Dave King and Steve Holden were the winners of the 12-hour class of Saturday's Autumn Mist Rogaine in the Wairarapa. But their score of 1210 of a possible 1700-odd was just 20 ahead of evergreen veterans Chris Tait and Tony Gazley, and 30 ahead of Blenheim father-and-son Alan and Robbie Holdaway. The event was run by the Wairarapa OC on farmland up to 400m just north of Martinborough.
The Wellington pair, who were 5th (6hr) and 8th (12hr) in the last Autumn Mist event, chose a clockwise circuit taking in the higher ground on the east side of the map early in the day. They bagged the last of the five 80-pointers, on the flats next to the Ruamahanga River, before darkness fell, and managed two more 40's and a 10 before the deadline of 7pm.
The top veteran men, Pete Thompson and Ian Howat were fourth overall on 1130, with mixed pair Brian Pawson and Rozanna Rawlinson 10 points behind. Jenny Cossey, Harriette Conolly, Sue Lyttle and Miriam Jones won the top womens class with 900. There were 24 teams in the 12-hour section of the event.
The 6-hour section, which also included an hour and a half of darkness, was won outright by husband-and-wife team Mike Sheridan and Fiona Clendon, with 630 points. Another mixed team, Andrew McLellan, Jo McKenzie and Stuart Palmer were next on 580, 20 points ahead of vet men Allan Stowell, Keith Frankum and Owen Rouse. Gillian and Malcolm Ingham won the 3-hour section with 420.
The event was the first in the Wellington area to use "proper" orienteering controls. Previous events with question-and-answer controls have enabled pioneering organisers to get rogaining under way in Wellington, but there are always one or two which are ambiguous, and they don't work well after dark. The controls (with mini flags) were well sited, and the scoring gave plenty of options. The unchanged 1:50,000 topo map gave a good picture of the terrain, at least until darkness. Organisers Jim Alpe, Ray and Liz Nicholson can be well pleased with their effort.
Full results, the course map, and some of the class winners' routes are avilable on the
Wairarapa OC website.
This written by Michael Wood
and installed on 20 May 01.