Controller's comments

Thanks to everyone who came to South Gare.  With over 1,000 entries, many travelling miles across the country, it showed that inter-club competition is still keenly contested, and with only a few points separating some of the podium positions!

South Gare is a great detailed area, and somewhat unusual terrain for the north east!  I hope you found the courses a suitable challenge for a major event.  The planning was somewhat constrained by the logistics of finding a finish arena not too far from the parking and bus drop off, and the long thin nature of the area, but Rob's courses managed to get everyone into the technical dunes, with a mix of longer and shorter legs, and sustained interest even through the last few controls.  And the dunes and beach provided a wonderful setting for the Arena.

We had quite a bit of discussion over the map legibility.  It had successfully been used for a previous JIRCs ..... but with all maps at 1:7,500 and younger eyes!  After much to and fro, we settled on digital printing (modern versions of which seem as clear as offset litho), Teslin waterproof paper (as recommended by IOF and less grainy than Pretex), some legibility and simplification updates to the map (thanks to mapper Paul Taylor), larger map scales for courses with older ages, and making rough open dunes white (rather than light yellow, which makes small brown contours harder to read).

Regarding a couple of organisational issues that may have affected people's runs:

• We ran out of course 9A&9B maps, due to some confusion in printing numbers.  We recycled maps from early finishers and gave punching starts to those who were held up.  Apologies for any upset this delay may have caused to the young children on this course.  If any early starters didn't find their map in their club bag (because we recycled it), and would like a map, please email the Organiser with your name and address and we'll print some more and post them out.
• Control 177 was vandalised between checking and first starts.  The kite remained at the control site on the ground next to the tag with the control number on it, but the stake and box went for a walk.  They were replaced before 11 a.m. and we haven't heard that it created any significant confusion or time loss for anyone (but apologies if it did).  We reinstated anyone who didn't punch this control when it was missing.  Thanks to the early competitors that reported it.
• Control #2 on Course 7 (Veterans) was obscuring the obvious sculpture feature on the map, which some may have wanted to use for navigation.  Apologies.

On behalf of all the competitors, I will offer thanks to all the CLOK volunteers for putting on the event, with particular thanks to Rob as Planner and Caroline and Alastair as organisers – it was a pleasure to work with such experienced and competent officials and nice to be alongside lots of ex club mates from CLOK again!

Duncan Archer (LOC)
Controller