Bosley Cloud

Colour Coded Event 16/12/2001

 Plain Results
 Split Times
 Progressograph

Planner's Comments:

Thank you to those of you who passed on favourable comments after your runs - we hope all competitors had fun!

The going underfoot is always going to be tough at Bosley - steep slopes, rocks, deep heather, brambles etc - and on such a small area it is not easy to plan courses which everybody will enjoy.  That said, believe it or not, we did try to avoid the "worst" bits, and the use of the SI punching system enabled us to criss-cross the area to provide some longer "running" legs, and avoid too much contouring on the steep & deep slopes.

For the Blue & Red courses master maps for both part 1 and part 2 were (unconventionally) copied down at the start.  This means that competitors do not have to faff around in the middle of their runs, so we hope this becomes standard practice in similar situations at future events.

We would also like to reiterate all Mike's thank yous, and thank Mike himself for Controlling & Mapping.

Andy & Vicky Thornton

Controller's Comments

Bosley Cloud is a tougher area than apparent from an armchair inspection of the map.  There are 3 main reasons for this; firstly, the heather is uniformly deep and tough (I don't believe that it is ever burnt as most other heather moors are!), secondly all the woodland has some sort of undergrowth, thirdly there doesn't appear to be enough contours on the map.  Comparing spot heights on the 1:25,000 OS map with the number of contours on the 'O' map suggests that there are insufficient contours on the 'O' map!  How this happened during the genesis of the previous 'O'-maps I have no idea! However the 1:25,000 OS map 1980 version does give a clue if you look carefully!
Bosley Cloud is also an area that benefits immensely from the new technology.  E-punching allows for much more imaginative course planning.  Also OCAD mapping and the ability to print maps a week before the event allowed us to amend the map to suit the ground rather than reject control sites, or even whole areas of the map as being unusable.

I was pleased with the relatively low numbers of competitors who retired or misspunched.

Thanks to everyone who turned up and made all our hard work worthwhile.

I would like to thank the following people:
Phil Colville Map Printer
Jenny Shaw Organiser
Thornton Family Map updating and planning
Ian Watson (& computing team) E-card Technology etc
Plus all other helpers on the day.

For making my job easier, and your orienteering more enjoyable!

Mike Greenwood