The were a small band of brothers that took to the start of the 3rd and final Rogaine for this year. 10 turned out in what was a real mixture of conditions. We had bright sunshine one minute, followed by hail showers the next. It was however, a much nicer day than Saturday when i put out the controls in a torrential downpour.
Blackden has always been a favourite of mine and as it turns out is also one of captain Harmers so he was along as one of the 10.
24 controls and 800 points were on offer on the course and there was a real range of route choice with no controls left without a visit which is nice from a planners points of view. Rich Hunt took overall honours today getting 700 points and only missing 3 controls. James Lowe gave it a good push but came back late so lost 60 points dropping him to 3rd, with Jon Moulding taking 2nd place.
In terms of direction there was a pretty even split of clockwise and anti clockwise. The older crew and me going clockwise with the younger whippets anti clockwise. The biggest challenge for someone who wanted to get them all however, being how to get controls 26 and 25 deep in the valley having climbed up to get the controls along the edge. Depending on route choice this could add in a lot of climb. When out setting the course and even Saturday putting the controls out I couldn't quite settle on the "best" route. A previous run saw me do 39,16,40,26,25,18,23,32,15 but this did add in a bit too much climb in for my liking so the planners route became 26,25,13,37,33,34,28,39,40,16,32,23,15,35,36,27,38,18,30,31,2,3,24, running into the middle of the course before picking up one control. This meant avoiding another big climb and making a nice traverse of blackden edge into the waterfalls at the head of the valley.
So with no juniors in attendance as many were representing Dark peak at wolfspit i had an opportunity to run the course. Following my planners route it became apparent that it was the optimal route as I managed to clear the course in a time of 1.40.12, 12 seconds over the time limit. I did have a distinct advantage knowing exactly where all the controls were, so not losing precious time looking for the exact location and only using the map a couple of times and never needing the compass. I'm sure some of our quicker boys could knock at least 10 minutes of this.
The controls will be out for another couple of weeks before Rich Hunt is kindly going to bring them in for me.
I'd like to run a summer rogaine from Blackden but will have to survey the bracken as it will affect much of the route planning. But i'm sure it'll be possible so watch this space.
| Name | Points | Penalties | Score | Number of Controls | Points per control | Time | |
| 1 | Rich Hunt | 700 | - | 700 | 21 | 33.3 | 01:38:50 |
| 17 | Jon Moulding | 620 | - | 620 | 18 | 34.4 | 01:38:00 |
| 15 | James Lowe | 680 | 60 | 620 | 20 | 34.0 | 01:50:07 |
| 10 | Ian Winterburn | 520 | - | 520 | 16 | 32.5 | 01:32:40 |
| 7 | Martyn Jones | 450 | - | 450 | 13 | 34.6 | 01:39:49 |
| 6 | Andy Harmer | 400 | - | 400 | 12 | 33.3 | 01:31:06 |
| 2 | Roy Small | 400 | - | 400 | 12 | 33.3 | 01:31:50 |
| 13 | Andy Bell | 420 | 40 | 380 | 12 | 35.0 | 01:38:48 |
| 14 | John Dalton | 330 | - | 330 | 9 | 36.7 | 01:32:40 |
| 3 | Moz Musson | 320 | 10 | 310 | 9 | 35.6 | 01:42:00 |
| Position | Name | Club | Class | Time | Comment | Bonus |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Richard Hunt | Dark Peak | M45 | 01:38:50 | 700 | |
| 2 | Jon Moulding | Dark Peak | M40 | 01:38:00 | 620 | |
| 3 | James Lowe | Dark Peak | MSEN | 01:50:07 | 620 | |
| 4 | Ian Winterburn | Dark Peak | M50 | 01:32:40 | 520 | |
| 5 | Martyn Jones | Dark Peak | M45 | 01:39:49 | 450 | |
| 6 | Andy Harmer | Dark Peak | M70 | 01:31:06 | 400 | |
| 7 | Roy Small | Dark Peak | M65 | 01:31:50 | 400 | |
| 8 | Andy Bell | Dark Peak | M55 | 01:38:48 | 380 | |
| 9 | John Dalton | Dark Peak | M70 | 01:32:40 | 330 | |
| 10 | Maurice Musson | Dark Peak | M65 | 01:42:00 | 310 |