Planner's Comments

Thanks to everyone who came out to The Dukeries, and what a perfect day we got, especially after the terrible weather the previous afternoon. Thoresby Estate is getting progressively more undergrowth, so keeping the courses out of the waist-high bracken and bramble while still providing a challenge was the main challenge planning. Most of the people I talked to seem to have enjoyed it, so hopefully we succeeded in that. Judging by the winning times, I think we managed to get the course lengths about right as well.

I apologise to the competitors on some of the longer courses who encountered the unpleasant woman who lives in the Clumber Estate house. That was entirely my fault as I'd been asked by Clumber to keep runners away from there, and I didn't consider the route choice past the house when looking at the options for that leg.

I'd like to thank all the people involved in putting on the event: Mike Gardner was a great controller to work with, and generously agreed to put controls out on Sunday morning when we couldn't get access to Thoresby on Saturday, Thanks to Robert for his excellent organisation, and to all the volunteers out in the cold on road crossings, parking, entries and results, starts and finishes, especially the finish team who coped admirably with being sent to the wrong finish location (again, entirely my fault, I'm afraid). Finally thanks to all the control collectors going round in the fading light, particularly Andy for helping the very cold orienteer he discovered out in the woods and still coming back to collect controls. We really couldn't have done the event without all of you.

Richard Dearden

Organisers' Comments

What a difference a day made. The weather was very kind and you were able to run around Thoresby and Clumber in glorious weather. Only 24 hours earlier the same place was being lashed with driving rain as the planner and controller were putting out the Clumber controls. Many thanks to Richard and Michael for their good work in planning and putting out the courses.

Thanks also needs to be expressed to the many NOC helpers who made the event run smoothly.

Congratulations to all of the new East Midlands Champions and to everyone who competed. We hope you enjoyed your course.

Two competitors who came to inform us that they had lost a fair amount of time due to a resident of a Clumber estate house shouting at them that they should not have been in the woods near their private house. A big thank you to them both for being so calm and collected when explaining what had happened and also when it was decided not to void that particular leg.

A big thank you to the very generous (or hungry) people at the event everyone who visited the EMJOS cake stall. The juniors had a very production day and raised £94 towards their activities.

All of the controls were collected in and the site cleared by dusk. The gates were locked as the light faded for the day.

Robert and Helen Parkinson (The two elves)