Latest ONSW News
Newcastle turned on superb weather and a brilliant new map in hosting the 2013 state champs at the weekend.
Blue Gum Hills Regional Park, just off the freeway at Minmi, proved a fantastic new venue for the Middle Distance titles on Saturday, while Astley's Tower East at Kitchener also fully tested entrants in the Long Distance event on Sunday.
The double header attracted entrants from the ACT, Queensland, Victoria and even a couple from Western Australia.
Results/splits/Routegadget from Middle (Sat) are here and from Long (Sun) are here.
Russell Rigby took some great photos on both days, and there are more from Saturday on our Facebook page.
The remaining State League event for 2013 is the NSW Sprint Champs on a new urban map at Pyrmont, just a stone's throw from the Sydney CBD, on Sunday October 13. The champs are the day after the annual Big Foot Sprints at Sydney Uni. Entries for both close Oct 7. Download the flyer.
An all-too-rare Sydney shower couldn't keep the kids away from our Junior League finale at Willoughby Leisure Centre on Sunday. Juniors and family groups made up more than 70 of the 124 entries for the outing through Hallstrom and Flat Rock Reserves.
While most of the winners are experienced juniors, it's great to see recent convert Jack Brown (GO, pictured far right) taking out the boys' very easy section. Jack went to all but one of the JL events and clearly has found his new sporting passion.
As many new families have discovered, orienteering can be done as seriously or as leisurely as you like, in lovely surroundings. And it builds such great resilience and confidence in kids.
Our overall Junior League winners for 2013 are:
Very Easy: Jack Brown (GO), Nea Shingler (BF).
Easy: Nicholas Tse (GO), Sophie Jones (UR).
Short Moderate: Duncan Currie (GO), Joanna Hill (GO).
Long Moderate: Lawrence Jones (UR), Georgia Jones (UR).
Champion club: Garingal.
Results have been updated on our Junior League page.
ONSW promotions director Barbara Hill has had a stunning 2 days of racing at the World Age Group Triathlon championships in London.
In her first international competition, Barbara (in the women's 45-49 age group) placed 7th in Friday's sprint and 9th in Sunday's Olympic distance course around the 2012 London Games locale. She was the best-placed Australian each time.
On Friday, Barbara was only 90 seconds behind the winner (who just happened to be the Sydney 2000 Olympic gold medallist) - despite losing a minute trying to find her bike in the first transition. In what some are billing as yet another Phar Lap poisoning or Gallipoli-level farce, it seems the officials overnight re-racked Barbara's bike and it was not as easily spotted as when she left it there. Given there were thousands of competitors on the day this proved a major hiccup and may well have cost her second place.
Sunday's longer course proved a bit tougher but two top-ten finishes are something to be very proud of.
The Hill family are having a short holiday in the UK before arriving back in Sydney with just enough time to get down to Canberra for the Aus champs.
Barbara has been a tireless worker for ONSW in a voluntary role and received the President's Award in 2011 for helping to modernise the look of our organisation and take it to new audiences. The orienteering community throughout NSW and Australia congratulates her on her success.
Is there no end to Patrik Gunnarsson's talents?
Big Foot's Swedish star last month headed down to the snow to put on what we believe to be the first ski-O event in NSW for almost 30 years. Garingal member Peter Stevens has emailed to say he hosted two events in the 1980s at Perisher, and a photo of one of them graced the cover of the Australian Orienteer (right). The report from 1982 said winds were so strong that two flags were lost and four others damaged.
Patrik's long-awaited return to the powder heralds a potential new outlet for orienteers.
He raced back to Sydney that night to run in the MetrOLeague finals the next day at Cataract, where he anchored the Feet to a fifth straight Division 1 title and also took out the individual medal. Read about Patrik's ski-O adventure...
