Ashdown Forest

The Harvester relays were near Ashdown Forest this year & it was good to see that SLOW had quite a few teams. These relays are more team-focused than the other orienteering relays during the year – there is no individual race, & you are in a team of seven or five, with half the people running in the dark. Fortunately no-one mispunched! The event was very well organised by Mole Valley including having several radio controls, a spectator control & great weather.

Our age-handicapped teams were looking to get into the prizes this year and they all came away with tall shot glasses to savour the event. Our first team back was the B Handicap. In fact they won the B course overall with Charlie T just managing to hold off the other teams on last leg.

B handicap team – Mike, Don, Charlie, Jim and Chris Fry

Our Women’s Handicap team were second women’s team overall, but given a team could win only one prize, our team picked up the Women’s Handicap Trophy & more valuable UK relay league points. SLOW’s women have done really well in the league this year.

Women’s B handicap team – Kate, Diane, Chris R, Rachel (and Caroline)

Our final team on the B course was a team out to enjoy themselves & totally succeeded. Well done to Sarah C & Dick for getting round in the dark, & Tony C & Gordon brought the team home in the daylight.

Our A Handicap team had some serious competition in the handicap class from Bristol, the Army & Southdowns. Eventually Bristol pulled away & we ended up 3rd, 25 minutes behind (8th overall).

A Handicap team – Ed, David, Alan, Paul, Stephan, Pete, Andy

Our youthful A Open team (Mike G, Gavin, Simon E, Mark V-R, Phil, Paul N, Charlie W) all performed very respectably & probably will end up 12th once the final dibber has been downloaded!

Thank you to the Catmurs & Chris Fry for lending spare headtorches – I’m sure they were well appreciated by those using them. I only once had to get up in the middle of the night during the week to swap batteries while recharging! Thanks to all of you for making things reasonably straightforward on the weekend by camping early or letting me know when you were going to arrive. Next year the relays are near York on 4th June – I hope this year has generated a lot of enthusiasm so that we will have some teams going up (by coach?) next year. See you at the South-East Relays on 23rd May at Wimbledon Common, or at an evening training event soon.

All the SLOW teams

We had 14 teams competing at the British Relay Championships in the Forest of Dean last bank holiday Monday. And came away with two 1sts, two 2nds, one 3rd, & four other top ten positions. Firstly, we had teams in both the Men’s & Women’s Premier Class. Both teams gained UK cup points, & the women are doing particularly well at the moment. The men (Charlie W, Mal L, Simon E) came 18th – Charlie was up with the lead pack for about 20 minutes on his first ever first leg. Simon had a good run on last leg. The women (Rachael H, Nicky K, Anja S) came 9th – Rachael was 2nd on the first leg!

Rachel (on right) was 2nd on the 1st leg of the Women’s Premier

Our veterans always have a good chance of podium positions at the British Championships partly because there are so many classes. The number of classes may get reduced in the future. The W40 team (Karen J, Jackie C, Christine R) got a silver medal. The W45 team (Kathy H, Sarah B, Diane L) won yet again – with extremely fast runs from Sarah & Diane; Kathy has been running well all year & now has a relay trophy to put on the mantelpiece. The M45 team (Peter Ha, Andy J, John D) came 3rd. John had a great run on last leg to get in the places but we ended up 5 minutes behind Guildford followed by Hertfordshire.

Left: W40 – Karen / Chris (+Jackie). Right: W45 – Diane / Cathy / Sarah

The M50 team (Paul S, Charlie T, Andy R) put in a very solid performance to come 2nd, just 3 minutes behind Thames Valley who had the youthful Neville Baker on last leg. Our 2nd M50 team (Don M, Alan L, Jim M) came a good 6th & were in 3rd palce after 2 legs before other clubs’ 1st teams hauled them in.

The last veteran’s performance was in MW55 (David M, Teresa T, Mike M) where we came 1st by 15 seconds. This was an excellent team performance in a very competitive class. Mike was amazing on last leg & looked as though he was trying very hard on the run-in! Especially well done to Teresa running with two of our most in-form men.

Left: M50 team – Andy / Paul / Charlie. Right: MW55 – David / Theresa / Mike

The junior classes were harder than at the JK, especially the yellow which was gaffled (ie had variations) as well. Everyone successfully finished their course & our younger juniors have gained a lot more relay experience that will be good to build on next year. Our Junior Ad Hoc teams came 4th & 7th, with especially good runs from Ralph S, James M & Michael M. Our Mini Relay team came 11th, with a great run from Robert J on 1st leg coming back in 3rd place.

The Short & Ad Hoc classes had the most teams! Our Ad Hoc team came 13th including a good run from Chris W. In the seniors, the Women’s Short team was 7th. Heather M was in the team & brought the team back 1st after 2 legs. Sarah C wasn’t overawed by this & brought the team back in a very respectable position. The Men’s Short team came a solid 22nd.

Overall the weekend was very enjoyable. The new SLOW red fleeces made their first appearance (thanks Simon), & many of us stayed in ‘luxury’ group accommodation very conveniently located for all the weekend’s events. We had carbo-loading feasts in the evenings, & were able to use up any excess energy playing table tennis, and table football. That was one part I was able to take a more active part in & allowed myself & Don to show Charlie & Simon how to play the beautiful game – roll on the re-match.

Best wishes Pete

Juniors

Other Relays – May 6th

Wednesday 6th May saw some less important relays.

During the day at the Army Relays at Long Valley, the SLOW team of Chris Robinson, Kate Thomas and Don McKerrow won the Ad Hoc class having led all the way.

In the evening in Richmond Park, the SLOW team came 12th in the Thames Parkland Relays. Those who have run this before might like to know the split times:
Andy Robinson 19.48
Karen Jones 20.21
Andy Jones 19.28
Owen Lindsell 18.30
The first 3 were all slower than last year (blame wet underfoot conditions and the British Relays 2 days earlier). it was Owen’s first run in this and he gained 2 places on last leg.

This is an annual orienteering competition between England, the Flanders region of Belgium and the Netherlands. This year’s competition was held on Blackheath, Guildford on 1st Feb.

Well done to all three and the rest of the England team who had a very sucessful day.