Scottish 6 Days third day report

Beautiful weather, a stunning race arena and some of the best orienteering terrain in Scotland.  Today’s event near St Fillans had it all, with the added attraction of a World Ranking Event Middle Distance race (and Middle Distance for us all which was a welcome relief after two tough days).

Dundurn was another new area to orienteering, discovered on the banks of Loch Earn, an area of ancient oak woodland along with more recent conifer plantations and a good smattering of bogs.  St Fillans Hill was an impressive 200 foot lump of rock rising up on the east end of the area but given the nature of the race we had to finish near the golf course rather than include a spectator control at the top. 

St Fillan’s Golf Club kindly closed the course for the day to allow a) passage of cars b) string courses and c) junior courses and as a keen golfer I can’t wait to get there and play on Sandy Lyle’s favourite inland course.

Day 2 and Day 3 had the benefit of LiDAR data specially flown for this event, but mapping these areas must have been very challenging.  Thanks go to Deeside Orienteering & Leisure Maps for Days 1, 2 and 4 and to Stirling Surveys for today, Day 5 and Day 6. Dundurn will be a firm favourite for future Scottish events.

The TV crew have captured some stunning footage of the area including the camera set up on a lofty perch 45 metres above the arena.  Karel’s team are feeding out up to 1000 metres of fibre optic cable to get pictures to you!  Make sure you watch the replays.  We will be sending out a questionnaire at the end of the event and we welcome your feedback on this and other highlights of the week.  Thanks go to EventScotland for their financial help – Scotland the Perfect Stage was never a truer slogan.

Tyler Morrison and his team worked really hard to make this a success – without the fantastic army of volunteers we couldn’t put on such a great series of races.  Gremlins did affect courses 18 and 19 and we do apologise to those who were affected.  On a final note race times have had to be adjusted for all course affected by the Day 2 “river crossing” so I wait to see if I go up or down in the results.

Further information:

• Elites race report from On the Red Line: https://www.ontheredline.org.uk/news/scottish6day-day3
• Follow the event at: https://www.scottish6days.com/2019/

– Colin Matheson, Reporter and Assistant Coordinator