Mitre: Epping North (Regional)
Results | Routegadget | Report
We hope you all enjoyed your run today in the glorious sunshine. Thank you for coming, and here are a few photos of the event to remember it by. More photos can be found here
Iain Ambler, Organiser
Thank you for coming to our annual flagship Mitre event today. Trust that you enjoyed your run.
Congratulations to all those placing well, achieving a good personal time, experiencing competitive orienteering for the first time or getting round what can be a tricky area. Thanks to Tom Edelsten for updating the Epping North map last autumn 2025.
The event ran smoothly in super conditions. We had no reported injuries. There were a couple of items of lost property - 1/ light blue and black bnrku O shoes (size 8) and 2/ a Lidl bag containing a pair of Fitlock trail shoes (size unknown) plus running kit. Let us know if they are yours and we will get them back to you.
CHIG packaged the event with a year’s free club membership for new members , targeting local NE London park running / running clubs. This proved popular and we are delighted to welcome 7 new CHIG members/ families. Hope you enjoy getting to know / reacquainted with this great sport.
Thanks to - the wonderful CHIG volunteer team, capably managing despite a lower than usual Pribul (Tim/Sally away) input. To our dependable friends the DFOK Bennetts and Matthew V for helping to get the controls out. To Hedley for clear, prompt advice and controlling ; to Harold for many very good courses. To Theydon Bois parish council for use of their village hall, and finally of course to the Superintendent of Epping Forest and her team for use of this fabulous forest once more.
Finally, do look out for our next event, a paired weekend urban Eastender in Beckton and Canning Town with our friends at DFOK 28/29 March.
Best wishes for your orienteering in 2026
Harold Wyber, Planner
As CHIG's flagship annual event, planning the Mitre does to some extent give me a sense of trepidation but I can definitely say that I enjoyed the experience this year, thanks in no small part to Hedley's patient and excellent support as the event Controller and Iain's fantastic organisational efforts. It was also great to have Tom Edelsten's updated map, which enabled me to realise some of the potential of the northern part of the area.
Prior to writing these thoughts, I watched the RouteGadget flybys of competitors' routes - many thanks to those of you who have taken the time to upload these - and I was delighted to see the range of route choices which the courses engendered. Despite being a relatively small area, Epping Forest North offers a great variety of terrain, from the relatively dense central part to the slightly sparer north, the more open and runnable gullies west of the Epping New Road and the mixed open and dense vegetation closest to Theydon Bois, not to forget the rare heathland around Long Runnings. I endeavoured to give most courses a fair mix of these terrain types and I hope that these made for a challenging but satisfying experience for competitors.
Hedley Calderbank, Controller
Harold's courses made good use of a fairly small area, with a very busy road presenting another constraint. The best areas are undoubtedly to the west of the road and the southern part of the area to the east. So courses up to Green stayed east of the road using some crossing of legs to maximise use of the best parts. Longer courses crossed the road and were cleverly packed into a smallish area without undue repetition (at least not in the same direction). The size of the area meant that the three longest courses had by this time experienced some relatively uninteresting terrain in the north. White and Yellow courses needed the biggest changes from the first drafts once we realised that the some of the small paths on the map were not only indistinct under leaf fall, but also supplemented by several other unmapped paths.
There was a great organisation under Iain. Both Iain and Harold helped to make my job a pleasure.