I would like to complement the planner on well-received if challenging courses. I have not seen them in any detail but in my role being out and around the assembly and finish areas I heard numerous very complementary comments. The actual area came in for praise as well from a number of people who had never visited Swithland before. With its complexity and myriad of footpaths you certainly need to keep in close touch with your map.

As a club we do not like a long summer gap in our programme of larger events and do try one such event each summer. Numbers are never as high as in prime season and the fact that Bradgate & Swithland is only available to us on Saturdays also cuts down potential numbers a little. Given that there was for some reason a conflicting EMOA fixture this weekend and we were obliged to have a fairly long walk from the parking area, numbers were a bit on the low side but the comments of those who did attend make the effort worthwhile.

In the end we were blessed with good weather and the walk in and out not unpleasant. As organiser I did have to spend much of the day ferrying helper teams back and forth but this did give me the opportunity to give lifts to a few of the older competitors.

I did however hear a few comments about the scale of the map. It is a complicated area and we have on occasion used a 1:7,500 map but I aware that the planner gave considerable thought to this issue before finally electing to use 1:10,000 as the traditional orienteering scale.

Vegetation is another issue this time of year. The planner kept runners away from nettle and bramble as best he could but the height of the bracken in places caused some amusement. Perhaps not entirely surprisingly it had grown nearly three feet in places over the last 6 weeks.

I would like to thank the 12 members who helped me on the day. Coming so soon after the Club hosted The British Middle Distance Championships when we turned out about 70 helpers it was a sterling effort to turn out again so soon.

I am particularly grateful to those who stayed on to help organise a search when two competitors were still out long after the courses had closed. Thankfully there was no problem but a lesson must be learned. Very fit athletes with no experience of orienteering will choose far too long courses and we need to find a way of picking these up when they register and giving proper advice as to what is an appropriate course.

It did however throw up another concern for the future which all clubs should consider. It turned out that Swithland Woods is in a mobile phone blank spot which we had not realised and in instigating a search, communications with the remote assembly area were impossible. I am especially grateful to the Park Rangers who used their radios to assist, sending one of their number in his Land Rover to help search the woods but more importantly give us a means of passing messages.

Roy Denney

It is interesting to plan an event in early May, and then assess the vegetation in late June. An area of rough open had become a jungle of 6 foot plus high bracken. However, there were viable routes to circumnavigate the bracken for those who chose to do so. From comments I heard after the event, Swithland is more runnable than some competitors expected,and in fact some areas have been extensively cleared of vegetation since the last time we used the area. We also included a small part of the woodland for the first time, and my thanks are due to those who willingly updated the map to take into account the changes.

The longer courses were able to get into The Brand beyond the north end of Swithland. This is a fascinating private "garden" and our thanks are due to Robert Martin for allowing us to use this very interesting area.

Due to car parking restrictions, the walk between the assembly area and start/finish was longer than we would have liked. Consequently the start/finish were placed in the corner of the woods, as close as possible to where competitors arrived. This was by no means my first choice location and meant that there were a few compromises and constraints on how the courses started and finished.

I also heard feedback that the courses were harder than anticipated. However, I hope competitors enjoyed their runs - I enjoyed doing the planning for you.

Bob Haskins