22/05/2022 Chris James Memorial Event – Ledbury

Urban terrain. Ledbury is a Medieval town centre with alleyways, surrounded by modern residential areas linked with paths. The area is bisected by the former Daffodil Line railway to Gloucester, now the Town Trail. The Yellow and Orange courses will also pass through woodland and fields.

1:4,000 scale with 5m contours printed on A3 size. Surveyed 2020-2022 to ISSprOM.

Important. The following symbols indicate restrictions on access. You must obey all such symbols shown on the map. You will be disqualified if seen or reported crossing any of these.

The Start is approx. 10-15 minutes’ walk from registration: under-16s will need to be accompanied to the Start because of some busy road crossings. The Finish is close to download.

Touch Free punching is enabled, but all runners must punch both Start and Finish.

Course lengths are expected distance run, as per British Orienteering guidelines

All courses are subject to final controlling.

Runners under the age of 16 on the day of the event may only compete unaccompanied by an adult on the Orange and Yellow courses, in accordance with British Orienteering Rules.

There will be no string course, as there is nowhere suitable close by. Instead there is an excellent play area close to the Finish!

We will use SI Timing, in contact and touch free modes. All runners must however punch the Start and Finish controls.

Starts: 11:00 - 12:30, but extendable if numbers require it. Please note the shortened start window. Make sure you arrive in good time to get to the start before it closes, and if running a longer course, early enough to ensure that you finish and get back to download before courses close. Do not assume you can start later!

It is a turn up and go start; there is no start time allocation, or block selection. However runners on the Yellow and Orange courses should start before 11.45. this is to allow the road crossing marshals time to fit a run in.
Courses close: 14:00, meaning that you must report to download before 14:15, or risk disqualification.

SI dibber hire: Standard dibber £1 Adults, Juniors free

Touch Free dibber: £2 Adults, £1 Juniors

As well as your standard entry fee, we are inviting you when you enter to make a voluntary donation of £1 towards the two charities Gill James has chosen to be beneficiaries of this memorial event - Cancer Research, and the Orienteering Foundation. The donation is optional, but you can choose if you wish to make more than one, by simply entering the number of donations you wish to make - so you could make one per person in your group, or buy 5, say for £5. All proceeds will go to the chosen charities, with NGOC picking up the processing fees for these transaction elements.

Entries close at midnight on Friday 20th May. Pre-entry is strongly preferred.

Entry on the day only while maps last, but note the premium price to discourage this. We should by then be able to accept credit/debit card payments, but this is not guaranteed so bring cash just in case.

A helper discount is available for those offering to help on the day. These events don't happen without volunteers willing to help out on the day, so if you are able to do so, before signing up to enter, email NGOC_Volunteers@outlook.com to let him know you can help, and ask for the helper discount code that you can apply when entering. You don't have to be an NGOC member to help, but you do need to be a BO member to be covered insurance wise.

As the Government has removed all restrictions on events and activities, COVID related refunds are no longer available. The standard Fabian4 terms and conditions offer an automatic refund up to 2 months before the event date, and we do not normally vary this specification. That means that in most cases no refunds are possible, as we do not publish details until less than 2 months before the date of the event.

However, for all except large events we hold entries open until only a day or so before the event, so you can delay entry if unsure whether you can run, until very close to event day.

Dogs are permitted under control in the Parking area, and on courses. Please note that the Town Trail and open spaces are popular with other dog walkers.

There are public toilets en route to the Start.

We are using the Community Hall as base for the event, and will be offering the usual NGOC cafe service there after your run, as well as a cake stall, hopefully an exhibition showing Chris James's huge involvement with orienteering over the years, and a fun map quiz asking you to identify various map extracts from areas around Gloucestershire and a little beyond; a bit hard on non-locals, but it's for fun, and the only prizes might be a free visit to the cake stall! All proceeds from the cafe and the cake stall will be shared by Chris's wife Gill's choice of charities - Cancer Research and the Orienteering Foundation.

A risk assessment has been completed, and a copy will be held at Assembly.

Under-16s will need to be accompanied to the start because of some busy road crossings.

There are two marshalled crossings over busy roads on the Yellow and Orange courses. Elsewhere all runners are responsible for their own safety when crossing roads and using paths and alleyways. You must be aware of and take care to avoid other users of these routes.

Living with COVID

As from 24 February:

• You are not be legally required to self-isolate if you test positive for COVID-19. You should, however, stay at home if you can and avoid contact with other people.
• You do not have to take daily tests, nor are you legally required to self-isolate following contact with someone who has tested positive for COVID-19.

Nevertheless, although all legal restrictions have ceased, you should NOT attend if you are Covid positive, or suspect you are, and everyone attending should continue taking sensible precautions, such as avoiding close contact, particularly around Registration and the cafe.