Warmup Race
Thursday 11 July at Holyrood Park
Warmup Race - Holyrood Park
Holyrood Park is a royal park with an array of hills, lochs, glens, ridges, basalt cliffs and patches of gorse, providing a wild piece of highland landscape in the middle of the city. The park is extremely popular and has over 5 million visitors per year.
Many visitors will be more familiar with Holyrood Park in winter at EUOC’s Big Weekend but the park’s landscape changes with the seasons, offering a different but equally beautiful running environment in the summer.
Preliminary Details
- Type of event
- Colour-coded, open hillside, South of Scotland O league (SoSOL) counter.
- Day Event Centre
- South Hall Complex, Pollock Halls of Residence, 18 Holyrood Park Rd, Edinburgh EH16 5AY. Open from 13:00-19:15 to collect all your race items. Leave kit bags in the hall. The only available toilets are in this building, none at the Start or Finish. CompassPoint will have their equipment van here.
- Location
- 55.93810, -3.16964; ///dance.finely.when
- Start times
- 15:00–17:00
- Starts
- There is one Start location today. 1.9 km plus 140 m climb.
- Allow a 45-minute walk (plus extra time to admire the views). The first 1.6km is relatively flat on pavements with most of the climb coming in the final 300m steep ascent to the Start. The route will be taped. The Finish will be manned from 14:00 to allow you to take a small detour on the way to the Start to leave kit and/or water bottle. (at your own risk). Do not leave anything valuable here.
- Finish
- 400m from Download. Follow tapes back to Download in Pollock Halls. First Aid provision will primarily be at the Finish.
- Courses close
- 19:00
- Map
- Holyrood Park, 1:7500 for everyone, with 5m contours, mapped to ISOM 2017-2. Updated map 2024 by Matthew Gooch. Copyright EUOC. The Orange course has a control on a rarely used platform feature, i.e. an obvious flat area on a slope. This is mapped as a brown three-sided triangle (△) and is represented by the charcoal-burning control description (
). - Food
- Pollock Halls have a café, please support them.
- Footwear/clothing
- Shoes with some grip recommended. Full leg cover recommended due to a few areas of gorse.
- Safety
- There will be marshalls at certain road crossings on the way to the Start. One significant crag on some courses will have black/yellow tape across the top but be aware that there are many other crags and steep slopes in the park. Some paths are quite stoney, take care when descending.
- Special Information
- We expect several hundreds of tourists will be in the park at the same time as the race, take care around them. The high road round the area is closed to motor vehicles from 15:00 today which means the walk to the Start should be vehicle-free after this time apart from park staff and some orienteering official’s vehicles. There will still be runners and cyclists on the road. The route to the Start uses some small steep narrow paths, rocky in places, please move to the side to let faster competitors pass if necessary.
- Juniors
- No restriction on juniors on courses but parents must accompany younger children to and from the Start/Finish as this involves road crossings. A Yellow map will be available to view (only) in the Day Event Centre with all Yellow course competitors course maps at the Start.
- Planner
- Max Carcas (INT)
- Controller
- Robin Sloan (RR)
).
Provisional Course Lengths
| Course | Difficulty | Length (km) | Climb (m) | Controls | Scale |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Brown | Hard | 7.6 | 395 | 27 | 1:7500 |
| Blue | Hard | 5.4 | 255 | 21 | 1:7500 |
| Green | Hard | 3.9 | 175 | 15 | 1:7500 |
| Short Green | Hard | 3.4 | 120 | 12 | 1:7500 |
| Light Green | Medium-Hard | 3.5 | 185 | 14 | 1:7500 |
| Orange | Medium | 2.6 | 130 | 13 | 1:7500 |
| Yellow | Easy | 2.1 | 80 | 10 | 1:7500 |
Travel Information
Parking: Very limited on-street parking. The nearest NCP car park is at St Leonards (700m).
From outwith Edinburgh: Park at Sheriffhall Park and Ride (free parking) and take the #33 bus (3 an hour) to the “Commonwealth Pool” stop – check for height restrictions on tall vehicles.
From central Edinburgh: Take the #30 or #33 bus (8 an hour) from Princes Street to the “Commonwealth Pool” stop.
It is a 5-minute walk from the “Commonwealth Pool” stop to the Day Event Centre at Pollock Halls.