[Pictured: Grant Bluett winning at Akita; Grant Bluett recently; David Stocks Divn 2 winner]
Around 20 years ago, Grant Bluett was rated among the top five male orienteers in the world and at the 2001 World Games at Akita Japan on Saturday 18 August, he won the Gold medal in inaugural men’s individual Orienteering event, against a field of the best 38 male orienteers in the world. On Sunday at Awoonga, he demonstrated he has lost none of his orienteering skills, in winning Division 1 of the Jim Sawkins Memorial Handicap, with a corrected km rate of 5 min 27 sec, by eight seconds from Matt Crane.
David Stocks won Division 2 with a corrected km rate of 5 min 57 sec, 15 seconds faster than next best Shannon Jones. The listing of the finishing order in both Divisions 1 and 2 is here.
The event was also ACT League 4 and the top 10 on corrected (rounded) km rate were:
- 125 Grant Bluett 5 min 27 sec
- 124 Matthew Crane 5 min 35 sec
- 123 David Stocks 5 min 57 sec
- 122 Ryan Stocks 6 min 6 sec
- 121 Patrick Miller 6 min 11 sec *
- 120 Paul de Jongh 6 min 12 sec *
- 119 Shannon Jones 6 min 12 sec *
- 118 Mark Gregson 6 min 16 sec
- 117 Ian Prosser 6 min 23 sec
- 116 Tate Needham 6 min 37 sec
* Patrick Miller was 0.12 sec faster than Paul de Jongh who was just 0.08 sec faster than Shannon Jones.
The top five best three scores after four events are:
- 1 Matthew Crane AO A 373
- 2 Shannon Jones AO A; Ryan Stocks BS A 367
- 4 Martin Dent RR A 365
- 5 David Stocks BS A 364
The standings are here.
The next ACT League event will be another organised by the Red Roos at Tidbinbilla on 13 September. The course planners will be Tomas Krajca and his parents, Pavel and Vera.
I will publish a full explanation of the Orienteering ACT age/gender handicap system in a week or so.