The Newsletter for the Scout County of Greater London North East For March 2014
The Southern 50 Competition 2014 On the Friday 14th February, Romford District Explorers headed for the Chiltern Hills, the home of the 35th Southern 50 competition. Four teams of four entered the competition on the Saturday which saw the explorers walk 30 kilometres in the quickest time possible. Upon arrival to Tring School, the teams had to book themselves and their teams in. this was the moment they found out their fantastic team names; Romford Tinky-Winky, Romford Dipsey, Romford LaLa, and Romford Po. The teams were up at 6am for a cooked breakfast and enough time to pack their bags for a strict kit inspection. The teams were each sent off in a mini bus to their start location which was a village hall where all of the 30k participants had to wait for their kit check. Once the kit check was completed by an official, the teams were called up to another official. They was handed a piece of paper that read all of their co-ordinates for their checkpoints. They had 2 minutes to devise the first part of their route then were sent on their way at a start time between 09.00am and 10.30am. The first teams were sent out at approximately 8am. Once they set off, they were left completely to their own devices, relying on their navigation, teamwork, physical and mental ability to move themselves between checkpoints. The checkpoints were manned bases where the explorers were handed food, hot drinks, soups, cakes to keep their energy levels topped up. Weather conditions were very lucky as there were growing concerns surrounding the event, so much so that the organisers cancelled the 50 Mile event for the first time in its 35 year history. However, on the day, although the ground underfoot was wet and quite boggy in places due to previous bad weather, the rain held off all day making walking conditions a lot more endurable. The wind remained forceful but if anything helped to cool the participants down. Later that evening, participants started to return back to Tring School, the finishing point for the route, looking tired, but proud to have completed. Out of our 4 teams, 3 completed the full route. All four teams gave feedback that they enjoyed the event and all of them said that they wished to return to the event the following year to beat their time. The results finished as follows: Romford Tinky-Winky: walked 8.9Km in 6hrs 28mins Romford Dipsey: walked 30Km in 7hrs 9mins placing 9th overall Romford LaLa: walked 30Km in 8hrs 13mins placing 18th overall Romford Po: walked 30Km in 9hrs 9mins placing 26th overall. A Huge well done to everyone that took part. You should feel proud of your achievements. Adam Vale. - Unit A Explorer Leader.