SELOC Successes
So many course winners this week that it’s hard to know where to start, so let’s try it chronologically. First up on Wednesday was the final event in this winter’s SROC Street League where Matt Driver took top spot. His winning margin was smaller than in recent weeks but still more than enough to hang on to his place at the top of the League table, so many congratulations to him – 498 league points out of a maximum 500 available is a pretty convincing win. He’ll get his prize at the special end of season prize-giving event this coming Wednesday, 13 March.
We had 14 SELOC members running on Wednesday. In addition to Matt, Steve Wilson had an excellent run garnering most points in the 60 minute category that put him 3rd on the points per hour basis used to derive overall results. Mark Sammon took 2nd place over 60 minutes, and it was also good to see new member Chris Taylor out for his first Street League event in SELOC colours.
Looking at the overall league, we have 4 members in the top 10 on gross (unadjusted) scores – Matt on top, Steve Wilson in 5th, Josie Greenhalgh running with Darren Baker of DEE in 8th and Paul Turner 9th. Once the age-adjusted handicap kicks in, it is Paul Turner that’s our leading runner in 5th as Matt’s youth drops him to 10th. In between these it is the age-adjusted battle of the pairs where Josie and Darren (7th) hung on to their 3 point margin with a good run on Wednesday night that held off the challenge from Ed Mellor and Anne Speakman in 8th.
Moving on to the weekend, PFO’s event at Thompson and Queen’s Parks in Burnley saw Cath Wilson take 1st place on the Technical course and John Nuttall top on the Light Green. On the Yellow course Anna and Daniel made it a good day for the Wilsons with 2nd and 3rd places respectively.
Then on Sunday it was the Northern Championships on the tough, boulder strewn slopes of Wharncliffe, near Sheffield. A rare run for Kath Etherden saw her take 1st place in W65S to complete SELOC’s batch of winners for the week, a full 8 minutes clear. John Nuttall rounded off a busy weekend with 31st place in M70 while Steve Round was 22nd on M65. Also good to see Caroline Barcham getting in a bit of practice prior to next weekend’s CompassSport Cup match, though she avoided risk of injury in the ankle-breaking terrain by retiring from W55S. However, she’ll be considerably more annoyed that the provisional results describe all on her course as being W85!
The only nearby event we didn’t have a winner at this week was Saturday’s Urban race in Sheffield’s interestingly-named Ponderosa. There’s no way Paul Turner could stay away with it counting for both UK and Yorkshire Urban Leagues, but he was our only competitor and finished unusually low in the results at 30th in Men’s SuperVets. Hope this doesn’t indicate recent injury problems recurring.
Upcoming Events
Prizegivings for SROC’s Street League on Wednesday 13th in Freckleton as noted above and also for MDOC Street League, where final placings have not yet been revealed. The MDOC race on Tuesday 12th looks very interesting with a trial of the Virtual Orienteering software. This uses smartphone technology and GPS to prove visits to the correct control site rather than a handwritten answer sheet – could revolutionise the results processing if it works, so worth a visit to Urmston just to see.
Then at the weekend is our CompassSport Trophy match at Bampton Common, Penrith so good luck to all our runners trying to win a place for SELOC in October’s final. That’s also the next event to count in the SELOC Club League for 2019. Anyone in need of a warm-up for that could try MDOC’s informal event at Wythenshawe Park or SROC’s in Williamson Park, Lancaster, both on Saturday. In the following week, DEE have a Night Street event at Northwich on Tuesday 19 March while at the weekend there’s a very attractive package of Lake District events from LOC and SROC. That Sunday, 24 March, is also the closing date for entries to Easter’s JK weekend in Hampshire.