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.

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.

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.

Quiet corner of Crathes inside the Gramp stockade.
Ian had finished his course and Lindsey in the background was having a break from car parking.
Great last (daytime) event of 2020 – many thanks to all the Esson’s for help with car parking, IT and down load.
Also Hugh and Ros for Start and control collection.
Happy Christmas to all!
Sam and Lesley Gomersall

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?

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

UrbanBrickWall0544590Here’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

UrbanBrickWall0544590Here 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

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.

Sam, Tim and Pete demonstrating the art of route choice on the MapRun RouteGadget

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.

Hazlehead Orienteering Sunday 2nd August

Results

Woohoo! We’re back in business with a near-normal event today in the southern part of Hazlehead thanks to David Esson. Looks like post-Lockdown event guineapigs, e-payment gizmo and new SI kit all held up well and you didn’t find the C-19 precautions too bothersome?

If you’re a non-member reading this looking for something different to do over the summer hols, we will be holding some Summer Series events but these will also have to club members only I’m afraid until we get the all clear to open things up to the wider public, but hopefully not too much longer to wait. You could of course get in touch about becoming a member – even though there’s less than half the year left, I’m sure we can do you a deal 😉

Why club members only at the moment? It’s to do with contact tracing and minimising numbers of folk gathered at events. We have other measures in place too – check our Covid 19 page for more info.

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.

Duthie Park POC

The Duthie Park permanent orienteering course has had a face lift, courtesy of two energetic young lads. Andrew and Matthew live close to the park and were looking for a lockdown exercise challenge. QR codes, a map and a marker pen later and they have ensured all the controls are legible once again.

If you know of anyone who may be interested in trying this course they can download a map from the Aberdeen City council website. Alternatively the map complete with course overlay and a compass can be accessed using a smart phone via the MOBO app.

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!

Click on the logo above to go to the MapRun page and scroll to the bottom to see new course maps listed for download

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.

(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.

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

DNC Scolty 19/2/20

I hope you all enjoyed tonight’s runs to a different area of Scolty (for DNC). Fortunately the weather gods were kind again! Did the fairy lights/bunting help add to the sense of occasion?

Thanks to Gareth for control collecting and David E for computing/results. Thanks too for the offers of control collecting help – not needed on this occasion, but much appreciated.

Results

Splits

Routegadget …to follow….

DNC Tyrebagger 5/2/20

Results Splits RouteGadget

Results updated 10/2/20 to show Joel Gooch on Long not Short course.

Neil’s comment says it all. Going to be some very entertaining GPS tracks not least from those who have run or planned at Tyrebagger so often we really ought to be able to do it blindfolded by now!

Thanks to Murray for putting on the event and to Helen R, Ian H and Dave K for helping collect controls while David was enjoying a taxi ride courtesy of the Nicholsons to Aberdeen and back to pick up a spare set of car keys. Doh!

Balmedie 23/2/20 (Regional)

I hope you all enjoyed a fabulous day at Balmedie. Beauty treatment of facial sandblasting thrown in for free.

Final Results
Final Splits
RouteGadget
Unfortunately Olivia Coman’s brikke failed and although we had a good idea of her overall time as there was no other way to prove she completed the course we’re obliged by the rules to show her as DSQ. Sorry Olivia!

(Any mistakes – names mis-typed etc – please get in touch
webmaster@grampoc.com)

  • Spot the control anyone?
More pics taken on the day by Lesley

Many thanks to Sam and Lesley Gomersall for Planning and Organising, Andy Oliver from Maroc Controller, and all the other Gramp helpers on the day not least David Esson who demonstrated yet another of his many talents as Chief Tent Wrangler.

SOA Gift Aid declaration

Just before Christmas SOA’s Finance Director, Ben Hartman, sent round an email asking any tax-paying members to complete a Gift Aid declaration.
As the SOA is a registered charity, Gift Aid allows it to claim extra funds from HMRC on any donations made – including our membership fees – as long as we’ve completed a declaration that we’re a UK taxpayer.

SOA has claimed £3K so far which all goes to help run and develop orienteering in Scotland. Needless to say every little helps so if you lost the email, didn’t get it in the first place because your email has changed or simply haven’t got round to it yet then please do it now.

http://bit.ly/SOAGiftAid2019

There’s a paper-based version if you prefer – just shout out to webmaster@grampoc.com and I’ll forward a copy.

DNC Crathes 8/1/20

Thanks to Sam and Lesley and the fearless Panda for tonight’s twirl round Crathes. Great start to the 2020 half of the series.

Results
Splits
Routegadget

If your New Year Resolution was to try Night O this year then see our DNC blog for full list of events to come and get in touch if you want a bit of back up or advice choosing a good area to start with: webmaster@grampoc.com

MapRun

Sarah Dunn of Scottish Orienteering is championing this mobile based version of orienteering using your phone’s GPS capabilities to track and time yourself while running one of our MapRun courses. Upload to Strava too so you can challenge your Stravamates.

Visit the MapRun page for more info, instructions and downloads for the MapRun app and pdf course files.

Christmas Brain Teaser

Anne Pearson of Tay to thank for this Christmas Brain Teaser.
There are 51 points available. 1 point for getting the IOF symbol correct, if there is a + sign you get an extra point for then converting O speak into a word/ phrase that makes sense in the letter. One point for each Christmas symbol. Have fun!

Hogmany Hangover Handicap 2/1/2020 @ Hazlehead Park

Great to see so many enthusiastic juniors charging round the Yellow (with more than a touch of sibling rivalry going on) and some old regulars coming out of the woodwork for some fresh air and a different challenge on the Score. First time I’ve been thanked for making someone’s brain ache – because “it took my mind off my other injuries”.

Results (as normal score)
Splits

Starter for 10 overall scores
I’ve adjusted a few people’s control/points tally following a couple of controls not registering but eye-witnessed or similar proof and/or my mental arithmetic going a bit wrong in the heat of the moment at download.

Well, those who read the Starter for 10 rules and inwardly digested certainly reaped the rewards, most notably Neil McLean who leapt up 10 places after calmly picking off 11 consecutive pairs. Also interesting how the “perfect” target score (which was actually wrong!) did seem to stick in people’s minds.

Congratulations to Duncan Grassie for seeing through my ploys and whizzing round all 25 controls well within time to win.

Thanks to Pete for helping set up (hence NC and a self-confessed DSQ in results), David for wrangling the Score software, George and Lindsey for the warm welcome/soup/fire after and Pete, Neil and David for helping collect controls.

AGM 2019 roundup, Gramp Champs and other successes

TLC for the download unit at Duthie Park Post-AGM Novelty event

The hot news from the AGM is the unanimous decision to swap from Emit to SI Air. Our old Emit kit has served us well over the years but is getting tired and outdated and needing more and more TLC (see above) so time for an upgrade. The future is definitely contactless punching and although Emit do have a TouchFree version we would be the only club in Scotland using it as Maroc have also decided to switch, so it makes more sense to join the SI Air club.

Gramp Champs 2019 by class and by category for trophies.
Congratulations to this year’s winners:
Morven Farquarson, Katrina McLeod, Ros Nicholson & Carolyn Mcleod
Sam Griffin, Mark Stockton, Tim Griffin & Bob Daly

The Griffin Trophy Stash
Getting down to the really serious business of eating prior to another fiendish quiz from Helen And Stuart Anderson

David Esson summarised this year’s goings on:

Numerous Colour Coded Events
3* Forest Sprints
5* Autumn Sprints
6* DNC’s
HHH + AWPR3
Summer Series – emphasis on Training
2 specific training days at KS and Crathes
SOUL * Cove part of BNC weekend
Day 6 of S6D Strathearn and 2 controllers for Day 1+3
JIAR @Scolty

Gramp Juniors attended 2 North area junior training days at GoD and Loch Vaa

SOA Accreditation – only needs 1st Aid Certificate to gain Bronze
Any offers?
SOA Funding issues = AGM – Possible Levy increases

Controllers Course in Morayshire in 2020 – any takers?

Bennachie Visitor centre contacted us concerning using the area for something to help celebrate their anniversary (can’t remember the number but it’s a biggie!)

Scottish 6 Days
1st Ali Robertson M40S

Scottish Score
1st Katrina McLeod W21

Scottish Champs
1st Sam Griffin M16A
1st Neil McLean M75L
3rd David Esson M40S
2nd 11+ Relays (Sam/Bob/Tim)

JK Sprint
2nd Sam Griffin

BNC
1ST Rachel Scott W50S
3rd Lesley Gomersall W55L Bronze
3rd Gordon Urquhart M40L Bronze
1st David Esson M40S
2nd Neil Mclean M75L Silver

Scottish Sprint
2nd Sam Griffin M16

JHI
3RD Sam Griffin

  • Musgrave Trophies
  • Rachel Scott: Webmaster/IT problem solver/Organiser of SOUL + planner of numerous events including AWPR3
  • Pete Lawrence: Planner of SOUL/Day 6 of Strathearn + AWPR3 +
    Controlling duties + recycling second hand maps to reduce our footprint
  • Chairmans Quaich
    Helen Anderson: for many years service on Committee serving as
    Membership Secretary, also being Day Organiser of Highland ’15 and Deeside ’17 and organiser of Junior Inter Area Relays @ Scolty

Post-AGM Treas-O-re Hunt 8/12/19 Results

Thanks to Dave Kirk for spending a lot of time tramping round Duthie Park and Ferryhill noting down numbers and details on various objects for us to collect on today’s Treas-O-re Hunt. (Presumably he must have worn his best puffa jacket so as not to look too dodgy as no reports in the P&J about suspect looking characters spotted in the area staring intently at burglar alarms.)

Other than Start and Finish no controls out but instead a list of questions related to controls on the map with multiple choice answers which we had to mark with a pin. Only one injury reported and that was with the non-pointy end apparently. (?!) 

Duthie Park and Ferryhill (59 points up for grabs)
Pete 53 points.    No penalties.      49.39 mins     Total 53
Hugh 45 points.    1 minute penalty.  51.12 mins     Total 43
Rachel 40 points.  No penalties.      47.45 mins.    Total 40
Dennis 41 points.  2 minutes penalty. 52.57 mins.    Total 37
Roz 34 points.     No penalties.      42.14 mins.    Total 34
Kirsty 50 points.  8 minutes penalty. 58.06 mins.    Total 34
Oonagh 32 points.  No penalties.      47.21 mins     Total 32
Morven 44 points.  7 minutes penalty. 57.59 mins     Total 30
Helen 29 points.   No penalties.      47.16 mins     Total 29
Laura 42 points.   8 minutes penalty. 58.19.         Total 26
David   Did the course quietly while everyone else was in the cafe - result unknown.

Duthie Park only (15 points up for grabs)
Samantha 15 points  No penalties   31.18 minutes Total 15
All questions correctly answered so today's ultimate winner! 

I have a good number of maps and question sheets if anyone else
fancies having a run round the course at a time that suits them
as a pre-Christmas blast. Let me know and I can post them out
or arrange collection - dkirk006@btinternet.com.

Scottish Junior Inter Areas 2019

North Area were the overall winners of this years Junior Inter-Area Champs and Sam Griffin looks very pleased with the trophy and remarkably relaxed unlike the poor frozen runner photobombing in the background!

It was a very crisp couple of days at Scolty and Cambus O’May for Relays and Individuals where over 100 Juniors competed against each other.
North Area comprises Gramp and our neighbours BASOC, INVOC, MAROC and Moravian. West is CLYDE, FVO and AYROC and the East is the smallest squad with ESOC, ELO, INT, RR, KFO and TAY.

 NorthWestEast
Relays684436
Individual Boys362725
Individual Girls451921
Overall Total1499082

Full write up and another photo of the now infamous Esson pram can be found on the SOA website.

Student and Junior Relays Scolty 9/11/19

We hope everyone enjoyed the relays today, it was great to see so many enthusiaistic runners out and about. Thank-you all for joining in.

Scolty Relays Overall Results

Scolty Relays Splits

The winners of the Girls Relay on Katja Neumann’s inspired woodland podium.

And here are a couple of shots of the grand procession that left the carpark Saturday morning en route to set everything up and the start of the Student competition.

Student start

Many thanks also to all our officials – Planner: Ali Robertson, Organisr: Helen Anderson and Controller: Andy Oliver (Maroc) – and the trolley mules, minibus driver, time keepers, map-disher-outers, emergency delivery bikers, start/finish line watchers….. Gareth, Pete, Rachel, Ian, Tim, Sarah, David, Oonagh, Carolyn, Iain, Helen, Marianne, John, George, Kirsty, Morven, Laura, Neil, Stuart & Judith.

DNC Hazlehead 13/11/19 Results

Results
Splits
RG (sorry, bit iffy in places as all on an old 1:10,000 map and some of the controls don’t sit quite right but close enough and the Splitsbrowser bit still works fine)

Lovely crisp night last night and you could follow footsteps in the frost across the grassy bits. No such easy ride in the forest though and the deceptively easy looking control picking section caught me out big time. Lesson (re)learned – be less ambitious at night.

Good to see AUOC out in force and having fun.

Thanks to Dennis McDonald for planning, David Esson for ‘puting and anyone who helped collect in controls.

Rachel ha ganado tercero W50 en El Trofeo de Las Pueblos Blancos

Three events of very different natures, in or close to 3 of the typical Pueblos Blancos in Andalucia, go to make up the competition. Typical Spanish organisation which means very relaxed but it all comes together in the nick of time even if it means some nifty improvisation like using oranges straight off a tree to weigh down the maps at the Start if windy.

Sadly, prizes will have to be left behind again as bottles of olive oil and sherry vinegar made with Pedro Ximenes are bigger than 100ml and we’re hand luggage only. Had we won the whole jamon top prize in the race number draw we would definitely have bought a suitcase and checked it in!

Jon Duncan Junior Deeside Cup 2019 Final Results

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERADue to potential conflicting Junior age class course designations at the Maroc Cambus O’May event on 10th November it has been decided to exclude the event from the JD2 Cup for this year.

The event is being used for the Scottish Junior Inter Areas Championships 2019 Individual and all Juniors are encouraged to enter their age class course which isn’t the same way that the (JD)2C system works, hence the conflict. So the 2019 (JD)2C standings have been calculated from the 8 events completed to date, ending with GRAMP’s Forvie event on 6th Oct.

(JD)2C 2019 Final Rankings

Well done to all GJO’s who took part and especially to:

Joanna McDonald W8 1st
Emily Robertson W8 2nd
Thea McRae W8 3rd
Samantha McDonald W10 3rd
Morven Farquharson W14 1st
Kirsty Farquharson W14 1st
Isobel Anderson W16 2nd
Oli Robertson M10 2nd
Sam Griffin M16 1st

And good luck to all our North East Juniors at Cambus O’May!