I hope you all enjoyed running in Lossie.  The times all seemed about right with the one glaring exception of the orange course.  I wondered at the time whether I was making the course just a bit too long and challenging which is what led me to put the warning to juniors on the notice at registration.  It was definitely at the very top end of the scale, and the leg to number 8 was a bit longer than most orange runners are used to.  That said, with such a small number of competitors, it's hard to be sure whether those runners who took a long time were just enjoying themselves so much that they were savouring the experience!  But for a silly mistake, young Andrew Barr, who is quite new to the game and is still in primary school, would have done the course in 36 minutes which perhaps suggests that the standard was OK.  Even adults mustn't be afraid to stay on yellow if you're not too confident with your navigation.  You can still get a really enjoyable blast round the woods, and if you've not had enough you can always do an orange later on! 

 

A couple of people came up to me at Anagach and commented that they enjoyed the variation in difficulty in the more technical courses.  Personally I quite enjoy the odd easy leg that gives you the chance to run a bit quicker, but you must then be able to control yourself when you get back in to the difficult bits - or rely on luck which is what I often do!

 

Next time I plan an event I'll make sure that I send the right map file to Stirling Surveys.  This time I sent an old file minus lots of map corrections.  This included a path used by all the junior courses!  I only noticed this late on Thursday afternoon so many thanks to Steve Barrett for saving the day and printing another set out in time to bring up to Aviemore with him on Friday, thus saving us a rather embarrassing experience to say the least.

 

Finally, I'd be interested to know the views of anybody who came to the event back in June when we used the same courses.  We'd ordered loads of maps but only 54 runners turned up which is why we decided to hold the same event again.  Did you enjoy running the same course twice and would you come to future events that did the same? (provided we left it a few months to give you some time to forget where you went).  Drop me an e-mail at alisonrodgers@supanet.com if you'd like to comment.

 

Mike Rodgers