Melanie Simpson and Ricky Thackray both had convincing wins in the NSW Championships at Jenolan East last Sunday. Melanie Simpson was “in the zone” after racing 3 events the previous weekend and did some cunning route choices to finish 6 minutes ahead of NZ’s Maquita Gelderman.
Finnish champion Ingrid Stengaard was a further 2 minutes back in 3rd, perhaps a bit jetlagged after her long flight. Nevertheless she enjoyed riding in the Australian bush again, having been at the Worlds in Victoria in 2004.
Ricky Thackray handled the steep and sometimes rocky 33 kilometre, 950 metre climb course to finish in 95 minutes, with a 10 minute gap to NZ’er Brent Edwards. New Aussie National coach, Ian Dalton was pleased to grab 3rd a further 5 minutes back. Route Gadget can be accessed through:
http://garingal.com.au/cgi-bin/gadget3/reitti.cgi*
AUS v NEW ZEALAND classes for the challenge in January 2012 will be:
M20, M21, M40, M50, M60 and W21, W40, W50.
Actual teams will be named closer to the competition.
ROUTE GADGET Analysis of Australian Championship courses is on the Eureka Orienteers website.
Add your route choices and see where the winners went.
http://www.eurekaorienteers.asn.au/routegadget/cgi-bin/reitti.pl
*website no longer available