News

SO Successes at the British Championships

A select group of Southdowners headed up to North Yorkshire for the National Championships but came back with one British Champion (congratulations Roger) and four other podium places including a win in the Women's Short Open relay (Heather, Scarlet and Anna). Also on the podium Ruth Rhodes with a bronze in the individual, silver for the Men's Short Open relay team (Tommy, Stan and Pete) and an excellent Bronze for our juniors in their AdHoc Relay (Ben, Harriet and Emma).

Full results for the weekend can be found here

Success at JK International Festival of Orienteering

Congratulations to all those who took part in JK over the Easter Bank Holiday weekend. Our very own Roger won all his races and got the JK Performance Shield as well as gold medals for the sprint and the two day event in M85L. Darrell High achieved a silver medal in M55L, Heather High a bronze medal in W18E and Ruth Rhodes a bronze medal in W80L over the two-day event.

Summer Trail Runs 2024

Spring club nights returned on Thursday April 11th. Courses have been risk assessed according to this document.

We will meet as a group at 6:30pm each Thursday although we hope to make the activities available online to attempt at your leisure. Courses will be saved in the Trail Runs folder on MapRun (UK/Sussex/Trail Runs).

Please sign up using the Strawpoll and indicate (when appropriate) whether you would like a map provided (cost £1) or are happy to print off your own.

Summer SOG Planners Required

Planners are required for the Summer SOG series events at Worth School, Lancing Manor, Hampden Park and Brooklands Park.

If you have planned before or would like to have a go for the first time, please speak to/email any of the club committee members listed on the contacts page. An event advisor will be available to support you throughout the planning process and on the day of the event.

Entries now open for Sunny Sussex weekend in May

Get your entries in now for a whole weekend of Orienteering between Arundel and Chichester. There’s a Middle Distance race on Saturday, followed by a Sprint race at Oaklands Park and Chichester University. Take advantage of the campsite at Eartham and then it’s a short drive to the Long Distance race at Houghton. Prizes on offer and children’s activities available with lots of opportunity for socialising and catching up with fellow Orienteers. Enter here.

Virtual Orienteering

During Covid times many clubs, including SO, set up a number of so-called virtual courses which club members could do on their own using the MapRun app. Instead of finding control flags participants used the GPS facilites of a smartphone or smartwatch to confirm that they had reached the desired locations. The courses that we set up are still available to use and links to them are listed below. In some cases the course may have expired - if you come across any of these please contact the club captain who can reset them.

SO Juniors win YBT Heat at Gravetye

Congratulations to our junior team who won today's Yvette Baker Trophy (YBT) heat at Gravetye Manor. Despite the rain and mud there was great team spirit, lots of fun and amazing map reading and running!

We had strong competition from the TVOC team, the final results were: SO 895 points, TVOC 893 points. We had five people score maximum points and lots of excellent runs from our whole squad.

JK and British relay entries

I am now taking expressions of interest for the two big relay championships taking place this Spring. The JK Relay on Stanton Moor, near Matlock, on April 1st and British Relay Championships on April 14th near Whitby.

To express an interest in running in one or both of these please complete this StrawPoll or e-mail the club captain. Since the entry fees for these events are quite steep the club has agreed to subsidise 50% of the cost of each relay.

Spring Club Nights 2024

Spring club nights returned on Tuesday January 2nd. Many thanks to Euan Marsh for once again taking the lead on these. Courses have been risk assessed according to this document.

We will meet as a group at 6:30pm each Tuesday although we hope to make many of the activities available online to attempt at your leisure. Courses will be saved in the Club Night folder on MapRun (UK/Sussex/Club Nights).

Please sign up using the Strawpoll and indicate (when appropriate) whether you would like a map provided (cost £1) or are happy to print off your own.

Brighton City Race 2023 official event video

The Brighton City Race will be back in 2025 as a level B national event. Check out all the excitement in this year’s official event video which is now online. It was shot in 4K, so if you change the settings in YouTube it’s even easier to see who’s who. There are photos here. We had a couple of items of lost property: A grey Decathlon hoodie (size L); and a Decathlon control description holder. Looking forward to the next BCR already. Happy Christmas, Rob.

SO have four new Southern Night Champions

Competing at the Oldhouse Warren SOG earlier in the day proved to be good practice for the Southern Night Championships hosted by the British Army in terrain consisting of army barracks, firing ranges and bracken-infested woodland. Congratulations to James Yule (M20), Neil Crickmore (M60), Ruth Rhodes (W80) and Roger Maher (M80) who were all victorious and came away with a range of trophies.

SO have five new Southern Champions

This year's Southern Championship took place at the November Classic in the New Forest on 5th Nov. This is a popular event for Southdowners and is always well attended.

Emma Chapman W12, Ben Chapman M14, Will Heap M50, Julia Jarvis W55 and Alan Velecky M55 all tackled the long courses over fast but pretty wet terrain and beat off stiff competition to become Southern Champions. They were each awarded a trophy, as well as a coveted Southern Championships Beanie Hat:

In addition the following members made the podium and got a beanie hat.

2nd M21E Nick Jarvis (he was 2nd by 1 second), 3rd W10A Harriet Nichols, 3rd W12A Emily Waters, 3rd M18E Tommy Heap, 3rd W80 Ruth Rhodes

We encourage participants to carry a mobile phone

A learning point from October's coaching conference was how many orienteers were not aware that carrying a mobile phone for use in emergencies is permitted (and has been since at least 2016!).

As a club we definitely encourage participants to carry a phone and also suggest that you might like to do the following:

• Set up the ICE number and emergency details if your phone allows this.
• Add the club mobile number 07526-792817 (on at every event and located with the SI team at download)

Competitors are not permitted to use mobile phones to assist with navigation. They are permitted to be used to call for assistance in the event of an emergency.

Sunny Sussex Officials Needed

A Planner and Organiser are required for the Sunny Sussex evening event at Chichester University / Oaklands Park and an Organiser for the Sunny Sussex Level B event at Houghton. All of the Sunny Sussex events are coordinated by Anna Chapman who can guide you through the roles.

​Peter Palmer Junior Team Relays 2023

One of the premier junior relay events of 2023 took place at Stowe Park, Buckinghamshire, in the early hours of Sunday 10 September. SO had a full team (hooray!) with a mix of very experienced and novice relay runners.

The SO team arrived in small groups at the event base in the early evening of the day before. Part of the tradition of the event is that all teams prepare for the early morning start by taking over a large hall and sleeping on the floor. Some of the other club teams participated in a football tournament, though our SO team (quite sensibly) preferred to minimise the chance of injury and save their energies for the running during the main event.