This is my last "Dave's Drivel" as I'll be standing down as club chairman at the next AGM. I've thoroughly enjoyed my three-year stint as chairman, but the club policy of maintaining a tradition that the chairmanship tenure is for a maximum of three years is a good one to allow fresh ideas to be introduced. For the next Jabberwaoc I'll produce a report covering the full three-year period: what I set out to achieve, what worked, what didn't, what fell by the wayside....

The major news item since the last Jabberwaoc has been the staging of our double badge event, the Thetford Thrash, with CUOC. Most of you are probably aware that the pre-event preparations didn't run smoothly. For various reasons we had three different controllers, where there should only have been one: John Collyer approved the course planning, Keith Downing checked all the maps and overprinting, and John Ward performed the on-the-day duties. In addition, we discovered less than a fortnight before the event that, although the land we were going to use had been safely booked for orienteering, there was to be a pheasant shoot on adjacent forest land. This almost scuppered the entire event as the risk of overlap was too great. However, a last minute switch of events meant that the event could still go ahead.

But once again, WAOC showed what it could do under pressure, with many key players bending over backwards to keep the show on the road. Fred Northrop worked many extra hours to produce the overprinted maps, whilst Mike and Nicola Gardner managed the pre-entries, with lots of additional work due to the complications caused by the switch of the two days. Ursula Oxburgh and Anne Duncumb took control of sealing the maps in plastic bags. Tim Mulcahy and Alan Milne, as event organisers, made numerous phone calls to resolve the last minute problems and ensure that helpers were recruited for actually running the event.

Slightly distanced from the organisational problems, Neil Humphries had quietly and efficiently planned an excellent set of Badge and colour-coded courses and Graham and Caroline Louth planned, organised and ran the string course.

Meanwhile, CUOC were managing their own half of the double event and were very understanding and supportive when the switch of events impinged on their own preparations (thanks particularly to Mark, Cath and Andrew).

After all the problems, the event itself worked pretty well. Unfortunately, the CUOC managed event on Saturday at Santon Downham suffered from dreadful weather: freezing cold drizzle all day, and car-parking problems detracted from the enjoyment a little. By contrast, the weather was almost perfect on Sunday. Cool, but still and dry and almost sunny at times.

One aspect of the event which didn't quite come off was to use the two days as an opportunity for CUOC and WAOC to get to know each other a bit better by combining helpers from both clubs on both days. Although the two clubs worked pretty well together at an organisational level, the last minute change of plans made it too difficult to successfully integrate the clubs "on the ground". However, it looks likely that the event itself attracted a bigger turnout than two independent badge events would have done, so in this respect it was a success.

Many thanks to everyone in WAOC and CUOC who worked so hard to make this event a success.

Dave.

I am sure that everybody would like to thank Dave for all the work he has put into the club during his three years as Chairman, enjoy your retirement. I am sure the committee will be more that willing to accept you back should you want to volunteer for one (or more) of the vacant posts.

If you wish to remain a member and have not yet paid your subscription, please do it right away. BOF members renew through BOF, club only members pay their subs direct to Anne Duncumb.

A range of sizes of both O-tops (1,2,4,5,6,7) @ £13 (p&p 40p extra) and sweatshirts (S,M,L,XL) @ £12 (p&p £1 extra) is now available. I'm sure you've seen the red, white and black O-tops at events and the sweatshirts are plain black with a 7.5cm sq. WAOC motif. You will be able to buy them at the AGM on 13 March or you can order one from me direct - just send a cheque and size requirements to me.

Any queries? Email me at: duncumb@compuserve.com

Anne Duncumb (Membership Secretary)

In June, myself, Clive Baker of NOR and Ian Benstead (a member of my running club) are taking part in a charity challenge: It's a race - we have to canoe the length of Lake Windermere, cycle over the Wrynose and Hardknott passes and then run to the top of Scafell. And that's the easy bit we also have to raise £3000!

Obviously we'd welcome donations and sponsorship but realistically we need corporate sponsorship. Does anyone know anyone who has access to company charity budgets and might be able to pull a few strings?

The charity is "The Wooden Spoon Society", a well-established charity raising money for cancer care and research. We can supply lots of details about the charity and the causes it supports. During the event we will have a support vehicle to which we can attach the logos of sponsoring companies, and we are working on getting local media coverage (we've already had a small feature in the Cambridge Evening News).

If you can help, please get in touch with me, many thanks,

Dave.

I hope you all had a good Christmas break and that your orienteering has been more consistent than mine over the last few months. I seem to have had some very good runs and some very bad runs including a particularly bad start at Epping NW last November. I am hoping to hold a training session there in May providing I can get land permission and I can find the control sites!

Thank you to the Gardners and the Bickles for making the journey to Oxhey Wood at the end of December for the last training session. I am sorry it was so wet and muddy, I realise it was a long way south and not on a particularly convenient day for some of you.

Compass and Pace

Being able to judge distance is a very useful skill in orienteering. It can help you know when to start slowing down and looking for your attack point or control, and it can help you know when you've gone too far and missed your control. One way of helping you know how far you have gone is to count paces - typically you will count double paces. You will need to know how many double paces you do to 100m. I do about 40 when running through open forest, but if you've got long legs and run fast you may well do nearer 30. Obviously this also varies depending on the type of terrain you are running through.

Being able to use the compass is an essential skill in orienteering, firstly for getting the map the right way round, but also for checking you are going in the right direction along a line feature, for helping you determine which path/stream you are on or crossing and for going on rough bearings as well as taking accurate bearings when there are no line features to follow. Compass and pacing is the only way to find a small feature such as a pit in an otherwise featureless forest (other than using the headless chicken approach!).

Visualisation and Simplification

When you plan your route you need to think about what you will see on the ground, i.e. you are interpreting and visualising the map. You need to form a 3- dimensional picture from the 2-dimensional map. A map covered in intricate contour detail is particularly difficult to visualise, but the best orienteers can do this. Being able to visualise contours is very useful even in the south east because contours rarely change whereas forest can be chopped down and paths disappear or new paths appear.

If the distance of the leg is short you may well visualise everything between the controls on the map, but if the leg is quite long you need to pick out the big features that you will see and not worry about the little ones on the way (until you get near to the control), i.e. you are simplifying. You need to do simplification to be able to use the Traffic Light technique (see last edition of Jabberwaoc), e.g. if the 1st big feature is a path crossing your route, you can ignore all those pits, thickets and knolls on the way to the path and therefore run fast.

And now for the latest Training Programme details....

Training Weekend (Swansea area)

As you will see from the training program I have now organised a training weekend for 3/4 July. We will be staying in an outdoor centre near Swansea. The courses are being planned by Phil Brown (an outdoor instructor and one of the tutors on my coaching course) and will be on such areas as Pembrey.

Breakfast and packed lunch will be provided but we will eat out on the Saturday evening in a pub. You will need to make your own way to the outdoor centre on the Friday night. The approximate cost for the weekend is £35.00 per person (not including evening meals or transport). I am looking into doing reduced rates for children. There are 20 places at the outdoor centre, although if more of you show an interest, local B&B's should be able to provide accomodation but you will have to sort this out yourself. If you would like to come please return the enclosed form to me with a deposit of £15.00.

Julia (julia@cpd.ntc.nokia.com)

WAOC

It is felt that EAOA should not invest in Electronic Punching at this early stage. This was due to the threat of vandalism (controls cost £51) and that we should wait until it is known which of the 2 systems other regions/clubs might be purchasing (BOF currently recommend both systems).

Steve Williams has successfully attained his Instructors qualification. OCAD Courses

Erik Peckitt would be available to run a course on the use of OCAD. The cost would be approx £10 each. Surveying could also be arranged.

EAOA

A new ranking list system is proposed to be used from 2000. Parallel running with the existing system will begin this year.

Instructions: decide amongst the pair of you who goes first.

One remains at base, the navigator, with map, course and radio.

The other, the victim, is let loose in the forest with a compass and t'other radio.

I was first victim and following the instructions of my navigator, Steve Hardy, ran south until I reached a path crossing and turned up the eastward track to the next major junction where I was to report back. ning uphill, something I don't do very often, in order to impress my partner with the speed with which I reached the first check-in point

I pressed the button on the radio and reported that the junction was near and what were my next instructions? ..silence. Assuming I hadn't turned it on I flicked the on-off switch and tried again: nothing.. Drat! I must have moved the band button so twiddled round all 4 options yelling: "Can you hear me Steve?"

Apologies to all those other radio users out there with ruptured ear drums! Deciding that I'd collared the only duff radio on the day I ran back to the start just as Steve realised that he had to push a button when he wanted to talk!!!!!

Keeping very calm I turned round and repeated the first leg, rather more slowly. One 'trying to impress' sprint per month is all I can manage! This time all went well and the first few controls were found without too much difficulty thanks to Steve's interpretation of the map and clear instructions: now that I could hear them! Half way round he assured me that he wouldn't send me on any nasty route choices which he'd been threatening to do beforehand. His kind heartedness wasn't quite what it seemed though as I'm sure he was just realising that as next victim with me navigating it would pay him to be careful where he sent me! The remainder of the course was fairly uneventful apart from having a little panic as whether I really was on the right path at one point and we finished, I hope in a respectable time.

RIGHT, MY TURN .... First instructions to Steve were "return to the path junction below MY last control and radio in (make him do a bit of map memory I thought). He managed this quickly (of course) and radioed in to receive the next instructions. "Turn North and follow the track to the next major junction" "OK" he said "but that's taking me back towards you" I look again at the map, realise I've got the map upside down and yell "no I meant south" into the radio. A minute or so later he reports in "I can see the junction, I've a hedge on my left and I'm in the large open area". Oops he hadn't heard my correction! Abject apologies followed with a plea to go back to the first Xroads and please go south this time, (I also promised to recompense him with a beer but hopefully he didn't hear that!).

The first few controls were fine until I gave him instructions to head SSW from a path bend to look for a control (plastic cup) on an earthbank bend. Very quiet for some time and then he announces "That was more SW than SSW but I've found it" obviously he had cleverly located it despite my erroneous directions! I gave the next set of instructions and then the fun started. The control he'd found (and neither of us bothered to check the code against the list that neither of us realised we had) wasn't the one he was supposed to have found so my next few instructions landed him somewhere totally different from where he should have been. The next 10 minutes or so are too painful to repeat, with Steve describing his location, me trying to match it to one of several alternatives within a few hundred yards of where I think he is and sending him off down paths he had no right to be anywhere near! The day was saved by my describing the control site and Steve's superb memory of the area. Having decided he knew which gully I was babbling about he went straight to it. The final control was a bit of an anti-climax and he returned to base.

As an exercise in visualisation and map reading it was superb and definitely to be repeated and recommended. CAUTION! Definitely not for married couples unless you're looking for grounds for a divorce??

Dave Wotton was 'at base' for the whole time and must have overheard some real crackers, so I hope he will also write a piece.

Well done Julia, thanks a lot, and long may you continue with your training sessions.

Lindsey

This is a list of all the organisers and planners for all the WAOC events this year. It shows that so far 19 different WAOC members have volunteered for either of these duties with the only event that is not yet filled being the Boxing Day Fun Event.

We will soon be arranging and publishing the WAOC events calendar for next year (2000). If you would like to volunteer for any of the events when they are published please contact us. If you feel you would like somebody with experience of either organising or planning to help you we can try to arrange this.

The Organiser always requires help to run an event, so if you have an hour to spare on the day why not make the Organisers day with a phone call to volunteer your services.

We would also welcome volunteers to put on a String Course for the youngest competitors (or judging by some results I have seen, senior competitors who like to relive their childhood).

30 January
Thetford Warren	Organisers:	Tim Mulcahy & Alan Milne
Badge event	Planner:	Neil Humphries
	String:	Graham & Caroline Louth
27 February
Mildenhall Woods	Organiser:	Roger Horton
Night Colour Coded	Planner:	Ian Jones
18 April
Ampthill Park	Organiser:	Tony Wilson
Ltd Colour Coded	Planner:	Nicola Gardner
23 May
Chicksands Wood	Organiser:	Tony Wadeson
Colour Coded	Planner:	Bruce Marshall
12 September
Therfield Heath	Organiser:	David Jones
Try-O	Planner:	Steve Williams
3 October
Rowney Warren	Organisers:	Keith Douglas & Mary Palmer
Colour Coded	Planner:	Ursula Oxburgh
14 November
Mildenhall Woods	Organiser:	Cath Pennington
Colour Coded	Planner:	Mike Capper
12 December
Maulden Woods	Organisers:	Peter & Jane Howsam
Colour Coded	Planners:	Dave Wotton & Julia Carpenter
26 December
?	Organiser:
Fun	Planner:

The minutes of the 1998 meeting were included in the March 1998 (Vol 26 No. 2) Jabberwaoc.

This is your opportunity to influence the activities of the club, make suggestions, ask questions and perhaps even put yourself forward as a committee member.

As well as being the annual formal meeting of the club, it's also a good social get-together and an opportunity to meet other club members in a rather more congenial environment than a cold, wind-swept assembly area. To help the social side along a bit, there'll also be a finger buffet. Please bring a contribution, either sweet or savoury (e.g. quiche, crisps, nuts, sausages-on-sticks, cake, etc.). There'll also be games and quizzes and, if the weather's suitable, some Street-Orienteering, so bring along your trainers and suitable clothes for a half-hour run around the streets of Cambridge.

St. Catherines College is in Kings Parade, just south of Kings College. There should be free roadside parking along The Backs and in Silver Street. Or use the multi-storey car park in Lion Yard.

I have the relay entry forms for the JK at Hawley and Hornley commons, near Camberley and the British Orienteering Championships at Holker, Cartmel, Lake District. Adult entry fees are £21-00 for the JK and £24-00 for the BOC, per team, but the club will subsidise the cost by 50% (£3-50 and £4-00 per competitor). Junior fees are half the adult fees.

I must know as soon as possible if you want to take part in the relays so that we can make up the teams. Please indicate what sort of class you'd like to be in (short, medium or long). There does not appear to be any EOD at the BOC and only very limited EOD at the JK.

Closing dates for Relay pre-entry are 28 Feb (JK) and 25 Mar (BOC) so please let me know asap. I may book a limited number of spare teams, but you'll then be restricted to what's available and it'll be first-come, first-served.

Dave.

The first WAGAL (West Anglian Championship Gallopen) seems to have gone very well, with a total of 173 participants, 335 qualifying runs, and 13 people getting a maximum 3000 points. Hopefully everyone has found the competition fun and an incentive to compete in our events. Congratulations to all the age-class winners.

However, somehow we need to identify male and female champions in each three categories: Junior, Senior and Veteran. This has not been easy as some of the classes have been very small. I've taken the following approach.

For each category (JM, JF, SM, SF, VM, VF) I've first identified the three highest scoring competitors. If they're clearly ordered, then it's simple. If they're not (e.g. three people each with 3000 points), then I've considered the difference between these three people and the second placed person in each of their classes. So if two people in the same category both had 3000 points, but one was 500 points ahead of the second placed person in their class whilst the other only had a margin of 250 points, then the person with a margin of 500 points is ranked higher. But even this had to be tweaked. For example, in the Junior Female class, Blanka Sengerova and Helen Gardner both had 3000 points, Helen had a margin of 2101 whilst Blanka had a margin of 611. But Helen's margin was so big because no one else in her class ran in more than two events. In these cases I've taken the margin between the class winner and the second placed competitor over the number of events in which the second ranked person ran. So in Helen's case, this gives her 2000 - 899 = 1101 points difference. In this case, it didn't make any difference to the ranking, but it might have done.

In addition, planners and non-competing organisers were each given 1000 points for the event which they planned/organised. This only affected Steve Williams' position.

So here are the 1998 WAOC club champions:

Category	Pos	Name	Points	Diff		Category	Pos	Name	Points	Diff
Junior Male	1 2 3	Peter Gardner Steven Lawson Simon Gardner	3000 3000 3000	505 199 50		Junior Female	1 2 3	Helen Gardner Blanka Sengerova Not awarded	3000 3000	1101 611
Senior Male	1 2 3	Neil Humphries Steve Williams Ian Jones	3000 2724 2703	512 410 407		Senior Female	1 2 3	Julia Carpenter Catherine Sowerby Helen Christopher	3000 2000 1796	204 345 131
Veteran Male	1 2 3	Colin Curtis Chris Morley Malcolm Mann	3000 3000 2983	336 50 126		Veteran Female	1 2 3	Ursula Oxburgh Janis Ryall Nicola Gardner	3000 3000 3000		237 216 0

Follow this link for the full gallopen results. Congratulations to our new Club Champions!

Dave.

The 99 Club Championship will again be based on league tables but this year there will be just one league to cover all age groups. The IOF ranking system for Elite runners has been used as a base which has then been expanded to fit a 'club' setup with its many different age classes and courses run (yellow to brown). This ranking system also takes into account the different running speeds between areas and the strength of the competitors attending an event.

Basic Rules

• Ranking events are all WAOC Badge events and Colour Coded (including Ltd). Cati, Summer Gallopen and Night events are not included.
• The best 4 scores from the 6 WAOC events to count towards the overall total.
• For Colour Coded only courses Yellow to Brown to count.
• Competitors must compete as individuals.
• Only the first run at each event will be used.
• The planner will be awarded a score equal to the highest at other WAOC events during that year.

To allow for different age groups and courses two weighting factors have been applied to the min/km for each runner to produce the 'weighted min/km'. The first is for the age class of the runner, these are taken from the BOF Guidelines. The second is for the course run which I have used the BOF Guideline for using a factor of 0.95 for Short courses. The factors used are listed below.

M10	1.43		M40	1.12		W10	1.72		W40	1.49		Yellow	0.75
M12	1.33		M45	1.19		W12	1.61		W45	1.61		Orange	0.82
M14	1.25		M50	1.27		W14	1.54		W50	1.75		Red	0.85
M16	1.19		M55	1.35		W16	1.49		W55	1.89		Lt Green	0.9
M18	1.14		M60	1.47		W18	1.43		W60	2.08		Green	0.93
M20	1.08		M65	1.67		W20	1.41		W65	2.27		Blue	0.96
M21	1.00		M70	1.89		W21	1.25		W70	2.56		Brown	1
M35	1.08		M75	2.17		W35	1.41		W75	2.86

The mean MP is calculated using the ranking points of all ranked runners who have completed the minimum number of events (4 for 1999) and who finish within 100% of the weighted min/km.

As this is the first year of this league the WAOC results from 1998 have been used to produce the current ranking points.

The mean MT is calculated using the weighted min/km times of all ranked runners (as above) who finished within 100% of the winners min/km and also the standard deviation SD of these runners.

The Ideal Mean Time IMT is calculated: IMT = MT + (MP – 1000) * SD / 200.

The Race Points RP are calculated using RP = [1000 + 50 * (IMT – RT) / SD)].

These are the scores after Thetford. If there are any errors please contact me.

Pos	Name	Class	Time	Min/km	Course	Weighted Min/km	Points
1	H Gardner	W14	0:39:47	07:39	W16A	05:14	1078	Mean Points
2	M Mann	M50	0:54:55	06:42	M50L	05:17	1075	MP=987
3	M Weldon	W45	0:54:33	08:57	W45L	05:33	1064
4	L Freeman	W45	0:55:11	09:03	W45L	05:37	1061	Mean Time
5	C Morley	M55	0:56:56	07:35	M55L	05:37	1060	MT=06:59
6	A Bishop	M55	0:57:06	07:37	M55L	05:38	1060
7	U Oxburgh	W65	0:34:14	12:14	W65S	05:40	1058	Std Dev
8	C Curtis	M65	0:59:34	09:46	M65L	05:52	1049	SD=01:06
9	Mike Capper	M40	1:12:32	06:39	M35L	05:55	1046
10	M Bickle	M50	1:02:05	07:34	M50L	05:59	1044	Ideal Time
11	D Wotton	M35	1:10:40	06:29	M35L	06:02	1041	IMT=06:56
12	N Northrop	M18	1:02:18	07:00	M18A	06:10	1036
13	I Wadeson	M18	1:02:38	07:02	M18A	06:12	1034
14	S Thomas	M45	1:05:41	07:23	M45L	06:12	1034
15	I Jones	M21	1:16:54	06:12	M21L	06:12	1034
16	Maurice Capper	M75	1:00:58	13:33	M75L	06:15	1032
17	M Bright	W60	0:34:38	12:22	W60S	06:15	1031
18	Tweedledee	M35	1:14:25	06:50	M35L	06:21	1027
19	R Harrison	M50	1:12:12	08:07	M45L	06:25	1024
20	P Gardner	M14	0:37:34	07:13	M14A	06:25	1024
21	A Duncumb	W65	1:05:43	14:36	W65L	06:26	1023
22	R Crook	M21	1:21:43	06:35	M21L	06:35	1016
23	J Ryall	W45	1:05:05	10:40	W45L	06:37	1015
24	A Palmer	M60	0:42:30	09:27	M60S	06:46	1008
25	R Horton	M50	1:10:25	08:35	M50L	06:47	1007
26	D Green	M45	1:12:08	08:06	M45L	06:48	1006
27	J Saxl	M50	1:10:59	08:39	M50L	06:50	1005
28	T Wilson	M50	1:11:13	08:41	M50L	06:52	1003
29	Tweedledum	M40	1:15:37	07:43	M40L	06:52	1003
30	M Marshall	W45	0:40:10	10:34	W45S	06:54	1002
31	S Williams	M35	1:20:58	07:26	M35L	06:54	1001
32	J Beadle	M50	0:43:34	08:23	M50S	06:58	999
33	N Gardner	W40	1:11:04	10:27	W40L	07:00	997
34	P Bickle	W20	1:14:37	09:57	W20L	07:04	994
35	Steven Lawson	M18	1:11:48	08:04	M18A	07:06	993
36	N Ives	W45	1:09:56	11:28	W45L	07:06	992
37	S Woods	W40	0:46:01	10:14	W40S	07:13	987
38	S Gash	W16	0:53:35	10:18	W16A	07:16	985
39	M Scutt	M45	1:17:44	08:44	M45L	07:20	982
40	I Smith	M40	0:54:14	07:59	M40S	07:28	976
41	B Marshall	M45	0:51:52	08:30	M45S	07:31	973
42	G Louth	M35	0:58:07	07:45	M35S	07:35	970
43	J Carpenter	W21	1:26:25	09:43	W21L	07:46	962
44	P Woods	M40	1:26:18	08:48	M40L	07:50	959
45	C Pennington	W45	0:45:51	12:04	W45S	07:52	957
46	M Gardner	M40	0:58:00	08:32	M40S	07:59	952
47	S Gardner	M12	0:30:47	08:48	M12A	08:03	949
48	Hazel Bickle	W45	0:47:06	12:24	W45S	08:05	947
49	David Staines	M18	1:06:23	08:51	M18B	08:12	942
50	L Gash	W40	1:25:28	12:34	W40L	08:25	932
51	Helen Bickle	W18	1:00:25	11:37	W18B	08:34	926
52	K Douglas	M40	1:09:14	09:14	M35S	08:39	922
53	P Ryall	M50	0:54:19	10:27	M50S	08:41	920
54	C Woods	W12	0:30:14	11:12	W12B	09:15	894
55	M Misson	M21	1:12:29	08:50	M21S	09:18	892
56	I Lawson	M45	1:41:01	11:21	M45L	09:32	881
57	M Humphries	M12	0:37:15	10:39	M12A	09:44	872
58	C Scutt	W45	0:57:10	15:03	W45S	09:49	868
59	S Matthews	W21	1:14:09	12:09	W21S	10:14	849
60	R Milne	M40	1:23:42	11:10	M35S	10:27	839
61	C Page	M50	1:49:58	13:25	M50L	10:36	833
62	C Bell	M50	1:06:43	12:50	M50S	10:40	830
63	P Humphries	M10	0:32:46	12:08	M10A	11:20	800
64	I Scott	M35	1:31:16	12:10	M35S	11:55	773
65	Daniel Staines	M14	0:43:02	12:18	M14B	12:00	769
66	J Nolan	W16	1:28:46	17:04	W16A	12:02	767
67	J Garner	M21	0:44:24	11:41	Lt Green	12:59	724
68	S Gregson	M12	0:44:30	16:29	M12B	16:29	564
69	S Staines	W40	1:50:21	24:31	W40S	17:18	527

A combined WAOC/NOR team consolidated their winning streak by winning both trophies for the second year in a row at the Peddars Way relay (a 45 mile, three person relay from along the old Roman road, from Knettishall to Holme-next-the-Sea). This year the team was made up of myself (Dave), Clive Baker of NOR and Peter Woods, who agreed to take part at very late notice after Steve Hardy had to withdraw due to an injury. The inclusion of Peter into the team meant an additional 5 minute handicap was added to our start time, resulting in us starting at exactly the same time as a SOS team.

SOS put up an admirable fight, with the lead changing hands several times until about 30 miles into the race, at which point they faded. The handicapping worked well - starts were staggered according to a handicap devised from the aggregate BOF ages of the team members, with the top seeded teams starting last. As a result, at Harpley Dams, 2/3rds of the way through the race, most of the teams had bunched up together, with 6 teams separated by only 200m. This coincided with the point where SOS were fading. Clive then overtook four of the remaining five teams to put us in second place behind a team from the North Norfolk Beach runners. We finally overcame them just before Ringstead and Peter ran the final stage into Holme-next-the-Sea, repeating last year's success when we overtook the NNBRs at pretty much the same point. We took a total of 5:11:30, i.e. running faster than 7 mins/mile and were the first team home by about 2 minutes, winning the handicap trophy. We also won the "fastest" team trophy, with the next fastest team taking 12 minutes more.

No doubt we'll be going for the hat-trick in Y2000, but it's not yet certain what date it'll be - it's normally the first Sunday in January, but next year that falls on New Year's day!

Congratulations to the following WAOC members for winning their classes in the 1998 EAGAL

There were also top 3 positions for the following WAOC members:

EAGAL is the East Anglian Gallopen (league) which is run by the EAOA for club members within the region. Each club in the region can nominate one of their events (normally a Colour Coded) each year to be an EAGAL. At Colour Coded events there will normally be a notice detailing the age classes and courses that competitors must run to score points. The best 4 scores during the year for each person are totalled, the winners being the those with the highest number of points in each class.

1998 events proved that this event is increasing in popularity and I'm hoping that, like previous years, the organisers will volunteer so I've presented a list of dates/venues so that anyone willing to have a go can pick and choose what suits them.

Dates so far: 21 April Priory Park, Bedford 26 May Ampthill Park Steve Hardy 2 June Rowney Wood Ian Jones 16 June Milton Country Park Tim Mulcahy 14 July Cherry Hinton Hall Bruce & Maria Marshall

List of available dates: 12 May 30 June 28 July 18 August 1 September

Available areas: (All subject to obtaining permission)

West	Bedford Park
	Rowney Warren
	Chicksands (after May)
South	Harlton (after June)
Central	Coe Fen (if CUOC are agreeable)
North	Ferry Meadows
	Hinchingbrooke Park

These are all very light hearted and low key, anyone unsure about their abilities to either plan or organise will find them ideal to cut their teeth on! The more experienced folk seem to enjoy doing them simply as a change from the usual event. If someone is unsure about doing one on their own then I will willingly give them a hand. Please call and put your bids in.

Lindsey Freeman (Halandlin@aol.com)