Pedalfest MTBO - Report
From organiser/setter Greg Bacon.
The Newcastle Orienteering Club was invited to run an MTBO event for Pedalfest on the Dungog common. A new map of the tracks and trails was prepared for the event with heaps of open land around the trails. The weather improved for the weekend however numbers were down a little for Pedalfest due to the rain on the days before and the colder winds on the day.
The course was set to cater for both novice and experienced competitors, we decided to be very flexible in allowing competitors to cross open ground and take some short cuts. Andrew Haigh took full advantage of the open areas and commented that he did not see much of the 12 odd km of single tracks around the common. Andrew cleared the course in 50 odd minutes having travelled around 9k in the process. Steve Todkill also used the open areas to his advantage to finish under 50 minutes. There were around 10 odd non pedalfest competitors and all enjoyed the location and the course.
At 1.30pm around 40 odd entrants for pedalfest turned up to tackle the course. It was chaos for a while trying to enter everyone and explain what was going on. Nicole Haigh handled the entries while Andrew explained things at the start line. It was great seeing the young kids and families heading off together basically looking for funny things hanging off trees.
All the competitors came back with smiles on their faces and the Pedalfest organisers were more than happy with the addition of MTBO to the activities.
Next time we should make a few easier controls for the kids to tackle and set up the controls for the main event to ensure that there is more advantage to sticking to the tracks than going cross country. Everyone still had fun with the open areas adding a new dimension to MTBO.
Thanks to Andrew and Nicole Haigh and Tim Hackney for setting up and running the show.