Compass Sport Cup/Trophy

[ba-ba]

...or the Sheffield Half!

[PG]

Area embargoes
Events and training with a map or otherwise seeking to gain a competitive advantage is currently not allowed for those that wish to compete in the following events:

*Northern championships 31 Jan 2010 Avoid Big Moor, Baslow, Curbar and Frogatt Edges.
* CompassSport Cup Final, 17th Oct 2010 Avoid area covered by previous Burbage Moor maps
* Regional Event Ecclesall Woods 21st Nov 2010 A one-year embargo starts on 21/11/09 for those that wish to run and remain competitive.
* British Championships 7th May 2011 Wharncliffe and Greno Woods

[jab]

But that advice has been updated, in 2008 - see the document linked at the foot of this page: http://www.britishorienteering.org.uk/event/embargoed.php

For embargoed areas it is quite clear: "... Any activity on the area after [the embargo is known] would then be considered as attempting to gain an unfair advantage and the offender could be disqualified under Rule 1.5.5."

It does discuss the possiblity of running "through" areas in relation to to the general "unfairness" rule, but the implication is that this is in relation to unembargoed areas, so only relates to lower level events.

The current "Rules of Orienteering" contain a reference to embargoes in Appendix O, which I can't see on the website. When I read the document referred to by Snail, i don't come away with the same impression that he does. As far as I can tell you are allowed to run through an embargoed area in a cross-country race, following a marked route with no navigation; you are allowed to take part in a cross-country race that may involve using a map if there is very little navigation and you stick to public footpaths; you are allowed to take part in a GCSE PE assessment on the area. You are NOT allowed to train or walk your dog on paths that criss-cross the area.
When I read the bit about "any activity..." I assumed that meant any activity other than the things that have been specifically stated to be acceptable. Thus I would suggest that many people would have read that and concluded that running over the Roman Road on Burbage isn't a problem. Given that Snail and I have read the same document and come up with completely different conclusions, it may be that it needs re-drafting before it is finally published as Appendix O.

[T5]

If the rules were applied to a wooded area I can see an arguement to allow people to pass through. However, with an open area like Burbage you could arm-chair plan a leg with an old map, run on a path through the area doing map memory but get excellent practice at terrain visualisation and even pick out attack points at set distances along certain paths.

Anyway, back to how this thread started and this (last) weekends races, I thought Shouldham Warren would have benefoted by some breaks in lines between controls - paths between start and 1, crossing point/tower on the way to 11 and the earthwall leading to 23 were all largely obscured (on Brown).

Other than that I was surprised how well the parking and terrain soaked up competitors from 8 competing clubs

[NFKleanne]

On my run at Shouldham, I only saw one other runner from my club during my run, the car parking was better organised than a district event in 2008!!!