FVO's teams at the Peter Palmer Junior Team Relay

Forth Valley Orienteers' junior stars flew the Scottish flag with pride in England, as they were the first Scottish team in seven years to take part in a major British competition.

The Peter Palmer Junior Team Relay, which is named after one of the pioneers of youth orienteering in the UK, has essentially been a South of England competition since its inception in 1993, but an event in Cumbria meant that FVO had not one but two teams in a 14 team competition.

Alexander Hunt was entrusted with opening leg duties for the A team, starting at 5am, and came back in 4th (27.54) behind a field that was led in by AIRE, who had top-stacked their team. Matthew Inman had the second of the two Dark legs, and maintained the 4th place (30.05) as AIRE dropped off the pace, and SYO went to the front.

James Edward took on the first of the Day legs, and hung on well to the coat-tails of AIRE, as the host club, which included six under 18s in its lineup, took to the front, James dropping off only at the very end to come back 5th (30.55).

Hannah Inman was one of the few genuine Orange runners on the 4th leg, and brought the team back up into a medal position with a leg time of 21.30, then Sophie Edward (18.53) did her best to keep the team up on the 5th leg, but handed over to Peter Owen for the closer having dropped back into 4th.

Peter showed up well early, but didn't count on a strong final leg from Sam Osborne for LOC, which brought them out of the pack to place the A team 5th at the end, with Peter's leg (34.20), just under two minutes behind the northern squad.

The B team was very much a development effort, with three under 12s, including Matthew Owen on a bold attempt at a Night leg, and they came back in 193.52, with Fraser Cheyne's closing leg of 37.17 (9th) the best leg of the six, and his acceleration from the final control spooked one team so much that they forgot to punch.

Initially, FVO thought they had done enough to win the Joan George Bowl, which is for the best team with an aggregate BOF age of under 90, but it became apparent that the SYO B team that was 3rd past the post qualified by a matter of days, and FVO took the silver medal in the class.