OK Nuts 2025 Results
Trophy Winners
- Men’s (The OK Nuts Trophy) – Tommy Rollins (Southern Navigators)
- Women’s (The Heather Monro Trophy) – Sarah Rollins (Southern Navigators)
- Junior Men’s – Jake Hilton (Southern Navigators)
- Junior Women’s – Issy Hawks (Happy Herts)
Officials’ Comments
Organiser – Mike Garvin
Well done to the trophy winners and to everyone who completed their courses.
As with SLOW’s 2022 event on neighbouring Leith Hill Place, this was Charlie’s project, mapping, planning and sorting out land permissions to resurrect an area that had not been used for many years.
We were lucky to have mostly dry weather in the lead-up to the event, as the access track and parking field were much softer a few weeks ago and I had some worries about possible parking chaos. SLOW thanks Colin Grimes, the owner of the parking field and much of Pasture Wood, who improved the access track and spread rubble in the gateway for our event.
We also thank Sarah Scarbrough (MV) who gave up her run, and other participants who interrupted their runs, to help a junior competitor who had an asthma attack in the forest. Fortunately the competitor had recovered by the time a paramedic reached her.
Lost property: a Silva baseplate compass with red cord was handed in.
Controller – Andrew Evans (DFOK)
The longer the comments from the Controller the greater the number of problems usually, so this can be a very short summary.
Charlie is to be complimented for the huge amount of time that he put into making this event happen, not just preparing a map which received favourable comments in the car park afterwards but in securing a much larger than usual number of landowner permissions for the event to even be held. The TD5 courses met the technicality with ease and the physicality of the terrain led to a wide variation in finishing times on most of the courses. Mike with strong support from many SLOW members had all aspects of the event delivery under close control. Both were a pleasure to liaise with.
Planner – Charlie Turner
When I started mapping about 18 months ago, I hoped that all the courses could be contained in Pasture Wood but obtaining permissions from a very large number of landowners proved to be more complicated than expected. After lengthy research permission was obtained to use a challenging good sized woodland block but just a few months ago access was unexpectedly withdrawn because of an awkward technicality. At about the same time two other slices of approved woodland were sold, thereby making much of my draft planning impossible. LOK came to the rescue by allowing SLOW to use some of their Leith Hill area for the three longest courses and I was able to squeeze the other courses into a much reduced size of Pasture Wood, by using double sided maps. I was concerned that the small area of Pasture Wood was too compact for a large number of competitors but from post race feedback I think my concern was unfounded.
In the absence of past race winning times there was little to guide me in deciding course lengths and acceptable height climbs. I have for some time been aware that where courses have steep climbs and are largely off paths, older, less agile competitors take longer than the current Planning Guidelines. It was for this reason that the Short Green and Very Short Green both had reduced course lengths and by looking at the results, this was a good decision, as even with shortened courses some times were still very long. All the courses were undoubtedly tough, giving a wider range of race times than usual and I apologise to those who found their course too severe and retired. Our next event on the area will reflect the above.
I hope most of you enjoyed running in Pasture Woods and for those of you who are hardened orienteers, it was good to have the challenge of competing on a new area. For those of you who ventured onto Leith Hill I hope you were not too confused by the many MTB trails and didn’t get caught in the Gaultheria Shallon vegetation.
As always the event wouldn’t happen without help and input from Gordon Parker, in most carefully organising the planning kit for me and being the Si Master. Mike Garvin, as organiser helped me by taking on tasks that I just didn’t have time to do. I must also thank my team of control hangers and early Sunday morning Si ‘activators’ – Andy, Karen, Paul, Dorte, Teresa and Mike, plus Geoff from GO. Bringing in controls after the event was quickly done by eight collectors; Chris, James, Harriet, Vinh, Duncan, Matt, Jonathon, Anthony (plus girlfriend).
Lastly a big thank you to Andrew Evans, the event controller who did multiple course checks, spotted some errors and offered helpful advice, particularly in encouraging me to reduce some of the course lengths.
Results
Results – SPORTident format (Live results)
Routegadget – draw your route!
Photos
The Map for JK 1971
Leith Hill, with Pasture Wood, was used again for the JK individual in 1977 (winners Geoff Peck and Ingrid Ohlsson). This was the first year that SLOW held a race called the OK Nuts; there was just one trophy back then, and it was won by Chris Hirst.
Additional Photos
Above photos: Vinh, Eloise, web.