posted Apr 28, 2013, 11:25 AM by ROC Chairman
This weekend's event at Mokobulaan was held in great weather and superb forests, the small turnout were treated to some great courses planned by Nicholas Mulder.
Preliminary Results below
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posted Mar 25, 2013, 2:16 AM by ROC Chairman
It was fantastic to see so many people at The Wilds short course series event yesterday, the weather was perfect and Nick Cooper and Charles Lautenbach put on some great courses, as usual the course looked short until you got out onto the course and discovered there was a fair amount of climb involved.
114 cards including groups so estimated at over 130 people
This was also a full scale test of the Timing software we are busy evaluating (Mulka2) the results below are from this software, 2 laptops were used as a network allowing for the finish to function unhindered while entry details were captured on the other laptop, the only problem is accuracy of data and illegible handwriting the 2 vital pieces of information that needs to be on both pieces of your entry form are: EMIT Card # and Course.
Well done to winners both from WITSOC (Stephanie Courtnage) narrowly edging out sister Christie me thinks it won't be long before the table are turned, Michael Crone maintained his dominance on the short course series beating Brad Lund by over a minute
Preliminary results and copies of the maps are available below under the attached files |
posted Mar 18, 2013, 5:32 AM by ROC Chairman
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updated Mar 25, 2013, 7:30 AM
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The 'ROC Stars' - Nicholas Mulder, Alex Pope and Eugene Botha retained their title as GOC Mens Relay Winners yesterday at the annual Gauteng Club and Schools relay championships.
The area used was the Derdepoort Recreation Park and presented some fast runnable terrain with a single hillside to give everybody something to think about.
Those orienteers without leg protection were given a surprise on a couple of legs with some thick Lantana bushes, leaving most orienteers with scratched legs and arms.
ROC's vets team ROC Solid managed a 2nd place behind RACO's Vets 1 team of Brian , Glynn and Peter Braun
The schools team from Helpmekaar took the honours ahead of St Davids in a closely fought battle.
A great morning of orienteering and thanks to the organising club (AR)
Full results will be posted soon |
posted Dec 21, 2012, 12:05 AM by ROC Chairman
PBG is a large area when one is only looking to plan 2.2km - 2.7km long courses. So I was able to concentrate on a different area for each prelim and final. This resulted in the prelims being a bit more physical and the finals using a lot more of the detailed path network. By 7am it was already hot and steamy whilst putting out controls so I knew competitors would be grateful for the shorter final leg - especially the ladies whose prelim was a little longer than I wanted. I also managed to limit the climb so as to not unnecessarily send competitors over the hill too often, alternatively to provide lots of route choice on the long legs over the hill so decisions could be made on whether to take stairs, concrete roads or foot paths. There does seem to have been quite a variation in the route choices taken by competitors which was one of my aims. Most route choices were 50/50 thereby forcing competitors to make a route choice decision quickly and early and sticking to it with conviction. Unfortunately the straight line controls from 1 to 2 to 3 on the men's final resulted in quite a few men running from control 1 to 3 and only realising their mistake at 3. I don't believe control 2 was a superfluous control as my aim was to create route quick short route choice decisions early on with the chasing starts. The same was for the ladies in their last loop on the final, quick route choice decision making led to the winner making her break.
Thank you to all those that assisted on the day and to Nicholas for remapping the area to sprint specifications. Nothing is nicer than planning on a map you know to be accurate and up to date.
Planner – Michele Botha
Firstly a big thank you to Michele for designing some challenging and intricate courses. My job in controlling was made extremely easy and I only had to make a few small suggestions based mainly on my good knowledge of the area. I agree with Michele that the Men Final’s 2nd control was not superfluous and the inbetween #2 required some detailed map reading. It’s not always about route choices. I would agree however that the high level of green in the area did make map reading difficult for participants; this should be a consideration and warning for future planners / controllers. The map is drawn to an international specification, so changing colours to improve contrast is not an option. From my side, a big thank you must go to the SANBI and the management of the Pretoria National Botanical Gardens for allowing us access for the event. Finally, a big thank you also to my ROC helpers and then to all the control collectors (Ian, Tim, Michael, Eugene, Sarah, Alex)
Controller – Nicholas Mulder |
posted Dec 14, 2012, 6:07 AM by ROC Chairman
2013 Orienteering Calendar has now been finalised, start making plans to travel to the events out of town where the best orienteering is... |
posted Oct 10, 2012, 2:50 AM by ROC Chairman
This area is certainly one of the roughest we have, that and the heat on the day made conditions tough for the orienteers, courses were generally a little shorter due to the extra climb but winners were still quite close to the predictions for course planner Nicholas Mulder.
It was a good day for ROC winners on the Brown Course - Eugene Botha and Michele Botha (3rd overall) winning the Mens and Ladies sections respectively.
Thanks to the awesome ROC team of helpers, Trevor,George,Joan,Adele,Stephanie,Glen,Ian,Michele,Eugene,Sarah this was another slick event and could not be done without the committed helpers.
Prelim Results and Split at the bottom of the page under attached files.... |
posted Sep 25, 2012, 2:46 AM by ROC Chairman
The prestige event of the year - SA Champs was held over the weekend near Haenertsberg in the Limpopo province, the racing started with the middle distance event at the Standford Lake College, some challenging courses with more than usual climb had competitors straining up the hills, but when it cam down to the serious runners they seemed to breeze up the hills (a lot to be said for training) maybe time for those Westcliff stairs :-).
Michael Crone winner of the Mens Elite and Jessica Lund winner of the Womens Elite,
The Long Distance was held on Sunday across the road at the Ebenezer Dam area and orienteers were greeted with cool wet misty conditions at the start and in fact all day. After a protest the W65 and M70 courses were reduced by cutting out a loop from their course, their initial course was 5.2km with 230m climb.
Again the racing was hot with Michael Crone edging out Ake for 1st place in the M21A by a mere 2 seconds, the Ladies race was dominated by Jessica Lund making it a double for both Mike and Jess.
Then onto the relay event held on Monday 22 teams set off UP the steep hill behind the start area, most teams resorting to a walk after the 1st 20 meters. PENOC managed a good win beating their opposition by a good few minutes, leaving ROC to take 2nd from WITSOC in a sprint finish down the hill between Alex and Michael (unfortunatley Mike missed a control so RACO were promoted to the Bronze Winners.
Thanks to the AR Club for arranging a well run event and special note of thanks to Nicholas Mulder for mapping the new areas.
Full Results will be available as soon as they have been published.
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posted Sep 2, 2012, 10:18 AM by ROC Chairman
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updated Sep 2, 2012, 10:25 AM
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The 5th re-running of the 1st Event todayn Transvaal (Gauteng now) was held at Delta Park event, this event makes use of the same maps and courses from the 1st event held here some 30 years ago, some features are missing or have been replaced with trees of buildings or fences. Some 72 cards were issued and a lot of new comers had the experience of running on the 1st map made for orienteering, symbols have changed over the years so some people had to fgure out what the hand drawn features on the map were (ie embankments and rocky knolls) OCAD has certainly made map reading a lot easier.
A good turnout with 3 3rd generation families in attendance [Cameron, Gabriel and Leah] Grandchildren of the winner Long course at the very first event (Derek Vaughan), [Erin] Granddaughter of Monika and Ian Cooper the planners at the very 1st event and [Rebecca] granddaugher of Pieter and Liz Mulder organisers of the 1st event.
The event winners today were Eugene Botha and Lisa de Speville (Long) Paul Wimberley (New Record) and Michele Botha (Medium) Jessica Lund (New Record) and Noel Braun (Short)
ROC provide all attendees at prize giving with celebratory cupcakes or slices of the big cake, which were hastily consumed.
3rd Generation Families
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posted Aug 27, 2012, 7:07 AM by ROC Chairman
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updated Aug 28, 2012, 7:17 AM
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The Mountain Bike series continued at Groenkloof yesterday, 46 cards issued on the day with a number of groups. The courses ( planned by Alex Pope and set out by Leon and Francois ) were challenging with many rough sections and some great single track. The winners of the long course Nicholas Mulder and Michele Botha (Ladies).
Unfortunately the Medium course had to be converted to a score event, maps were printed double sided for the 2 maps used but I mistakenly printed the all controls map for the medium course instead of the medium course map (Wally nomination for me :-).
Thanks to the ROC team of helpers (Nic, Stephanie, Adele, Nick C, Sarah, Trevor, Ken, Glen C,Karin and Steve, Leon and Francois) for making this event a success.
Collecting controls is the time when I usually see the animals at Groenkloof I don't notice them while I am racing, this is still a great area to run/cycle in with the animals.
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posted Aug 20, 2012, 12:36 AM by Craig Ogilvie
The Mountain Marathon hosted by RACO was held at Pelindaba yesterday, perfect conditions for orienteering with longer courses and more climb than the usual colour coded series event. The area is very rough with many of the dreaded 'wag-n-bietjies' to slow you down, thankfully at this time of year the dark green was fairly easy to go through making route choices shorter than taking the path route around. Although there were some lurking pieces of barbed wire that caught a few people.
A great victory in the 2 open courses for ROC Members Michele (Botha) winning the Ladies (Martha Epprecht Trophy) and Nicholas Mulder winning the Mens (Camp and Climb Trophy), Nicholas managed to hold of 2nd place Cobus van Zyl by 40 secs thanks to a mistake by Cobus costing him 6 minutes at a control. Michele on tha other hand dominated the Ladies and almost beat all the Men on the Blue course as well.
Thanks to the RACO team Paul and Roger especially for their last control (Blue and Brown) up from the back of the hill to the top for a control then down to the finish :-). |
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