Bendigo Orienteers chose the Smith’s Reef forest between Maldon and Castlemaine last Saturday for their third Bush Classic event of the year. David Brownridge set the courses and made good use of a mixture of open fast terrain and low visibility wattle regrowth for the harder courses. Many competitors came from Melbourne, Ballarat and further afield for the first of two days of Orienteering near Castlemaine.
Bryan Keely showed great form to win 7.1km Course 1 ahead of Chris Naunton and Duncan Coombs, with Jasmine Neve the first female finisher on the course.
Young locals, Louis Cameron and Nic Cherry were beaten into first place on course 2 by veteran Jim Russell. This course was very well contested with 23 competitors.
Jimmy Cameron put in a blistering run on Course 3 ahead of Don Cherry and Andrew Steer.
Henry Cameron hit form to take out Course 4 ahead of Serryn Eenjes and Reuben Cameron.
Course 5 was won by Merv Bendle ahead of Chris Bendle and Angus Jones, just ahead of sister Greta.
It was great to see Ross Slater and Andrew Jones return after long absences from the sport. Hopefully we’ll see more of them in the future.
Results can be found on our results page, where you can use Eventor or WinSplits
The Course Setter, with his helpers on the day
Charles Brownridge
