Planners Comments

My job seemed so easy on the day that it can only be down to those who helped
to put out and collect controls - and the good weather! My thanks therefore
to Roger, Diana, Trevor, Hilary, Toby, Frank, Bob Brandon, Mike Hampton,
Sue Bicknell and Iain Botheroyd for their help. I hope I haven't forgotton
anyone.
Janet Richardson

Controllers Comments

"Sutton Park is fertile ground for birch, gorse and holly or holme. 
These grow quite quickly and can obscure entrances to marked paths. 
Spindly holly can make the going tougher than marked under trees. 
Birch especially sometimes decays quickly and both holly and birch 
are cleared from time to time. Marked paths can fade and unmarked 
ones can appear prominent. Odd unmarked open or thick patches are to 
be expected.

There has been a thorough clearing of gorse in recent years in some 
areas intended to restore the heath. This has extended the areas 
for running and made useful boundary features for control sites.

Exmoor ponies , 25 of them, NE of the railway make quite heavy 
tracks and these are often unmarked.

The pine copses in the south-eastern parts are like beacons leading the way.

Checking controls early on Sunday the brilliant bark of the sunlit 
birches and the flutter of yellow in the upper branches was 
exhilarating.

The whole show went like clockwork reflecting the practised skill of 
the Droober teams. Janet Richardson's courses were, I am sure you 
agree, interesting and enjoyable. Little was changed as a result of 
my scrutiny.

I had a recurrence of an idea for 'radio orienteering" which I should 
now call 'Mobile Phone Orenteering' or MPO for short. Teams of pairs 
compete. Each member of a team has a mobile phone. One member of the 
pair stays at base and has the map with the controls marked and a 
description list. The other is in the forest and has the wherewithall 
to punch at controls. They communicate by mobile phone through 
instructions and questioning. The object is fro the person in the 
forest to complete the course in the shortest time as in ordinary 
orienteering. In the elementary form of the game the person in the 
forest has a compass. For the Elite version the person in the forest 
has no compass. For the Super Elite there is only one way 
communication from base to forest but not the other way. Perhaps we 
shall play the elementary form in Sutton Park one day."

Toby Norris