Welcome to the 9th Edition of NNews – a (roughly!) quarterly newsletter from Northern Navigators.
The newsletter contains details of upcoming events and contributions from our members. Thank you to everyone who has contributed to this edition.
This newsletter was put together by Thomas Puschmann and Matthew Foskett.
Please let us know ([email protected]) if you have any comments or wish to contribute to any future editions.
(Picture of NN team at Ilkley Moor Compass Sport Heat)
Upcoming Events
Note: Some details are provisional, always look at the website of the organising club for final details.
Sun 23rd Mar – Plumpton Rocks, Harrogate, (Claro, Regional)
Sat 29th Mar – Spring Local Series Event 1, Stocksfield (NATO, local)
Sun 30th Mar – Cumbrian Galoppen, Great Tower nr. Newby Bridge (LOC, Regional)
Sat 5th April – Informal activity/training at Cong Burn, (NN, activity)
Sat 5th April – Scottish Sprint Championships; Tweedbank (RR, Regional)
Sun 6th Apr – BL Burnbanks Cumbrian Galoppen; Burnbanks, Haweswater, Penrith (BL, Regional)
Sat 12th Apr – Spring Local Series Event 2; Newburn, Newcastle (NATO, Local)
Sun 13th Apr – Long Distance; Skelder Woods, Whitby (CLOK, Regional)
Fri 18th-Mon 21st Apr – JK, see below.
Sat 26th Apr – Elemore (NN, Local)
Sat 26th Apr – BL Saturday Series, Hallin Fell; Hallin Fell, Howtown on east side of Ullswater, Penrith (BL, Local)
Sat 26th Apr – Give it a Go! – 6; Hell Wath, Ripon (CLARO, Local)
Sun 27th Apr – York City Race; York (EBOR, Regional)
Sat 3rd May – Summer Series; Bassleton & Thornaby Woods (CLOK, Local)
Sun 4th May – Middle Distance & Yvette Baker Trophy Heat; Errington Woods, Redcar (CLOK, Regional)
Sat 10th May – Spring Local Series Event 3; Seaton Sluice (NATO, local)
Sat 10th May – British Orienteering Championships; Grizedale Forest, South Lakes (NWOA, Major)
Sun 11th May – British Relay Championships; Bigland, South Lakes (NWOA, Major)
Sat 17th May – Summer Series Event; Yarm School (CLOK, local)
Sat 17th May – BL Middle Event (Northern Champs Weekend) (UKOL) – Knipe Scar; Knipe Scar, Penrith (BL, Regional)
Sun 18th May – Northern Championships (UKOL); Angle Tarn Pikes, Patterdale (MDOC, National)
Sat 31st May – Urban; Bedale (CLOK, Regional)
Sun 1st June – Urban; Richmond (CLOK, Regional)
Sat 14th June – Brandon Sprints (UKOL); Brandon (NN, Regional)
Sun 15th June – Newcastle upon Tyne UKOL/UKUL Urban; Newcastle (NATO, National)
Saturday 13th Sept – Stockton Riverside Middle Distance Urban (NEOA, Regional)
Sunday 14th Sept – CompassSport Trophy Final; South Gare (CLOK, Major)
Sunday 26th Oct – North East Score Championships; Chopwell Woods (NN, Regional)
JK Events
Fri 18th Apr 2025 – Jan Kjellström Orienteering Festival – Sprint (UKOL); Sheffield City Centre, Sheffield (Major)
Fri 18th Apr 2025 – Jan Kjellström Orienteering Festival – Trail O; Crookes Valley and Weston Park, Sheffield (National)
Sat 19th Apr 2025 – Jan Kjellström Orienteering Festival – Middle (UKOL); Tankersley, Barnsley (Major)
Sat 19th Apr 2025 – Jan Kjellström Orienteering Festival – Trail O; Hesley Wood, Sheffield (National)
Sun 20th Apr 2025 – Jan Kjellström Orienteering Festival – Long (UKOL); Wharncliffe, Sheffield (Major)
Mon 21st Apr 2025 – Jan Kjellström Orienteering Festival – Relays; Middleton Park, Leeds (Major)
We also have a weekly club night on Wednesdays at 6.30pm in the vicinity of Durham City. Contact [email protected] for further details.
Wednesday Clubnights and Saturday Morning Training
Our weekly club training continues to be well-attended and a popular way to concentrate on technique or fitness. The venue changes each week but usually within a 5 mile radius of Durham and is operated via a WhatsApp group. If you would like to join, get in touch with Debby and you can be added to the group. Alternatively, the details are put on the website each week (usually by Monday).
As well as this, Saturday morning training sessions are happening about once per month and they usually have 2 courses (an easy one suitable for young juniors and a longer, more technical one). The upcoming dates are:
Saturday 5th April – informal activity/training at Cong Burn
Saturday 26th April – local event at Elemore (permissions obtained but I’m looking for a planner – let me know if you are interested)
In addition to or if you cannot make our Wednesday nights, CLOK are currently running a “Couch2Green” course which may be of interest to those who are nearby enough – they’ve asked us to share the details below:
“Our Adults Beginners course in back for 2025, starting on the 26th of March and ending on the 17th of May (with a break for Easter).
This course is open to everyone, including those who come from a running background, those who enjoy walking in the hills, and also those who have been Orienteering for years, but want to brush up on their techniques.
We start with the basics and by the end of the course the goal is to complete and green course. Information can be found here.”
Summer Street-O Series
Matthew Foskett
Just a heads up that the Summer Street-O Series will be returning on Wednesday/Thursday evenings (and potentially a Saturday in Weardale) between late April and mid September. First event is likely to be the ever popular Newton Hall Street-O. I’m currently anticipating about 5 events in total – dates will be confirmed later in March. If anyone wants to volunteer to plan/organise then please get in touch – it’s a great one to start with if you’ve never planned/organised an event before.
Interesting upcoming Urban events
Dave Peel
What makes an interesting Urban event? I think, the variety of route choice; an interesting urban landscape where the planner can hopefully create courses with a good variety of leg distance; and good pre/post event options. I’ve also focused on events that aren’t too far away and are easy enough to get to.
Sat 5th April: Tweedbank Scottish Sprint championships: Double event – RR – Regional
Two sprint races in Tweedbank in an area that has a mixture of complicated housing with many cul-de-sacs and alleyways. This is a bit further away than the other suggestions but should be an excellent event – the previous sprints races organised by RR were great. There is a train station in Tweedbank and free car parking also.
Sun 27th April: York City Race – EBOR – Regional
Easy to get to by train or car (though parking is expensive), the map is usually excellent with good route choice and with a good mix of wide streets, alleys and parkland usually. Also plenty to do and see in York after the event.
Sat 31st May: Bedale Urban – CLOK – Regional
Easy enough to get to by car, this event is part of CLOK’s summer series of events. As a market town, I would expect some good route choice for most of the legs. This would also combine well with the parkrun at Thorp Perrow.
Sun 01st June: Richmond Town – CLOK – Regional
A weekend of Urban orienteering courtesy of CLOK – Richmond is an old market town on the banks of the Swale and it should have some lung busting hills on the course. I’d expect the courses to utilise the network of vennels and alleyways to great effect. Once again there is plenty to do in the area after the event.
Interesting upcoming forest/moor events
Julian Warren
Meteorological spring has arrived and we’ll soon be entering the peak Orienteering season with all the major events coming in quick succession (JK, British Champs, Northern Champs and Scottish Champs). I’m not going to talk about the majors because they speak for themselves but there are many other events to get your teeth into. Here is a selection of the ones I think are worth going to with a short bit of puff.
Plumpton Rocks, 23rd March – near Harrogate.
(note main entries have closed, but limited late entry – check CLARO website for latest availability)
Woodland around a lake with large boulders, gullies and hollows. A smaller version of Brimham Rocks? I’ve not been to this area so don’t have any inside information but I think if Quentin Harding has mapped it, then it must be good. Middle distance means short courses, fine navigation with lots of controls. Yorkshire Dales Ice Cream will be present (Dave).
Great Tower, 30th March
At the southern end of the lakes about a two hour drive from Durham but well worth it, an excellent day out.
There is a great café adjacent to the Motor museum near Newby Bridge. The area is based around a Scout camp above Lake Windermere. It is a compact area which is mostly natural oak woodland on a western slope with some clearings. Lots of rock features from boulders to large crags on different levels. Fine navigation required. This is a real three dimensional problem with steeply contoured slopes with spurs and re-entrants. Been here a lot and it never fails to challenge and bamboozle me. You have to be on the ball in this type of area and keep contact with the map. Make sure you are at the correct level as it is easy to make parallel errors.
Burnbanks 6th April
Close to Shap just off the A6, about an hour and half from Durham.
Sheep grazed Lakeland fell overlooking Haweswater. Fast running short cropped grass with some areas of bracken. A series of hillocks on a large hill with good contour detail and many rock features and marshes. Reasonable path network but no walls so compass work and contour visualization is important. Use crags, boulders, reentrants and spurs as navigation points. Courses can have a lot of climb. This is a great area if you like to run fast and straight on a compass bearing. To avoid excessive climbing you have to concentrate on contouring.
Skelder 13th April
Near Whitby about an hour’s drive from Durham.
As used for the British Relays. Mostly fast running, relatively flat area of mixed deciduous and conifer woodland with some open rides and clearings. Some paths, rides and walls make for good handrails and catching features, a few boulders, knolls, depressions, pits and earth walls can be difficult to locate if the vegetation is high. Subtly contoured slope on the eastern area can be tricky if you are traversing it. Abbey View Café nearby and fish and chips available in Whitby, apparently the best in the country.
Errington Woods 4th May
Close to Redcar about 40 minutes drive from Durham.
Quite a small area of woodland, predominately conifer, sloping with great views of industrial Teesside. Steep in places with pits, depressions and some crags at the top. Can have areas of brambles. Good path network. Middle distance event which should have lots of controls and short legs, requiring fine navigation and changes of direction. Try to use the path network to get close to control and look for a good attack point.
End of life for SI-Card5 and SI-Card6!
Allen Banister
Sportident have announced that future updates to Si Timing hardware will not include support for SiCard 5 (the old red dibbers), Card numbers 1 – 499999, or SiCard 6, Card numbers 500000 to 999999. So note if you still use one of these, they will come to end of life, though the date is not yet known. I will keep an eye on hardware updates and let you have further information when I find out. See the Sportident Facebook Post for all the details. Note, there is no panic yet, as this change could be a long way off, just a heads up from Sportident.
The NN hire dibbers are SiCard 8 – they will be supported, though Sportident recommend upgrading to SiCard 9 or a SIAC Active Card for those changing from SiCard 5/6. One notable limitation of SiCard 8 is that it will only hold 30 control punches (on top of start / finish etc), so SiCard 9 future proofs you a bit if you don’t want to pay for a SIAC when the time comes to upgrade.
For those of you with SIACs, I will repeat a point on battery life.
At download, you will be notified that your battery is low if the system detects less than 2.45v on the internal battery, OR the battery is more than 3 years old. I have been getting low battery warnings at events for over 2 years now, and my SIAC voltage is 2.98v (which is fine). So don’t waste money (and resources!) on an unnecessary battery replacement.
We have a SIAC test box I can bring along anytime to check your battery voltage, or there is usually one at an event.
Worst case scenario, you are at an event and the SIAC stops responding – just carry on and punch the boxes as you would do with a standard dibber; maybe lose a few seconds.
Note on SIACs, the active mode is switched on by the check box (not clear), and off by the finish box. By default, the download will also switch it off, if for whatever reason it was still on.
If (like me) you use a SIAC for controlling, then don’t punch a check box, and it will act as a normal dibber, with a capability of waking / checking 128 boxes (minus however many you punched at the last event). If you accidentally do punch a check box, then make sure you punch a finish box to turn it off.
Tip of the day: if you punch the start box and it doesn’t beep, then your dibber isn’t cleared!
60 seconds with…..Elizabeth Bedwell!
Elizabeth Bedwell answering questions from the Warrens
What’s your role in the club?
Southern correspondent.
How long have you been orienteering?
Since before I could walk (carried around a green course in North Wales by my mum at 6-weeks old).
How did you get into the sport?
My dad started orienteering when he was a student at Loughborough University and so naturally, when kids came along, it became a whole family affair.
What’s your warm-up routine?
Jog to the start then a bit of dynamic stretching including high knees, leg swings, and shooing the chickens.
What’s your best result?
At the BUCS relay 2024.
Signed up for an Ad Hoc relay team, expecting an easy run as third leg. Was alarmed when my team-mate returned in first place with another team chasing in hot pursuit only 3 seconds behind. I tried to hold on as long as possible and was relieved to finally finish in 2nd overall (although no one records the Ad Hoc team results…)
What do you eat before your run?
Always a banana about an hour before orienteering. Sometimes a cheese croissant if the starts are really late.
Thumb compass or base-plate?
Used to be base-plate until about 4 years ago when I swapped to thumb compass. I found it better suits my “rough bearings” approach.
Do you take compass bearings?
Usually use rough bearings, just orientate the map then point and run. Exceptions include long legs in open moorland and if visibility is reduced because it’s foggy or dark.
What’s your favourite orienteering area?
There are so many to choose from and I think it depends on the course planning too. A well planned course can make any area nicer and the reverse is also true.
If I had to pick one: Holme Fell.
An area with little marshes, large knolls, and scattered trees. Fairly technical but not too physical, and in a beautiful part of the Lake District. Although I’ve mostly been there for training, not full events.
Lycra or baggy?
Lycra (easier to dodge the brambles)
Moorland or forest?
Forest
Urban or cross country?
Cross country (who doesn’t love an excuse to get muddy!)
Do you pace count?
No
What’s your worst mistake?
Running off the map at Doctors Gate, October Odyssey 2023, causing a 10-minute error. I missed crossing a footpath on the way to number 5, so I kept running North to find it – spurred on by Dave who was confidently running in the same direction.
Are you a results nerd?
Not usually. Sometimes I get dragged into it by Paul who is.
What do you think of Routegadget?
I think it can be fun, but it depends on the course/area. I’m more likely to look after an urban event where the route choice is more distinct. Forest events when people go (or try to go) straight can be less interesting in my opinion.
North East Junior Squad
Jacob Li
On Saturday 2nd of March, me, Oliver and Thomas were dropped off at Captain Cook’s monument car park near Great Ayton. We then walked to the forest on the east side of the monument where we got organised into our groups by our coaches.
First, we did some pacing on contours and compared it to pacing on flat ground. Then, we practised contouring with around 15 different controls. Me and Oliver were in the same group and we both found this very easy.
After that, we were split into different relay teams with the rest of the squad. I was in a team with two people from CLOK called Isla and Nell and I was doing the medium course. I was second back for my course (it was a mass start) and the person doing the short course was back as well. The person on my team doing the long course decided to walk the entire thing so Oliver’s team won because the person doing the long course for his team came back first.
The final thing we did in the training was compass bearings. We had to bear to a control and on the control there were some caramel wafers hidden. Somebody was so motivated, they fell down a tree trying to find it. Then somebody else found the wafers and we shared them out.
For the night, we stayed at Great Ayton Village Hall, which had wifi and heating, and had beans, rice and potatoes for dinner. After dinner we played lots of different board games like UNO. In the morning, we had eggy bread and hot cross buns. We also did some map geeking for the acorn event. Then we got picked up and drove to the event which took place at Great Ayton Moor.
For the event, we didn’t have any start times but I did short green; Thomas was doing blue and Oliver did light green. The course I did was easier than I expected, although I had a bit of trouble finding control number 2, because I had a dodgy bearing, and control number 11 because I went on an unmarked path on the map, which led me further north than I was meant to go.
Other than that, I did okay and came 3rd on my course. Thomas came 2nd on his course and so did Oliver. After that I did a bit of socializing and went home.
Compass Sport Trophy 2025
Bob Cooper
Everyone knows that venturing onto Ilkley Moor without ones hat on is inadvisable as it risks catching your death of cold. At least that is the message in the local dialect of the folk song cum Yorkshire Anthem “On Ilkley Moor Bah t’At”. Perhaps heeding this advice, or more likely the forecast of the Met Office of heavy rain and strong winds in this somewhat exposed area, the organisers of the preliminary round of the Compass Sport Cup/Trophy Competition taking place at Ilkley Moor on Sunday 23 February 2025 made cagoules compulsory and suggested the wearing of gloves.
Despite the anticipated bad weather (which, as it turned out, was much less severe on the day than had been forecast) a 23 strong team of NN stalwarts made the journey to Yorkshire. This included 3 Junior members and one octogenarian! Unlike some of the speedier and hardier team members who ran in club tops and simply carried cagoules, I togged up in a cagoule and a peaked cap against the elements from setting off on the 1.6k to the Start until getting back to the Finish and walking the 0.75k to download/Event Centre at Ilkley Grammar School.
On starting my run I hardly noticed the light rain and wind as I tried to reconcile the multiple paths on the ground with those shown on the map. Pace counting and compass got me to the right area and it was contours and features that finally led me into the first control safely. Thereafter things improved for a short while but, on leaving control 4 and heading to 5, I had a senior moment and ran past it, reaching control 6 before having to retrace my steps to pick up 5. Fortunately that leg was quite short so I probably only lost 3 or 4 minutes. The remainder of the course I negotiated steadily rather than quickly so all in all I was a quite surprised at download to find I was leading my class.
Back at the event centre live results were being posted and it became apparent that NN was leading the Trophy competition. Meanwhile, Team NN were enjoying the excellent food sharing picnic that has become its hallmark.
At the end of the day when points had been calculated it was confirmed that we had finished with a team score of 1276, ahead of our competitors, CLARO (1264), EPOC (1258), EBOR (1246) and NATO (937) and had won the qualifying round of the Trophy competition. The Trophy competition is open to “small”; clubs, that is those with 120 or fewer members and NN falls well within that limit. There are 12 different Compass Sport classes reflecting age and gender: seven Large (courses 1-7), where the winner scores 100 and following finishers score 99, 98, 97 etc; and five Small courses (courses 8A/8B, 9A/9B, 10) where the winner scores 100 points and following finishers score 98, 96, 94 etc. The highest 13 individual scores count to a clubs overall points score, subject to a maximum of 2 counters from each of courses 1-7 and 10, and a maximum of 2 counters from each of the combined 8A/B and 9A/B courses So all is clear and simple to calculate!
Together with commitment of club members, strength across the range of courses is one of the keys to success in the competition. Such strength was apparent at Ilkley where we had members contesting all but two of the available courses (8B and 9B). Special mention should be made of our 3 Juniors who all counted among the teams 13 highest scorers – well done! It is not only the point counters that are significant, however, but also all participating members whose performances can affect the number of points achieved by other clubs by pushing their members down the points table – the more runners we have on each course the better.
We can now look forward to not having to travel so far afield for the final this year; it’s going to take place at CLOKs area at South Gare near Redcar on Sunday 14 September 2025. So, hopefully see you all fit and well then. Finally, thanks to Debby for organising the clubs participation in the event coordinating entries and travel arrangements etc and well done to everybody for your brilliant performances to achieve an excellent result.
A weekend in Bradford
Matthew Foskett
After all the busyness of organising the Durham City weekend in mid-November, a weekend of orienteering organised and planned by others seemed attractive. Especially as it included a rare terrain – Indoor-O.
Dave, Meg, Tom and myself caught Friday evening trains down to Bradford and found our way to the hotel. Initially it turned out Tom and Meg’s room had already been taken 
The next morning started with a walk across to parkrun (passing by Valley Parade, see photo). A uni friend of mine (Andrew Stemp) joined us here and I had a sociable run for most of the 3 laps until Tom and Andrew sped off up the hill on the final lap. Dave kept Meg company until he also got overly competitive.
The museum in the park (see photo) was closed for refurbishment prior to Bradford being City of Culture so we headed to a local café where we were enticed by the Indian brunch option (see photo) – definitely a good choice. We took the long route to the orienteering to walk off our brunch.
The location for the Indoor-O was the very grand Bradford Grammar School (see photo). Indoor events are most like an urban sprint – lots of turning this way and that and a need to look closely at the map. The course took us over 5 floors with staircases labelled by letters (see photo). I made the mistake of starting just in front of Andrew and he’d caught me by control 3 (I’d not spotted staircases F and G and so went all the way to A and back on leg 2-3).
After that my navigation mostly settled down until 15-16 when I left staircase C a floor too early – there was a swimming pool on floor 1 and having visited here previously on the course the chlorine smell of the stairs made me think I was already there. But no, it was Floor 2.
The intricacy of the navigation meant I had to pay constant attention to the map and where I was. Plus you also have to watch out for other runners and remember to keep left (to avoid collisions). The race became almost timeless – I had no idea how long I’d been running! There’s the usual trade off between pausing to plan the most efficient route and just going for it – I think we all found we ended up with “favourite” staircases which we used over and over whilst completely ignoring the presence of others which may have been more useful…
The finish was back in the main hall where the others were waiting. I’d taken 20:43 which was middling with times on the long course varying from 13:26 to 60:57.
We were to be joined by Debby and Julian (sadly Barney was ill) and so while we waited we went to the cake stall (to go with Tom and Julian’s home baking) and the Christmas craft table (it did say it wasn’t just for children!). We then waited at the finish for Julian (see photo) and Debby to finish their courses (their later start led to some dimly lit corridors, maybe need a torch and whistle just in case in future!).
After a shower and rest we all reconvened for an Indian – Naomi joined us too. There was much googling of various things on the menu and lots of mango lassi (see photo)!
Sunday brought a change of scenery – we headed to Roundhay Park in Leeds (see photo) for an event on parkland and woodland. There’d been rain overnight and although the sun was out, conditions were slippy underfoot.
I started just after Tom and this was definitely to my benefit – he struggled to find control 2 (see map with green trace for my route) and suddenly I had a race on my hands. I was just behind him for 3 and 4 and then saw him racing off to 5. I tried not to get distracted by this competition and to navigate with care.
Unfortunately my chosen navigation was to take the next path to the East – closer looking at the map would show it doesn’t quite connect to the main path and so I missed it and ended up on a subsequent path with the dark green bushes either side. This threw me (and others) and I ended up spotting the buildings to the east and then the fences to bring me back to 5. Luckily for me others had done likewise including Tom…
My bearing to 6 was pretty good, but the vegetation wasn’t what I anticipated and I bailed too early from it, thinking I had messed it up (plus I was looking for a monument whereas in reality the symbol was for a hide). This meant I was behind Tom and the others who’d messed up getting to 5 on my route to 7 and 8. Given I knew the others had all got lost getting to 5, I felt justified going my own way to 9 which paid dividends – I kept it simple and stuck to the lower path. I found the subsequent few controls pretty simply. That said, I’d not seen Tom or the others so had no idea whether I was still in the lead…
Things unravelled a bit at 12 – I was close, but not close enough and I could see additional pits everywhere which must have been just slightly too small to be mapped… I relocated and tried again, finding the control as Tom burst onto the scene. From here on it was head to head running with minimal mistakes. We chose different routes in places, but remained neck and neck. On the final few controls my footwear advantage told in the mud (Tom had less grip which hindered him on the mud/steeper grassy slopes). Navigation had been tricker than expected in the parkland terrain but definitely good practice.
Team NN gradually reappeared and then we found a café to enjoy a well earned late lunch. Dave and I had gone for a slightly later train so we took a leisurely walk to the centre of Leeds rather than the bus, before the train back to Durham. All in all a lovely weekend (18.8km ran and 43.8km walked by my watch before anyone claims it was mostly eating 
Planning at Aykley Heads
Clare Baker
Aykley Heads is my go-to place to run from home, with lots of nice trails and views of the city, so it was a treat to be asked to plan the North East Night Championships there- I wanted to make sure that I showed off my local area in it’s best light (albeit in the dark…). And happily, not having to drive to get to the area made logistics a lot easier.
As the area was so close to home it meant I started thinking about control sites a few months before – with lots of runs around my favourite trods and trails, picking out nice-looking features. There’s some really nice patches of woodland that I wanted to put controls in and take as many courses as possible to. But initial runs with the map showed that there was quite a bit of map updating needed, and a few features that could be added to make things more interesting. Allen then did a huge job of updating the map, adding on the Wharton Park segment and making both the urban parts and the wood and moorland type parts legible at a 1:5,000 scale.
The area has lots of paths, so to get in a navigational challenge I wanted to create as much route choice (macro and micro) between controls as possible, rewarding accurate execution of the routes and planning ahead. I wanted the start to be as close as reasonably possible to the assembly while only requiring one road crossing on the course. With Matthew’s help, we decided that manning the road crossing (rather than sending people around via station) to get into Wharton Park was the safest thing, and so the approach to the road crossing controls also started to provide some shape to the courses. Finally, I wanted to take people in and out of the different terrain types several times to challenge switching between different techniques and orienteering at different speeds. These thoughts and constraints then shaped the courses themselves.
After checking out some likely control sites, I started planning the courses, checking and tagging control sites and running some of the legs to make sure that everything made sense. Allen was really helpful with feedback, and checking that control sites and courses were correct and fair (and dealing with my purple pen challenges! [Purple Pen is one of the software used to plan orienteering courses]). We changed some control locations to avoid the worst of the undergrowth in places, and I happily spent time pondering possible routes and tweaking control sites. Allen also pointed out some route choices on legs I hadn’t thought of, and I got to explore even more of the woods in the area – resulting in even more map updates for him to make sure the route choice for each leg was fair.
I was happy to see quite a few entries – it’s always nice to know that the work that goes on behind the scenes will be worth it! We had the benefit of putting the controls out in the daylight – and I had the generous help of Richard Jones from CLOK to help put out the controls which made everything easier. With everything in place, I was able to wander around to be at the start for the early starters – and it was fun to see the people puzzling over the map right from the start. I had planned a long first leg all the way across the map for a couple of the courses – the challenge being to pick a good route quickly, with no controls beforehand to do any pre-planning. Finishers seem to have enjoyed the experience and the courses, and having the warm hall to go to after their run made for a great atmosphere.
Of course orienteering events only happen with the generous help of lots of people – and a massive thank you has to go to all the NN members who stood out in the cold, manning the road crossing and finish, and collecting in controls afterwards.
And if you ran the courses – well done! Do please share your route on Routegadget (it’s not too late!) – it’s always really helpful as a planner to see where people went and the different choice people made.
Edinburgh Big Weekend
Thomas Puschmann
Between the 24th and 26th of January 2025, the Edinburgh Big Weekend took place. On the Friday night, there was supposed to be a night event called “Fight with the Night” around Edinburgh University’s King’s Buildings; on Saturday, there was the “Edinburgh City Race” urban event through the Scottish Capital’s city centre; on Saturday evening, there was the ceilidh with lots of raffle prizes; on Sunday, there was the “Arthur’s Seat Classic” all around the famous hill with amazing picturesque views and over the whole weekend, Storm Éowyn, the strongest storm in the UK for over a decade was forecast.
This turned everything on its head. On Thursday the 23rd, EUOC (the organising club) decided to reschedule the “Fight with the Night” and move it to the Saturday evening because the winds were meant to be strongest on Friday. Most people in NN were going to go on Friday in the early afternoon by train but all trains had been cancelled so they either went by car or decided to try again the following morning. We decided to go the next day by train.
At just after 7:00 the next morning, we set off for the train station. At the platform, we found Meg and Tom and got on. All was going smoothly until we got just north of Alnmouth. The train had stopped and we were told that the pantograph (the bit at the top of the train that connects to the power lines) had been broken by a branch that was stuck in the power lines because of the wind. The train manager told us that we’d get going again in about an hour.
Two engineers climbed on the roof and tried to saw the pantograph off and four and a half hours of playing card games with Meg and Tom later and we were still stuck between Alnmouth and Berwick. We knew that if the train had got going we would have still been able to get to the urban event on time.
Eventually, a different train came alongside us to take us back to Newcastle. It was full of people because it had two trains worth and Meg was considering just going home because she didn’t think it was worth trying to get there anymore. It got to Newcastle so we were almost back where we started. At this point, we knew it would be very close and if everything worked out we might have just been able to get to the urban event on time. Everything did not work out.
We got out of the train and got on a different train that was meant to be going to Edinburgh but the conductor said that it would be about 45 minutes until the train went so we got off and the train immediately left! After, we tried going outside to wait for a coach to take us up but nothing arrived. We waited for about an hour and a half at Newcastle and we were about to go back home but a train finally came. We got to Edinburgh after about 9 hours travelling and we had missed both the urban and the rescheduled Fight with the Night.
We checked into our hotel, got changed and then met up with Meg and Tom to have some dinner before the Celidh. It was very fun and exciting. In the break in the middle, we had haggis because it was Burns night and we did the raffle. Ollie got a packed lunch box, and I got a buff and a GB team top.
The next day, we got up early and met Meg and Tom for a quick breakfast on the way to Arthur’s Seat. It was a nice day and it wasn’t very far so we walked there and got ready to run. Tom jogged up with Meg and the rest of us followed with Dave. It was freezing and windy on the top and I was doing my first blue course so I was pretty nervous.
I didn’t find the course too hard but I made a couple of stupid mistakes, like running to control 4 when I was going to control 3. I also couldn’t find my way to number 5 but I think that I got better as time went on because I became used to the terrain and scale on the map.
Overall, I came 28th out of 84 starters and 80 finishers which I was really happy with. After everyone had finished, everyone who was in NN went to a cafe together and we ate chips. Gradually people left because their trains were going and we went back to our hotel and got on our train that (thankfully) arrived home within 3 hours.
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