Konsta Vanhanen is our new ONSW scholar
- Last Updated: Tuesday, 15 August 2017 11:45
We are pleased to announce that Konsta Vanhanen will be our orienteering scholar for summer 2017-18.
Konsta is from Finland, as was our inaugural scholar Atte Lahtinen.
Konsta will arrive in time for the Australian championships in late September, then stay with Goldseekers for 4-5 weeks as they put on promotional events in Bathurst to capitalise on the carnival.
A keen MTBOer, Konsta is on the Finnish national team and also won the 2015 junior world rogaining champs in Finland. A young man of many talents, then, but we'll let him introduce himself a little further:
"My name is Konsta. You may know my country from saunas, Santa Claus (in fact I live only 200km away from Santa) and Formula One driver Kimi Räikkönen. Or perhaps Atte Lahtinen, my fellow country man, has already told you everything.
"At first I have to say that travelling Down Under has been a big dream for me for a while. I'm pretty spontaneous person, loving every kind of new challenge and adventure – but hopefully those "challenges" have nothing to do with snakes, crocodiles, bugs, spiders... and so on :D
"I'm a 23-year-old economics student going to take off one year from studying. I've been doing sport since I was a child (mainly skiing, running and Finnish baseball), and as late as at the age of 13 I began to orienteer. And after that there was no way back. Pretty soon I also began ski-orienteering and found mtb-orienteering. I've never been the fastest runner or the strongest cyclist, but instead I've concentrated to train and develop my orienteering skills and tried to find my own way for thinking. Nowadays I do some 50% of foot-o and 50% of mtbo. In foot-o I represent Finnish team Ikaalisten Nouseva-Voima, which has risen to top 15 Jukola team (Jukola is the greatest orienteering event on the earth organised every June in Finland). I've been running only in our second team, but it has been really instructive to follow at close quarters how the best elite orienteers train.
"In mtbo my best results are bronze in sprint in Junior World MTBO Champs 2014 and last week I achieved 6th place in sprint in the senior European MTBO Champs in France.
"I went to an orienteering high school for three years, where I learned a lot about what it means to be and act like an ambitious athlete and how to train. These are some aspects I'd like to bring with me from Finland and share for you the Finnish way of thinking about orienteering. Coaching is really dear to my heart and I'm always eager to talk about orienteering with people - so do not hesitate to ask me for a chat. And I'm hoping to coach as much as possible during my stay.
"I don’t know what to expect, but I'm sure the upcoming 6 months are going to be one of the coolest of my life and I'll meet a lot of great moments with you!
"Best regards," Konsta.
Record turnout at Ski-O champs
- Last Updated: Sunday, 13 August 2017 22:51
Competitors from four states - even Western Australia - made our annual Ski Orienteering event on Sunday the biggest and best ever.
Recent heavy dumps of snow, and clear blue skies on the day, made for ideal conditions at Perisher - and a record turnout of 50 participants certainly enjoyed it.
"Map attached to my jacket with safety pins and my compass on my zipper with a cable tie. Great fun and loved every minute of the long course," said WA's Natasha Sparg, who took a lesiurely 3 hrs 50m on the 7.3km Long course.
"Thank you to organisers Marina Iskhakova and Fedor Iskhakov for this amazing event. The best introduction I could ever have to skiing."
Co-sanctioned with OACT, the event was jointly organised by Red Roos, Big Foot and Perisher X Country as part of XC Ski week.
There were three line courses, a two-hour Snogaine and a family treasure hunt for parents and kids.
Results are here. We thank all those involved for this great initiative.
Galston, Greenwich take out Sydney North champs
- Last Updated: Tuesday, 08 August 2017 09:16
Galston High School and Greenwich Public School are the proud new titleholders after a very windy annual Sydney North schools championships at St Ives Showground on Monday.
Galston have been coming for a few years now and built on their preious experience to unseat Riverside Girls. In the primary division, Greenwich had two Garingal juniors leading the way.
All up we had more than 240 entries, with a big increase in primary school numbers. Great to see some follow-through from the programs we have run at Mimosa PS and Lindfield East PS in particular.
A big thank you to Barbara Hill for organising, Terry Bluett on SI, and all the coaches and other helpers who ensure the students had an enjoyable day.
And a reminder that entries for the annual NSW Schools Champs close next Monday (August 14). This year we are in the Illawarra - see the flyer for details.
Sydney North was the last of our regional championships for 2017 - but we still have gala days to come in Term 4 in Armidale (Oct 20) and Orange (Nov 3).
Youth prevails at Goanna
- Last Updated: Monday, 07 August 2017 17:52
Young shoulders won out over old heads at Garingal's annual Goanna wacky race at The Clay Pan in Beacon Hill on Sunday.
JWOC rep Toby Wilson (Garingal), Ewan Shingler (Big Foot) and Serena Doyle (Uringa) were first across the line in the mass start mind-bender that is the brainchild of ONSW marketing and communications officer Ian Jessup.
Competitors may skip controls, may follow others, and have a small box section to be done in any order - throwing the standard line course a little out of kilter and introducing some tangential decision making into the mix.
For example, fourth-placed Bart Vonhoff was en route to #13 on the long Goanna course, but found himself instead at control a in the box. Worry? No - he simply skipped #13 and continued! (Don't we all wish we could have days like that?!)
Toby (43:03) deadheated with Andrew Brown last year in the Goanna but had the glory all to himself this year as he pipped Big Foot junior Alastair George by 18 seconds. Visiting Tasmanian Karl Bicevskis was a further 14 minutes back in third place.
In the medium DraGOn, Ewan (38:59) shrugged off a heavy cold to beat Tom Kennedy (second place again) by seven minutes. Mapper Jim Merchant was third in just under an hour - feeling right at home no doubt.
In the short GeckO, Serena (40:58) edged out Toby's mum Airdrie Long by half a minute, with Peter Fozo - one of Garingal's Hungarian imports, third in 49:47.
A bi thank you to controller Ron Junghans and the team of GO helpers, especially SI guru Col Burnett who had the task of programming such a spectacle as well as overseeing the trial of SI Air.
The courses are on Routegadget, with some amusing 'noodling' on the Goanna.
