Junior Squad title.

The region's Junior Squad exists to develop the orienteering skills of committed East Anglian youngsters - could you be the next to go to JWOC? The main squad is open to those who are of light green standard, with a development squad for younger juniors aiming to reach this level. The squad's regular training sessions include weekends away to find some hills, and the region enters a team for the Junior Inter-Regional Championship competing against the best juniors from other parts of the country.

Report on Junior Inter-Regional Championships, Northern Ireland, September 2009 by Sophie Louth

This year the annual Junior Inter-Regional Championships (JIRCs) were held on the 12th and 13th of September in Northern Ireland. A team of twelve juniors from the East Anglian Junior Squad (EAJS), accompanied by Graham Louth and Janet Cronk, flew to Belfast (very) early on the Saturday morning, many of us travelling to Ireland for the first time. At Belfast Airport we met up with the North West and West Midlands Junior Squads, and then shared a coach to the competition area for Saturday’s individual competition – Slievenagore in the Mountains of Mourne. After a 20 minute up-hill walk to the start, the courses ran across open rocky moorland before entering an area of forest; the final run-in was across the grassy slope of a reservoir dam, which made for a good view for the spectators. At the finish all the Juniors were presented with a stick of rock with the words “JIRCS 2009” through the middle! Our best results were achieved by Jacqueline Heybrook and Thomas Louth, coming 21st and 10th respectively in their age classes.

After the competition we all got onto busses and were taken to Ballykinler Army Base, where we were staying for the night. Initially the army wanted everyone over 16 to have their photograph taken, but once they realised how long this was going to take they just issued us all with blank passes! With all the teams from all the regions staying together there was a great atmosphere: everyone ate together in a communal dining area where there was a good supply of wholesome food to keep everyone happy, and lots of opportunity to catch up with friends from other regions. After dinner the prize giving was also held in the dining hall. Whilst EAJS didn’t win any of the main prizes, Susha Chandraker and Alex Ware won spot prizes of Lagan Valley drinks bottles. After the prize giving many of us retired to bed early, to make up for our early start.

The following morning everyone had to be up early again so that we could arrive at Lagan Valley Regional Park in time for the relay competition. The atmosphere around the start was incredible, with everyone supporting their fellow competitors in the massstarts. The terrain was challenging with a lot of undergrowth making running difficult, and an early gaffle to split the teams. East Anglia entered two boys teams: the first, consisting of Thomas Louth, Thomas Hemmingway, and Jonathon Cronk, came 13th; the second featuring Jonathon Heybrook, Todd Cooper and James Park finished in 29th. Unfortunately the East Anglian Junior Squad doesn’t currently have any W16 girls, and only one W14 girl, and so we weren’t able to enter any competitive girls relay teams. We did however enter two ad-hoc teams: one on the boys ad-hoc course (made up entirely of girls!) and one on the girls ad-hoc course. Our ad-hoc girls team, consisting of Susha, Rhiannon Ware and Jacqueline, came 3rd, with both of the teams that beat them containing boys. Meanwhile the “boys” team had only two runners, Hannah Newton and Sophie Louth, who both had good runs (unlike a number of competitors on other teams who mis-punched in the race to win!). Once everyone had finished there was prize giving, with Scotland finally winning the overall competition, having been second for many years. East Anglia meanwhile finished joint 11th. After prize giving, we bundled into the coaches to set off back to the airport for the trip home, after a very enjoyable weekend.

Congratulations to our two 2008 British Champions

Congratulations to our two 2008 British Champions, Thomas Louth M14 and William Louth M10. Thomas and William are both members of WAOC and William is a member of the recently formed East Anglia Junior Potential Squad (EAJPS).

Junior Squad member Thomas added to his success by achieving a Silver medal in the World Schools Championships in Scotland.

Report on the 2007 M/W 17 British Orienteering Tour to Uppsala - Edward Louth

When I first arrived in Uppsala, Sweden I was hit by the heat. I was worried that my two weeks of training with the GB squad was going to be characterised by dehydration. However for most of the training the temperature was some what less tropical and on a few days it rained. I had met most of the coaches before as they coached on the Halden tour last year, and they outlined their plans for the weeks ahead. After a day's training near the hut it was interesting to make comparisons between Uppsala, mostly flat with few features, and Halden, lots of rocks and large open marshes. The first week was mostly technical training with several exercises planned for each day, we were doing up to twelve kilometres a day, and culminated in the classic race. This was in Norra Lunsen, an enormous area with few features and virtually no paths, and was a real test because of the difficulty in relocating. After this we had the opportunity to rerun some of the legs we had made mistakes on and try and improve our times.

For the second week there were a number of other races intermixed with training. For this tour we concentrated on race technique, for example "trains" exercises when we are started at random intervals on a short course and have to try and catch those ahead. These force you to compete under pressure which is both fun but also pushes you to run faster than you can navigate. On one day we had four sprint races, one was around Uppsala castle which was a superb area with a good variety of techniques and speed required. Two of the races were microsprints, one around the club hut and another in a tiny area which involved visiting 29 controls, some more than once.

Over the two weeks I learnt a lot in some of the very best terrain in the world, note JWOC is in Gothenburg next year. As always the tour was great fun spending lots of time with other orienteers of my age, most of whom I have known for a very long time.

Jonny Cronk - Report on Lagganlia Tour in 2007

Lagganlia would be a great experience for anyone, but it was in particular, for me. There is no question that Lagganlia is tough to a certain extent but it is immensely enjoyable.

One thing to look forward to is getting your Lagganlia O-top. Unfortunately for me they spelt my name wrong. I hope that nobody else has to go through that traumatic experience like me.

The bedroom I shared with 3 other boys, and lucky for us, our bedroom had it's own bathroom. Nobody could complain about the food that was provided for dinner by our own two cooks. Every day they were able to cook fabulous meals that were much looked forward to after a hard day's works out in the forest. I think I had seconds of something at least once a meal.

Every day is different but has the same pattern as all the other days. Every day we got up at around 7.55 for breakfast at 8.00. After breakfast we would make our lunches and have a briefing about the day ahead. Most days consisted of exercises in the morning in our groups then exercises after lunch and race analysis in the evenings after dinner. Race analysis may not be the most fun thing to do but it is useful to talk about what you did and how you can improve.

We did many exercises throughout the week, there was lots of work that we did on compasses and I learnt how to pace. Because of the numbers of coaches (there were lots) everyone gets shadowed at some point in the day. This is really helpful for feed back and how you can improve, next time. In training, exercises such as control pick, attack points and simplification were around 2 km so you had time to do lots of them.

When you get back from training you are given quite a bit of free time before and after dinner to mess around (not in a bad sense though) and do things like play basketball, football or simply just chill out in your room or in the main gathering place (the lounge).

Like I said, not every day is the same. On one evening we found out about route gadget and how to use it. On Wednesday, in the afternoon, we had some free time and all went into Aviemore. Most people went into Tesco and bought Tesco value cola and Tesco value chocolate. While the chocolate was scrumptious the cola wasn't so nice! After Aviemore we went to Baddaguish for a game of football (that was slightly violent), rounders and a bar-b-cue with the other Scottish tour. Of course Lagganlia won! If that is a matter of interest to anyone.

On the last day we had an individual race and a relay race. Both were fun but I found that they were unnaturally hard.

I would recommend everyone to try and get onto the Lagganlia tour as the people you meet there are awesome and it is really enjoyable, mostly because of the people. I for one particularly found it enjoyable as well as beneficial for my orienteering.

Simon Gardner - Report on the EAJS weekend in Yorkshire

“Rain” was a general thought shared by all, after and during the training on Saturday. Nowhere near enough to think about calling it off, just enough to dampen certain spirits and caution footing. The area was moderately technical with an interesting combination of:

The training itself comprised a variety of original or infrequently used exercises and a well planned control pick. One of the more useful exercises for me was the relocation which, whilst not too hard, did prove a slight challenge when trying to relocate and head towards the control as fast as possible after Edward did his best at trying to get me lost. We both had our problems but I claim victory (despite Ed running me around the map twice) for Ed actually not finding one control, giving up and going onto the next one. Of course that’s not the whole story!

Sticking with good tradition there was a Relay at the end of the “day”, the setup of the relay was all but traditional, however. Each team of 3 had to visit 10 controls one at a time using map memory. In order to tell if a team had visited a control they needed to write down a description of the furry thing they found at the control. Most of these were small fluffy blobs which made a “deboingggg” noise when hit against something. They were amusing for longer than they really should have been but eventually got slightly annoying. I believe my team (Jonny, David and me) obviously would have won had the pink fluffy thing not disappeared nearer the end

Back at the youth hostel all ate cake and were merry. Finer details have been left out to preserve some general opinion that we have at least some sanity and sense so apart from an incident with a saucepan, squash and a spherically based table I won’t admit to any other events that evening, no matter how uninteresting they really were.

The event on the Sunday seemed to go well enough for most, however, I have now decided other people who run M21L are annoyingly fast so that despite having a great run I still came near bottom. In the competition for the fastest run in time I believe these were the results for the squad:


Boys
  1. Ed Louth, 27 sec
  2. Jonny, 29 sec
  3. Simon, 31 sec

Girls
  1. Jacqueline, 36 sec
  2. Katy, 39 sec
  3. Sophie, 39 sec

Looks like WAOC all the way.

Jacqueline Heybrock - The BOF Lakeside Training Weekend 2006

The BOF Lakeside Training Weekend took place from the 24th to the 26th of November. The weekend away was for 14 to 16 year olds and was my first experience of training with other young orienteers from around the country, having never been on a training weekend before. After arriving at the YMCA late on Friday night we were allocated rooms and on Saturday woke up early ready for the day ahead.

After eating a full English breakfast each regional group was sent to a different area for training. My group went to High Dam where our trainer had prepared a series of short technical runs to practice our navigational skills. The terrain was fairly open with lots of intricate contours and an enjoyable and challenging area to train. That afternoon we all took part in a sprint race around the Youth Hostel. As it was my first one I was slightly nervous about what to expect but soon began to enjoy it.

That evening we were given a talk from the World Class orienteer Graham Gristwood who shared with us some of his past experiences of World Championships and gave us tips on how we could improve our orienteering technique. We were then given some information on how to get selected for the England team and what we should try to do to match the criteria.

On Sunday we set off again to a different orienteering destination, with very different terrain in comparison to the first day. This time we were given a longer course that required us to practice a range of techniques. Again, this was useful because it enabled us to practice techniques we may not usually have used and practice the things we had learnt the day before.

We then set off after what had been a tiring but very enjoyable and brilliantly organised weekend in the Lake District.

Sophie Louth - Report on Summer Training Tour to Lagganlia

Every year the best 14 year olds from each regional junior squad are invited to attend a week's summer training tour at Lagganlia, near Aviemore, in Scotland, and this year I was delighted to be one of them.

The week started on the Saturday with the train journey up to Aviemore from Cambridge. I was on my own as far as Peterborough, but then got on the train to Edinburgh and met up with some of the others who were coming on the tour, and also some of the 15 year olds who were going to Glenmore (which is just down the road from Lagganlia). More of us got on along the way, until eventually we got to Aviemore, and from there we were bussed to Lagganlia.

Having arrived, we found our rooms - I was in a room with 4 other girls - and then went straight outside to do a compass and pacing exercise. After that we had dinner before being given our tour O-tops (every summer tour has a special O-top with the name of the place and the date on the back), before going to bed.

For the rest of the week the routine was pretty much the same every day: wake-up at 7:30 for breakfast at 8:00 - breakfast was usually cereal and toast and fruit - before splitting up into our groups for training on one of the areas around Lagganlia, returning to the centre for lunch, or having a packed lunch in the forest, before going back out to train in the afternoon, then back for tea, showers, then dinner, followed by a talk or exercise about some aspect of orienteering.

Most of the training was on Inshriac, which is the forest all round Lagganlia. During the week we did lots of different training exercises including: control pick and attack points; compass and pacing; aiming off; following a line; getting lost (otherwise known as relocation); simplification (involving drawing our own maps); map memory; and traffic lighting. We also did a number of more or less competitive races including some fun relays, a sprint race, a middle race, and a classic race.

We also had a chance to socialise, and on the Wednesday evening we went to Glenmore and played football, had a barbeque, and then a disco with the older juniors.

Finally it was time to go home and we were all bussed back to Aviemore to catch the train back home.

I really enjoyed myself during the week, and learnt a lot too, and I'd like to thank Richard Barker and all of the other EAJS coaches for helping me get selected for the tour.

Edward Louth - BOF 2006 Summer Tour to Halden, Norway

This year as with previous years BOF ran a tour for M/W16s to Halden in Norway. We stayed at the Halden IVF hut; there are three clubs in Halden which is a city similar in size to Cambridge. The hut was spacious with three floors and saunas. Placed in the middle of a large orienteering area the hut is an ideal starting point for training. We were able to orienteer from the door and drive to many stunning areas, all nearby. Surrounding Halden is a large expanse of excellent forest, all mapped for orienteering. Throughout the week Ralph Street and I shared Neil Northrop as a personal coach. This was superb as Neil is a very good orienteer himself as well as a brilliant coach. The first week was mainly spent improving our technique in the complex Norwegian terrain; with the second week concentrating on a number of races forming a tour series. The training was very demanding with both boys and girls doing around 10km a day for the first week. We did several exercises to improve our visualisation near the control. We also practiced long legs up to about 1km and simplification. One afternoon we had a distractions race; this involved the coaches trying to distract us as much as possible. They did this by several means such as stealing maps and placing dummy controls. Runners were started at random intervals which added to the confusion.

The tour champs consisted of a middle race, two sprints and a classic race. One sprint was around the hut with a map at 1:1000 which was great fun; I took as long on one control as on the rest of the course. I won the sprint race, held around a fortress in Halden, only 1:30 behind Neil Northrop and well clear of any other juniors. A scoring system was devised which meant that as I was in the lead before the classic I started last. The other four boys bunched up ahead of me, leading to me coming last. However I came second in the tour series, partly because Ralf Street was disqualified on the sprint race for crossing a wall.

I had great fun on tour and over two weeks I certainly got to know everyone very well. I learnt a lot from two weeks of training in Norway with some very good coaches. I think my orienteering has improved greatly and look forward to going back to Scandinavia at some point in the future.

Following the tour and in light of selection races I have recently been reselected for the GB START squad.

Edward Louth - Report on trip to the O-Ringen 2006

This summer I travelled to Scandinavia for the O-Ringen and two weeks of training in Halden, Norway. The O-Ringen is a major event in Sweden with approximately 14,000 competitors, many of whom camp on the event campsite. This year the event was held a few miles West of Söderhamn, a major Swedish city, on an airfield and surrounding fields. I was camping in the youth campsite along with the Gardners from WAOC and a number of other Brits, surrounded by young people from all over the world including Australians and lots of Swedish. In its entirety the campsite was enormous with a supermarket in a hanger and several marquees housing shops, restaurants and two discos.

This year was special because competitors were able to walk to all the days, so no busses. Three days finished in the campsite and the other two at an arena around two kilometres away along a sandy track. The orienteering was excellent in runable forests with complex contour and rock detail. Few paths or major features made relocation difficult and time consuming. One day I even managed to run off the map as I crossed an indistinct path without noticing it. The climb was not quoted for the courses so before the event I had no idea of how much climbing I was going to have to do. In fact none of the days had excessive climb or any extremely long legs. I found that the navigation was what cost me the time rather than physical difficulties. Even though there was almost a runner on my course (H16) starting every minute from 9:00 to 2:00 I rarely met anyone on my course. The scale of the event was quite staggering with eight run-in lanes and bridges constructed to carry runners over roads.

After a tiring week of competing in Sweden I travelled to Halden, Norway, for two weeks of training with the British START squad. The journey involved several changes between trains and buses. All was fine and on time until we reached a station where all trains appeared to be cancelled, we asked a shop assistant who unfortunately confirmed this. Luckily we were able to contact a coach driving a car which was not too far away who turned back to pick us up. It was quite a squeeze with five of us and all our luggage in a relatively small car but we got there alright.

East Anglia's JIRC team.
Members of EAJS at last year's JIRC in Scotland

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This page was last updated on 22nd February 2010 at 1:12pm