The weather truly welcomed us to Braemar on Day 3, with lovely sunny skies and virtually low wind.

Orienteers were treated with stunning views from the finish at the top of the hill and if you had a later start you may have spotted the paraglider swooping down towards the arena.

Feedback from participants were that they enjoyed the challenges of the courses and were pleased to have softer under foot to run on today.

Planners perspective from Dave, Clive and Ewart:

“While this is an excellent area for orienteering much of the hillside to the east of the map, well used in 2017, is now overgrown with high heather and was not suitable.  As this was a middle-distance race, however, the planners were able to focus on the very best bits of the forest, accessed by the slightly long walk to the starts.

“The forest did suffer from storm damage in winter 24/25 but very few areas became unusable as a result.  There were some tricky decisions on which of the many extraction lanes to show on the map; 12 months ago the forest looked like a bar code but the generally positive tone from the competitors suggested that we got those decisions about right.

“Enjoy the rest of your week.”

We’d like to extend our thanks to Invercauld Estate for allowing us to use their land for the first 3 days. Also a massive thank you to Neil Fraser whose fields we invaded today – thank you for looking after us!

We hope this glorious weather continues as the week progresses.

Rest day tomorrow in Ballater so we’ll see you at the sprint event or the mountain biking in Scolty.