Grit, I never check the forecast, there is no point, as I go out in any weather anyway :D and it really cannot be much worse than it was on Saturday :)
Printable View
Grit, I never check the forecast, there is no point, as I go out in any weather anyway :D and it really cannot be much worse than it was on Saturday :)
Hmmm, yeah, then there is the matter of keeping the map in its envelope :D
That is going to be the hardest bit... but... I reckon on day two we will be heading south towards Wasdale/Langdale :D
Hypo, you want to join us with your partner? I know you did long score, but we can all congregate somewhere near the planned overnight camp in the evening and have some fun?
Mark Weir has no room to comment on the OMM being safe etc, when was it only last week that two sets of school children had to be rescued from his mines due to flooding!
Sorry if this has already been posted.
Well that IS interesting ! Might have to give BBC Cumbria a call to see if they can confirm that ;)
Maybe that's what made Mr Weir go a little overboard at the weekend.
A year and a half ago while I was on my way to Honister from Scafell supporting a BGR, my kids wandered into the slate yard behind the car park. There was no works traffic about but they shouldn't really have been there. My son (9 at the time) had just discovered a very exciting helicopter hidden in a hollow and was considering a closer look, when he spotted a man striding purposefully towards him. At this point he shouted for his Mummy which distracted my wife from her chat. My daughter and son were by this time in the company of Mr Weir and my wife decided she had better go and apologise.
My daughter had several nice bits of slate in her hands that she was in the process of collecting / pilfering.
My wife approached and apologised to be greeted by a smile from Mr Weir who said they were discussing the helicopter and if they wanted they could have a sit in it.
They then had a guided tour of the helicopter and after maybe 20 minutes Mr Weir said that he was going to take off now so could they stand back while he did. My wife apologised for the obvious slate pilfering to which she was told that the kids could help themselves. Mr Weir then took off, flew towards Buttermere, turned back aerobatically and swooped past the kids giving a big wave as he passed. They talked of little else for days.
I've never met Mr Weir but from my family's experience he is a genuinely nice chap. I think he misunderstood the events at the weekend. Being the sort of person that obviously makes decisions and runs with them - you don't make enough money to fund a helicopter without being - some of his decisions at the weekend were wrong. We all make wrong decisions sometimes but we're not usually operating with news hounds egging us on. Perhaps it's time to drop the negative comments and just put it all down to experience.
I think I welcome this posting.
Whether he was right or wrong or somewhere in between I am prepared to give Mr Weir the benefit of the doubt over his actions. I doubt if he expected his "morgue" soundbite to be headlined in newspapers and he appears to have provided welcome comfort to many OMM competitors.
He appears to be running a successful business and probably felt someone had to step in and direct and make decisions etc. because that is what business men do. And who knows what advice Mr Weir was given by the different bodies involved?
One sided demonization of people is easy sport.
And if after all this Mr Weir's business gets a fillip: where is the harm in that?
Any one who has been directly involved with the media will absolutely know the toxic distortion of the truth that it engenders. In that regard, the actions of some of the media has been quite commendable in this case! There was almost a balance!!
There are also lots of other skills that successful businessmen possess that Mr Weir did not display!:(Quote:
Originally Posted by GrahamB
This extract from the OMM site makes interesting reading:
We asked Mark Weir from Honister Slate Mine not to transport competitors down to Cockermouth but he continued to do so under his own initiative. This made it more difficult for us to account for them. He had also complained that competitors were taking shelter in his café, eating their own food and preventing his other customers from getting access to the cafe. We offered, there and then, to pay for all food and drink consumed by competitors.
The last section about eating thier own food in his cafe is hardly a comment made by someone volunteering to manage a disaster situation!:eek:
I couldn't agree with Graham more. Furthermore, since the organisers were disseminating no information at all to the public at large and in the main inadequate information to the competitors themselves (on arrival at the Buttermere, "it's cancelled, go back to the event centre" was the sum total of it to those competitors I have spoken to) they can hardly complain that Mr. Weir saw fit to step in.
With all that said, the criticism (of everyone, on this board) has now been overdone. It seems to me the one lesson here is that no one really had a crisis plan (which includes both actions and the provision for words when something goes wrong) and that being the case, it was inevitable that things would spiral out of control as they did.
Likely all of those involved got some things right and some things wrong but a little humility in certain quarters really wouldn't go amiss. The hills are alive with the sound of keyboards, I guess.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Grit Britain
I suggest the whole document, from which you have extracted this tendentious section, makes even more interesting reading. The only fault the OMM organisers admit to was "Our interpretation of the weather forecast obviously underestimated what actually happened".
Storm in a tea cup then eh?
Quote:
Originally Posted by GrahamB
Ooo, that's a good word for a Thursday teatime.
I had to look it up.:DQuote:
Originally Posted by millipede
So did Breezie! :DQuote:
Originally Posted by Grit Britain
I note that there is even a good discussion on this forum:
Institution of Occupational Safety and Health
Some very interesting reading on there!Quote:
Originally Posted by XRunner
Sorry, I'm down in Somerset on the weekend of 15/16 Nov. Getting the car serviced (it's far cheaper than in Essex), visiting the parents and getting some quality runs over the Quantocks.Quote:
Originally Posted by Hanneke
Pitty!
Well, so far 15/16 November is a provisional date for me, it may well become the weekend after, as I am in the Peak District the weekend before so may need/want to be at home the 15/16th...
That last link is to my OMM partners thread on the OMM on the health and safet forum... interesting :D
No its not don't encourage themQuote:
Originally Posted by Hanneke
Unless you mean Steve Davis interesting :D
health and safety my ....:rolleyes:
Steve Davis :confused::confused::confused:
Steve Davis :DQuote:
Originally Posted by Hanneke
What more should they have said? That gave all the information that was required (at least until Mr Weir started turning people back/transporting them to Cockermouth).Quote:
Originally Posted by Splinter
A mate has asked me to post his letter to the BBC on here:
Anybody writing to the BBC is welcome to use his letter (or parts of it) should they wish.
BBC News coverage of the Original Mountain Marathon 24th/25th/26th October.
Someone at the BBC needs to explain and apologise for the inaccurate and
gross misrepresentation of the events surrounding the cancellation of
the OMM due to flooding.
The false reporting of figures, clearly unverified by journalists or
editors and the misleading presentation by the BBC, resulted in a great
deal of utterly unnecessary distress for the families and friends of the
OMM competitors.
I was a competitor and what the BBC presented as news was blatantly
false. We, as competitors, were unaware of being 'lost', 'missing' or
'unaccounted for'. All my fellow competitors I met knew exactly where
they were and what they were doing at all times. The BBC's massive
imbalance in allowing self appointed locals to speak as representatives,
ill informed Police and again the, I believe deliberate, misleading
presentation of figures was prejudiced to sensationalism. This
sensationalism was the driving force behind the BBC's journalism and
news. The facts were irrelevant to you.
Your inability to obtain information was made up for with speculation
and fallacies which were pedalled continuously even when they became
blatantly untrue. A new low for the BBC, if this is how the BBC reports
an incident in which I was involved and well placed to observe, any
trust in you has gone.
The poor communications was cynically exploited by the BBC journalists
and editors. The competitors and organisers had no ability to redress
the failures of the BBC news system. To me the BBC's impartiality and
integrity in news has been proved a sham.
The imbalance of the BBC is highlighted by the fact it ignored the
rescue of five ill equipped walkers (NOT OMM competitors) in Langdale.
This rescue required the combined efforts of Langdale, Ambleside and
Kendal Mountain Rescue Teams who worked valiantly in extremely difficult
conditions to achieve one the most technically outstanding rescues for
some time.
I have reviewed other media coverage and the BBC's is left massively
wanting, more akin to the Daily Sport than a valid source for news. I
look forward to the day I no longer have to contribute to the BBC and
support such incompetent drivel.
Well, understand that I'm speaking for a friend here (two, actually) but they felt that there was no obvious reason (i.e. visible to them, having completed the first day) for cancelling at that point and they thought in any case it'd have at least been courteous if nothing else to give a reason beyond "bad weather" for the cancellation. There have been rumours that mid-camp was flooded, but they were told nothing about that. Furthermore, there were absolutely no provisions whatsoever for getting them from the mid-camp back to the event centre and, having just completed day 1, Buttermere back to Seathwaite wasn't exactly a two minute walk. In fact, if the weather was so inclement as to force cancellation of the entire race, they felt "off you go by foot back to the start" was rather an inadequate plan to enforce it. Anyway, that was what was expressed to me, for better or for worse.Quote:
Originally Posted by Toreador
Quote:
Originally Posted by Highy
Sorry, but it's a pretty weak letter. I don't disagree with any of the conclusions at all, but it's full of "shouting," ranting, raving, and finger-pointing where dispassionate, objective and calm fact stating (and there are a great many facts to support the argument) would present a much more persuasive and compelling case. Ironically, he is doing exactly what he accuses the BBC of doing and writing a tabloid style letter where a "Times"-style response would make his case a great deal stronger.
I think they were a victim of circumstancesQuote:
Originally Posted by Swiss Toni
1. The overnight camp was in an area that didn't allow for other camping spots if the main one flooded.
2. Getting back to Race HQ involved going over a pass that had a business situated there allowing for people not involved in the OMM to get "involved" :)
I've been in the old Rock & Run MM the overnight camps were well away from any roads and any flooding would just mean having to camp a little higher.
I think the OMM needed to have a marshall on Honister Pass and will need to look at its procedures to stop anything like this happening again
While I agree that a better explanation than bad weather was needed ( I don't think bad weather on its own is an excuse to cancel any race if your not up to it don't run) I think a competitor who complains about walking back to the start (about five miles) has entered the wrong event. :rolleyes:Quote:
Originally Posted by Splinter
There were OMM marshalls at the top of the pass at 1.30pm. We dropped down to the pass intending to run down to Gatesgarth as we were running of (medium score) time. Judging by the number of C course competitors heading in te other direction; they'd only just got the message a few minutes earlier about the event being cancelled.Quote:
Originally Posted by Baggins
At 432 comments on this (433 including mine), have we not covered everything?
The press have said their bit, so have the police, so have the Mountain Rescue, Mark Weir, us, and so have the organisers. What happened has happened and we will be non the wiser for carrying on the discussion. It's all been said before.
Anyway, can't wait until I receive my Day 2 map..........:)
Agree. The world has moved on. In fact it had by last Tuesday.
However it takes a few days for Athletics Weekly to appear and from a well written and balanced full page article by Britta Sendlhofer (Editor of The Fellrunner) I quote the opening remarks by two competitors:
Mark Hobson: "I back the organisation 100%. It was brilliant....."
Alan Brentnall: "Personally, I think that the forecast warranted a cancellation, but I respect and understand the organisers' decision to try and carry on with the event."
Both these competitors are on the FRA Committee and I quote their differing remarks as printed in AW to illustrate that things are rarely black and white.
Very few indisputable facts have emerged about the OMM but as the vulgar expression goes: "everyone has an opinion."
I don't think they were complaining about the distance per se (they damn near won their class so they were certainly capable of the 5 miles!) so much as they felt that the fact that they were simply told to walk on back to base and nothing else belied a complete lack of logistical preparation or adequate explanation. They just got the sense that there was no planning at all and the organisers were simply winging it.Quote:
Originally Posted by Baggins
I have to say that for all the rights and wrongs of the whole thing (and to me no one emerges from this episode totally blameless) the absolute lack of humility of any kind from Mike Parsons greatly mitigates my natural inclination to take the side of OMM in all this.
Not having read all the posts, my overidding feeling is that events like this are too big. In this day and age we should be heading back to local events for local people. Borrowdale and 2,500 people plus cars etc just doesn't add up.
Oh No! It certainly adds up.Quote:
Originally Posted by Deek
2500 x £42.50/head = £106,250
So anybody who is not fortunate enough to live near these areas is not allowed to be a fell runner?Quote:
Originally Posted by Deek
I don't see that Deek is saying that perse. I think that it is more a case of exercising personal discretion. I run on the fells to get away from the crowds, not to join them.Quote:
Originally Posted by Muddy Retriever
Indeed. And in the 43 pages of mainly hysteria that has together created this thread, the most sensible moment and contribution was Baggins' rather dry and (unintentionally) dismissive aside noting that while the mountain marathoning world was coming apart at the seams in a very public way, he was calmly trotting solo around the Ennerdale Horseshoe. See, even the OMM thread has thrown up someone we can all respect.Quote:
Originally Posted by wheezing donkey
What a daft statment. All who started were there because they wanted to be.Quote:
Originally Posted by Splinter
If they had been left alone they would have finished Sunday with a great experience and awaiting their next OMM.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Stagger
that's probably the best statement on this thread i have read so far, :) all 43 pages of it.:D
If you live on the South Coast there are plenty of ways to test your stamina / endurance without travelling 500 miles for a weekends jaunt. Its just that if fell runners value the environment, value the moment, as well as the chance to leave no stone unturned in testing themselves physically in a beautiful way, it just doesn't tie in with the changes that need to be made to protect the very thing that we cherish. By all means get a temporary job in the Lakes, take a holiday in the Lakes, but we need to stop thinking that we can do any event any amount of times. We need to enjoy our localities wherever they may be and save special trips for special occasions. I say again, who really thinks that 2,500 competitors plus cars, etc etc arriving in the top of Borrowdale for the weekend is the way forward. I brace myself for some stick........Quote:
Originally Posted by Muddy Retriever
I think you should also consider where that £106k might go. I suspect that the farmers at Seathwaite and Gatesgarth view the OMM and other MMs as far more profitable business than sheep farming. I don't know the figures but from conversations some years ago with farmers whose land was used for event centres / overnights, they saw the income as very useful - directly into the local economy.
If you then start adding in insurance, Wilf's for over 2500, marquees, toilets, printing, website, etc I don't think the organisers are going to make a huge income from it.
I don't think the event is too big. You don't have to enter if you prefer solitude. Should Grasmere Sports be discontinued because thousands of cars turn up? How many people participate in Sports at that event and how much money does it take on the gate?
Some people will just complain about anything. There's room for everyone to do their own thing within reason.