the year so watch this space for news on both Crathes and our other Summer event at Tollohill that may also be affected.

Covid 19

We want clubs, volunteers and participants to feel safe, confident and also enjoy their first experiences returning to orienteering events. So Scottish Orienteering have put together an Event Guidance document and a COVID-19 Risk Assessment which has been approved by Scottish Government and we also have the support of sportscotland.

Why club members only at the moment?
It’s to do with contact tracing should the need arise, minimising numbers of people using an area at any one time and so we can practice our new anti-C19 measures.

What are these new anti-C19 measures?
Simple things to minimise the amount of person-to-person contact and the risk of person-object-person transmission so for example we ask runners to register in advance, pay by contactless gizmo, no results displayed at the event or anything else like cake stalls that would cause folk to gather in larger groups, provision of sanitiser as well as general observance of the current government guidelines. For a fuller list, see our Covid 19 info page.

Oooh! Shiny new stuff!

Look what we’ve got to play with for future events now we’re gearing up to restart O post Lockdown! Control numbers have been added to the ‘Technical Info for Planners’ post which can always be found easily (along with info for Organisers, Controllers and Competitors) using the menu at the top.

We also have a small stock of SI dibbers available for those without their own which will be sanitised prior to dishing out for the forseeable future as part of the C-19 precautions put in place at future events.

That nice welcoming ‘ding’!

The Gramp MapRun Factory (Rachel) has been busy over the last couple of weeks and we now have several more courses uploaded courtesy of Sarah Dunn. From Aberdeen Uni and Perwinnes Moss (4 variations Easy to Tech) down to Stonehaven via Cove. Or a novelty twist based on and Aberdeen Street Art Trail. You pays no money and takes ‘yer choice!

More ideas are being worked on by a couple of other Gramps too and we’re open to suggestions for either areas to use or courses to convert. Ping an email to webmaster@grampoc.com to get your requests/offers in for either MapRun or lowkey trad courses as we start to prepare for travel restrictions being lifted even further.

And the ‘ding’ bit? That’s how Tim Griffin described the noise his phone made at each control when test running Perwinnes Moss.

GMC 2020 postponed until next year

Due to the many ongoing uncertainties caused by Covid, we have decided to postpone the GMC until 2021 probably still in November again. More information to follow later in the year.

We know this will be a disappointment to many, not least our regulars from south of the border who have been looking forward to treating themselves after Lockdown, but we feel it better to wait and be able to make concrete plans and proper preparations rather than play “will it, won’t it” for the next few months.

Holiday abroad anyone?

As some of you said you’d like to do more of the virtual O here’s one somebody else made earlier. No cryptic shenanigans just straight forward questions to answer thanks to an Italian club in Trentino.

Question form (in English – they’ve cottoned on they’ve got an international audience) has links to the O map and Google imagery. Too late to submit the form now to take part in the competition but do it anyway with a big THANKYOU! on the bottom.

Visit https://oritrentino.it/virtual-cpop/ for more of these but you’ll have to translate the questions.

Tics

In anticipation of Phase 1 and greater flexibility meaning we can get out and further about, here’s a wee reminder that starts about 1 min 40 secs in on BBC’s Out of Doors Out of Doors – Archaeology, Cloud Gazing and Wildlife Watching – BBC Sounds

Abz Uni Kings Campus virtual O answers and winners

Answers

Congratulations to Helen and Stuart for winning the “answer them all” category gaining 980/1000 points in a time of 4:00 GMT (Gin Mit Tonic) and I know they will now be puzzling over how they got that now they have the answers to check as it doesn’t match up. (Clue: arbitrary bonus points awarded for bothering to convert four score merks into £sd.)

Jeremy came second despite sprinting out of the blocks as soon as the quiz was posted, even supplying photographic evidence, but then fell victim of WiFi problems so didn’t manage to answer them all before the deadline and incurred a few penalties in his panicked rush to submit by Monday.

Pete won both the “500 points with least number of controls” and “most controls in 30 mins” categories by dint of no other entries.

I know of more folk, non-Gramps, who had a go but didn’t want to submit answers so would you like another of these but without the competition side to it? Leave me a comment.

Abz Uni Kings Campus virtual O

Take a virtual tour of the Abz Uni Kings Campus map using Google Maps/Streetview to “visit” controls and have a look around to find the answers to questions in this Score event.

The questions are all based on what’s visible in the latest Streetview imagery so don’t bother visiting on the ground as the same objects may not be there any more. This is purely armchair orienteering so grab a coffee/tipple and get clicking instead.
All control sites are either right on or visible from the nearest Streetviewed vantage point or can be found via the Photosphere blue dots.

Control scores vary from 10 to 100 depending on whether
– the answer is staring you in the face
– you need to do a bit more manouevring/zooming/panning (like Trail O)
– a bit of a parallel Google hunt required triggered by what you observe
– cryptic clues with the answer word lengths in brackets, e.g. (3, 6, 3)
– a couple which will really test your Google search skills unless you happen to be or know a local historian (but the answers suggested themselves within a few clicks while I was noodling around so shouldn’t take you hours.)

Google Maps centered on Start
O map with Score controls
(You may find it easier to have two devices on the go to view side by side.)
“Loose” control descriptions if you want them – they are also on the O map
Question sheet xls pdf

1. Choose a challenge from the four types listed at the top of the question sheet, depending on preference for easy ride to brainbending.
2. Time yourself – be honest!
3. Visit your chosen controls and fill in the answers
4. Send your sheets to webmaster@grampoc.com by 11th May. Postable lavish prizes may be up for grabs!

Gramp Orienteering Bingo Game – April 2020

Which Gramp members, past or present, or anyone can get a tick off the boxes to get a cross (X), a frame around the outside, or a full house?!

Click on the pic to view biggified version.

Answers – Gramp map sprint recognition – 8 Apr 2020.JPG

Answers to the Orienteering Puzzle

1. Aberdeen University, building: new library
2. Seaton Park and Hillhead, building: ‘the boiler room’
3. Hazlehead Park, building: café
4. Westhill, building: shopping centre
5. Danestone, building: Grandholm dental clinic
6. Cove, building: Altens hotel
7. Duthie Park, building: toilet block
8. Westburn & Victoria Park, building: toilet block

Well done to all the winners – prizes…. found on the next event.

Click on the pic to view enlarged version.

Gramp map sprint recognition – 8 Apr 2020.pdf

Hello,

Sprint map recognition brought to you by Sam, they are all from Gramp Sprint area, and there’s a bonus point if you guess correctly the function of the building shown in each extract. 😉

Prizes for all…!

See attached PDF. Answers in next week.

Posted by Jeremy.

Gramp map sprint recognition – 8 Apr 2020.pdf

Answers to “Gramp Orienteering Lock in Quiz”

Well done to all of you who tried the "Gramp Orienteering Lock in Quiz".

Answers -> And see attached PDF.

1. Hazlehead
2. Scolty
3. Crathes
4. Tyrebagger
5. Glen Dye
6. Forvie
7. Foggieton
8. Balmedie

Next Quiz Due tomorrow Wednesday 8th April.

Answers – Grampian Orienteering Lock in Quiz.pdf

Gramp Orienteering Lock in Quiz

Hello,

What with all the Orienteering suspended – do you know or can you find which location belongs to each map snippet?

– for many this will be easy…

– answers in 1 weeks time.

See attached PDF.

Comments welcome!

Grampian Orienteering Lock in Quiz No. 1.pdf

(JD)2C so far…

Rankings following Birsemore can be found here.

Obviously with the current suspension of all orienteering events until further notice there won’t be any more updates for a while. Next counting event will be advised when orienteering resumes following all relevant guidelines from BOF and UK government.

All orienteering suspended due to Covid 19 coronavirus

Those of you who are British Orienteering members will have received an email this morning (17/3/20) announcing the suspension of all orienteering activities with immediate effect on the advice of PHE, WHO and others.

All bets are off as to when we can recommence but I think you’ll need to find alternatives for your exercise fix for some weeks if not months to come. Cue MapRun! BUT… DO NOT TRAVEL UNNECESSARILY JUST TO DO THIS AND PLEASE NOTE THAT THESE ARE NOT OFFICIAL BRITISH ORIENTEERING REGISTERED EVENTS OR ACTIVITIES.

We’ll see about adding some more courses for you to have a go at when restrictions are relaxed but for the moment keep it local, don’t all go at once and respect the 2m rule. Stay safe everyone!

GRAMPIAN MOUNTAIN CHALLENGE 7th/8th NOV: postponed until 2021

CompassSport Cup/Trophy Heats and Scottish Middle Distance Champs 2020

Well done to the 5 Gramps who went down to Errochty over the weekend to fly the flag for the club (metaphorically, don’t think they actually took a banner) in the CompassSport Trophy for smaller clubs. I’ve seen the maps and looks like Sam & Tim Griffin, Sam & Lesley Gomersall and Bob Daly between them covered a mighty lot of contours to earn their points.

INT, MOR and INVOC go through to the Trophy Final and FVO and ESOC to the Cup Final. Good luck everyone!

And double congrats go to Sam Griffin who won M16 at the Middle Distance Champs at Gleneagles where Morven and Kirsty Farquharson came 3rd and 4th W16 and Neil McLean 2nd HyperVet.

There’s no photo to show these podium perchers as prize giving didn’t happen due to measures to limit gatherings/contact. (Kissing trophies has got to be a sure-fire way to catch something even if it’s not Covid-19?)

Johnshaven SOUL

Always thought Johnshaven would make a good place for a SOUL and Maroc proved me right today with Nick Hale exploiting the best bits to full advantage. David Esson was keeping his powder dry for his Birsemore Black Binge tomorrow but wandered around watching the entertainment and took some photos of various Gramps (and 2 ex-Gramps) in action…..

I particularly like the one of Iain with the creels next to the wheelie bins. It’s urban, Jim, but not as many people know it.

New Membership Secretary

Many thanks to Helen Anderson for diligently carrying out Membership Sec duties over the last decade or so – not sure when she started but it certainly feels like a loooooong time ago.

She’s now handed over the files of office to Lesley Gomersall so thanks to Lesley too for taking over.

Anyone else out there wanting to assist us with some of these backroom roles please get in touch as we can always find a suitable slot for your particular skills/preferences.

Right now we could really do with someone (or two someones if you work better as part of a team) to ramp up our Facebook site or help us swap to other platforms you think might help and to come up with some fresh ideas re advertising or otherwise spreading the word to newcomers.

Does this sound like you? Please get in touch with David Esson or one of the other committee members.

DNC Glen Dye 4/3/20

Results Splits RG

Many thanks to Paul Duley for doing the honours tonight and David Esson for computing. Bit of a shock to find Glen Dye looking considerably different tonight but hopefully enough left for the Regional we’ll be holding here in October.

Scottish Night Champs 2020

Congratulations to those Gramps who travelled up to take part in the Scottish Night Champs held at Findhorn last weekend.
Looks like an intriguing mix of urban/forest/dunes judging from RouteGadget so it’ll be interesting to hear what they thought of it.
Did it encourage a few more folk to have a go than would do if it were all forest I wonder?

M45 Matthew Parkes 6th
W21 Katrina McLeod 3rd
M55 Sam Gomersall 4th
W50 Helen Rowlands 4th, Ros Nicholson 5th
W55 Lesely Gomersall 3rd
M40 David Esson 1st
M75 Neil McLean 1st