SA Champs

Klipkraal near Sabie was the venue for the 2009 South African Orienteering Championships. Most of the junior categories were hotly contested. It was brilliant to have so many juniors at one event!

Middle Distance Results:

W21E - Jess L and Salome ran the elite women's course. Salome had a good run to take the bronze medal.

W20 - Jess H, Sarah, Steph and Zoe ran in this category. Steph had a superb run to take the gold medal with Zoe coming second.

W12 - Christie, Heather and Micaela tackled the 1.4km course. Christie continued the Courtnages success by taking gold.

M21E - Brad ran the elite course and came an impressive 9th place out of 19.

M20 - Nicholas de Klerk, Michael Crone, JP and Ropafadzo did well on the M20 course. Ropa had an smooth run to take his maiden SA champs title.

M12 - Josh de Klerk blitzed round his course in 10 minutes.

Classic Distance Results:

The juniors certainly kept things interesting with only one junior managing to win both a middle and classic title.

W20 - All 6 girls were competing on the 6.2km course. Salome had another solid run to take gold, Steph took silver with Sarah finishing 3rd.

W12 - Heather Wimberly managed to out do her competitors to take gold.

M21E - Brad tackled the 11km course and had a great run. Way to go Brad!

M20 - Michael took gold with JP not far behind on the M20 course.

M12 - Josh was the champ on his course.

Relay:

As always the inter-club relay was lots of fun. Brad ran the last leg for the winning Raco team and Michael ran the first leg for the Witsoc team which took Silver. The other juniors showed off their skills in the nice, runnable forest and did their teams proud. Below is a pic of the winning Raco team being sprayed with sponsored aquelle water:
The area was beautiful, the food on sale at the event centre was great and the calenders and mugs we got made it even more memorable. Thanks to Raco for a well organized event.

After the Classic races on Friday Dave Peel, former British coach, had a session with the juniors who went to Italy. We discussed our experiences at JWOC and how we can improve at future JWOCs. It was interesting to hear his ideas.