DNC Forvie 12/12/18

Well Murray certainly made us all think all the way round with a couple of exceptionally difficult courses. Chapeau to those who whizzed round in ridiculously quick times and commiserations to those who really struggled on those fiendish long legs.

Results  Splits   RouteGadget

DNC Balmedie 28/11/18

Results
Splits
RouteGadget

Well done to Matt for persevering through wind, rain, sandstorms and 2 waterproofs to get the controls out there for us tonight and the 22 nutters who braved it all – points well earned all round.
I’m told there’s video evidence on Maroc’s Facebook page.

Scottish Score Champs 2018

Four GRAMPs made the trip down south to Roxburgh Reiver’s event at Elibank in the Borders (to get in a bit of Score practice priot to the post-AGM event next weekend?) and did very well!
Congratulations to Pete Lawrence and Neil McLean who are this year’s champions for M55 and M75 respectively. Bob Daly came 2nd M60 and Rachel Scott 3rd in the W50 class.

GMC Braemar 2018 photos

If you spotted Struan Kirk out and about with his camera then there’s a fair chance he spotted you and you’re in the GMC Braemar 2018 gallery.

If you want a high res copy (anywhere between 3 to 8MB) of any of these then email webmaster@grampoc.com with the photo number(s).

More photos here too from Ian Hamilton

23rd and 24th Feb 2019 British Night Champs Weekend

A wee heads up that an exciting weekend of orienteering is coming your way in Feb:

Sat 23rd afternoon – Urban Sprint SOUL @ Cove, Aberdeen
A brand new map is being created for us by Graham Gristwood and Chris Smithard*, Pete’s planning it in his head just now and Rachel’s organising so will be after offers of help as we anticipate a good turnout of folk wanting to warm up and while away the hours waiting for the main attraction…
BREAKING NEWS – Emit Touch Free Punching will be used courtesy of Emit UK

Sat 23rd night – British Night Orienteering Championships @ Muir of Dinnet
Maroc are busy organising this one. Planner Drew Tivendale says he’s very pleased with his courses (IHHO) and Richard Oxlade is doing his best as Controller to keep Drew’s enthusiasm in check. Should be a fantastic night and a chance for you to compete in a Major event within spitting distance of Aberdeen.

Sun 24th – SOL 1 @ Birsemore
Another chance to take on the challenge of Deeside but in daylight this time at the first SOL of 2019.

Online entries for all three events are now open on Fabian 4.

First closing date is 4/2/19 after which fees go up by £1.
Final closing date is 18/2/19 midnight.

You can enter 1, 2 or all 3 events in one hit by clicking on the Fabian 4 Enter button above.
Get the dates in your diaries and enter now!

*Pete and Rachel’s latest claim to orienteering fame is to have provided B&B, including a fish supper from The Bay, for these GBR athletes. Not every day you get to share tartare sauce with WOC and British Gold medal winners!

GMC Braemar 2018 photos

Tyrebagger 14/11/18

Results   Splits   RouteGadget

Woohoo! Results posted from Tyrebagger car park courtesy of David’s mobile Wifi signal – in’t technology wonderful?

Many thanks to Matt Parkes, Dennis McDonald and David Esson for doing the legwork to collect while I sat and posted.

Long 4.9km, Short 3.1km

SAT 23/2/19 SOUL @ Cove, Aberdeen

First event of 3 for the British Night Orienteering Championships Weekend 2019

Registration/Download and Event Centre: Altens Community Centre  what3words: jukebox.dogs.shuts
Toilets and rooms to leave kit while out racing.

Parking: in far corner of car park of The Aberdeen Altens Hotel
Many thanks to hotel for giving us permission for this – you might like to book a room there with twin/double rooms from just £50.

Timing system: Emit Touch Free – emiTags will be provided FOC.
Many thanks to Emit UK for providing the kit as it gives folk a chance to use it prior to JK2019.

Starts: 13:00 – 15:00
Fees: Seniors £10 (non-BOF/SOA supplement £2), Juniors and Students £5

The British Night Championships 2019 will follow on after this event (about 1 hour’s drive up Deeside to Muir of Dinnet) and then there’s the first SOUL of 2019 at Birsemore on Sunday 24th.

Online entries for all three events are now open on Fabian 4.

First closing date is 4/2/19 after which fees go up by £1.
Final closing date is 18/2/19 midnight.

You can enter 1, 2 or all 3 events in one hit by clicking on the Fabian 4 Enter button above.
Get the dates in your diaries and enter now!

Planner: Pete Lawrence GRAMP
Organiser: Rachel Scott GRAMP
Controller: TBC

31/10/18 Hazlehead (DNC) Results

Results  Splits

Ta muchly to Dennis and his mate at 243 for a spooky spin round the fairways and greens tonight.

Woooooooooooooooooooooo!

Autumn Urban Sprint Series 2018

Apologies for the delay (folk working abroad or otherwise engaged) final rankings now calculated:
Rankings incl 5 Wed eve events + SOUL     

Big thanks to all our organisers and everyone who came and ran too. Need both to make a series!
Many folk commented on the friendly nature of our series, despite the intense competition between old rivals again this year, and the addition of cakes and a few more juniors taking part all helped to add to the atmosphere. Hope you enjoyed it and will be back for more on Feb 22nd (spoiler alert – we’re putting on an event in Cove prior to the British Night Champs at Dinnet.)

CONGRATULATIONS TO CATEGORY CHAMPS FOR 2018:

Sam Griffin and Samantha McDonald    JU16 (Under 16 and shadowed)
Josie Gomersall and Lachlan Kirk           J  (16 – 20)
Mark Stockton and Jenny Ricketts        Open
Marianne Lang and Willy Nicolson        V  (40 – 50)
Evgueni Chepelin and Lesley Gomersall SV (55 – 60)
George Esson                                       UV (65+)
Carol Jackson and Rory Halliday            Best Newcomers

Wed 22nd Aug  Duthie Park  Results
Wed 29th Aug Seaton Park  Results
Wed 5th Sept Westburn & Victoria Parks Results
Wed 12th Sept Westhill Results
Sat 15th Sept SOUL Balgownie/Danestone  Results
Wed 19th Sept Aberdeen Uni Kings Campus  Results

Scolty – 14 October 2018 – Level C – Results

Results and splits
RouteGadget (draw/upload your route and compare with others)
BOF results page with Ranking Points

Hope you all enjoyed yourselves? Certainly seemed that way as I came back from the finish to find what appeared to be a lively cocktail party in full swing with folk animatedly discussing courses and catching up with friends in the sunshine by the cake stall.

Apologies for the control malfunction with 166 on the Orange course and thanks to Yann Newey for reporting it so promptly.
We thought we’d managed to reprogram a spare control and get it replaced before too many of you were affected but looking at the records just now nearly everyone was showing no punch – not 166 or the original number of the spare – so our cunning plan didn’t work. I’ve guesstimated a split time for you all so that you are re-instated in the results.

If you spot any errors like spelling mistakes or age classes or saying shadowed when you weren’t or vice versa then please email webmaster@grampoc.com and I’ll correct asap for the final results.

Course
White
Yellow
Orange
Light Green
Green
Blue
Brown

Length
1.8km
2.4km
3.2km
3.5km
3.8km
5.6km
8.1km

Climb
50m
55m
75m
80m
65m
170m
245m

Officials
Planner: Ian Hamilton
Organiser: Helen Rowlands
Controller: Gareth Yardley

bto SOUL 8 Danestone 15/9/18 Results

.
Results by Class
Results by Course            Splits by Course
RouteGadget
bto SOUL points
BOF Ranking Points (will be calculated overnight 17th/18th))

Lovely day to belt round Danestone and we didn’t really need the hall although it made a great spongey football pitch at the end. Good to see all our SOULmates from down south and up north – hope you enjoyed yourselves as much as we did hosting.

Many thanks to all our helpers: Helen and Stuart Anderson, Rob Hickling, the Gomersall 3, Gordon Urquhart, Alex Maclachlan, Marianne and Patrick Lang, the Farquharson 3, Evgueni Chepelin, the Griffin 3, Jeremy Huthwaite and first and last the Danestone Community Centre jannie.

Planner: Pete Lawrence, Controller: Tim Griffin, Organiser: Rachel Scott

Urban Series Abz University 19/9/18

Great sprinty course from Sam which kept everyone concentrating right to the end and a fitting finale to this year’s series. Perhaps only to be expected from one of our juniors who is proving to be rather nifty at Urban Sprint races recently coming 2nd at the British Sprint Championships in Bath.

Sam says “Thank you to all those who turned up and braved the weather! Hope everyone enjoyed the course and a big thank you to those who bought cakes and hot drinks. I appreciated the positive feedback and I hope you all agree that it was a good end to another great urban series!”

Hope you all got home safely (was an interesting journey back to Stoney wrestling the hi-top campervan in a straight-ish line.)

Results
Splits

Ranking after 5 Wed events  Ranking after the 5 Wed eve events. SOUL results yet to be added … coming soon hopefully!

Urban Series Westhill 12/9/18

Results   Splits

The old 3-controls-in-a-straight-line caught one or two folk out tonight or was it just getting too dark to see the map? Must be autumn – had to put the headlights on to get home.

Urban Series Westburn and Victoria Parks 5/9/18 Results

In’t technology brilliant?!
Helps us to “void” leg 10 – 11 or in other words, subtract the time it took you to cross the road but throws a real spanner in the works when it decides to die on us mid-event. I’ve guesstimated a split time for all of us affected by 248 keeling over – very arbitrary but at least we now all have times.
Apologies about the printer also deciding to die as otherwise we could at least have sent you away with a provisional printout to look at pending my tweaking. Hope it’s feeling better again by next week.

Results    Splits

I’ve also guesstimated age classes for some of you. Jeremy needs to know this so he can put you into the right urban category as he’ll be producing rankings soon now we have 3 events under our belts. If I’ve got it wrong then please accept my apologies and let me know via webmaster@grampoc.com and I’ll correct them.

Did anyone other than Lyndsey try the Friends of Victoria and Westburn Parks tree trail map ? She said spotting small metal plaques is a lot harder than spotting kites.

Urban Series Seaton Park 29/8/18 Results

Results

Everything went well apart from the control on the Tower going for a bit of a walkabout. Do you get tungsten tie wraps?
And as the sun was setting on Seaton Park the feedback was….Urban hmmm…… hills, mud and nettles!Thanks to all who turned up and special thanks to Ian McLeod for collecting controls.
Dennis

Thanks go to Dennis McDonald for organising and also to the two passersby who rescued and looked after number 13 for us – the one by Wallace’s Tower. If you’re reading this it was much appreciated not only because it gave me a chance to get my breath back and it was nice to meet you and chat for a wee while.

Urban Series kicks off Duthie Park 22/8/18

Many thank to Dave for a great start to this year’s Urban Series …

Results

Come and Try It @ MBC Festival – Saturday 1/9/18

Gramp are hosting a come-and-try–it session at Foggieton Woods on Saturday 1^st September as part of the Milltimber, Bieldside and Cults (MBC) festival. Everybody welcome from young to old, fit to not-so-fit, individuals or groups – all you need is a bit of curiosity and a pair of trainers/trail shoes, we’ll provide the rest.

Starts from from 2-3pm so come along and find us at the Festival from about 1:30pm onwards to register and get someone to talk you through the basics before getting out there and having a go.

Templars Park Summer Series Grand Finale 15/8/18

Results   (BBQ without rain – RESULT!! )

Thanks to Tim for squeezing everything into that poor little car and squeezing some fun courses into Templars’ bijou area. Map memory definitely favours the regulars so well done to those relative newcomers brave enough to take it on.

Thanks to all our 11* organisers during the series – chocs were handed out to those of us there last night and the rest of you may be able to claim yours providing you do it soon as they went back to the Rowlands household to be “looked after”. Aye, right!

*Helen R did two and acted as Summer Series Coordinator so lots of chocs thanks to her.

Thanks to Sarah Wallace for keeping track of our results and organising Summer Series prizes (she got so carried away buying prizes she forgot to get BBQ food for herself apparently!) – many happy smiley folk went home clutching fudge, chocs or cactii. We’ll be publishing the final scores soon.

Also awarded last night were some of the Junior prizes gained over the last few months for attendance and/or performance at various events. Too numerous to remember and list here so ask Eddy Coman at the next few events if your name was on the list to claim your badges and certificates.

Thanks also to Bob, Gareth, Rob and Dave who assisted collecting controls last night and Dave Kirk for taking it all away ready for the first event of our Urban Series next week at Duthie Park.
See you all again there?

Glen Dye Summer Series 8/8/18

Results

What more can you ask than a lovely sunlit forest with some reasonable technicality? Grateful thanks to Fasque Estates for allowing us to use a different car park from the usual on a Wednesday night which gave the Short course a more pleasant run than is possible from the usual car park, and allowed everyone else the chance to run in the pleasant north east part of Glen Dye usually visited only by longer courses. Generally everyone seemed to enjoy themselves, which is the main point.

One apology – I gather the kite on Control 3 on Long Tech had fallen to the ground making the control much harder to spot. Not intended! Thanks also to those who helped collect controls – Bob, Tim, Bill and David

George

[Controllers Conundrum re kites on the ground: as a short person I frequently find that the relative angles of dangle of kite/vegetation/bumps on the ground mean I can’t see them until virtually on top of them anyway so glad to see the score evened a bit! That and the fact that I was one of the last folk through No 3 last night meant I didn’t bother to stop and rehang it to give the Planner a helping hand as I normally would.
But now I’m wondering – should I rehang or will that make it unfairly fairer for any subsequent visitors?  Rachel]

Scolty Summer Series – 25 July 2018

A beautiful evening to spend outside … the dry spell resulted in some fast running for some and the heat slowed others down! Many thanks to the control collectors David, Dennis, Bob and Gareth.

Results

No event next week, but do join us in Glen Dye on 8th August.

Crathes Summer Series 18/7/18

Results

Nice to see Michaela and Lucie from AUOC, a Belgian family and a few other well-kent runners and occasional visitors to our Summer Series helping to boost the numbers to a very respectable 48 given it’s peak holiday season. Although not wall-to-wall sunshine it was a fine, warm evening but amazingly no midges to bug us – seems like the continuing dry has really hit them for six this year or have I just been lucky?

Thanks to Ian H for organising including a no paths option for the Long Tech (not that that slowed the whizz kids down any.)

Next week we’ll be at Scolty.

Tyrebagger Summer Series 11/7/18

Thanks to Bill and Paul for this week’s Tyrebagger event, and Olivia for supplying the refreshments. Who knew bracken was so drought resistant!

Results

Next week we are at Crathes Castle

World Masters Orienteering Championships 6th – 13th July 2018

We have 3 Gramps running at WMOC 2018 over in Denmark – Oonagh Grassie W60, Rob Hickling M60 and Peter Bellarby M80.
Following the opening ceremony complete with flags, steel band and Indoor Sprint event amongst other things, they got down to business on Saturday with Sprint Qualifiers followed by Sprint Finals today. Tomorrow sees the start of the Forest Qualifications for Middle and Long Finals on Wednesday and Friday respectively.

You must be 35 or over to compete and there are so many folk there that they hold qualifiers for each category with four or five groups with 50, 60 or more competitors in each. This event is massive!
You must finish within a certain percentage of the top of your group in order to qualify for the A Final, i.e. to be within shouting distance of being a Champion. Everyone else still gets to run in B/C/D Finals too, even those who mis-punch in a qualifier.

So how are our guys doing so far?
Rob came in a storming 6th place in his qualifying group so was in the A Sprint Final but unfortunately mispunched. Bad luck!
Oonagh had a couple of steady runs to finish 30th in the C Final and likewise Peter 28th in the B Final. Considering the, literally, world class opposition these are all excellent results and let’s hope they can capitalise on this in the forest events this week.
(Rob/Oonagh/Peter – a wee heads up if you’re reading this: I’ve been told that Danish white forest isn’t necessarily what you’d expect.)

Judging by the photos and videos it’s as hot over there in Copenhagen as it was running round Menzieshill at SOUL 5. You may spot some familiar faces as there are quite a few other Scottish orienteers competing in Denmark, not least Donald and Duncan Grassie, Roger and Trish Coombs, Lynne Walker, Eddie Harwood, Margaret Dearman, Guy and Beryl Seaman, Rhona Fraser and Joan Noble all from Northern clubs or area. Links to live and final results can be found on the WMOC 2018 frontpage if you fancy keeping an eye on the rest of the weeks’ happenings.

Tollohill Summer Series – 4/7/18 Results

A beautiful evening to enjoy the view down the Dee and to the new turbines. Lots of takers of Ailsa’s lemonade tonight!

Special thanks to prosource.it for allowing us to use their car park, and thanks to those who used it or came by other means to free up car park space. Thanks also to Gareth , Bill and Paul for control collecting.

Results

Summer Series 27/6/18 Balmedie + BBQ Results

OK – the weather did its other usual trick. By the time I got there (delayed in the infamous A90 roadworks enlivened by Lesley G hanging out of her car window miming “can I have a cuppa?” at me in the campervan as we trundled slowly along) the haar was rapidly developing into a real pea souper. We should maybe have armed the control collectors with flares so we could keep track of them?

Thanks to John Lang for planning and a host of control collectors/BBQ monitors.

Results

Autumn Urban Sprint Series 2018

One course of TD3 (Orange) standard about 3 – 4km long in streets and parks.

Rankings incl 5 Wed eve events + SOUL     

Big thanks to all our organisers and everyone who came and ran too. (Need both to make a series!)
Final rankings have now been calculated and posted above.

CONGRATULATIONS TO CATEGORY CHAMPS FOR 2018:

Sam Griffin and Samantha McDonald    JU16 (Under 16 and shadowed)
Josie Gomersall and Lachlan Kirk           J  (16 – 20)
Mark Stockton and Jenny Ricketts        Open
Marianne Lang and Willy Nicolson        V  (40 – 50)
Evgueni Chepelin and Lesley Gomersall SV (55 – 60)
George Esson                                       UV (65+)
Carol Jackson and Rory Halliday           Best Newcomers

Wed 22nd Aug  Duthie Park  Results
Wed 29th Aug Seaton Park  Results
Wed 5th Sept Westburn & Victoria Parks Results
Wed 12th Sept Westhill Results
Sat 15th Sept SOUL Balgownie/Danestone  Results
Wed 19th Sept Aberdeen Uni Kings Campus  Results

Crathes – Level C Event – Sun 24 June 2018 Results

Final results and splits
Routegadget – this is where you can see where everyone else went and where the big mistakes were made – if you haven’t played with RG before then there are guides and videos found here

Results with BOF ranking points (will be calculated overnight Tues and incorporated into overall rankings Thursday)

Many thanks to Crathes Castle and Estate for permission and Neil McLean for making the long trip down several times to plan. David Esson provided computing backup to Neil and also covered entries/timing on the day (apologies for not having a results display during the day itself) and Jon Musgrave was our Controller.

Thanks also to the Farquharson Three, Lindsey and George Esson, Jonathan Smith, Jeremy Huthwaite, Lesley and Sam Gomersall, Griffins en masse, Helen Anderson, Pete Lawrence and Bob Daly for assisting with set up, registration, starts, road crossing, control collecting, looking for late finishers and dismantling which made my job very easy and pleasant today with plenty of time to sup coffee and catch up with some old faces. (Also Dennis McDonald, Paul Puley and Ros Evans who also volunteered but weren’t required in the end.)

Jonathan also spotted and reported some smouldering vegetation near one of the controls at the western end and guided the Crathes Rangers to the exact spot so they could extinguish it before it developed too far.

Rachel

Summer Series Perwinnes Moss 20/6/18 Results

Results

Thanks to those who braved the weather and came along tonight – lots of comments about the undergrowth but that’s Perwinnes Moss for you. It’s hard to plan ‘interesting’ courses without having to take you into ‘interesting’ places so my philosophy was to embrace the nettles and gorse and jump in with both feet. If it’s any consolation I had to go to those ‘interesting’ places to to set out the controls and my knees are also stinging still.

Thanks also to Bob Daly, David Esson and Neil McLean who helped me collect everything in again.

Did anyone else see that doe and fawn I told you about?

Rachel

Easy 1.9km
Medium 2.8km
Short Tech 2.6km
Long Tech 4.5km

Summer Series Dunnottar Woods 13/6/18 Results

Results

Despite the slightly inclement weather, it was an enjoyable event at Dunnottar, which was improved significantly by the availability of delicious cake and homemade lemonade from Ailsa who is fundraising for a trip to Nepal with Operation Raleigh.
Hopefully more to come in the following weeks!

After such a dry spell, it was a bit unfortunate that the wild garlic* on the hill got a soaking before the event, but no-one seemed to mind too much about the mud and aroma!

Thanks to Phil for helping out and to Phil, Olivia, Rachel and Pete for controls collection.

Eddy

(*The up side to this is that we can rule out vampires in the Risk Assessment.)

Summer Series Foggieton 6/6/18 Results

Results

Sorry about the delay – Harris and the rest of the Hebrides were just too beautiful to tear ourselves away from in time to find WiFi connection to post last week. Although I’m told that Foggieton was equally sunny so fingers crossed the weather repeats itself for the rest of the Summer Series.

Gramps at LAMM 2018

Congratulations to all those who high-tailed it to Harris for the last ever Lowe Alpine Mountain Marathon (LAMM) this past weekend. Special mention to Sam and Jack Gomersall – FIRST – on the C course. Whoopee! Well done! Great photos on the LAMM site (and links to full results).

Other Gramps and associates spotted in the listings below, apologies to anyone I’ve missed – there’s no club listing …

Summer Series – Countesswells – Wed 28/5/18

Thanks to all who came along to Countesswells on Wednesday.  We enjoyed a short break from the recent heat wave and even had a few spots of rain!  This first-time organiser would like to pass on a massive thanks to all of the club members who helped pull this event together, and especially to David Esson for huge assistance in the run up and on the day, I really couldn’t have done it would you!  There will be a Summer Series League this year for Gramp members, calculated on best out of 4 in each course.  Current standing will be announced after the fourth event.  See you all next week!

Results

Next week (6th June is at Foggieton).

Scottish Championships 2018

We have more champions in our midst – and some double champions too! Building on last weekend’s successes Ros Evans, Oonagh Grassie and Kevin Reynard all won this weekend and some excellent personal results all round so congrats to all and as with the BOC I’ve listed all results as a measure of how we did overall:

Individual at Achagour
M12B 2nd Noah Griffin
M14A 7th Sam Griffin
M14B 2nd Connor Whitelaw
M21E 14th Jack Gomersall
M40L 2nd and Scottish Champ Ali Robertson
M50L 6th Tim Griffin, 21st Gareth Yardley
M50S 1st and Scottish Champion Kevin Reynard
M55L 7th Ian Hamilton, 8th Sam Gomersall, 13th Pete Lawrence, 14th Iaiin McLeod
M60L 9th Bob Daly, 10th Paul Duley, 12th Rob Hickling
M65L 14th Dave Armitage
M70S 2nd and Scottish Champion Michael Forsyth
M75L 3rd Neil McLean

W14A 10th Morven Farquharson, 12th Kirsty Farquharson
W18L 2nd Josie Gomersall
W50L 12th Carolyn McLeod, 14th Laura Farquharson, 16th Helen Rowlands, 17th Rachel Scott
W55L 14th Lesley Gomersall
W60L 18th Anne Hickling
W60S 1st and Scottish Champion Oonagh Grassie, 4th Anne Hoy, 5th Jayne MacGregor
W65L 1st and Scottish Champion Ros Evans

Yellow 1st Oli Robertson

Relays at Roseisle
11+
5th GRAMP 1: Tim Griffin/Ali Robertson/Bob Daly
6th GRAMP 2: Sam Gomersall/Gareth Yardley/Robert Hickling

17+
2nd GRAMP 3: Pete Lawrence/Ros Evans/Kevin Reynard
12th GRAMP 5: Sam Griffin/Neil McLean/Rachel Scott
13th GRAMP 6: Lesley Gomersall/Oonagh Grassie/Helen Rowlands (5 secs behind-ooh!)

20+
30th GRAMPy Auld Wifies: Anne Hoy/Jayne MacGregor/Anne Hickling

Many thanks to GRAMP’s own Christian Horner (aka David Esson) who not only got his head around the team age categories but also successfully managed us all up into teams and came back up from Aberdeen to cheer us all out and in on Sunday despite not running himself. All photos were taken by him with his iPhone while standing in the pits trying to keep track of us all.

Forest Sprint Series – Final Results

Here’s the final points table for the series.  Best four results count towards the final score.  Well done Tim Griffin (2nd) and Sam Griffin (6th).

FSS Results 2018_Final

Summer Series Hazlehead Wed 23/5/18 Results

Thak you to Jonathan Smith for planning/organising the Summer Series kick off in his ‘back garden’ (and also for agreeing to take over looking after the club kit very soon I’m told.)  As predicted, the Long Tech “got what they deserved” by dint of the bracken starting to really spring up in the last week or so in the wooded areas to the south, obscuring the knolls and depressions quite nicely and so forcing us to get the compass out or risk a long run round the perimeter trying to work out how to attack them.

Results

Short: 1.1km, Medium: 2.5km, Short Tech: 3.7km, Long Tech: 4.7km

Many of you may have spotted Eddy Coman going about the car park with fistfuls of certificates for the Junior Participation Awards – by Friday I hope to be able to post more information on this but for now a big thank you to him as well for playing catch up with over a year’s worth of results to trawl through.

British Orienteering Championships 18th/19th May 2018

Well done to everyone who came, ran, won or just had fun and helped out over the weekend.
Photo links for many of us caught in action (or mid-lick of an icecream) can be found on the SOA website post dedicated to BOC 2018.

It was a mighty big ask of Gramp to be lead club for both Relays and Trail O on the same day and it got pretty squeaky with both Organisers vying for members with the right skills, abilities or personalities to cover the diverse jobs required for each event. We managed but not without the help of you all mucking in and agreeing to jobs you wouldn’t normally choose and quietly getting on with them as well as spotting gaps in our cunning plans and quietly filling those too.
I’m sure I speak for Anne Hickling too when I say a humungous thank you to all our helpers.

In a break from tradition, as it’s not very often we have this many Gramps attending the British Championships with a chance to compete against the best of Britain, I’ve listed all our results:

Individuals at Balmoral
M12B 2nd Noah Griffin
M14B 4th Connor Whitelaw
M21E 35th Jack Gomersall
M40L 14th Ali Robertson, 21st Gordon Urquhart
M50L 9th Tim Griffin, 51st Dave Kirk
M50S 1st Kevin Reynard
M55L 21st Evgueni Cheplin, 22nd Sam Gomersall, 23rd Iain McLeod
M55S 2nd Ian Searle, 8th Pete Lawrence
M60L 8th Rob Hickling, 25th Paul Duley
M60S 1st Richard Oxlade
M70S 1st Michael Forsyth
M75L 9th Neil McLean

W16B 2nd Olivia Coman
W18L 1st Josie Gomersall
W21E 17th Katrina McLeod
W21S 6th Heather Hale
W50L 16th Laura Farquharson, 18th Rachel Scott, 23rd Carolyn McLeod
W50S 2nd Roz Nicholson
W55L 5th Lesley Gomersall, 29th Sonia Armitage
W60L 27th Anne Hickling
W60S 2nd Oonagh Grassie, 5th Anne Hoy, 8th Jane MacGregor
W65L 13th Ros Evans

Light Green 7th Morven Farquharson, 15th Kirsty Farquharson
Yellow 3rd Oli Robertson

Iain Hamilton was Assistant Planner and Dave Armitage Assistant Controller

Relays at Torphantrick
M50 8th GRAMP 1 Tim Griffin, Dennis McDonald, Bob Daly
Mixed Adhoc
9th GRAMP 4 Ali Robertson, Carolyn McLeod, Oonagh Grassie
14th GRAMP 3 Rosslyn Nicholson, Iain McLeod, Kevin Reynard
21st GRAMP 2 Richard Oxlade, Ros Evans, Hugh Nicholson

Trail O at Crathes
Standard course:  Joint 1st Alan MacGregor, 3rd David Kirk, Joint 6th Angus Aitken
Elite Course 10th (and Unofficial Scottish Trail-O Champion)  Helen Rowlands

Anne Hickling was Planner/Organiser and Rob Hickling was Controller

Rachel and Ian H (almost) on the podium. We were subsequently asked to move off to the side but I think Sheila Strain and friend were doing a much better job of photobombing than us?

Forest Sprint @ Mulloch 9/5/18

Many thanks to all those who made it to Mulloch tonight, especially considering the not-quite-perfect weather conditions. Thanks also to Gareth, Bob and Zoe for help control collecting.

Results

Well done to those who recognised the photo locations, may be we should put on some photo-O too!

Note on forest rides. Mapped rides are the wider gaps through the mature trees and may be obscured at ground level by younger tree growth – look up! There are old and new extraction lanes running parallel to the mapped rides that are may look like rides, can be good route choices but are not shown on the map. Some examples below. I hope this helps.

Mapped ride (bit soggy underfoot)

Recent extraction lane

Mapped ride with younger trees. Crossed in foreground by recent extraction lane.

Mapped ride

Extraction lane

Glen Dye – Level C Event – 6th May 2018 Results

Final results and splits
RouteGadget – uses previous version of the map for expediency but not a lot has changed
BOF Ranking Points (will be added to Rankings on Thursday)

Looks like several people didn’t start their brikkes properly, hence the problems with control 1 not registering.
You need to watch for the LED flashing at Start and all controls but not so easy to spot in the sunshine.

Wow! What a lovely day for an outing round Glen Dye – almost too hot for some and I for one welcomed the chance to paddle across a couple of streams and grab a quick swig of water. Thanks to our officials and their helpers for putting on a great event and to all of you for coming along to enjoy the sun and a chance to get in some last minute practice prior to the upcoming British and Scottish Champs.

Officials
Planner: Gareth Yardley
Organiser: Laura Farquharson
Controller: Andy Oliver MAROC

PS Don’t forget to check yourselves for ticks – looks like the sunshine woke them all up too. Sooner you spot and remove them the better (not a good look for the office or school.)

Forest Sprint @ Scolty 25/4/16

Great turn out at Scolty … here are the results. Many thanks to Matt for taking on the planning. Well done!

Results

Results from Foggieton Forest Sprint

The snow has all gone now, leaving the undergrowth nicely flattened.  Much more runnable than Foggieton in the summer.  Results here:

Forest_Sprint_Foggieton_Results

Thanks to Helen Rowlands for helping clear up, and Bob Daly for collecting the controls.

Wot’s WOD?

We’re on the WOD map!

Hazlehead 23rd May is now officially registered as a WOD 2018 event.

Come and be part of the biggest mass participation orienteering event ever.

WOD 2017 saw an amazing 288,007 participants. OK, time to fess up – not all at Hazlehead but at 2,265 locations in 79 countries which is still mindbogglingly large numbers. Come and help us beat that in 2018 and bring some friends.

https://www.facebook.com/Worldorienteeringday/
http://worldorienteeringday.com/

Summer Series 2018 – Weds 23rd May to 15th Aug

Summer Series Events

Fun, friendly events with something for everyone on Wednesday evenings. All events will have 4 courses making them suitable for beginners and experienced alike:

• easy (all on paths – white/yellow standard – upto 2km)
• medium (partly on paths – orange standard – upto 3km)
• two as-hard-as-we-can-make-it courses of different lengths (generally referred to as short and long tech with as-the-crow-flies distances between 2.5 and 5km).

Starts  6-7pm, courses close 8pm (unless changed for a particular event, please check website for any changes)
Seniors £4, students/juniors £2

If you need to know more please or have any questions, please contact the summer series coordinator using this form.

Junior attendance awards up for grabs again. (That means CHOCOLATE!!)

Links to maps showing the car parking/registration locations will be added nearer the time.

… then Wednesday entertainment will continue with a series of Urban events in Aberdeen (and Westhill), including a multi-course event on Sat 15th Sept in and around Danestone (details coming soon).

Continue reading →

Forest Sprint Series 2018 – Weds 11th April to 16th May

Sprint O is great fun – lots of controls in quick succession in a relatively short distance and fast running alone is no use in this discipline if it’s of the headless chicken variety! You really have to look closely at the map, make snap decisions about route choice, execute them quickly and cleanly while all the time trying to read a jiggling map and watch where your feet are going. Give it a go.

Links to all parking locations will be confirmed soon so check back here nearer the time or on each clubs’ website.

April 11th    Foggieton    GRAMP  Results
April 18th   Tillyfourie   MAROC  Results
April 25th   Scolty           GRAMP  Results
May 2nd      Tilquhillie   MAROC  Results
May 9th       Mulloch       GRAMP  Results
May 16th     Bellwood      MAROC  Results

Overall series results coming soon (Ian H has been very busy as Assistant Planner for the British Orienteering Champs hence the slight delay)

One course TD3 or Orange standard i.e. medium difficulty, about 3km, with lots of controls and route choice in a relatively small area so full on concentration required just as much as fleet feet. Great for developing Juniors too if accompanied by a TD3 standard runner. Best 4 scores out of 6 will count towards the FSS league results.

Registration: 18:00 to 18:50
Starts: 18:30 to 19:15
Fees: £4 Senior, £2.50 Junior/Student

.

Scolty DNC 2018-02-14 Results

Many thanks to Gareth for braving the worst of the day’s weather to put out the controls for me … must be something to do with the date!

Apologies to long course runners for not having full set of timed controls – entirely my fault for not collecting correct controls from the store. Splits below are as recorded. I have attempted some fixes for routegadget …

Thanks to everyone who came along – see you all next week at the meal. Helen

Results
Splits
RouteGadget

Tyrebagger DNC Results – 31st Jan 2018

On the night of the “super-moon” there was possibly enough light to complete the courses without using a headtorch!  Joe Wright nearly had an opportunity to try that theory out, as he broke his light (and bashed his knee) before even starting.  Fortunately for him, he borrowed a light and his knee didn’t seem to slow him down too much … after the second control, that is 😉

Here are the results and split times.

Routegadget is loaded up here.  Please upload your stumblings around.

Planner – Murray Anderson

Balmedie DNC – 17th Jan 2018 – Results

Another delightful night for orienteering … clear, moonless (fantastic views of the constellations), little wind … and even the open sand areas were frozen, so were very fast running.  If you weren’t there you missed a treat.

Here are Results and Split times.

Routegadget (with Splitsbrowser) is now loaded up – enter your trails (and trials!).

Thanks to John Lang for enjoyable courses, and I hope he warmed up quickly after freezing in the car!

Next week we’re at Balnagowan in Maroc-land.

Back of Bennachie Results – Sun 4th Feb 2018

It turned into a beautiful winter’s day at Back O’ Bennachie (after a cold wet start) – blue skies, no wind, and a tough hilly forest and moor to test you all.

Here are provisional results and split times.
Routegadget has been loaded here, please add your routes!
You can also analyse your splits on Splitsbrowser.
Splits are also loaded up to Winsplits Online.

Taken a wee while (sorry – holidays and handovers) but results now uploaded to BOF site and ranking points will be calculated overnight 20/2/18.

Course details were as follows:

White 1.8k 40m
Yellow 2.1k 40m
Orange 2.3k 45m
Lt Green 3.0k 80m
Green 3.6k 140m
Blue 4.6k 210m
Brown 5.6k 225m

A (JD)2C event.

Our very grateful thanks to:

Organiser;   Lesley Gomersall
Planner :      Sam Gomersall
Controller:   Drew Tivendale (MAROC)

Raemoir DNC – 3 Jan 2018 – Results

Taking a look at the weather for the rest of the country, we were pretty lucky with the conditions for the DNC race at Raemoir.  We had the most benign evening, with almost no wind, clear skies, a nearly full moon, and temperatures just hovering a degree or so above zero.  That didn’t mean there wasn’t any ice around though ! … the tracks to the start were skating rinks and the car park was pretty treacherous.  But everyone was very careful and no we had no bumps or lumps – well done everyone.

Rob and Joe showed us exactly how it should be done on the Medium and Long courses respectively.  Well done gents.  Congrats also to Helen, our leading lady, obviously benefiting from using her Xmas present of a shiny new head torch.

Here are results and split times.

Routegadget is loaded up here – please enter your wanderings!

Organiser – Rob H.

HHH results

Mon-O-poly Results

Well done to everyone that braved the cold and took on a whole new style of Monopoly at Tyrebagger today. HHH results

Congratulations to the winners of both courses, Olivia Coman and Lynn Smith on the short, Keith Yardley and Rob Hickling on the long.