2023 KBlll

 

The KBlll proved to be a marvelous weekend with reasonably warm winter temperatures, lots of sunshine, little wind and no rain! So, there is the weather report!

Saturday – Olney State Forest

The forest located near Dooralong (NW of Wyong) is a real mixed bag. On the flat there is a a creek happily winding its way across the map. The vegetation here has a distinct greenish tinge and lots of detailed contours- slow going, you need to be accurate. The hills surrounding are traditional spur gully, with a rock feature or two. The vegetation was open and fast.

The courses all headed across the hilly section before plunging into the creek flats and then back into the hills.

Three Uringans were placed 1^st after Day 1. Maggie Mackay, W16A, Linda Sesta W55A and Gayle Shepherd W55AS. We also had three thirds- Jane Boland W Open B, Jonathan Nolan, M16A and Jim Mackay M60A. Not a bad days work.

A special mention here of the exploits of kelvin Meng. Kelvin is at uni based in Canberra. Being a self-sufficient soul, he came up to Wyong by train and then hopped on his trusty bike to ride out to the event. All went well until he was close to the event site when he had a spill. Grazed hands and a damaged knee resulting. Undaunted he camped the night in the forest and treated himself the next morning. His hands looked like the taping used by boxers when he finished. Needless to say, Kelvin competed all 3 days with a very sore knee. The Miller family from ACT chauffeured him around the rest of the weekend.

Damien, Angus and Ant comparing their runs

Dave at the start traingle

Gayle on her way to 1st place

Dave at the finish. A lot stopped here before tackling a steep hill to the arena

Jane's course

Jane with her bodyguard

Jonathan in flight

Junior catering- raising funds for the Aust Schools Champs WA

Kelvin complete with bandaged hands

Linda on the way to 1st place

Michael's course

Result Slats made a comeback!

A foot injury kept Ron out of the bush - 

Sunday- Honeyeater Hideout

Sunday dawned bright and chilly and it was off to Richmond Vale (near Kurri Kurri). What a delight was in store with the arena on an exposed ridge, remember no wind and lost of sun and there we sat with a brilliant view on what could best be described as a manicured paddock. Many orienteers camped the night. Perhaps the most appealing feature for a couple of Nolan boys was the fire pit. Will, who had accompanied Jane on the course on Saturday headed to the fire whilst Jane headed to the start.

The map was mainly spur gully and typically around water there was green. A lovely plant that grows here is called by orienteers the “Lawyer Plant” – once it gets hold of you it doesn’t let you go!

The courses were fantastic and challenged you at every turn. Gayle was the best placed Uringan in 2^nd with Linda and Jonathan in 3^rd. Ant finished 4^th after a rather “Barry Crocker” 10^th on Saturday. Jane was also 4^th.

Ant at the start

The assembly area

Will's work!

Gayle's course

Jane heading from the start

Jim, toiling up the hill to the finish

Kelvin's M20 course

Monday – The University of Newcastle

Once again sunshine although the arena was in dappled shade but still warm. The Newcastle Uni is huge and lots (read lots and lots) of buildings. Courses were fantastic as you weaved in and out and under and over through passageways up and down stairs. Courses had lots of controls and a map flip. Had to say this causes confusion – I picked up my map, arrived at the start triangle, located the start on the map and nothing fitted… A few highly technical non orienteering words later I realised I was looking at the second side of the map. Once looking at the right side – it all made sense.

Jonathan in M16A after two thirds stepped up one more to finish in 2^nd. Jane, Linda, Dave and Maggie all came in 3^rd in their respective classes. It was great to see our youngsters Ella Gudes and Elodie Warlters out on the Enter on Day Very Easy courses. They did rather well coming in 4^th and 5^th respectively.

Final Results 

After 3 days of competition, it was now time to see who were the overall winners. Unfortunately for Gayle who after days 1 and 2 was right amongst the leaders, she had a missed punch. So easy to do on a complex sprint map.

Linda, “Miss Consistency” finished 2^nd overall. Jane and Jonathan were 3^rd not a bad effort for our competitors Jim and Maggie were both close to the podium in 4^th. Ant and Michael were 6^th overall.

Well that is it a fantastic weekend and our congratulations to the organisers. Great courses, great maps and great organisation.

Well all that was left was to head south on the freeway – mmm slow but safe.

Cheryl Bluett's 75th Birthday

Kelvin 1

Kelvin 2

Kelvin 3

Maggie's course

Ori heading through the run through

Ron's tracking

Ron's course

Some of the many stairs

MetrO League 2023 #2 - Wianamatta West

 Metro League 2 was run on a new map  in a new suburb called Jordan Springs. The map was unusual in that it is fully fenced which meant there was surprisingly little urban rubbish dumped in the terrain.

The weather whilst chilly was brilliant aespecially if you found a spot in the sun. There you could easily forget that it was only 12 degrees.

As was the case in Metro 1 our teams were understrength with Divisions 4 and 5 only having 2 and 3 runners instead of 5. Division 2 fielded a full strength team and defeated the Western and Hills team 31 points to 23. However, Western and Hills turned the tables and won both Division 4 and 5 32-13 and 31-21 respectively.

In Division 4 we had two new Metro League Runners in Xiaohui Sherry Zou and Karen Shaw, with Karen collecting an impressive 8 points and Sherry 5. For first timers they did great.

Division 5 saw Julia Prudhoe- fastest on the course so she racked up 10 points, Gayle Shepherd 13th on the course, 7 points and Dave Lotty 32nd on the course scoring 4 points.

It was in Division 2 that there were some great results. Shane Doyle  was 4th fastest  for 10 points, Maggie Mackay 11th on course- 8 points. Serena Doyle 20th on course for 6 points, Jim Mackay 21st on course for 5 points and Zoe Melling 30th on course for 2 points.

Division 4

Division 2

Division 5

Round 3 of the Metro League is on 25th June at Yerambah Lagoon

Round 4 of the Metro League is on  23rd July at Forestville

Round 5 of the metro League is a Uringa Event on August 6th at Lansdowne

This coming June long weekend sees a very small contingent heading north to Newcastle for 3 races. Each day is a State League Event and the total time over the 3 days is used to calculate the 3 day Champions.

Photos from the event courtesy of Sandra Stewart

Morning Briefing

Dave

Gayle

Karen

Buddy Club members - Paul and Julia Prudhoe

Serena

Shane

Wayne

State League 5 & 6 Central Highlands - Brrrrrrrrr

Saturday - Kahli's Rocks 

For those back in Sydney you may have thought that the weekend was rather chilly. Well let me tell you the weather on the Central Highlands- Bathurst, Orange, Molong was extremely warm only if you were a penguin holidaying from Antarctica.

Saturday saw the crowd gather at Kahli's Rocks  which is midway between Bathurst and Orange and conveniently located about 600m off the Mitchell Highway. The map was made initially by Eric Andrews and named after Eric's dog who unfortunately met up with a rather large snake whilst Eric was mapping and passed away. Fittingly we entered the map through "Kahli's Gate."

There is a lot of open on the map but once you head off the plateau areas it is slower and very tough navigation. Gordon Wilson, Bennelong, set excellent courses and winning times were pretty close to  planned times.

Dave Lotty, Open Easy was home first, as were the 16A twins - Maggie Mackay and Jonathan Nolan. Ant Nolan, M50A was second and Jim Mackay M65A along with Jan Sargood W65A were 3rd in their classes. Wayne Eliot was just off the pace in M40A finishing 4th.

Maggie's Course

Wayne's course

Ant

Jan

Jono

Maggie

The open paddock  - "the Ice Pit"

Wayne leading Rohan Hyslop home!

A feature of the Saturday event was that there was this howling cold southerly blowing. Whilst it was sheltered in the forest and a lot warmer,  the finish arena was in an open paddock. It was so chilly that even the sausages cooking on the juniors BBQ were icing up! Needless to say there was little socialising post race as people headed to their cars to warm up and make a quick exit.

Dinner was consumed at various venues between Bathurst and Molong. I did hear that the NSW Junior all dined at a great  pub in Orange. 

Sunday - Gumble Pinnacles

Sunday morning dawned chilly but no wind. The sun was still in bed behind a  blanket of cloud and refused to come out until later in the day. 

Gumble Pinnacles is located approx. 40 minutes west of Molong and is a map of two characters. One -open and fast and the second thick, slow and tricky. Course setter Greg Barbour, Big Foot, made sure you worked hard for your progress.

Dave Lotty doubled up with another first in Open Easy and also scoring a weekend double was Jonathan Nolan M16A. Having  a "blinder" in W55AS was Gayle Shepherd who was almost 14 minutes faster than her 2nd place competitor. There was a brace of Uringan 3rd places. Maggie Mackay W16A, Sarah Garnett W65A and Rick Steele M65A.

Special mention here in that Maggie and Jonathan are very much in the mix for selection in the NSW School's team for the Australian Schools Championships which will be held in Western Australia in late September. The final selection races will be held over the KB3 weekend ( formerly known as the QB3). Fingers crossed for strong performances from this pair.

With the wind nowhere to be felt there was a lot of catching up with friends post event. Coffee and cake was the order of the day. A thoughtful Big Footer had a warming fire prepared which many of the younger set delighted in keeping it blazing. 

Another innovative feature were the "sneaker results". As there was no phone reception, Andy Simpson printed results regularly and these were attached to some nearby corflute!

Now we have mentioned Livelox before. Ant, on the Uringa Facebook page, bravely put up his tracking from day 2 pointing out that sometimes the brain and the map are at odds with each other. (As an aside I would be pretty happy with that run if it was mine!)

To have a look go to:

https://www.livelox.com/Viewer/2023-NSW-State-League-6-Long-Distance/M50A?classId=601720&tab=player

 and on the left click on Ant Nolan then press the play button. 

Livelox is a great training tool:

Gayle was heading for control 1 (top of photo) from the start. Granite terrain can all look the same.

When discussing the leg, Gayle was sure she had taken an accurate bearing and went back almost to the start to do it right but alas a  similar result. Moral to the story was it is easy to drift off the bearing and  come across rock that looks for all intents and purposes to be very similar to what you are looking for.

Rick's course

Ryan Patterson- all of 5years old!

Sarah

Sarah's Course

Coming Events

May 28th MetrO League 2023 #2 - Wianamatta West 

Uringa is fielding teams in Division2, 4 and 5. Currently we have 5 runners entered so need quite a few more. Entries close Saturday 27th May at 17.00.

Enter via Eventor at:

https://eventor.orienteering.asn.au/Events/Show/18675

June 10,11,12 - 2023 KB3 and NSW State Leagues 7, 8 and 9

3 excellent events - you can run one or run the lot. Entries close - Sunday 28th May

Entries and information at:

https://eventor.orienteering.asn.au/Events/Show/17757