For the first time in SYO history, there were 3 SYO teams competing in the Peter Palmer Junior Team Relays. Before heading to the venue, the teams assembled for the traditional first stage of team bonding at Pizza Hut.  Once everyone was sated we headed onto the accommodation and event centre at Groby School.

After SYO had fought for our rightful space in the tightly packed sportshall (space was allocated by club rather than number of people needing room on the floor)! The juniors headed out for a warm up and yet more team bonding in the form of football - luckily no injuries were sustained in our teams! Meanwhile the adults were finding out all the important details for the next day and, after the football, tried (in the dark) to explain the procedures for the 5am start.

After all teams had been declared, LEI added a surprise twist by declaring the course lengths - significantly longer than anyone was expecting! Each team of 6 juniors had to cover in excess of 30km - there was even an added 250m run out for each leg!

Once the team meeting was completed, it was time for the obligatory team photo/opposition psyche out as 22 SYO tops were paraded en-masse around the building. The psyche out culminated in a full team gathering in the lobby when it was announced the free food bar was closing and the ‘wasps’ descended.

There was just time to get into race kit (why sleep in PJs when you can save 2 mins the next morning?) before the 10.30pm lights out to catch some winks.

Thanks to the ‘no alarms before 4 o’clock’ rule, at 4 on the dot there was a chorus of alarms, much to the annoyance of most of the team, who felt an extra 20 minutes of sleep would have done no harm! Those who were awake headed out to the ‘arena’ excited, but not before the glow sticks and war paint had been suitably applied (we were rather sad not to have won the best face paint award).

The 1^st legs were lined up and ready to go. At 5am, still pitch black and to the dulcet tone of the M1, they were off into the deep dark woods (Ratby woodlands)!  Even though the courses were longer than expected, the 1^st legs were soon through the spectator control by 5.30am the 2^nd legs on the leading teams were off! By 6 o’clock it was quickly getting light and more of the team were emerging from the warm sports hall out into the chilly morning to spectate.

The spectator control provided much amusement. The planner had expected runners to emerge from the forest along the only path (it had even been taped for this purpose) to give a decent view of competitors as they approached the control. However, many competitors found more imaginative routes which resulted in competitors bursting out of the forest edge from all directons, keeping spectators and team mangers on their toes! Throughout the competition, especially in the dark, there were many cases of mistaken identity!

The format of the competition is such that, as the relay progresses, the legs that juniors are required to run get shorter and shorter until the longest last leg. This means the handover gets faster and more furious and with the added complication of potentially 3 yellow leg runners on each team all dressed rather similarly, the inevitable happened - one enthusiastic yellow leg runner incorrectly handed over to the keen green runner from another SYO team! The organisers correctly adjusted the finish times and even awarded the two teams a prize for ‘best hand over’.

The results were:

SYOn Fire 2^nd Overall, but winning the Joan George (combined orienteering age classes under 90).

SYOung Blood finished in 12^th place overall

All SYOver the Place finished a very creditable 17^th.

It’s fair to say that a great time was had by all even though everyone was a little sleep deprived by the time morning came. A big well done must be said to all SYO juniors as there were no mis-punches. They also all demonstrated a fantastic attitude throughout the event. The final placings of the teams were particularly impressive as 16 of the 22 juniors were debutants at the competition.

Particular congratulations must go to:

• Callum and Ryan who bravely tackled the night legs having only had 1 evening of practice and never having run in a night competition before.
• The Green legs, Thomas and Hamish, who weren’t fazed by the last-minute surprise of having to run 7.1km, both faring very well.
• Louise for holding her own whilst running the 1^st night leg against 21 boys
• Euan for achieving the fastest time on light green
• Naomi, Sam and Imogen for cracking yellow times
• Pippa for holding off the very strong LEI runner on the last leg to ensure we finished 2nd
• Dom for catching up 6 places on his night leg
• Max for an excellent run on orange & bringing the team into 2^nd place.

Also a big thank you to all the parents (Charlie E, Rosie, Jacky, Pete, Pauline, Emily and Sylvia) who transported and supported us.

Save the date! Next year’s Peter Palmer Relay is on Sunday 10^th September 2017 at Sutton Park near Birmingham. (Juniors must be M/W12 to M/W18). If you would like a chance to get a feel for the terrain before then, there is a great opportunity as the area is being used for the British Schools Orienteering Championships on 20^th November 2016.

Day 5 Swiss O Week

Members of SYO travelled far and wide over the summer to enjoy their passion for orienteering.

First on the international multi-day event calendar was the Swiss O Week in St Moritz. Only the Tryners and Nick Barrable were there from SYO but there was a fairly large British contingent. The stunning scenery, mostly gorgeous weather, efficient organisation and challenging orienteering combined to produce an excellent (if somewhat costly) multi-day competition. A noteworthy difference to the UK multi-day events was a special evening prize giving for each of the days. Freya was delighted to achieve a podium position in D10 on 2 days; while Nick went a step further with 4 podium positions and a 3^rd place overall.

The following week gave a host of different multi-day options. Perhaps the most prestigious multi-day event with 20, 000 competitors is the Swedish O-Ringen. This year it was held in the mountainous ski region of Salen and was unusual in that most of the areas were on open fells rather than the traditional Swedish forest. The Marstons and Coopers of SYO attended and reported back on an enjoyable week of orienteering though there were no podium positions in the very stiff international competition.

Meanwhile, closer to home Wales hosted the Croeso 2016 – 5 days of orienteering competition in beautiful South Wales. Whilst the weather was rather wet at times, feedback on the event praised the friendly event team, stunning views and great variety of terrain.  As this event was closer to home, it is not surprising that there were a fairly large number of SYO members there. Congratulations to overall prize winners Dom Dakin 3^rd M16, Nick Barrable 3^rd M21L, Tony Udris 2^nd M45S and Pippa Dakin 2^nd W21L.

Nick Barrable & Pippa Dakin on the podium at Croeso

Another multi-day competition taking place in the same week was the Slovenian OO Cup. This year the event was centred on the ski village of Kranska Gora, although 3 of the 5 events took place out of Slovenia – 2 in Northern Italy and 1 in Austria. The gorgeous alpine scenery, friendly vibe, low key organisation, relatively low prices and fiendishly technical orienteering proved very attractive to our members and there was a large SYO contingent. Well done to Dave Peel (2^nd M50), Jenny Peel (1^st W45) and Nick Lightfoot (3^rd M50 Ultimate, where paths are removed from the map).

Jenny Peel 1st W45 OO Cup, Slovenia

The following week, many SYO members then continued down to the 4 day Bubo Cup on the island of Cres in Croatia. Due to the high temperatures starts were early, allowing competitors to pursue more traditional holiday pursuits for the rest of the day. There were more podium positions for SYO with Dave and Jenny Peel winning their respective classes and 3^rd for Kim Baxter in W21E.

The summer of orienteering ended, as tradition dictates, with the White Rose in North Yorkshire. Whilst the weather and terrain perhaps doesn’t quite live up to the standards of some of the other multi-day events, plenty of SYO members were attracted by the opportunity to enjoy a social weekend of camping and orienteering in Dalby Forest. There were podium positions and White Rose mugs galore for SYO.

1st & 2nd for SYO in the Young Junior Women Sprint

Sprint: Dom Dakin (1^st JM), Alex Elliott (3^rd JW), Pete Tryner (1^st VM), Pete Guillaume (2^nd UVM), Euan Tryner (1^st YJM), Imogen Pieters (1^st YJW) & Freya Tryner (2^nd YJW)

Individual Combined: Megan Hill (1^st W10B), Alice Pieters (2^nd W10B), Freya Tryner (1^st W12A), Yasmin Field (2^nd W18L), Jenny Johnson (1^st W35L), Clare Baker (3^rd W35L), Rosie Field (3^rd W50S), Judith Guillaume (2^nd W60S), Sheila Sprot (3^rd W65L), Monika Cooper (1^st W70S), Robbie Lightfoot (2^nd M10A), Jamie Lightfoot (2^nd M12A), Daniel Hill (2^nd M12B), Euan Tryner (3^rd M14A), Dom Dakin (2^nd M16A), Joe Field (3^rd M16A), Jake Field (1^st M20L), Tony Udris (1^st M45S), Dean Field (1^st M50S), Nick Lightfoot (1^st M55L).

Night: Dom Dakin (1^st JM), Joe Field (2^nd JM), Paul Bradbury (2^nd SVM).

1st & 2nd for SYO in the Junior Men night event

If you fancy trying a multi-day event for the first time, then the bi-annual Scottish 6 Days is a good place to start. Deeside 2017 runs from 30th July to 5th August and is centred on the town of Ballater.

Well done to Pippa Dakin, who earlier in the summer, represented GB at the European Youth Orienteering Championships. Read her report on her experience.......

This year the competition was held in Poland and based in the city of Jaroslaw. There were three races in total; Long, Relay and Sprint.

Before we travelled out the team had spent time familiarising ourselves with the terrain that we would be faced with by looking at maps of the area and planning courses for each other. Only the Long area had a previous map and so one of the GB coaches created a map of the Sprint area for our use! To further help with preparations as what to expect from the terrain, when we arrived we had the chance to walk around the town where the Sprint was to be run and also participate in the model event on the Eastern part of the area where the Long was to be held. We knew after the trainings that it was going to be a tough few days ahead of us with temperatures hitting 30 degrees Celsius as well as the extremely physical terrain.

Being my last year at the competition I had hopes that all my training, both physical and technical, in the lead up to the competition would enable me to post pleasing results, unfortunately this was not exactly the case.

In the Long race I made a number of technical mistakes and was also feeling very physically drained due to the heat and tough terrain. This led me to a 34^th place and out of the top 20 finish I had hoped for, 6 minutes behind 20^th position.

For the Relay it had been decided that I was to run in a mixed relay and was on first leg, my preferred leg! This race I was much cleaner than the previous day with only one technical slip up and was much happier afterwards.

The Sprint was the last race and I was feeling very tired and not as sprightly as I had hoped. This meant the whole course was a struggle to get up to speed, and even though technically relatively clean I ended up in 36^th place.

I had a great time in Poland and I am very grateful for the financial help I received - this helps me to continue orienteering to high levels and rely less heavily on my parents for financial support. I have learnt many lessons from the EYOC 2016 experience about where the faults are in my orienteering, specifically in technique and how to approach racing and can now work on these so that in the future I can achieve that top 20 placing that I have set my sights on!