IT’S A HOLLINGDALE HORROR –
BUT HARWOOD’S THE HERO
Moravian Orienteering club were celebrating at the weekend as club talisman Eddie Harwood became the Scottish Supervet (M55) champion in a tough, technical race at Kinloch Rannoch on Saturday. Meanwhile, in one of the toughest national junior championships in living memory, Forres Academy pupil Andrew Barr achieved a major milestone in his orienteering career by finishing 3rd Scot.
A good turnout of 16 club members with ages between 10 and 60 made the trip down the A9 and Harwood was back to his unstoppable best as he dominated his age class to win by over 4 minutes in the 6 Km event. Leading right from the first control he produced a virtually flawless run to leave Grampian’s Rob Hickling trailing in his wake. In the Boys Under-15s class, Moravian had 3 runners including Adam Nicolson, Johnstone MacPherson-Stewart and Andrew Barr, all of whom attend Forres Academy. There was an exceptionally strong field including several national-standard runners who had come up from England, and the Forres trio were amongst the youngest in the race.
For all three runners, the technical standard of the course was harder than any of them had experienced before, but this was to prove no barrier for Andrew Barr, who is clearly benefiting from his training with the Scottish Junior Squad. Making only one significant navigation error during his 54 minutes out on the 4.3 Km course, Barr came home in 6th place overall as 3rd Scot; a magnificent performance against some class athletes. His team mates, like many others in the race, came seriously unstuck in places, resulting in major time loss. Nevertheless, it was immense credit to all of them to successfully complete the whole route. “It was unrelentingly hard” commented team manager Harwood afterwards. “The technical standard of the course would have tested the very best adult competitors, and for all three of our lads to cope with a race at this level makes me very proud. Young Andrew clearly has a most remarkable talent”.
There was success in other areas too. Former club chairperson Margaret Dearman, who has been a mainstay of the club for many years and rarely gets much credit for performing out in the forest, ran her socks off in the W60 class. Her 5th place was a well-deserved result for someone who has given a great deal to the sport locally for decades. RAF man Ade Chapman also put in a very strong run in the ultra-competitive M45 class and came 9th.
After the individual competition on Saturday, the focus was on team racing on Sunday in the relays. Moravian had a very strong looking team in the veteran men’s race, with Jon Hollingdale, Steve Smirthwaite and Eddie Harwood forming the most formidable partnership the club has been able to put out for a long time. However, the race was to turn into a disaster for Hollingdale and his team, after the Kintessack runner had come home on the first leg seconds behind the leader. Second leg runner Steve Smirthwaite put in a faultless run to put the team in the lead, and with in-form Harwood on last leg, a victory was seemingly assured. Harwood duly held on to the lead finishing first, only to hear that Hollingdale had been disqualified for inadvertently punching a wrong control. In orienteering relays where runners are head to head, a competitor might find himself running through the same sequence of controls as other runners for a while, only to suddenly encounter a variation. Unless concentration is spot on, it is the easiest thing to be distracted and follow another runner into a wrong control and this is what happened, to bitter disappointment all round. Hollingdale can now look forward to being the subject of club banter for some considerable time.
However, spirits were soon on the rise as Moravian’s junior teams were to do the club proud. In the under-17s relay, Moravian probably had the youngest team in the race, with Andrew Barr still 12 years old, and Johnstone MacPherson-Stewart just 13. Middle leg runner Tom Chapman was older but lacked the racing experience of his younger team mates. Nevertheless, the team produced a scintillating performance, with MacPherson-Stewart gaining major scalp to come home in front of Aberdeen’s Sasha Chepelin after the first leg. Chepelin, despite being only 14, is so good that he normally runs in the Under 17s in individual competitions, having rarely tasted defeat in his true age class on Scottish soil. After solid runs by Chapman and Barr, the team finished 7th overall and 3rd Scottish team. With the two younger lads having another 3 years in this category, and many other developing juniors coming through the club ranks, the future looks promising indeed.
The final success of the day was in the handicap relay where Mike Dearman, Nick Barr and Tim Eden all ran great races to finish 3rd to round off an excellent weekend.
All eyes are on the juniors again next weekend when 8 youngsters are representing the north east in the inter-region competition held over two days in the Aberdeen area. The slightly lower technical demands of the races allows less advanced club members to participate, and it will be good experience for some of the club’s up-and-coming youngsters. There are relay races on the Saturday and an individual competition on Sunday where the race is the 4th in the Scottish National Orienteering League. The show then rolls on to Culbin the following week when it is the long-awaited Moray & Highland Junior Championships where the technical standard is lowered to make the race an attractive proposition for local junior runners with no experience of orienteering. There are adult classes too, and all information is available on www.moravianorienteering.org