• Cotswold Outdoor (Vouchers & contribution to Entry Form printing)
• Exicor Pest Control (donation)

We hope our two new operational arrangements regarding supervision of Mini-Trek teams, and certificates for ALL those who took part, were accepted. First impressions were that they were received well and worked OK.

Next year's event, our 43rd year, will be held on the usual weekend, 19/20 May 2012. Entry forms will be posted to you in January 2012. Please notify us of any address or contact or e mail changes in the meantime. Please take care of your trophies … we’d like them back next year, pristine, engraved and polished ! Winners of both Boots will be contacted separately about additional plinths.

WW2011 Committee 23 May 11

A reminder that the closing date is 2 weeks away – 23 April Easter

Saturday

If your entry hasn’t been sent off yet, then please to your best to meet the date

The purpose of this Extra Newsletter is to let you know the committee decision on the rule changes mentioned in the Newsletter last month. These are:

(1) Mini Trek supervision: Thanks for the views expressed by some of you. The Committee has decided that supervisors will NOT be required or indeed allowed to walk behind their teams this year. However they will be expected to check on their teams at key points along the route, apart from at Checkpoints. At least two members of each team will be required to carry mobile phones.

We appreciate that this may cause difficulties for very young teams, and we would not want to deter very young teams, so if full supervision IS required, the team will be allowed to enter, but not be competitive ie gain a place. This status need not be declared until the Start, to allow maximum flexibility for teams during training for the event.

The Committee noted that in our sister event The Cleveland Hike, held on the North Yorkshire Moors, team members walk the whole 35 ml route, without close supervision, from age 13.

(2) Certificates: ALL members of teams taking part but not gaining a place, will be given a certificate, but the likelyhood is that due to time limitations at the Finish, these will be available for supervisors to collect after the prize presentation, rather than be presented. However, the rule that a team has to complete the WHOLE course to gain a place and place certificate, stays, and no dispensation will be given to teams who are rerouted by marshals to miss checkpoints, due to their anticipated late arrival at Camp or Finish. Again we ask that this be explained to teams in advance, to avoid disappointment.

These changes will be incorporated into the TIs (Team Instructions), but we thought it only fair to give as much notice as possible to you all.

WW2011 Committee

9 April 2011

WALTHAM WALK 2011 - STAFF, FRIENDS & PAST ENTRANTS' 

NEWSLETTER

Well, another year past and another year’s planning, for WW2011 well underway. Past entrants will have already had their Entry Form, but for those staff and friends who haven’t seen it, it is attached together with this year’s poster advertising the event. We have used our new printers again, and hopefully they have produced another professional looking entry form, at less cost than the old black and yellow one! 

Three themes for this year’s “new look” Newsletter... (1) Location (2) Funding (3) Proposed rule changes.... so here we go......

(1) Location: In 2010 we returned to camping at Danbury, for the first time since the 90s, and it proved to be a great venue. A lot of improvements made to the old place, which is run by Essex County Council, since we were there last. So we have decided to return there this year and even do a circular route on Saturday, by starting at Danbury, which will help with logistics. Don’t worry you Skreens Park fans .. we’ll be back there soon, I’m sure!

(2) Funding: As you are no doubt aware, over the past 3 years we have been able to obtain a £5000 total grant from the Grass Roots Fund of the Essex Community Foundation, who have been good friends to us. The real cost of the WW Event is around £16 per person, but the grant has enabled us to keep fees close to half that for Main Event and Mini-Trek teams. But that money will be all spent by the end of this financial year, so we hope to find new funding for 2012, but in the current climate it’s very difficult.

(3) Proposed Rule Changes: Two aspects of the WW Rules have continued to give the committee much grief in recent years!

The first is the requirement for supervisors to walk behind Mini-Trek teams,the rule being purely for safeguarding reasons, bearing in mind that teams that could be as young as 11 on the day. The problem is that we have had several comments/complaints that some teams are being “helped” more than others. Virtually impossible for the committee to make adjudication on the matter, and it has caused a little unrest. What we are debating and will be finalising at our next committee meeting on 30 March, is that supervisors will just be required to check their teams at various waypoints (eg where a footpath leaves a road, and other obvious places) & not walk behind them all the way. This should also make it easier for supervisors with multiple teams to look after. There will be a requirement for at least two of the team to have mobile phones with them, just in case. Virtually all teams do anyway.

The second is not allowing teams who do not complete the whole course, to gain an official place in the results. Despite the rules being clear (but not often explained to teams by their supervisors!), team members are often disgruntled if, say, we lift them through a couple of checkpoints on the Saturday, solely because in our estimation on the day, (and we have long experience in this), they won’t reach the campsite by nightfall. Again,for safety reasons, we can’t have teams walking in the dark, and of course they have to pitch camp, cook, and then be up early the next morning! The proposal is to give all entrants who take part, but don’t make the whole course, an “unplaced” certificate for accepting the challenge. Time restraints at the finish mean that it is unlikely names will be on these certificates, but can be added later locally.

If you have any contribution to make on these tricky matters, please email me before 30 March ...we’d welcome your views. 

STAFF! Our biggest problem continues to be finding enough staff to adequately run the event on the day. With one or two of our "old faithfuls" suffering poor health, or unable to make the weekend due to family or work commitments, we're stretched to the limit! We hope this newsletter may encourage those of you who we haven't seen for a year or so, to return this year - WE NEED YOU ! You can even phone a friend and drag them along! Please advise Len by 25th March, of your availability for the weekend, if you haven’t been in contact with him already. I know some of you have. 

We are especially asking those staff/supervisors who are likely to accompany teams, this year, to commit themselves to what times they are available to help over the weekend, by 15 April, rather than leave it until the weekend or just before. This should then give adequate time for us to allocate staff to checkpoints at our final meeting, and for staff to be briefed in advance by their Check point marshals, especially concerning administrative and safety matters. It is all too much of a rush on the day, to do properly. Many thanks in advance for your co-operation.

Look forward to hearing from you soon, & hopefully see you on 21/22 May we hope. Don't forget to visit walthamwalk.org.uk to keep up to date. If there is any change to your e mail address or other details, or even want to be removed from our mailing list, please let us know. Finally, I would just like to say a word of thanks to the small group of WW friends, who, over the years, have given great support to WW, both financially and in other ways… many thanks.

LASTLY REMEMBER THE CLOSING DATE THIS YEAR IS EASTER SATURDAY

WW2011 Committee 

Well done to all those teams & individuals, who took part, but didn't quite make it all the way as a team… a great achievement to do what you did !  Our thanks go to all of our sponsors:

Cotswold Outdoor (Prizes & contribution to Entry Form printing)

Exicor Pest Control (donation)

Grassroots Fund of the Essex Community Foundation (grant over last 3 financial years)

Thanks also to all visiting staff who helped at checkpoints and with transportation.  We look forward to you helping again next year, and it would be most helpful, to advise us of your availability around March time, so we can plan the checkpoint staff duties in good time.  Thanks also to St John’s Ambulance Brigade.

Next year's event, our 41^st, will be held on the usual weekend, 21/22 May 2011.  Entry forms will be posted to you in January 2010.  Please notify us of any address or contact or e mail changes in the meantime.  We would urge all organisations to ensure their teams are properly trained for the event, in the use of map and compass.