ISF World Championships - April 2008
Following selection races last November, the school's orienteering team were invited to represent England in the H1 (boys born in 1992 and 1991) age class at the ISF World Schools Championships in Scotland in April.
The team of James Taylor, Peter Lynas, Craig Woods, Harry Nicholson and Daniel Hughes competed against teams from over 20 countries including many of the world's top Orienteering nations, and from as far away as China and New Zealand.
After arriving in Edinburgh, the team spent half the week at New Lannark and the second half in Stirling. The week consisted of 4 events, a model (or training) event on the Tuesday, followed by the opening ceremony, held in the Scottish Parliament Building. This was followed by a classic and middle distance eent on the Wednesday and Friday. The final event was a friendship team event on Arthur's seat followed by the closing ceremony.
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Individually James Taylor finished 11th and 12th in the two races, missing a place on the podium by only a minute in the middle distance race. Peter Lynas, Craig Woods, Harry Nicholson and Daniel Hughes all finished in the top half in at least one of their races. The school team finished 5th out of the 18 teams which ran in their age class, but were no match for the Swedes where 6 schools are selected for intense coaching by the Swedish Orienteering federation One wonders what out team could have done if we had been coached 4 or 5 times a week by some of the top coaches in England!
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The final event is a team score event. 3 runners from 3 different countries have to visit all the controls between them. In addition they have to meet up at the controls and punch together. One was near the start, one at the furthest point and one was the final control, so that teams could run to the finish holding hands (great if you are with 2 good-looking girls!).The runners have one hour to meet up and plan who visits which controls before the mass start.
The week included a disco after Wednesday's prize-giving, a cultural evening and tourist fair on Friday with lots of food on offer from the other countries, and an evening of Scottish dancing with a live band on the Saturday night. In the interests of international relations, Craig danced with as many girls from other nations as possible, receiving a proposal of marriage from one of the Chinese!
