Wimborne Orienteers

Scottish Six Days 2017

Glen Tanar Balfour Forest Birsemore Hill Creag Choinnich Glen Feardar

An honourable mention of those WIMs who spent the week of 30 July-5 August at the Scottish 6 Days on Deeside! Top ten results were achieved by:

Kevin Pickering - 7th in M60S including 3rd place on Day 3
Keith Henderson - 4th in M75L including 3rd place on Days 2, 3 and 5
Grace French - 3rd in W10A including 2nd place on Days 5 and 6
Hilary Pickering - 3rd in W60S including 2nd place on Day 2, 3rd on Day 3 and 1st on Day 5
Gillian Cross - 8th in W70S including 2nd place on Days 1 and 2
Nikki Crawford - 6th in W75S including 2nd place on Day 1 and 1st on Day 5

Well done also to Andrew & Karen French, Martin Cross, John Warren, Debs Mays, Sue Hands and Jo Stanley.

Scottish Six Days website

Background photograph taken by Wendy Carlyle at Braemar
View Wendy's photo albums on Flickr

We are also grateful to Kevin Pickering, Andrew French, Steve Rush and Andy Johnson for use of their photos

Royal Deeside 2017 – A Personal view of the Scottish 6 days

Its big, it lasts a whole week and you have the opportunity of sharing competition with 2500 orienteers not only from the UK but from Scandinavia, all over Europe and from many other parts of the world. Its exciting to be a part of an event of this size and some of us have been hooked by it for many years!. It doesn’t seem daunting, because start times are spread over 4 hours and once in the forest its no more busy than any other event except that if you have a late start there are a lot of ‘elephant tracks’ to either follow or lead you astray! It is only in the final run in past a kaleidoscope of club tents and banners that the adrenaline gets to work and you have the motivation for that extra effort to impress your friends!

The anticipation of the event first started on a sunny Saturday afternoon with arrival at Ballater, a large village in Deeside and the location of the well equipped event camp site. The event centre was in the suitably named Victoria Hall in the centre of the village where you collected an envelope with your race bib, programme, final details and memento. Here the atmosphere really ‘buzzed’ as people greeted friends, exchanged stories of the long journey to the event and did some relaxed equipment shopping with the regular O traders, who for once were located indoors (Ian of Ultra-Sport was very impressed to be in a room with a deep fitted carpet!!). The village had a wide range of local shops, eating places, an outstanding bakery and was the starting point for the daily bus service to each event for those who didn’t wish to use cars.

All events were within 15 miles of Ballater along the sides of the Dee valley with upstream being much more mountainous than downstream. And the valley road was superb, almost traffic free, and took us past the entrance to Balmoral Castle on several occasions.

The 6 days of competition were in predominantly coniferous forests breaking out into rough heather mountain sides on the longer courses. Relatively few tracks and as a bonus very few brambles and bracken so you could set compass bearings and follow straight lines. Underfoot grass covered rocks tested balance and on the long courses there were some seriously steep slopes and crags to deal with. Walks to the start could be sociable or testing. Some were short but others up to 3k with a lot of climb which meant that it was a good idea to allow plenty of time to recover before your start time was called. The fact that we had a week of good weather totally transformed the experience and to come home with dry O shoes was almost unique!

The competition was in the form of a league. You scored points on each day and your best 4 runs counted, so up to two disasters could be regarded as an ‘educational’ experience! WIM achieved podium places for Grace French who had a brilliant week on W10A with several 2nd places, and Hilary Pickering W60S. Grace looks to be one of WIMs future stars and her sister Alice seems to have also been bitten with the O bug!

From the photos you’ll see a kaleidoscope of tents and banners round the finish run in. WIM shared our tent with WSX and the two club banners flew together throughout the week. The tent really comes into its own at multi-day events as a base for kit and a place to sit, relax and chat about what is to come or what was your experience out on the course.

Club tents on Day 6

Each event had highly efficient car parking arrangements and the assembly area looked like a mini ‘shopping mall’ with food and equipment traders doing a steady trade throughout the day. ‘Tom’ our local ‘O’caterer was there, but it was good to see local traders benefiting, particularly on the last two days when the local farmer and his family did a roaring trade in home made beef burgers assisted by their very well behaved sheep dogs!

After 3 days of competition there was the traditional ‘Rest Day’ which for many was an opportunity to be even more energetic. For those who wanted yet more orienteering there was a ‘sprint race’ round the streets of Ballater, but for many this was the day to go further afield. On previous ‘Rest Days’ I have climbed Ben Lawers, and Barbara and I climbed Lochnager together at a previous 6 days. This time I went up Glen Muick and climbed high to get a great view of the Cairngorms. Alternatives included the National Trust ‘Castles of Mar’,the jewel being Crathes, further east down Deeside with wonderful gardens, the event site of a previous 6 Day Event Centre.

Each day you received a ‘News-sheet' giving updates on competition information, evening social events and personal messages such as birthdays and anniversaries. The social programme was largely based in Ballater and varied from talks on the local area, to folk quiz ,music,whisky tasting and of course a Ceilidh.

The final 3 days were close to Braemar where some courses were seriously steep and the Air Ambulance had to be called in. Finally 2 days in Glen Feardar where terrain was not so severe and if you had time you could even glimpse the Royal Standard flying over Balmoral Castle.

The Warrens have taken part in the Scottish 6 Days every 2 years since 1979 as evidenced by the collection of trophies that Barbara won over the years, and although I was sadly alone this time Royal Deeside 2017 came up to expectations. It is always a wonderful holiday in a country with utterly sublime scenery and to be able to share this with friends has been a privilege. If I was to pick out one memorable 6 Days it must be Oban 2011 where a very large WIM contingent not only took part on stunning terrain, but also spent a memorable day managing car parking!

The 6 Days is a great orienteering experience, if you haven’t been yet look out for 2019!

John Warren

Day 1 - Glen Tanar