Then and Now
Random thoughts about ‘JK’s past and present
Looking at the photos taken at the JK Relays at Minley on Easter Monday it would be hard to better the setting and facilities. A sloping grassy field with a spectacular long downhill run in and plenty of room the to cheer incoming and outgoing runners before either shopping for O gear or joining the queue for food and drink and the loos. The car park was close and road access was easy. How did it compare with JK’s of the past that involved WIM?
It is 40 years since WIM was first involved in the JK which in 1979 was held in Devon and comprised a ‘warm up’ event on Day 1 at Haldon Hill, a ‘Long distance race’ on Day 2 at Fernworthy Forest on Dartmoor, Day 3 (the WIM day) was the JK Relay event at the aptly named Bramble Brook just off the Exeter-Plymouth road, and a ‘Run Down’ individual event at the north end of the Quantocks.
The Warrens were then new to Orienteering but it didn’t stop me being volunteered as Relay Race Day Organiser! Preparations had been in hand for over a year with courses planned by Ron Wilton and Ian Keith, two of WIM’s founder members. Much of the equipment for the event had to be transported from Wimborne to Exeter by car. Just to name a few items – 4ft long 3inch diameter wooden stakes, two per control site with a timber cross piece on which the two control punches had to be screwed, tape not the current handy plastic type but off cut rolls of hessian from Wilton Carpet Factory. Each was massive, heavy and took several trips to deliver. If you ran into this tape you would bounce back off it! Tables and folding chairs and tents were the least of the worries.
Once down in Devon we had to clear a wooded site of brashings and literally cut through a thicket to enable incoming runners to get to the changeover.
The whole event attracted 2300 competitors similar to 2019 and on the day there were 400 teams entered.
I can remember that weather on the day was fine, parking was on minor public roads efficiently handled by two BOK members who were policemen and the event ran to schedule with results declared by 2pm. Unusually, in those days BOF got sponsorship form Robinsons Soft Drinks, who brought along a double deck bus converted into a hospitality suite, and made it clear that access was only for their guests, which excluded all event officials!
10 years later in 1989 the JK returned to the SW using Longleat, Stourhead and Gare Hill for Days 1 and 2 individual races and Gare Hill for the Relays. WIM and WSX were responsible for the Stourhead Individaul event near the aptly named hamlet of Gasper. Event entry was by post and Cris Tween spent many hours opening envelopes and filing s.a.e envelopes which were often in a very bad state. She also prepared and had printed the programme and start lists which were posted to every competitor. The entry was huge with over 3800 competitors so the work load for everyone was massive. Car parking was on an old airfield, but it involved a near 3k walk to assembly and back, which people did without complaint and at least starts were close to assembly. The 1990s was the dawn of computing with the famous ‘BBC’ computers used for some of the results processing. However control cards and pin punches were used so each had to be checked by hand which involved a huge labour force on the day of the event occupying a large marquee in a sloping field. The weather was good and the teams were very efficient with results declared on the day.
On a sad note JK 89 had the misfortune to have competitors collapse and die on each of the Longleat and Stourhead days. These traumatic events were efficiently handled by a first aid and medical team but illustrate how important it is to have appropriate emergency procedures in place at all events.
Map of H65A course at Stourhead from JK '89
Things change, but still in the Cornish Penhale Sands JK of 1997 manual punching was used. The entry for this event topped 4000 yet the highly trained results team were posting results for competitors within 20 mins of them finishing the course. This time I was the lead Planner with Dudley Budden (BOK) and Graham Pring (KERNO) and on the day we enjoyed cloudless skies and high temperatures. We did not have digital maps so checking was a huge job with 14000 maps which took a 21cwt van to get then to Cornwall. If you haven’t been to Penhale it is difficult to visualise the daunting challenge of setting out on a course on the huge sea of dunes where depressions could as easily be on the top of dunes as low down!! I hear that KERNO are proposing to use it for the JK in the early 2020s so there is your chance!
John Warren
Map of M50L course at Penhale Sands from JK '97 (click map to enlarge)
Read about JK '97 in the June edition of CompassSport (click article to enlarge)
