Event 3 already, where has the time gone, this is one of my favourite areas and it was great to see so many coming along to enjoy that part of the Wye Valley. We were lucky again with the weather and week of dry weather beforehand really helped. This was not the case when I did my final recce a few days before and I was really quite worried, some of the trails where still a bit sticky but on the whole I think for the time of the year it was pretty good.

On the whole I was very pleased with the course and the clearance with just a coupe of penalty points by the winners is a fair reflection of the conditions. I did do a last minute swap of CP 5 and CP 20 to avoid the potential of two visits to the river valley so I may bear this in mind next year! CP 12 caused some anguish as a few riders thought it was at the more northerly junction of the Bridleway and old railway line, especially if you can in from the road.

Clearly someone wasn't best pleased to see everyone having such fun and CP 9, the one closest to the hall went missing. The culprit thought we were all back in the hall when they struck, fortunately only one person was effected and has been credited the points.

Mark Morgan M50 was first in the 2 hour Score posting 345 points and Ian Kennett was in second on 305. On the 3 hour SAF the overall winner was Ifor Powell M50 who just pipped Harry Kingstone M21 into second place, 499 & 498 respectively. Ifor did blue first, Harry red and both their CP order was the same in opposite directions! 3rd was Andy Greg M40 on 490 and the 1st Female was Iwona Szmyd W40 on 418.

The Other results were:

M60, Nick Dallimore – 450
W50, Ro Cole – 375
Y18, Huw Higgins-Worrell – 335
Mixed, Amanda & Rhys Williams – 315
Generation, Lisa & Adam Methven - 286
M70, Alan Shergold – 285
W21, Naomi Malkin – 275
W60, Shirley Robinson – 240

The full results and latest league standings have also been published and are available via the links below this report.

Thank you to the caterers Amanda and Verda for the excellent grub, also to Andy, Gary, Ifor, Liam and Si who helped collect in the CPs at the end. We had a very generous kitty for our chosen charity and £120 will go to Severn Area Rescue Association.

The next event will be hosted by Gill Stott at Soudley near Cinderford on Sunday 24th March, normal early entry and helper discounts apply.

Once again thank you all for coming and see you next time.

Siôn James and the Black Mountains MBO Planning Team