The first major orienteering event of the year isn’t usually the British Championships but, to avoid disturbing ground nesting birds, this year’s event took place last weekend.  Eight Reivers made the long trip south to the New Forest and were rewarded with a good set of results over the fast terrain.

John Tullie normally has to miss the Championships because it clashes with his lambing time, but he made the best of the opportunity this year with a storming run to take 2nd place in M50.  Lindsey Knox also had a good run to take 4th spot on W50.  The club’s three Scottish Junior Squad members all had solid runs with Sarah Tullie and Karen Maxwell both finishing 6th on their courses, and Kirstin Maxwell taking 7th in the Future Champions Cup race.  Other results: Robin Sloan 20th, Douglas Henderson 22nd, Ian Maxwell 33rd.

Only three members stayed on for the Relay Championships but the team of Robin Sloan, Douglas Henderson and Lindsey Knox managed a highly respectable 7th place in the Mixed class.

Full results here

Elsewhere a small number of members had a good day at the Edinburgh Sprint which took place at Hopetoun House, South Queensferry.  The event takes the format of a prologue then a chasing start, with the winner being the person with the fastest overall time for both legs.  In the Senior Men’s category Doug Small finished in 12th place on 36:46 mins with Andrew Armstrong not far behind in 14th place on 37:11 mins.  On the Senior Ladies course Eileen Maxwell had two good runs to finish in 3rd position. Results are here

Well done to Karen Maxwell, Kirstin Maxwell and Sarah Tullie who have all been selected for the 2009 Scottish Junior Squad. 

The final championship of the 2008 orienteering season was a successful one for Roxburgh Reivers with four members becoming East of Scotland champions last Sunday.  The event was held in the impressive, but wintry and muddy, grounds of Penicuik Estate.

Iain Cattermole M12 took his first piece of silverware, well done. Karen Maxwell successfully defended her W14 title, Ian took M45 and Lindsey Knox bowed out of W45 with a win in that class.

There were 2^nd places for John Tullie (running as an M40), James Tullie, Sarah Tullie and Paul McGreal, and taking 3^rd place were Eileen Maxwell and Jim Knox.

More information:

Rachan and Dreva, near Broughton, was the venue for this year’s Scottish Score Championships.  Brilliant blue skies, a covering of snow on the hills, and lovely autumn colours led to a sociable discussion with everyone in the car park after our runs.

Oddly, Courses 1 and 2 (i.e. everyone 16 and above) had the same controls but the oldies had 60 minutes and the fast young ones had 70 minutes so the faster “young” ones didn’t need to choose which ones to leave out – just blast all the controls as fast as possible.  BUT, several people took an illegal short-cut so the M21 trophy went to the 5th place finisher.  This meant a slightly confused prize-giving but we did amuse ourselves by booing any mention of people who hadn’t returned their trophies from last year!

There were only 5 RR’s in attendance but we came away with 2 trophies – Robin Sloan on M60 and Lindsey Knox on W45.  Both got slight revenge for last weekend’s SOL finale by beating the SOL winners.  Andrew Armstrong was 5th on M50, Bill Bruce 6th on M55 and Jim  Knox 8th on M60 – but Jim was suffering tired legs after winning a Teviotdale Harriers race the previous day compounded by an ankle tweak sustained coming back down from the far away controls.

More information:

Highland Perthshire proved a fitting climax to the Scottish Orienteering League although the results for the club could have been better. Six RR’s were still in the hunt for the 2008 titles but, after a tough physical and mental test in Craig a Barns overlooking picturesque Dunkeld, only Eileen Maxwell managed to claim overall victory.

There were individual wins for Douglas Tullie, John Tullie and Kirstin Maxwell but not by enough margin to take the league, with best 4 scores from the year counting.

Douglas and James Tullie were part of the Scottish team competing in the Senior Home Internationals this weekend and were instrumental in the team’s demolition of the other nations – an emphatic and very satisfying win.

Further south, Ian Maxwell was having a different exciting weekend, taking part in the Original Mountain Marathon in the Lake District.  Ian and his partner Robin Orr finished their Day 1 course before discovering that the event had been called off due to bad weather and took refuge overnight in a youth hostel.

A windy day near Aviemore resulted in perfect conditions for the local gliding club and the orienteers running in the Inshriach forest below them, although the orienteers also had the added interest of an aggressive capercaille which had chased the course planners the day before.  Luckily it didn’t make an appearance although some courses were changed to avoid it’s area.

The more serious business of navigating through one of Scotland’s most intricate forest focussed the athlete’s minds and Roxburgh Reivers bagged a good number of podium places in this the penultimate round of the 2008 Scottish Orienteering League.   There were wins for John Tullie, Robin Sloan and Lindsey Knox plus runners-up places for Jim Knox, James Tullie and Eileen Maxwell.  With the final round taking place at Dunkeld in a fortnight, all these runners are in a good position to take the overall title.

Other results: Kirstin Maxwell 3rd, Sarah Tullie 4th, Ian Maxwell 5th, Karen Maxwell 6th.