Sumer is Icumen In

The Shamrock O-Ringen is just a few days away, the weekday evening events have started, the Senior Team are away in France at WOC selection events and the exams are with us ... Summer has arrived!

First Report from France

First reports from Aix-les-Bains are of a number of non-finishes from the elite teams. Ireland’s Toni O’Donovan reports:
“It’s been a pretty tough weekend with physical, technical terrain.  The race today was a bit of a monster.  Roz and Aislinn finished for the girls with only Marcus, Andrew and Nick finishing the boys race.  Toni picked up an injury yesterday so went straight from the start to finish after collecting her map, David made it to 5 before going over on his ankle and at various points throughout the course there was attrition.   Other teams faired in a similar way with, for example, the British team having even fewer finishers than the Irish team.   A few have been particularly surprised by the rough nature of the terrain with more brashings and felled areas than expected.  We’re back in Le Revard tomorrow to do some more training in the area…..” Follow the team's fortunes here.

Shamrock O-Ringen

The 17th Shamrock O-Ringen is on the June Bank Holiday weekend on the Sheep's Head Peninsula, Co. Cork. The first event is a Middle Distance race at  Gortnakilly, then Day 2 a Classic Distance at Maulnaskehy and Day 3 a Chasing Start at Rosskerrig. The open mountain terrain of West Cork, and the unique atmosphere of the Shamrock, attract many competitors from abroad again year after year. This year there are more than 260 entries from sixteen countries, from Europe, Australia, New Zealand and USA. Check the event details here.
This year Kerry Orienteers are staging a prologue Sprint event on Friday evening June 3rd at Rinn na gCros, Kenmare.

Leinster evening events

The annual CNOC series of Tuesday evening events has started and there are three to go: Hill Wood, Monasterevan, on May 31st, probably Donadea on June 14th  and Hollywood (with a barbecue) on June 21st. Start times are from 6 to 7.30 pm and there are normally three courses plus an "adventure run", a mid-length, simple course following line features (like the no-longer-used Red course in colour events).

Munster evening events

Cork Orienteering Club's evening events are on Tuesdays: details here. The series started on May 10th and runs until July 19th.

Ulster evening events

Evening events in NIOA clubs continue on Wednesdays (LVO WEE series) and Thursdays (NWOC). Details here.

IOA AGM

The IOA Annual General Meeting was held on the weekend of the Irish Championships, at Kippure Estate, Co. Wicklow. The outgoing Committee were all prepared to stand again and there were no controversial motions or exciting moments. Details of the meeting can be found here. (Well, maybe not ...!)

IOA Awards

At the IOA AGM, the following awards were announced for 2011:
Niamh Corbett (CorkO) got the Mactíre Trophy for her 4th place in W16 at last year's European Youth O-Championships in Spain;
Mike Long and Catherine King got one of the the Silva Awards, for their support for the entire Irish orienteering disapora for last year's World Championships in Trondheim, Norway;
Rory Costello (KerryO) got the Silva Trophy for his orienteering activity through the years in Kerry.

IOA at Adventure Weekend
The Irish Orienteering Association was represented at the recent Adventure Weekend at the RDS in Dublin, where outdoor centres and a variety of high-adrenaline activities were being promoted.
IOA shared a stand with the environmental group Leave No Trace and with Mountaineering Ireland.
Interest in orienteering was steady, with a number of lapsed orienteers returning to the fold, or people who had orienteered in other countries but who never tried it here.
Mainstay of the event was IOA Communications Officer Finn Van Gelderen, who took the chance to show his excellent one-minute film advertising orienteering whenever possible.
Another facet of the weekend was the Dublin urban adventure race "DARE", involving running, cycling, kayaking, assault courses and street orienteering ... with SI results processing by CNOC's Short family.

Leinster Inter-club Championships
GEN are hosting this event at Carrickgolligan, Kilternan, Co. Dublin on Sunday June 19th. All runners can count for your club, so come along and support it if you're not in Finland at Jukola. Make a weekend of it ant take in  the LVO NI Series event at Tollymore, near Newcastle, Co. Down on Saturday 18th.

British Champion

Congratulations to LVO's Alan Gartside on becoming British Trail Orienteering Champion this month. Alan has pioneered trail orienteering in Ireland almost single handed and his events in conjunction with the JK at Easter involved the usual head-scratching deviousness we have come to expect of Alan.

Up to speed

Follow the fortunes of the Irish teams at the European Youth O-Champs in the Czech Republic here, the Junior World Championships in Poland here and the World Championships in France here.
No announcements have been made about the EYOC and JWOC teams, but piecing the evidence together suggests that the EYOC team will be: W16 Niamh Corbett and Clíona McCullough, M16 Jonny Quinn and Harry Millar; M18 Laurence Quinn, Eoin McCullough and Mark Stephens.
Equally, piecing together the evidence for JWOC suggests that the team will be Colm Moran, Conor Short, Cillín Corbett, Josh O-Sullivan-Hourihan and Jack Millar. Check for corrections when the teams are announced! (I got the teams right - they were named on 30th May. Visit the Irish Junior Squad page here.)

Setanta Rogaine Reminder

The 14th Setanta Rogaine (6 hour individual, 6 hour team, 24 hour team) score event in the Wicklow mountains) is on June 25th/26th and entries close on June 17th.
A Rogaine is basically a mountain navigation race, (or long score event) where you locate as many controls in the mountains as you can, in the allocated time period (6 or 24 hours). When doing the 24 hour event you can come back to the hash house for some food and a few hours sleep in your tent. The hardier competitors will stay out all night and will bivvy for a bit under a bush although some keep going without any sleep. The 6 hour would be a good event for those of you new to Rogaines and long events who want to practice your skills! See details here.

Finally ...

Good luck to all the young orienteers doing exams in June! Getting out for a run is a good break from studying and will help keep your brain working and your fitness maintained for those summer races to come ...

A Look back at IOC2011

Mini-O at Kippure Estate (Pic: Tara Horan)

 The JK in Northern Ireland a week before the Irish Championships brought benefits and challenges to IOC: benefits in increased numbers and joint promotion of the two events; challenges also in increased numbers and the associated parking requirements and the inevitable comparison of two rather different competitions. The emphasis in the JK was on an international orienteering festival with quality orienteering and lots of ancillary activities; the emphasis at IOC is on a small group of people running a National Championships, where the courses are the main focus and anything else we get is a bonus: more relaxed than the JK, lying somewhere between the JK and the Shamrock O-Ringen in outlook as it is in its dates.

Ajax took on virtually all the organisation, with help from DFO on the ground, and brought us three days of excellent orienteering, introducing us to the intricacies of turf cuttings and of Wicklow boulder-fields.

Saturday's Middle Distance race at Glendoo East saw Paul Smyth's courses zig-zag through the turf banks in full view of the waiting runners and finishers in the sunshine - turning orienteering into a spectator sport. With the exception of the Elite courses, the courses were very short with winning times more like a sprint than a middle distance race - some runners compared it to urban sprint racing without the buildings! Curiously, I could see no guidelines in the IOA Rules relating to a Middle Distance Championship, just Classic, Relay and Sprint. Bill Edwards (CorkO), home from New Zealand, took 1st place in the Elite, followed by Ger Butler (3ROC) and Jonny Kendall (CorkO); Toni O'Donovan (CorkO), Aislinn Kendall (CorkO) and Jenny Peel (SYO) took the top spots in the Women's Elite.

Results are here.

Kippure, the highest mountain in Co. Dublin, dominated the proceedings for the weekend - the distinctive TV mast was visible from much of the competition terrain and the event centre, at Kippure Estate near the Sally Gap hosted mini-O, the IOA AGM, meals, music, Routegadget talks, prizegivings, accommodation and socials. Read about Kippure Estate here and Kippure Mountain here.

On Sunday the action moved to Brockagh, near Laragh, for the Classic distance race, as breeding birds put paid to the original area. Aonghus OCléirigh planned the courses which were very testing in the early stages and ventured into less interesting terrain towards the finish with longer legs to challenge fitness and route choice. In common with the JK and all the IOC events, there was scarcely a tree to be seen or a drop of rain (I said scarcely, not none at all!) all weekend: giving a totally false impression of Irish weather to our 250 or so O-visitors.

Marcus Pinker (CorkO), Ger Butler (3ROC) and Shane Lynch (CorkO) took top placings in the M21 Elite, with  Ciara Largey (FermO), Toni O'Donovan (CorkO) and Rose Burden (AIRE) finishing 1st, 2nd and 3rd in W21E. Marcus's win is particularly notable as he had been badly injured in a cycling accident and thought it would take him another year to get back to full fitness.

Classic event results are here.

Relays head for the turf banks (Tony Lawlor)

Monday saw a move to the blasted heath on the west side of Glendoo ridge for the Relays. Similar terrain to the Middle Distance - a bit wetter underfoot but with relatively less climb. The wind and the dust blew and the army tents and Buff-ed and buffeted bystanders with dust-smeared faces suggested Outer Mongolia rather than the Featherbeds, but the orienteering went ahead regardless. Planner Marcus Geoghegan brought the runners gradually up the hillside in full view of the start. Mass starts became specks of colourful ants scurrying across the turf, coalescing into small groups to confer before splitting up and moving on. The running was fast and the thinking required, faster still. The dust caused problems for the results team (see below) but Pat Healy kept everyone up to date with a commentary aided by Martin Flynn's live display (unfortunately only visible to Pat).

CNOC retained the Women's title (Niamh O'Boyle, Bridget Lawlor and Ruth Lynam) and Cork O initially regained the Men's title (Jonny Kendall, Arnis Saltumis & Shane Lynch) but subsequently an issue arose regarding the eligibility rules for Irish Relays which have both a residency and a citizenship requirement. As a result, CNOC were later declared the winners of the Irish Club Relay Championships while the Cork O team were the fastest team on the day. (I think I have it right now ...) Fingal won the Junior 48- class (Sandis Retkins, Donal Kearns & Seán Kearns) and CorkO won the Junior 36- class (Ailbhe Callanan, Ciara Fitzgerald & Norah O'Brien).
It does appear that there is an anomaly in the IOA Rules which require a runner in a relay team at the Irish Championships to (among other things) have been present in Ireland for at least 6 of the 12 months  before the event, while no such restriction applies to the individual race. I gather that the IOA will be looking into ironing out any wrinkles in the rules in this area.

See the Relay results here.

There are lots of photos on the IOC web site here.

OMG! What a Nightmare!

Martin Flynn was in charge of the computers and results at the Irish Championships. Everything was going well until ...

I feel my mind shutting down as my body rises involuntarily out of the chair in a futile attempt to make a run for it.
It has all gone so well up to this.  Downloading 500 pre-entry competitors is a lot easier than EOD for 100.  The nearest thing to a problem was having to use the genny - generators are noisy, smelly, heavy things and I prefer to use batteries.  After 'fixing' the results of Saturday, I was in bed by 1 am and the relay teams were entered by about midnight on Sunday.  On a Shamrock, this would constitute short-time working.  The live results screens had worked reasonably well, apart from the occasional power issues.  It looks like the radio controls were working, despite some last-minute problems with the WIFI.  Pat Healy is giving it large on the PA.
Then the first finisher downloads and the world comes crashing down.
In what is to become an all too familiar sight, the Ór Finishers panel flashes multi-colour, a sure sign that the course was wrong.  Why is this happening?  Did she do the wrong course?  Is the course wrong in Ór?  Was she given the wrong course in Ór?  Was she given the wrong map?  Is there a bug?   With only one relay per year, I did not have a chance to fully test it beforehand but I am reasonably sure that it should work.

They say that everyone has a guardian angel on their shoulder.  Mine is named Denis Deasy.  This is a typical conversation:

SI:              Beep!
Ór:              Wrong Course.
Me:             Hold on a minute, I have the wrong course for you and I'll need to sort it out.  What course did you do?
Downloader: Ehhhhh. (a reasonable enough response)
Me:             OK, what class were you on?
Downloader: Mmmm.
Me:              What is your name?
Downloader: Ahhhh.
(OK, I made that part up.)
Denis (finds it in the spreadsheet):  Team 123, leg 1.  Course H6-L

Course changed, blob green, move on.

With the time taken up fixing the course, I am up to high do and have visions of the download queue reaching back to the last control.  I have lost confidence in the system.  I am reasonably sure that there will be results but maybe not today.
People want to re-download to get a good splits sheet.  Can't they see that I'm stressed out here and there's a queue building up behind them?  Some people's blobs don't go green when their courses are fixed.  I don't like this.  I check them as best I can.  One or two have obviously mis-punched.  Others are just missing a control or two.  I am always suspicious of this but don't have time to investigate.  When Toni O'Donovan has a missed control, she takes it on the chin.  I can't be sure if she realizes that she missed it or what.  I'm sure she will be back if there is a problem.
Why has nobody come to get results?  I try to look at them to make sure they make some sort of sense.  I can only see one leg runner per team.  There must be something wrong.  No,it's OK, only first leg runners have downloaded so far.
There are downloaders with times of over 600 minutes.  A sure sign that they didn't clear before starting.  I am going to have to sort this out but when and how?  All the time, Denis and I have to figure out what course people did and fix it - over 200 people.  Some people are on the correct course.  Somehow, it seemed weird when this happened.  There is definitely something odd about the OP courses.  They always give a green blob - maybe they don't have any controls defined on them.  I will have to sort it out later.  A guy downloads.  "You're not Don Short", I say.
Don Short.  Whenever I see him or his name, I know that some wacky and interesting form of chaos is on its way.  For a long time, I have been convinced that the Shorts have a bag of SI cards and grab a random one out for each event, just to torture the results guy.
It turns out that Don's team is running in a different order to the one they declared.  Or that they are running in the correct order but with different SI cards.  Or that they are in a different order with different cards.  Or that they are actually aliens from another dimension.  One symptom of PTSD is that the exact details are removed to help save the victim from insanity.  As it turns out, several teams have done something similar.  I'm sure it happens all the time and is normal, though I wouldn't like to test this theory at a JK.  I will just have to add a mechanism to make swapping easier in Ór.
At some stage, the queue disappears briefly.  I am up to date and try to figure out what's going on.  Paddy Joe is still belting it out on the PA.  The radio controls must still be working.  Who'd a thunk it!?  I wonder what people think of the commentary.
I had assumed that my dry gritty mouth was caused by the stress until my mouse packed it in.  Then I saw the dust.  Everything was covered in it.  Could it damaging the laptops, printers etc?  Who knows, gotta keep going and hope for the best.
Ór starts to become slow and unresponsive.  In a moment of hysteria I think maybe it's because of the dust.  More likely it's a bug.  I will fix it when this is over.  Hopefully, it won't grind to a halt in the mean time.  I look down - 200 downloads, less than 60 to go.  I see light at the end of the tunnel.
People continue downloading (slowly) and Denis and I continue fixing their course.  The immediate panic is abating and I have renewed confidence in the software but will the results be OK? There seem to be a number of problems.  The results show FermO winning but Ruth downloaded ages before Sharon.
Why is Oisin Wickham DNF?  Indeed why?  He has a start & finish time and punched all the controls.  I have since fixed the bug that caused the problem but I still don't know what happened.
At last, Marcus appears and demands results.  I print out a set and try to explain that some of the times are wrong (no clear) and he will need to look for anything else that looks dodgy.  He doesn't seem too happy but that's his problem, I am still trying to figure out how to sort out the problems I know about.
Finally, after fixing a few errors, Marcus is happy enough with the results to call a prizegiving.  I think that one or two winners are mis-declared but this is quickly rectified.  The last finisher arrives.  I can pack up and try to remove the dust from my gear, my car and myself.
I come home and fix up the results.  I remove the dodgy punches from the non-cleared cards and add the EODs. I still don't know what happened to the courses in Ór between midnight and 10 am but manage to figure everything else out to my satisfaction.  Results uploaded.  Routegadget looks OK.  Time for sleep.
So, if you found me even ruder than normal on Monday, I apologise.  You have to realize, I was having a very bad day.
- Martin Flynn

Shamrock O-Ringen Deadline EXTENDED TO May 15th!

Entries for the Shamrock O-Ringen on the Sheep's Head peninsula in West Cork were to close on Friday 6th May but have just been extended to May 15th. The event is on the June Bank Holiday weekend (June 4, 5, 6) and the entry list so far is dominated by runners from outside Ireland who have discovered them selves, or heard others talk about, the unique atmosphere of the Shamrock which makes people come back again and again. The format is a middle distance race on Saturday, a classic distance on the Sunday and a chasing start on the Monday, all on the wonderful craggy, contour-rich terrain with the smell of bog myrtle and the call of the cuckoo. What a way to spend the weekend!
As I write, entries have just crept up over the 200 mark, with slightly more than 50% from abroad, so there's plenty of room for more. The relaxed, friendly atmosphere with challenging terrain and courses are what mark out the Shamrock as different from other events, so go on and enter if you've never been there - you won't regret it!

Enter now at the Shamrock O-Ringen web site here.

Follow That!

The final countdown to the 2011 Irish Championships is on. Last weekend's JK in Northern Ireland will be a hard act to follow, but Ajax's Irish Championships this weekend will be the biggest IOC for some years, maybe the biggest ever: more than 500 competitors have entered, many of them having stayed on for the week after the JK. The entry from Ireland stands at about 275 with visitors making up the balance.
The Middle Distance and Relay events will feature the open mountain with turf cuttings terrain on the spine of the Dublin/Wicklow border between Glencullen and Glencree, similar to the area mapped by Marcus Pinker at Raven's Rock/Prince William's Seat used for a Leinster Championships some years ago. Competitors at Sunday's Classic event at Brockagh, near Laragh, will have the runnable boulder-strewn slopes of Brockagh and the marshy ground and more complex contours and crags of Mall Hill to contend with.
The visitors are particularly prevalent in the older age classes - imagine 29 M65's in an Irish Champs!. However, the entry of 46 in M21E and 20 in W21E will make sure that there is hot competition at the top end too. Will Nick Simonin retain his title, or will one of the locals like Shea O'Boyle win the men's race? Will Niamh O'Boyle, who has had some injury problems in the past year, retain her title?
In the Relays, will 3ROC take the elusive men's title after finishing top Irish team at the JK? Will CNOC retain the Women's title?
In addition to the main events, Ajax's event centre at Kippure Estate, west of the Sally Gap, will feature a Mini-O event run by Colm Hill as a fundraiser for the Junior Team on Saturday evening and will also host the IOA Annual General Meeting on Sunday evening.
Full details and startlists are here.
Remember that parking at the events is limited, so try to share transport as much as possible.

JK2011

Marcus Geoghegan said it all, in his brief note about the event in the Irish Orienteering E-Group today:
"The eGroup has been very quiet about this, but that's probably because everyone is still stunned by the amazing achievement of the Northern Irish clubs last weekend in running the JK.
The events were fantastic, challenging, orienteering. The organisation was impeccable. It was a triumph, no other way to describe it. I don't know how they managed to do it, but I for one want to publically say well done. I'm already eagerly anticipating the combined World Champs and Northern Ireland 6-day in a few years' time."
I would have to agree with Marcus's assessment of the event. To attract more than 2000 orienteers to Northern ireland was some feat, many of them never having orienteered here, or even set foot in Ireland before, but to run four such excellent events with such panache and style really was an extraordinary achievement - as if the organisers had been doing it all their lives.
In addition to the fantastic sprint race which kick-started the weekend at Stranmillis College in Belfast, the Individual events on the dunes of Tyrella and the slopes of Slieve Croob, and the relays at Tyrella, continued to impress the competitors with their courses and organisational quality. On top of that, throw in a QUBOC prologue sprint in Queen's University and Belfast's Botanic Gardens, Trail orienteering at Castlewellan and Murlough, TempO at Stranmillis, a micr-O maze and three outstanding string courses for the junior juniors, a table quiz for the Irish juniors, the BOF AGM, and a concert and social in Newcastle, and it made up quite a weekend.
As someone who was involved in a peripheral way in some of the organisation, I could see the amount of planning and thought that went in to every aspect of the event, from terrain selection through bussing competitors, to mapping, to music, to volunteers and equipment, from crisis to crisis, and the degree of cooperation between all the organising clubs (spearheaded by LVO) showed total commitment to the JK as a showcase for orienteering and for Northern Ireland.
There were very many obstacles to be overcome along that way and the organising team was very fortunate to be able to draw on the talents of organisers like Colin Henderson, planners like Bill Simpson, Igor Stefko, Wilbert Hollinger, Greg McCann and Philip Baxter, and many others, all shepherded along by the unflappable Harold White. Several retired orienteers came to see the Festival in full swing or help at the events, and it was great to see the elder statesmen of Irish orienteering like  Ernie Wilson meeting Seán Rothery and Wilbert Hollimger, or Freddie McCann back to help at the Relays.
The competitors' comments were very positive: "A great JK", "One of the best I have been to", "Fantastic orienteering", and no doubt the plaudits will continue to come in.
So: Hats off to NIOA for staging a really outstanding JK! You can read more about it, with results and reviews, on Nope Sport here, on the BOF web site here, and the full results are on the JK2011 web site here.
The JK Trophy was won by Scotland's Interlopers, with the British Army team taking the women's relay title.
Read about the Sprint here, Day 2 at Tyrella here, Day 3 at Slieve Croob here and the Relays here.
Next year's JK will be in Scotland on April 6-9 2012, largely in Perthshire.
There is no truth in the rumour that, since  Jan Kjellstrom Orienteering Festival over the Easter weekend in Belfast and Co. Down was such a success, the name of the event will be changed to the Seán McEllistrim O-festival ...

Some of the Irish highlights of the results were:

Sprint: Rúairí Long 1st M12; Bill Edwards 2nd M40; Caoimhe O'Boyle 2nd W14; Niamh Corbett 4th W16; Faye Pinker 3rd W35; 
Individual: Jonathan Quinn 4th M16A; James Logue 1st M40L, Bill Edwards 2nd M40L; Aonghus OCléirigh 5th M50L; Frank Martindale 4th M75L; Caoimhe O'Boyle 1st W14A; Ruth Lynam 2nd W55L; Clare Nuttall 2nd W70L; Faith White 3rd W75.
Relays: CorkO finished 8th in the Women's Open (Toni O'Donovan, Aislinn Austin,Faye Pinker); LVO  won the Under 40 Junior Relay (Frazer Howe, Eoghan Knight, Paul Pruzina); 3ROC finished 4th in the Mini Relay (Clodagh Moran, Cian May, Aidan McCullough) and 4th in the biggest class, the Mixed Ad Hoc (Mary O'Connell, Cliona McCullough, Eoin McCullough).

Ivan Millar reports:

Irish perform well at home JK

Irish senior orienteers performed well at the JK2011. following 3 hotly contested races 5 senior team members have been selected for WOC in France.

The sprint event on Friday saw a very tough challenge through the buildings of Queens and Stranmillis college. The top 3 Irish Men and Women were:

Mens:
Nicolas Simonin - 15.03
Seamus O'Boyle - 15.24
David Healy - 15.26

Womens:
Niamh O'Boyle - 15.09
Toni O'Donovan - 16.03
Ciara Largey - 17.02

Saturday brought the extra challenge of Sunny conditions and the intricate contour detail of Tyrella sand dunes. Top Irish were:

Mens:
David Healy - 37.36
Marcus Pinker - 40.00
Nicolas Simonin - 41.47

Womens:
Niamh O'Boyle - 42.06
Toni O'Donovan - 42.50
Ciara Largey - 43.56

Sunday saw some classic Irish mountain orienteering with the festival visiting Slieve Croob. Top 3 Irish were:

Mens:
Nicolas Simonin - 82.04
David Healy - 86.16
Marcus Pinker - 86.20

Womens:
Toni O'Donovan - 71.21
Ciara Largey - 73.45
Aislinn Austin - 87.13

There were many other solid performances by the Irish seniors. Overall results were very pleasing and provide evidence of real progress in the build up to the summers major competitions.

JK Snippets:

Did anyone hear or see the cuckoos at Tyrella at the weekend? They were in good voice at the western end of the area for the relays.
Competitors were probably unaware of some last-minute changes to courses at Slieve Croob: on the Wednesday before the event access was lost to part of the area and three courses had to be replanned, controlled, and new sites selected, maps reprinted and bagged and control descriptions prepared in time for Sunday ... this was on top of losing the only patch forest in the whole JK weekend across the road from the Slieve Croob starts because of breeding birds.

Some JK photos:

Stranmillis Sprint Arena

Seán Knight, Leslie Coughlan and Jack Millar go for the line.

The sun shines at Tyrella

Slieve Croob Finish

JK Trophy mass start at the Relays

Dara OCléirigh hands over to Róisín Long (Ajax)

Waiting for changeover

Rúairí Short hands over to Colm Hill (CNOC)

Former World Champion Jorgen Martensson, one of our distinguished visitors.

See more JK photos, taken by Simon Errington, here.

April 2011

Harold White, Olivia Baxter, Charle Reid and Stephen Gilmore are among the group to launch the JK Sprint race at Stranmillis College, Belfast.

Fermanagh event cancelled

The planned event on the Tuesday after the JK (the day after the Relays) has been cancelled because  Fermanagh Orienteers' involvement in the JK weekend would overstretch the small club too much. However, you can still run on Wednesday and Thursday in the Mournes before heading southwards to the Irish Championships.

JK entries still open

Even though the official closing date for the JK individual events has passed, limited entries are still available up to the limit of printed maps. These late entries will cost £2 per day on top of the normal entry fee - see the Sportident web site for details here.

Support the Irish Junior Squad

If you're going to the JK, there are two opportunities to support the Irish Junior Squad: through going to the Table Quiz on Saturday evening at Stranmillis in Belfast, scene of the Sprint the previous day, or by buying one of the JK hoodies and sweatshirts available on the event website via Sportident. You can sign up for the quiz at the event, but you need to order the tops in advance as they are being made to order. Details here.

The Junior Squad has runners from all parts of the country and promotes technical and fitness training for young orienteers. Squad members will travel to the European Youth O-Champs in the Czech Republic in June, to the Junior World Champs in Poland in July, to the World Championships in France in August and to the Junior Home International in faraway Fermanagh September. The kids (or parents) have to put up most of the money for these trips, so every bit of help from the O-community is really appreciated.

Countdown to IOC2011
Less than four weeks to go to the premier event in the Irish O-Calendar! With the hype surrounding the JK, it may be easy to overlook the Irish Championships a week later, but the combination of the two events has been a bonus for them both. Entries for IOC have topped 400 with two days to go before entries close, but Relay entries have still to pass the 50 mark. Relays can be great fun, so if you've never tried one, get together with your friends or clubmates and give it a lash. The number of relay classes has been reduced to seven, so it's not as complex as it once was and there fill be a good number in each category.
The Middle Distance race on Saturday 30th April at Glendoo Ridge East, on the Dublin/Wicklow border between Glencullen and Glencree, will feature open mountain with old turf cuttings, and the Relay on the Bank Holiday Monday will return to the adjacent Wicklow side of the ridge facing into Glencree. The organisers recomment bringing binoculars as much of the competition area is visible from the changeover area: every control a spectator control!
Sandwiched between the two is the Classic race at Mall Hill/Brockagh, close to Laragh and Glendalough. Previous maps of the area can be seen on Routegadget from the IOC web page here. The ground is more runnable but boulder-strewn in comparison to the other two days, and GEN have kindly provided the map and terrain since the original area was declared out of bounds due to breeding birds.
Full details of the event here.

25 Years Ago

Most of the issues of The Irish Orienteer published between 1982 and 2008 have now been scanned and should shortly be available as pdf documents on the IOA web site, thanks largely to Brian Hollinshead who undertook the scanning. As a taster, here are some snippets from 1986:

The Irish Championships at Slieve Croob on April 26/27 (see JK2011) were won by the AJAX pair of Peter Kernan and Orla Cooke. Brian Corbett was 9 seconds adrift in the men's race. A good run by Marcus Pinker saw him take the M11 title! Curragh won the Men's Relay and GEN the Women's.

The cover of the first issue of the year showed Eileen Loughman running through the bush at the 1985 World Championships in Australia. Roxanne White was the only other Irish representative.
A letter of appreciation from Gareth Murphy in Dublin praised a recent string course he had done: "Dear John I enjoyed doing the string course I liked the animals I liked the bear best". Aonghus ÓCléirigh introduced "Grandslam Orienteering" with a mass start event on a lovely little map of the sand dunes at Portmarnock, sadly now a golf course. The third "Irish Orienteer Trophy" inter-club knockout competition ran in 2006, based on the UK CompassSport Cup. UCD Orienteers (also known as Belfield Orienteers, BO) celebrated their 10th anniversary. They were UCDOC but became UCDO when people used to ask "What's UCDOC?" in their best Bugs Bunny voice.

Preparations were under way for the Continental Cup and the World Military O-Championships, both to be held in Wicklow. At the IOA AGM in Wesley College, Dublin, Connacht Chairman Frank Ryan expressed the view that the sport in the province was in the doldrums (but it still survives today). The International O-Federation was celebrating its 25th birthday. A party of Swedes, led by Peo Bengtsson, visited Ireland in the week after the JK and ran in a series of specially staged events. National Orienteering Day (with introductory events across the country) was on October 5th.

The Moving Crag controversy was revisited by Curragh Orienteers and Niall Rice who had a difference of opinion at a Grade 1 event in Stradbally in May 1983 (the first event where homogenised milk was given to finishers) when a control wasn't in the expected location. This was the cause of considerable controversy in IOA for some time.

Happy times!

Phoenix Park Time Trial is no more

For several years the Irish Junior Squad has been running time trial fitness tests in the Furry Glen in Dublin's Phoenix Park, on a route involving hills, tracks, mud, trees and streams. The Office of Public Works have called a halt, though, because of concerns about environmental damage in the area, though this was hardly caused by a group of orienteers running there a couple of times a year. The March time trials are likely to be the last, but the Park may yet provide an alternative.

You can see the results of the time trials over the years at the Junior Team web site here.

Ivan's Long-O series a success

In a return to old-style orienteering with a 21st century twist, Ivan Millar organised a series of three Long orienteering events using 1:15000 maps to give the Elites and prospective Elites a chance to run longer courses on this scale of map in preparation for races like the Workd Junior Championships and the World Championships where running times in excess of two hours are common.

The events are Gortalougheny, Co. Fermanagh, Carlingford, Co. Louth and Tollymore, Co. Down, attracted good crowds whio certainly got value for money. CNOC's Colm Hill took the top spot on the Men's long course, with Ciara Largey (FermO/QUBOC) took the ladies prize.

Full results and information here.

JK Concert
A first for this year's JK is a concert featuring the groups Bearna and Bethany in the elegant Slieve Donard Hotel in Newcastle on Easter Sunday evening, feet will be tapping and jivers jumpin' to Lambeg and bodhrán at the JK social.
The music will be preceded by the Routegadget sessions where winners and losers dissect their routes, and the evening will feature other music and entertainment plus the prizegiving for the Trail-O events.
The organisers would prefer people to but a ticket beforehand, though they will be on sale over the weekend too. Tickets are only £7 for adults and £3 for children. Buy tickets online at the Sportident website here. Incidentally, JK entries have reached almost 2100 with a very high percentage running the sprint race as well as the conventional terrain races.
It turns out that it's not "Different Drums" after all!

Closing date reminders

JK relays 7th April

Irish Championships 8th April

Shamrock O-Ringen 6th May

Would anyone care to do a report on the recent Leinster Championships for us?

Sudden Oak Death affects Larch

Sudden Oak Death

Cad a dhéanfaimid feasta gan adhmad?
Tá deireadh na gcoillte ar lár;
níl trácht ar Chill Chais ná ar a teaghlach
is ní bainfear a cling go bráth.

Now what will we do for timber,
With the last of the woods laid low?
There's no talk of Kilcash or its household
And its bell will be struck no more.

You may have seen where the March Mountain Bike O-event at Clonmore North, Cahir, Co. Tipperary had to be abandoned because Sudden Oak Death has been found in forests in the area. Appropriately enough, the Lament for Kilcash, on the slopes of Slievenamon, ostensibly deals with deforestation in the same area in an earlier era, though really referring to the decline of the Butlers, one of the old noble families of Munster.
Curiously, the disease in Ireland seems to affect Japanese larch, beech and Noble fir trees rather than oak, but it is caused by phytophthora ramorum, a disease related to potato blight, a fungal plant disease of which Irish people will be very aware for historical reasons.
The disease has been found in forests in Northern Ireland and has also had an impact on orienteering there. One problem with the disease is diagnosis: as it affects the larch, which loses its leaves in the winter even though it's a conifer, it is not until the spring that the disease shows up when the tree fails to grow. Signs of ooozing sap and obvious wounds on the trees are also an indication that the disease has struck.
The disease is spread by wind and rain and trees which are close to laurel thickets seem to be particularly at risk. Previously it has affected rhododendrons rather than larch.
Nobody seems to know what to do to deal with it. One drastic solution is to fell the affected forest; another is to ban public access, either all together or to restrict people to roads: either of these could have a major effect on orienteering - remember foot and mouth disease in 2001?
Read what The Irish Times had to report on the disease last August here. Visit Suddenoakdeath.org here.

On 31st March 2011 the Department of Agriculture issued this press release:

Department gives update on Phytophthora ramorum Monitoring

The Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine is continuing to survey forests and control outbreaks of the EU regulated plant disease Phytophthora ramorum, a fungus like organism that can damage and kill infected trees and plants. Under EU requirements, annual forest surveys for Phytophthora ramorum have been ongoing since 2003. Until last year, there had been no findings on tree species and P. ramorum had only been detected in forest areas on wild invasive rhododendron shrubs.  Following the initial findings in Japanese larch in Ireland in July 2010, an extensive national aerial and ground survey was conducted.  These forest surveys have now confirmed the disease in Japanese larch at eleven forest locations in five counties.

Japanese larch appears to be particularly susceptible to the disease, affecting all age classes and locally causing significant dieback and deaths.  Noble fir, beech and Spanish chestnut growing in close proximity to the infected Japanese larch have also been found to be infected at a number of the sites and it is likely that the Japanese larch is the source of the infection. The infected trees are being removed to prevent the disease spreading.

 There has also been a recent scientifically confirmed finding of P. ramorum in a single Sitka spruce tree. The infected young tree is approximately two metres in height and significantly it was growing in close proximity and underneath the canopy of a large infected rhododendron bush. It is very likely that disease spores produced by this overhanging infected rhododendron bush were the source of infection of the tree.  This is the first field record worldwide of P. ramorum infection in Sitka spruce although the species had been found to be susceptible in international laboratory trials. Spruce in the immediate area of all the Japanese larch outbreak sites have been surveyed and no further P. ramorum infections have been found.  The area around the infected Sitka spruce has been effectively quarantined and monitoring will continue.

There has also been significant number of outbreaks of the disease particularly in Japanese larch in Northern Ireland and Great Britain and the Department is liaising closely with the relevant authorities.

The Department continues to take all necessary measures to establish the extent of the infection and to control the spread of the disease.  Forest owners are requested to be particularly vigilant and as the summer growing season commences to report any unusual symptoms of ill health in larch or other species to the Forest Service of the Department.  For further information on the disease please see www.agriculture.gov.ie/forestservice

New EastWest Map of Wicklow

Barry Dalby of EastWest Mapping in Co. Wexford, has just published the fourth map of the Dublin/Wicklow mountains, a companion for his earlier maps of West Wicklow, Dublin/Wicklow and Lugnaquilla. All the maps are on Pretex waterproof paper at 1:30 000 scale with 10 m contours and retail at €9.95. They show a lot of historical and archaeological information as well as detail of more immediate importance to the walker, runner or cyclist. There's a special offer for all four maps as a package. Details here.

No Irish Sprint Champs before the Summer

On top of the twelve Days of O you've already read about, there was to be a new kid on the block: the Irish Sprint Championships at UCD, Belfield, in Dublin 4's leafy suburbs, on the eve of the Irish Championships. However, permission from the college authorities is slow to come so the event won't go ahead in April. Planner Laurence Quinn (GEN) hopes that the event will go on in the autumn, in association with a weekend of orienteering in Leinster. We've had Irish Sprint Championships before (two years ago at the Shamrock O-Ringen, the race was at Ross Island, Killarney in a small rocky complex forest with ancient copper mines; last year it was in the NUU Campus at Coleraine). This year - when it happens - will be more like the mixed urban terrain being commonly used for sprint-O. Watch this space! In the meantime, take a day's rest between the JK and the Irish Championships.

JK2000?

Will entries for the JK at Easter top 2000? Today they are at 1956 with four days to go ... Remember that the deadline for JK2011 entries is 31st March and for Relay entries is 7th April. Relay entries have to be made separately on the SportIdent website. See here for details.

Irish Championships entries close soon

Entries for the Irish Champs (both individual and relay) close on Friday 8th April: details here.

Leinster Champs return to Glencree next weekend

GEN run the Leinster Championships in Glencree next Sunday. The terrain is a mixture of steep forest, steep open craggy mountainside, and rough open not-so-steep mountain: hence the courses are rather shorter than you might expect, at least on paper. Start lists and event details are on the LOC2011 web site here.

Shamrock O-Ringen entries close May 6th

The Shamrock O-Ringen 3-Day on the wonderful Sheep's Head peninsula in West Cork is on the Bank Holiday weekend at the beginning of June and entries close on May 6th. However, because of parking and logistical issues, if the entries exceed what the organisers can deal with, entries will close before this, so enter early to be sure of a place! Details here.

March News

 
JK Deadline Approaches
Entries for the Jan Kjellstrom O-Fest in Northern Ireland at Easter have topped 1800 but IOA-based orienteers have only managed 165 entries at the last count. These entries are up on 2010 in Devon, but with such a major event just up the road, it's a shame not to take full advantage and enjoy Britain's premier O-event on your doorstep. Entries close on March 31st and Good Friday's sprint-O time slots are filling up fast, so enter now.
In addition to the main Sprint, two Individual and Relay events, there is Trail-O (fiendishly clever courses set by a certain Alan Gartside have Trail-O enthusiasts coming from all over Europe to see if they can get the better of The Man) , TempO (a bit like timed trail-O), String courses for the smallest kids, and a series of other ancillary orienteering and fell races over 12 days. Two of the JK races (Sprint and Classic at Slieve Croob) are also IOF World Ranking Events, a chance for our Elites to pick up WRE points. Incidentally, sprint entries are up a lot on last year's JK, particularly in the older age classes who are discovering the fun of sprint-O: it's mind over matter: sprint-O for the mind, not just the body!
There are large groups coming from Sweden and Norway and orienteers from another 15 countries, some staying for the Irish Champs and some even staying as long as the Shamrock O-Ringen in June! Australia, Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Latvia, Netherlands, Norway, New Zealand, Portugal, Switzerland and Sweden are all represented, as well as the UK and Ireland.

Did you know that the Legananny Dolmen is on the slopes of Slieve Croob (JK Day 3) where the 1986 Irish Champs were run on the weekend of the Chernobyl nuclear plant explosion?

The Twelve Days of O
Remember that there are twelve days of orienteering associated with the JK and the Irish Championships, from QUBOC's Sprint race in the Botanic Gardens area of Belfast on Thursday 21st Aptil to the Irish Relay Champs on Monday 3nd May, so make Ireland your orienteering destination this spring. See JK details here; Irish Champs details here; Shamrock O-Ringen details here.
The omens are good for the Irish Sprint Championships in Dublin on Friday April 29th but the details have to be finalised before it's made official.

Volunteers still needed

The scale of the Jan Kjellstrom weekend is several orders of magnitude greater than anything we have seen before and the organisers need all the help they can get. The number of jobs is endless, from ones involving no knowledge of orienteering up. Please, if you can help at all, get in touch with the JK organisers and volunteer, even for a day or for a specific job, or organise a group from your club to help. If you have non-orienteering friends or family, get them involved too.
Several clubs have been designated as the start team, with a rota so they can run too; Cork O are doing the download and results; the main bulk of the work is falling on the three Northern clubs, North West OC, Fermanagh Orienteers and, of course, Lagan Valley Orienteers, who have put in months of hard work to bring the project this far.
Seriously, time is running out and volunteers are genuinely needed. You're not being asked to give blood, just sweat and tears!

JK Hoodies and Sweatshirts now available

The Irish Junior Squad will be selling JK hoodies and sweatshirts to raise money for their squad training and tours. The tops are available in a range of colours (blue, red, green, grey and black) and sizes. They should be ordered in advance at the JK entries page and picked up at the event. Irish Juniors have been warned only to get the green ones! Hoodies and sweatshirts have to be ordered by 31st March. See the JK entries web site here.




 JK Entertainment too!

A 4-star hotel is the venue for a unique night's entertainment to round off the festival aspect of this year's JK. The ballroom of the sumptuous Slieve Donard Hotel in Newcastle (where the Mountains of Mourne sweep down to the sea) has been taken over for the Trail O prizegiving and a major concert and night's entertainment on the Sunday night, before the Relays on the final day of the festival.
Tickets for this extravaganza (including Routegadget presentations of winners' routes, inspired by the Shamrock Sessions) should be booked on the JK entries web site here. Adults £7, under-12's £3.

The Slieve Donard was opened in 1898 as a luxury hotel at the terminus of the Belfast and Co. Down Railway, attracting visitors to the spectacular scenery of Newcastle.
Please remove muddy O-shoes before entering the hotel!

Some March 2011 Dates for your diary: full details on the IOA/NIOA Fixtures Lists.

6th         2010 Munster Championships, intricate extensive sand dunes, Inch, Co. Kerry
7th         Final date for cheap Leinster Champs entries. See here.
12-13th  Junior Squad training weekend, Dublin
13th        Bull Island, Dublin. Leinster League event on fast sand dunes.
14th        Leinster Champs entries close.
19th        Mountain Bike O, Clonmore North, Cahir, Co. Tipperary: CANCELLED. See note below.
20th        Final Long-O event for experienced orienteers, Tollymore, Co. Down
26th        Northern Ireland Score Championships, Belvoir Park, Belfast
31st        JK 2011 entries close
April 3   Leinster Championships, Glencree, Co. Wicklow

Spring News

The birds have started to sing, which is a sign of spring, but they also bring bad news for orienteers. Breeding birds of prey in the only forest section to be used on Slieve Croob at JK2011 and on the area for the Classic race at the Irish Championships have caused access problems. However, all is not lost: some judicious replanning of courses will be necessary for the Elites at the JK but the effects on Ajax's IOC are more serious so the competition has been moved to Brockagh Mountain/Mall Hill , near Laragh in Co. Wicklow, courtesy of GEN.
It's  easy to be wise after the event, but perhaps the name of the IOC area, Carraig Na Seabhac ('Rock of the Hawks') might have given a clue ...
Full details of these changes can be read at the IOC web site here. For details of JK2011, see here. JK entry fees increase on Sunday 27th February.

The Twelve Days of O 

There's a great opportunity for orienteering between Easter and the May Bank Holiday weekend, with  twelve events in twelve days, or even more if you take in the String course and o-maze at three days of the JK!

Thu Apr 21st, Belfast Queen's Sprint
Fri Apr 22nd, Belfast JK Sprint
Sat Apr 23rd, Co. Down JK Middle/Long
Sun Apr 24th, Co. Down JK Long
Mon Apr 25th, Co. Down JK Relay
Tue Apr 26th, Co. Fermanagh Gortalughany Colour
Wed Apr 27th, Co. Down Mournes Colour
Thu Apr 28th, Co. Down Mournes Colour
Sat Apr 30th – IOC Middle, Co. Wicklow
Sat Apr 30th – Mini-O
Sun May 1st – IOC Classic
Mon May 2nd – IOC Relay

There are also two fell races in the Mournes on the two Thursday evenings and a pre-IOC training event is planned at Scarr, near Laragh: more details later!

Have you entered the JK and IOC yet? There are almost 200 runners entered for IOC and more than 1700 for the JK. With all the on-line entries, it's easy to overlook one (like the Munster Championships, now on the magnificent sand dunes of  Inch, Co. Kerry (see photo) on March 6th, and the Leinster Championships in Glencree, Co. Wicklow, on April 3rd. - cheapest entries to March 7th.)

Other interesting events coming up include some mountain-bike orienteering in Munster organised by CorkO on 26th February in the Nagles Mountains, near Fermoy, and on 19th March (at Clonmore North, Cahir).

Meanwhile, Setanta's Seán Hassett is trying to coordinate Leinster fixtures for the rest of the year. He hopes that there will be some MTB-O events in Leinster too.

The Northern Ireland Night Championships will be in the University of Ulster, Coleraine on February 19th - remember the IOC Sprint race last year?

In Leinster, Fingal again push the envelope northwards with an event on February 20th at Derrycassin, Co. Longford, a companion for their maps in Meath, Cavan and Monaghan.

For Elites and aspiring Elites, Ivan Millar's Long-O series continues at Carlingford on February 27th and Tollymore/Meelmore on March 20th. These races are only for experienced and fit orienteers who need to get practice running on 1:15000 scale maps, although a shorter-but-still-difficult course will also be available.

On the subject of aspiring elites, IOA are running a Junior Squad Training Weekend  in Leinster on March 12/13, with the uausl gut-busting time trials in the Furry Glen in Dublin's Phoenix Park on the Saturday and Ajax's Bull Island event in the subtle sand dunes on Sunday. Unfortunately the Saturday clashes with the All Ireland Schools and Colleges Cross Country Championships, also in Dublin.

On March 26th the NI Score Championships will be run in the Lagan Valley Regional Park in Belfast.

More to follow ... Incidentally, the movie theme (The Birds; Ryan's Daughter - filmed at Inch) in this edition is coincidental, but can anyone think of some more movie references relevant to orienteering? Lost? A Walk in the Sun? Maybe "Gone with the Wind" when all your controls blow away? Dumb-O? Into the West? Send them in!