Moravian Orienteers shine in Northern Night Championships

The second and third events of the Northern Night Championship involved members of Moravian Orienteers club.

Altyre Estate’s intricate woodlands hosted competition number two, where the terrain proved mixed with lovely open trees leading to very speedy terrain.

On the other hand there was deep heather and felled trees in bog that was extremely slow moving. Yet the terrain was the least of these brave orienteers' worries, as the snow was coming in fast and nobody escaped its wrath.

As per usual the terrain and hypothermic weather proved no problem for Moravian Orienteers with successfully high placings. Michael Bishenden won the long course in an astounding time of 32 minutes and 34 seconds.

Kathryn Barr was the fastest woman on the long course with a time of 39:09. Skilled orienteering also happened on the short course with Rob Parkinson winning the course by 11 minutes.

There were two courses at the event to be as inclusive as possible: the long course for competent orienteers and the short for those who wish to orienteer a shorter distance than the long but have the same technical difficulty.

Race three in the series of six was contested in amazingly wonderful freezing conditions in Culloden Wood.

There had been a couple of centimetres of fresh powdery snow on ground that had not thawed and refrozen so it was not at all icy. Stunningly beautiful, and with the temperature having risen to just below freezing it was about as perfect a night as one could ask for.

Sadly the Moravian contingent was down in numbers, probably due to the road conditions. With the absence of the runaway winners of the two courses in the first two events, with 16-year-old Bishenden on the long, and Parkinson on the short, it was open to others to rise to the top.

Finlay McLuckie (14) was third in the long event, only two and a bit minutes down on the adult winner. His mother Morag came second in the short.