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Congratulations to this year’s
winners: Happy Herts.
The HAVOC Chairman will present the trophy at the next available opportunity.
Planner’s Comments
Thank you all for making our club members efforts worthwhile. Attendance was
much higher than expected. Using Chingford Plain for car parking does mean that
the shorter courses do not get to visit the best bits to the north of the map. I
tend to favour/plan TD5 courses that tempt you to run straight, away from the
path running option, thus this can prove challenging, but hopefully fair. The
downside in the southern part of the map is that this can involve some slow
run/walk sections of woodland. Although generally, progress through the green
proved to be much better than the map suggests. ‘Recced in unison with a 65 year
old non-orienteering granny’. I did receive a number of favourable comments
which is quite satisfying. However, I do understand that for many it may have
been a wee bit more challenging than your average Essex woodland event. Epping
Forest has been underestimated by many in the past! Look forward to seeing you all
at future HAVOC events.
Garry Parmenter (Planner)
Organiser's comments
Apologies for the grottiness of the car park - this was due both to recent rain
and also, we think, to horse boxes reversing onto the grass and churning it up
into a muddy mess (the horse riders have had free access to Chingford Plain over
the summer). We were not allowed to use the adjacent car park because they are
storing wood chipping there (possibly to repair paths churned up by the horse
riders?!). There were a lot of positive comments from competitors as they picked
up their car keys at Registration (and at Download too … Ed.) - it's really nice
when people do take the time to say "thank you", it makes all the hard work
worthwhile. And a big "thank you" from me to the HAVOC team of helpers.
Barbara Fothergill (Organiser)
Controller’s Comments
As we were unable to secure the services of an external controller so, it fell
to me to do the pre-event checking. Fortunately an easy task with Garry
Parmenter’s meticulous planning. As he planned a Black course, required for the
SE League, I decided we should make use of the course length ratios, as shown in
the guidelines, and based on the length and climb for the Black. So, some
lengths for the draft courses required a slight adjustment.
A few weeks before the event when I was out in the forest it was fairly dry.
However, recent heavy rains left the paths, especially those favoured by the
mountain bikers, very muddy in parts; as was the car park, of course. The high
winds during the two days before the event played their part in creating
significant leaf-fall, obscuring many of the smaller paths. These weather effects
resulted in more difficult orienteering conditions than when I last visited the
forest. Fortunately I had the services of Paul Beckett, assisted by Graham
Batty, to do the on the day control checking, whilst I took my trusty broom,
bought for orienteering purposes, and swept a few of the paths used for the
junior courses.
I do apologise for a shortage of maps on some of the courses. I had expected an
entry of about 200 but we got nearly 260. I did manage to print some extra maps
on the day but then my laptop “died”. So we had to resort to recycling maps as I
failed to have alternative technology on hand. My thanks go to those people who
kindly gave up their maps. Replacement maps are in the post to those who left
their details. Also, I apologise to those people who were unable to run the
course they entered but did chose an alternative course at the start. Thank you
all for your patience, good sportsmanship and spirit.
Most people found their course quite tricky, a good technical challenge and it
was pleasing to hear so many saying they really enjoyed the orienteering. The
map has been updated by Tom Edelsten (CHIG) and I heard only a few issues with
the mapping. Whilst out checking controls I had to admire the skill of the
mappers, past and present when interpreting the area and trying to be consistent
particularly with the vagaries of the vegetation.
All those who made a contribution in staging the event should be proud that
their efforts were so well received.
Janet Biggs (HAVOC)
secretary@orienteering-havoc.co.uk