Sprint distance measurement

[Gross]

IOF Rules Appendix 6 gives the terrain requirements:

http://orienteering.org/wp-content/uplo ... s-2011.pdf

As you will see the controls for sprint should be technically easy.

[Gnitworp]

Give us a paragraph reference, Gross.

[Gross]

It's a chart on Appendix 6.... gives specifications for all types of orienteering races

[andypat]

Theres a world of difference between a sprint O in urban vs parkland.

Exactly my point - therefore different disciplines?

Not different disciplines. As Gross and Arnold has pointed out the same skills can be tested. The point I was making was more to do with managing the expectations of the potential entrant. This goes from issues to do with Urban areas and U16s, to footwear choice up to guys like Rocky who might want to target sprints in the sort of terrain that the WOC is being run over.

Personally I love Sprint orienteering and would do more, but I'd be more likely to travel a distance for a sprint in good quality campus/urban terrain than one in a public park.

[NeilC]

Personally I love Sprint orienteering and would do more, but I'd be more likely to travel a distance for a sprint in good quality campus/urban terrain than one in a public park.

Is that because you don't consider places like Battersea Park (World Cup) or Scone Palace (PWT) challenging enough?

[EddieH]

Battersea Park was OK but not a patch on the qualification at Surrey University. Scone was fantastic.

I've jut been looking at the World Cup final in La Chaux de Fonts (Compassport). The bit they used was not a patch on the WMOC qualifiers they had there. To me the majority of that was not challenging as it actually makes not real difference which way youy go with 2 equal rectangular routes. Why don't they use the technically most challenging bits available?

[Gnitworp]

Because they don't want to make it technically challenging?

[Red Adder]

Two points on distance.

As a planner surely you need to have a realistic view on the actual distance to be run in an urban event so you can judge if the EWT is within range - and with OCAD that is very easy to do, even if you tweak the course.

We also ought to be considering newbies more in our distance statements. On yesterday's Green (5.0km) I "ran" 5.7 (Routegadget suggests 5.3 was possible) whereas a newcomer could make sensible and safe route choices and cover 6.5 km (assuming no errors). If a road-runner turned up for their 10km race and actually had to do 30% more they would not be pleased - perhaps its another reason why we can't attract and retain runners.

[Gross]

Maybe another reason is how much continous running do newcomers do ? A 10km runners know he / she will run at 'x' speed for a steady period.....

In orienteering, particularly for beginners, there is zero steady running... it's stop, start, fast, slow, run, walk....

[Neil M40]

I think we are pretty clear on what we're trying to test with the Sprint Distance.

There's a much more complete version of this on BOF / IOF websites but broadly it's "making lots of micro decisions at very high speed" with the actual control sites being fairly easy and certainly very clearly defined (building corner, etc).

In practice a town centre or university are likely to be good candidates, but why not some parkland areas if they're intricate enough but you probably do need some buildings of sorts. Or ideally a mixture of all of the above.

A purely forested area, however intricate, is not likely to be a particularly good area - that's what Middle is for...

You can view all of the sprint maps from WOC from the links world of O.

http://omaps.worldofo.com/?sr=WOC

The 10 sprint finals held so far I would characterise as

2001 forest
2003 urban
2004 forest
2005 forest
2006 parkland
2007 parkland
2008 urban/parkland
2009 forest
2010 urban/parkland
2011 urban

Which is sort of interesting. Defnitely trending towards urban.
None of which bothers me - I'm much more interested in the proper orienteering maps from the 90s and earlier.

[Red Adder]

Early maps are interesting - notice that Culbin has 2.5 m contours while the 1966 Finland map seems almost to use hachures - which give a very strong visualisation of the bumpiness of the land.

[Gnitworp]

1978 WOC (Classic) had 2.5m contours on a 1:15000 map. Contours merged where ground was very steep, which, in my view, doesn't necessarily present an impediment to map interpretation. There were some quite large landforms and height differences in places and few form lines throughout.

[andypat]

Personally I love Sprint orienteering and would do more, but I'd be more likely to travel a distance for a sprint in good quality campus/urban terrain than one in a public park.

Is that because you don't consider places like Battersea Park (World Cup) or Scone Palace (PWT) challenging enough?

Cant comment on Battersea Park but I went to Scone Palace because it was PWT not because it was in a park. And yes it was a fantastic race.

Incidentally if a park is mapped to ISOM not ISSOM is it still a sprint? I am looking forward to Stag's Glasgow Parks Championship again this year - but then again its not too far to travel

https://oentries.com/event/details/213-staglasgow-s-13th-parks-championships-3-parks-in-1-day

[Another180]

1978 WOC (Classic) had 2.5m contours on a 1:15000 map. Contours merged where ground was very steep, which, in my view, doesn't necessarily present an impediment to map interpretation. There were some quite large landforms and height differences in places and few form lines throughout.

This post as much relevance to the topic of "Sprint Distance Measurement" as orienteering does to landing men on the moon

[Gnitworp]

...and was simply responding directly to the previous post, which, with respect, is maybe more than yours is doing.