XMAS 5 Days –A short history

‘1985 to 2023 and beyond’

Nick Dent

PhotosByTom.com.au

More than just an orienteering event

The Xmas 5 Days, a series of five orienteering events held in most years between Christmas and New Year, was first held in 1985, and has been held in one form or another every year since, except in 2020 when Covid-19 put a hold on the event for one year.

The idea for this long-running event was the brainchild of Frank Anderson who was then a member of Central Coast Orienteers. Frank: ‘The Xmas 5 Days was an idea I had a year or two before the 5 Days started. After I moved to the Central Coast, I started the Toukley 2 Days that had many entries. A year later I thought a five days in late December would be great after an event organised by Tom Andrews in Victoria in mid-January. So, the Xmas 5 Days started in 1985.I set all courses for five consecutive days and drew courses for four classes each day.It was a tiring time but a great time. Ethel [Frank’s wife] did all the entries and we had many people camp at our place on the lake at Toukley. We spent the afternoons doing water sports and many people learnt how to water-ski behind our boat. Things went so well, and I didn’t hesitate to run the 5 Days again in the following years – 1986, ’87 and ’88. Every year we had European visitors who came for our 5 Days. Peo Bengtsson [SWE] organised a large groupevery year and we had several more from Europe. Our visitor’s book was full of some WOC champions and medallists. Ethel and I have many fond memories of those years.’

In the early years Frank was the mapper (mostly), course setter, controller for all events with some help from other Central Coast orienteers. Ethel looked after the entries manually, and results had to be manually calculated and then typed up. No SI in those days. Control cards had to be checked for the correct punches. Frank remains part of the orienteering community as his daughter Jenny and grandchildren Mikayla and Erika Enderby continue to orienteer and perform at the highest level. Erika competed at JWOC this year. Apart from providing the opportunity over the many years for some good orienteering on some of Australia’s best maps, and against the best from Australia and sometimes the best from Europe during the festive season, some well-established traditions have become associated with the Xmas 5 Days. Dick Ogilvie, who was the coordinator of some later 5 Days events, said this about the very early days: ‘The nerve centre was Frank and Ethel’s kitchen. Frank used to do everything, putting out the flags and bringing them in, and doing all the results on the kitchen table. Out the back there were 30 to 40 people camped in the backyard. Maps were a bit rough compared to today, but everyone had a great time.’

Early morning and late afternoon start

Frank established the tradition that day 1 would start late in the afternoon, mainly to allow travel to the event after Christmas and Boxing Day. The other days traditionally have early starts to avoid the possible heat of the day. This allows plenty of time for recreation and relaxing during the rest of the day.

Daily prizes and raffles

A tradition to have daily random prizes and raffles was believed to have first been introduced to the Xmas 5 Days at Stanthorpe in 2000 by Dave Erbacher (The Australian Orienteer, March 2010). However, there were prizes presented at the 5 Days in the 1992, for example one-sizefits-all t-shirts. Anyway, this tradition still exists at the 5 Days in some form to this day.

Post-event recreation

In some years post-event recreation activities were organised. One of the most popular was in 1997. A five-aside soccer tournament was organised at Lyneham soccer fields in Canberra on the afternoon of days 2 and 3, with finals and BBQ on day 4. One of the organisers of this event was Jason McCrae who says that his career, as part of the Voice of the Forest commentary team with Andy Hogg at JWOC 2007, really took off when he did the commentary for the final. The winning team included the Quayle brothers, Tom and Dave. This made the punters happy as Tom was favourite at 4-1 in pre-event betting (The Australian Orienteer, Autumn 1998).

Men’s A results 1986 as typed up by Ethel and sent out in the mail to all competitors. Some famous names amongst these. Also, interestingly three dead heats. Day 3 was a night event, something that has almost disappeared from the orienteering calendar but remains a very popular part of orienteering events in Scandinavia, such as in Tiomila and Jukola relays. The map Nunns Creek is now schools, retirement villages, houses, and shopping centres at Erina. Frank was keen on night orienteering and included a night event in the Toukley 2 Days, which is one of the few night events still held in Australia.

Mountain Bike Orienteering

In 2008 during the Xmas 5 Days held in Victoria’s Golden Triangle two mountain bike orienteering (MTBO) events were part of the program. At the event in 2012 in Beechworth the organisers also included two MTBO events in the evening of day 2 and day 4. The event on day 2 started and finished at Indigo Winery. Those who competed in this event and then stayed on for a drink had to orienteer the next two days on two of Australia’s most iconic maps

Rowdy Flat and Kangaroo Crossing

Variety of formats

Over many years the format of events has varied as there are no set rules for the 5 Days. Many years have featured chasing starts both real and reverse on day 5. In 2006 on day 5 at Macquarie Woods in reverse chasing start, Olav Lundanes (NOR), Julian Dent (AUS) and Carsten Joergensen [Jørgensen (DEN)] were being chased by Mats Troeng (SWE) the last starter in a very exciting finish to what was a very international 5 Days. Julian won the event but Mats held on to the overall victory. Some years there have been mass starts on one of the days. In 2000 on day 3 the course controller described the mass start at Long Swamp: ‘The mass start was good, it was just like the running of the bulls at the beginning. Fantastic!’ In the early years there were no separate male and female courses. As the entries grew, some years (e.g. 1997) featured age classes rather than just a range of courses.

Earthquake and bushfire

The 1989 Xmas 5 Days was held in the Newcastle area, and day 2 was at Stockton Sand Dunes. On the day of the event, Thursday 28 December 1989, at 10:37 am the Newcastle region was hit by an earthquake which measured 5.6 on the Richter Scale. I was in the car park area next to my car, and I saw it move forward and back, thinking that someone was pushing the car. Little did I realise that it was an earthquake. It was only later from the radio on the way home did we realise what had happened. We drove home over the Stockton bridge which we later found out had actually moved during the earthquake. This was a significant natural disaster in which 13 people died and 160 people were injured.

who has won nine gold medals at JWOC and has [one gold and] multiple silver and bronze medals at WOC. Course 2 winner was Kjell Melander – a well known Swedish mapper. At the Xmas 5 Days in 1997 held in the Canberra area, Tore Sandvik (NOR), a WOC-1999-relay gold medalist, was the winner in men’s elite holding off Rob Walter in the chasing start on day 5.

In 1998 Peo Bengtsson’s World Wide Orienteering Promotion group included Janne Salmi [FIN] and Vroni KönigSalmi [SUI]. Janne was the winner of the gold medal in the short distance at WOC 1997, and Vroni subsequently won three gold medals at WOC in 2001, 2003 and 2005. However, the winner of the men’s elite was Australia’s top orienteer at the time Grant Bluett [gold in World Games in 2001] who held off Janne in the chasing start on day 5. 1998 featured a who’s who of elite orienteering in Australia in the late 1990s.

In 2004 in Armidale David Brickhill-Jones returned to Australia from Finland and won all five days. Mårten Boström (FIN), a WOC sprint champion, was third after a bad run on day 5. In 2006, as a training camp for JWOC 2007 to be held near Dubbo, the Xmas 5 Days was organised at Orange. A large group of overseas orienteers made the trip down under to get some experience of the granite terrain that would be used for the JWOC events. Two of Eric Andrews’ maps, Kahli’s Rocks and Gumble were used for three of the events. Olav Lundanes (NOR) who had won the JWOC Long Distance in 2005 and had been second in 2006 was one of these overseas competitors. Olav on a hot day, clearly won the long at Gumble. He went on to win the long and middle events at JWOC in Dubbo.

In 2019 the 5 Days were held in Armidale for the fourth time in its history. The region had been suffering a prolonged drought and before Christmas it had bushfires to the east of Armidale. Just four days before the event the University of Armidale withdrew permission to use a map Newholme West due to concerns about bushfires. Long-term member of Northern Tablelands Orienteering Club Eric Baker’s property Oakview was the replacement map. The five days went off fine but on 4 January the southern part of the map used on day 4, Pine Tree South, was alight from a lightning strike, and over the next days two-thirds of the map had been burnt.

World champions and others

The event has been popular with orienteers from Europe as they can have a summer holiday away from the northern hemisphere winter and compete in some orienteering as well. In 1990 the winner on course 1 was Arto Rautiainen (SWE), and second was Christian Aebersold (SUI) a three-time relay world champion and a father of Simona Aebersold

In 2014 on their way to the World Cup races in Tasmania in January 2015 multiple world champions Tove Alexandersson (SWE) and Gustav Bergman (SWE) participated in the 5 Days which was held in Sydney for the first time. It featured a sprint event at Cockatoo Island in the middle of Sydney Harbour and an ultra sprint in the parkland in front of the SCG. Tove won all four days that she entered and then went to Tasmania and won the three World Cup events. Christian Tingstrom (SWE) second in men’s elite said: ‘I am an orienteer not a runner, so I love how you have to concentrate very hard on the map in an area that looks very easy, with all the dummy controls from other courses.’

The former long-term Orienteering of Australia president, Blair Trewin, in 1997 described the Xmas 5 Days as ‘chance to experience five enjoyable days of orienteering in mostly pleasant terrain, a formula which has served the 5 Days well over its history.’

YEAR LOCATION

1985 Central Coast

1986 Central Coast

1987 Central Coast

1988 Central Coast

1989 Newcastle

1990 Ballarat

1991 Belanglo

1992 Central Coast

1993 Bendigo

1994 Southern Highlands

1995 Ballarat

1996 Central Coast/Newcastle

1997 Canberra

1998 Newcastle

1999 Goulburn

2000 Lithgow

2001 Stanthorpe

2002 Orange

2003 Southern Highlands

2004 Armidale

2005 ACT/Jindabyne

2006 Orange

2007 Newcastle

2008 Daylesford/Ballarat

2009 Belanglo

2010 Armidale

2011 Central Coast/Newcastle

2012 Beechworth/Albury

2013 Orange

2014 Sydney

2015 Armidale

2016 Newcastle/Cessnock

2017 Southern Highlands

2018 Sydney

2019 Armidale

2020 Southern Highlands

2021 Southern Highlands

2022 Lithgow

2023 Central Coast