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Peter Meyer, President of SHOO, was the organiser of the Club event at Appin on Sunday 19th June. The map, which has had several incarnations as West Cliff, Dharawal and now Appin, provides great rock and track detail. Normally it is a map that is an organisers dream. Courses can be planned to run through an area of natural beauty around the Georges River, but the map also includes civilisation in the form of Appin Oval to provide other useful facilities. However on Sunday, Peter found that all the recent rain had flooded some of his normal crossing points, and his Oval had a rugby match on it right where he wanted to put his start! With the characteristic shrug of a well seasoned organiser Peter moved his start, and replanned the Red and Orange courses, and thanked his lucky stars for the most beautiful running weather he has seen for a few months. John Russell (SHOO treasurer) won the Red course in 69:30, and Salme Fuller the Orange course, putting more useful points towards the much coveted Golden SHOO, the annual points score competition which also has a junior counterpart, the Little Golden SHOO.

Sandra Stewart and Lyn Malmgron organised the South West Regional Schools Championships on Tuesday 22nd June that saw nearly 400 students from age 9 to 16 years old competing on courses set around the Camden Equestrian Centre. Coaches and experienced orienteers for all over Sydney were drafted in to help introduce the students to orienteering around a practice course, before their individual races started. A quick lunch and then it was on to the most ambitious part of the day, a team relay across all the age groups, which also saw some of the coaches showing off their paces to the youngsters. Thomas Hassall Anglican College brought along 30 senior students, whose school sports uniform was perfect for the day. Elizabeth Macarthur High College, Hurlstone Agriculture High School and Chevalier College battled it out with them in the older age classes, whilst the primary schools competing included public schools from Elderslie, Cawdor, Camden South, Thirlmere, Warragamba, Mawarra, Narellan Vale and Mount Annan.

Peter Charlton set out a series of seven courses on the North Eastern slopes of the Sugarloaf Ranges for the Newcastle Orienteer of the Year Series Race 3. On an interesting map which is scattered with old mine workings alongside classic spur/gully terrain he avoided the temptation to visit all the big rock on the steeper upper slopes near the road to the Sugarloaf summit and struck a good balance with the more runnable forest closer to the freeway. Steven Todkill won the Long Red (5.7km) in convincing style with Jenny Enderby winning the Medium Red (4.7km) with an equally comfortable margin. Nearly 90 runners enjoyed the glorious weather. Find results for the NOY3 here and courses on Routegadget here

Early mist did not deter 22 teams racing in the Metro League, a near full complement of Junior Leaguers and over 45 racers who entered on the day, at the Doonside event organised by Big Foot on the 26th June. Garingal proved hard to beat with strong performances in all their teams and individual winners in all the courses except Division C where Ian Meyer was running for SHOO. The Big Foot team managed to get the better of them in Division A which reversed the results of their last match against each other and is making for a most interesting division in this year's competition. Big Foot's C team also managed to get the upper hand, but Garingal Blue Tongues held out against SHOO by one point in Division D. This was the last Australian race for international exchange student, Ellen Kastensson who returns to Valbonne, France after her seven week trip. She brought along her exchange family, Claudia and Aurora Chick for their first orienteering experience. Find Metro League results here and Junior League results here