Yvette Baker Trophy Final and NOC District Event, Sherwood Pines, 4th Dec 2005

Planner

It was great to see so many people at the event and is was pleasing to get so many positives comments regards the planning on both the district event and Yvette Baker final courses. Having planned the Junior Inter regional relays on the southern section of the map just six months previous it made it easy for me to make sure they didn't cover the same areas. The assembly area with spectator control went down well with the juniors as expected.

Thanks to Keith Strebb who not only helped put out controls but also agreed to be stand by planner. Only three weeks prior to the event I slipped a disc in my back and it was looking dubious whether I'd be able to make it on the day. However I recovered well and despite it being the first running I had done since, I managed ok. Thanks also to Steve Martin who gave a hand to collect in controls.

Richard Robinson

Controller

It was a pleasure to control an event with such competent and meticulous officials, particularly of course the Planner and Organiser -- many thanks to both of them. As well as needing little advice, they both must be credited with several inspired innovative touches, along with the more mundane hours of graft, which together made this event a success. Both Janet Evans and Richard Robinson had many constraints to work around, and many extra factors to consider in accommodating the needs of the Colour-Coded event alongside the Yvette Baker Final. I think they succeeded admirably. For the Yvette Baker event, Richard fitted in a radio control, a spectator control and final loop without exceeding the recommended course lengths. For all the courses he avoided much of the bramble, bracken and brashings which blight parts of Sherwood Pines, and he provided interesting and challenging legs and route choices. I heard many very complimentary remarks made about the quality of the course planning, and he should be very pleased with his efforts. Janet had many more balls to juggle than anyone could reasonably expect, but she didn't drop a single one, and among many other things she should take a lot of the credit for the wonderful atmosphere in the assembly area. Spectators and competitors alike seemed to have been stimulated by the sense of occasion, heightened by some excellent commentary from Mick Lucking, who did a superb job of raising the excitement and tension while himself remaining calm and in control. His job was made easier, of course, by the ever-reliable technical input (remote radio link, software, etc) from Michael Napier, whose Results service once again enabled the Trophy presentation to be spot on time. Many thanks to both of them, too.

But in the end, the event was successful and enjoyable because so many enthusiastic people came and made it so. A legion of helpers did their share, and more, to cover the extended time which the event took. A big thankyou to all of them. And thank you to the huge number of people who attended both as competitors and supporters and made our efforts worthwhile. We hope to see you all again.

Such large numbers turned up, in fact, that although we printed about 25% more maps than our usual top limit for Colour-Coded events, we still ran out on 3 courses. Apologies to those affected, especially those who had collected a Control Description sheet but found no map at the Start. This shouldn't have happened, as there were equal numbers of maps and C-D sheets for every course, so once a set of C-D sheets was used up, no-one else could register for that course. I can only surmise that a few people must have gone straight to the Start without registering. A couple of people asked why we didn't issue the Yvette Baker control description sheets at Registration. This was because each course shared a couple of controls with the Colour-Coded event, and we wanted to prevent the Colour-Coded competitors from passing on specific information about them. With hindsight I feel we should have added a short section of taped route and possibly an extra control on the White course - it was my call, and I'm sorry if any youngsters struggled without them.

Alan Beardsley