Results for DVO Regional Event, Shining Cliff, 12/02/2011

Saturday 16:08 updated results uploaded

Next events Saturday 26^th February – Local Event (White to Light Green) Elvaston Castle Country Park near Derby

Sunday 6^th March – Level C Event (White to Brown) Hardwick Hall

Controller’s comments

Shining Cliff is a physical area and it is difficult to get course lengths right to suit everybody. I encouraged the course lengths of Brown and Blue to be increased as the rules say: “Where no Black course is planned, it is still necessary to determine the length of a nominal Black course with an elite winning time of 67 minutes in order to use the ratios for the other courses. In this instance the winning time on the Brown course by a top standard elite competitor should be 57 minutes.” (event guideline b). Thanks to Richard Robinson we nearly achieved that. Too many events have courses much shorter than this, so there is a risk people have false expectations.

It’s a shame there is now so much out-of-bounds terrain on Shining Cliff. It makes planning good technical courses more difficult. Having start and finish by the car park adds more “dead” running, but is appreciated at winter events. Derek and Jen Gale did well, given the constraints. Most people seemed to be happy with their courses, if not with the final climb, and it was good to see post-race conversations comparing routes in the assembly field.

I enjoyed working with Jen, Derek and the whole DVO team and it was great to be in the area on such a lovely day.

Peter Gorvett (SYO)

Organiser's Comments

It was the first time I'd organised using the 'team system' and it was far less effort than last time, with hardly any phone calls! How did we live in the days before email?

A big thank you to all the teams – you all knew your job, all I had to do was bring the equipment. The parking team took £114 which the farmer will give to a charity of his choice. It made a nice atmosphere having the Junior Squad cake stall, thanks to them too!

Planner’s Comments

It was something of a shock going back to the area in February, the effect of snow and then cattle meant the whole area was much more runnable. This was a good thing, making some straight route choices a viable option. However, it also made a lot of the controls more visible, which perhaps reduced the technical difficulty. We hope this didn’t spoil it for anyone. Parking at the highest point of the event area and a desire to keep the start and finish close by for a winter event meant a bit of dead running at the start and a slog up the hill at the finish. But it would have kept you warm!

We had a minor panic the afternoon before when we found the gate into the parking field completely unopenable. But fortunately, when informed of the problem, the farmer ‘adjusted’ the fastening with his hammer and we entered unhindered in the morning.

Everything seemed to work smoothly on the day and our thanks to Peter for being a very thorough and helpful controller.

LOST PROPERTY: Stainless steel flask left near the start.

String Course Results: Shining Cliff 12^th Feb 2011

Issabela Edwards 8 DVO 6 mins

Alessandra Edwards 6 DVO 6 mins

Marvin Gibbs 3 DVO 12 mins

Peter Mackervoy 9 DVO 6 mins

Mackenzie Hodson 5 DVO 12 mins

Ben Mackervoy 7 DVO 6 mins

Ben O’Donnell 6 DVO 6 mins

Jake O’Donnell 4 DVO 11 mins

Sam Stimpson 8 - 5 mins

Lizzie Sheridan 7 NOC 7 mins

Patrick Sheridan 5 NOC 7 mins

Sophie Vincent 8 DVO 5 mins

Max Staube 1 OD 30 mins

Rachel Duckworth 7 DVO 6 mins

Alexa Lindsay 4 DVO 14 mins