Members
Archive of News and Information stored under the Members category.
Southdowners reap rewards at JK2025 Festival of Orienteering over Easter
The Easter bank holiday weekend is always the time for the JK International Festival of Orienteering. This year it took place in South Yorkshire and many club members took part. Our notable results at the Sprints were Roger Maher M85 Silver, Emma Chapman W14 Bronze and Mark Johnson M10 Bronze. For the overall two day competition Roger Maher M85 Gold and Emma Chapman W14 Bronze. James Curtis showed great skill in the Trail-O and claimed top spot in the juniors. For the relays the Men's Short team won silver and the Women's short team got bronze.
SO triumph at UK's first civilian Biathlon Orienteering competition
SO members won five medals at the Biathlon Orienteering competition held at JK2025 in Sheffield over Easter. Anna Chapman won Gold and Jane Lambert won silver in W50+. Peter Chapman won silver in M50+. Ben Chapman won bronze in M16- and Emma Chapman won bronze in W16-. The Competition is a mix of orienteering and electronic rifle target shooting.
British Middle Distance Championship success
SO Club members didn't have to travel far to take part in the British Middle Championships on 15th March 2025. Held in dry and sunny, but cold weather at Holmbush and Buchan Country Park, near Crawley.
Huge congratulations to our three medal winners:
Roger: Gold M85
Emma: Silver W14
Ruth: Silver W80
A massive "well done" to all SO competitors for navigating their way around the rhododendrons.
Results can be found here
Read on for more photos.
Southdowns has eight new South East Long Champions
Congratulations to all SO members who took part at the Blackheath and Farley Heath SE Long Distance Champs in the Surrey Hills on 2nd February 2025.
Eight of our club members became South East Long Distance Champions in their age categories. They were Mark Johnson M10, Ben Chapman M16, Nick Jarvis M21, Kenny Leitch M60, Roger Maher M85, Emma Chapman W14, Anna Chapman W50 and Jasmine Bennett W70. Six SO members won silver medals and four won bronze medals. Read on for more info about the courses and the medalists.
SO has 10 new South East Long Champions
Congratulations to all SO members who took part at the Black and White Hills National event, near Bagshot on 1st December.
Ten of our club members became South East Long Distance Champions in their age categories, three won silver medals and 3 won bronze medals. Read on for more info about the courses and the medalists.
Knock-out Sprint fun eventLane End Common, Chailey
The Knock-out Sprint is an exciting orienteering format originally designed for TV. It’s popular at international level and is included in World Championship and World Cup events. This summer, the format comes to Sussex.
It will be a fun evening event where everyone runs 4 short 1km races in the style of a knock-out sprint competition. Athletes run in groups of 4 or 6 to see if they can return first and get promoted to the group above. In each round, one athlete will be promoted from the group and one will be relegated.
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.
Can you help the club with Publicity?
Call-out for someone, or a couple of people to help our team publicise our SO events and come up with some new ideas on reaching out to people.
Have you got a small amount of time on a regular basis to look forward at our event plan and push messages out about events as well as publicise the sport generally? The club is also interested in the idea of publicising a series of MapRun courses to encourage participation, so this could be an alternative strand. You will be working with a friendly bunch of people who already post items. Familiarity with Instagram, Facebook and possibly Strava a bonus for the publicity help. Familiarity with MapRun a bonus if you're just able to help with that part.
Contact Anna if you think you may have some spare time to help. Any small amount of time you can give would really be appreciated! (Credit: Vectorjuice)
Medals at JK2023 Relays
The JK2023 relays took place at Dale Park in the Lake District. SO fielded ten, three person teams in six different relay categories. SO have a history of placing well in the Men's and Women's Short Relay category so there were several teams in each.
The teams did well with Heather High W18, Ali High W45 and Scarlet Heap W20 gaining silver in the Women's Short and the family team of Stan M21, Will M50 and Tommy Heap M18 gaining a bronze medal in the Men's Short competition.
Success at JK2023 Individual Days
This year's JK took place in the Lake District and a large contingent of Southdowners from aged 9 to over 90 took part. Day 1 was a sprint around Lancaster University and Day's 2 and 3 were individual races in the technically challenging areas of High Dam and Bigland.
Two of our youngest juniors, Lucas and Harriet, had stand out performances winning the M10B and W10B courses over the two individual days. Roger Maher became JK champion in the M85 age category and Mike Gammon got silver in M90.
British Championship Medals
Roger put in a sterling performance at the British Champs to win back his British Champion title, winning the M85 competition by over 12 minutes. Silver medals were won by Mike Gammon in the M90 class and Ruth Rhodes in the W80 class and bronze by Scarlet Heap in the W20 Elite course. Congratulations to them all.
A large team of Southdowners took part in the British Champs at Hambledon in March. We all had some really long courses, but enjoyed the challenge and the atmosphere at the event. Some of our youngest members also ran their first white course unaccompanied at a British Champs and put in an excellent performance.
SO has three South East Night Champions
Congratulations to Anna Chapman (W45-50), Peter Chapman (M55-60) and Roger Maher (M80) who all became South East Night Champions at Wimbledon Common on Nov 19th, 2022.
Others also gained podium positions with Rob Lines (M55-60) getting a silver and Liam Marsh (M20-M40) getting a bronze.
Got the Orienteering bug?Try these other events over the next month
If you are a member of Southdowns Orienteers then you are also eligible to attend any other Orienteering events that are on.
During November many SO members will be running at the events which are run by other clubs in the South East and we would love to see you there.
We also run our Tuesday evening Club Night Activities which is another opportunity to get out to run and navigate in a fun atmosphere.
Read on for more info ...
Summer Adventures
After the Hawth event, we take a break for the Summer season and are back to it in September.
Many of our members will be heading off to different parts of the country to take part in multi-day Orienteering events, including Lake District, Yorkshire and Sweden, amongst others I'm sure.
In addition some of our juniors have been selected for tours and events in Stockholm and Gothenburg ... more on this in the next news article ...
Read more for information about each of these events.
JK Success in Wales over Easter
Well done to everyone who took part in the JK2022 - the annual international Festival of Orienteering - which always take place over the Easter weekend. We competed in very varied terrain from University to iron workings to mine workings to a military training site. Great competition, technical areas, social assembly areas and great weather made for a great weekend. Special congratulations to Mike Gammon M90 who became JK Champion, Emils, Tommy and Nick Jarvis who won the JK Men's Short Relay event and Ruth Rhodes W80 who became JK Sprint Champion. Take a look at the maps and routes here. More photos if you read on ...