JK 2023 Lake District

[Homer]

Well done JK 23 team

So my revised estimate for M21E is 14km and 600m climb. Or around 10 minutes less suffering for me

Hopefully no last minute rule changes when I'm planning in 2025...

[pete.owens]

I'm not sure the other courses should have been changed even if there had been much more notice. The WRE rules only supersede the JK rules for the two WRE classes.

The course length ratios are just a short cut to make it easier to calculate appropriate length courses for each class, rather than go through the whole rigmarole of working out the running speed in terrain and appropriate winning times individually for every single age class. Do the calculation once and scale everything to an appropriate reference (in this case a 95m M21 course).

It doesn't matter whether this course is actually offered or not - in the same way that course lengths at most forest events are expressed as a ratio of a non-existent black course.

[pete.owens]

The only courses being replanned to account for the IOF rule are M21E and W21E.

It would be a good idea to warn those who have entered or who are thinking of entering the W21E course that it is going to be 10% longer than they would expect. Some might prefer to transfer to W21L. Given the nature of the terrain this might not be obvious even when the course lengths are published.

[blairtrewin]

For what it's worth, I'm IOF Event Adviser for a long distance WRE in Australia on the same weekend as the JK and the advice I got from the Rules Commission was that I had the authority to approve course lengths according to 2022 standards if course setting was too far advanced to incorporate the 2023 rule changes (as it turned out, it wasn't).

As mentioned elsewhere in the thread, the IOF rule changes don't have any direct implications for classes other than M/W21E at "standard" WREs, but obviously the IOF decision about equalising winning times will prompt a lot of countries to look at doing likewise in their domestic rules. (In Australia we haven't made any changes yet but have agreed in principle to do so from 2024, though it's a bit easier for us because we already had equal winning times for all masters age groups from M/W45 upwards).

[graeme]

Its not exactly a last minute thing - its been coming for many years. You might have thought people would have thought it through.
Here's what I wrote about the unintended on attackpoint in 2015. And repeated in every consultation since. There's a kind of irony that the changes pushed for by some elite women come fully into force for everyone else straight away, while the W21E's get a year to adjust. (Except that the JK planners have very sensibly ignored the whole thing.)

What should have happened, IMO, was a discussion led by the female athletes as to whether the women's course should be longer, perhaps as long as the men's. But it soon became clear that there was no majority for this. What then happened was a shift from petitioning for what the minority actually wanted (long women's course), to something less concrete that was difficult for anyone to argue against (gender parity).

Once that cheap argument was won, we had imposed upon us a shortened men's course, something that essentially nobody wanted.

If our elite O-women have a genuine desire for longer courses, that's their right to decide and the IOF should respect it. What the elite women don't have, is the right to decide is how long the men's course should be. By allowing the debate to shift to "gender parity" we're risking that a small number of elite women destroy the Men's Long.

I don't believe anyone actually wants to shorten the men's race. But if we're not careful that will be the unintended consequence of debating gender parity, just as it was in cross country.

[graeme]

As mentioned elsewhere in the thread, the IOF rule changes don't have any direct implications for classes other than M/W21E at "standard" WREs,

Actually, that' s not true in the UK. Our course lengths here are defined as a fraction of M21. So when M21 gets shorter then, by default, so does everything else. In some cases there are guidelines about course combinations including W21E (see example of M40 longer than M35 above). So organisers need to be alert to which rules/guidelines don't work with the new elite lengths - or do what JK are doing and replan the elite courses.

[pete.owens]

Our course lengths here are defined as a fraction of M21. So when M21 gets shorter then, by default, so does everything else.

That isnt the case.
The courses are a suggestion that would give appropriate winning times for the classes given a typical entry and start window - they are not fixed in stone:

This table has been drawn up on the assumption that there are 3000 competitors competing in a four hour start span and class combinations may be varied where circumstances dictate this.

(my emphasis)
It is the target winning times that determine the CLRs, not vice versa.

The rules also go on to explain what should happen when the longest course is not a 90-100 minute M21 course:

All course lengths should be scaled to the length required for M21E, which has been
allocated a course length ratio of 1.00. However, if for the first Individual (forest) day
there is no Long distance course for M21E and planners should then make a realistic
and reasoned corrected length estimate for a hypothetical Long M21E course and base the corrected lengths of courses 2 to 27 on this. The M21E Middle distance course should aim for a ratio of 0.34 to this.

OK so it specifically refers to how to deal with situations where the elites run a middle distance race and everybody else runs long, because the JK rules allow that to occur on Saturday. But it is clear that that is how planners are expected to deal with the situation of a shorter (or longer) M21E course.

In this case we have a hypothetical 95 minute M21E course already planned, and all the other courses can and should and indeed have been planned relative to that. What is now needed is an
M21WRE course with a CLR of 0.95
which should be fairly easy to achieve by slightly trimming the already planned course.
And a
W21WRE course with a CLR of 0.69 (=.82*80/95)
about the same as the already planned course 3.

[DM]

That's a very long post to agree with what's been done.

One question though. Course 3 is M18/20E. Why are you suggesting W21E should be scaled against that?

[pete.owens]

I wasn't - I was just calculated the CLR for for an 80 EWT W21 course as a ratio of a 95 minute EWT M21 course and the result came out at 0.69, which just happens to be the same length as course 3.

Whether it is a good idea for a WRE course to be shared with any other JK classes is a different question irrespective of the length. Given that you need seeded start list with a 3 minute start interval (ie a maximum of 81 entries), then presumably any men whether M40 or M20 would need to be allocated the very earliest start slots.

[graeme]

Our course lengths here are defined as a fraction of M21. So when M21 gets shorter then, by default, so does everything else.

That isnt the case.

Sorry, but it really is.
The JK rules do list both estimated winning times and ratios, but it is stated later that the EWTs "Are provided as a guidance only" and its the course ratios that the planner works towards. All other rules and guidelines are the same.

This came about by work from (I think) DJM. Its a very good idea, recognising that very few planners have a good feel for the speeds expected of every class, and evading unfair criticism when courses with very few entrants have long winning times.

These are all "shoulds", which gives just enough wriggle-room for the JK to do what they did. I certainly agree with them - I don't think anyone believes its a good idea that everyone else's course should get shorter just because some elite women want to run further. I'm not sure who thinks its a good idea that M21E should be shorter for that reason either.

Or are you saying that henceforth at WREs elite course lengths should be different from non-WRE elite events: longer for women and shorter for men? That would make the ratios work, but seems deeply weird.

If we think the JK has done it right, then the ratios will need to be adjusted throughout the rules. (especially given that winning times on larger courses were outside the range already last year).

[awk]

Our course lengths here are defined as a fraction of M21. So when M21 gets shorter then, by default, so does everything else.

That isnt the case.

Sorry, but it really is.

As an ex-JK planner, I can confirm that: I was expected to work to the ratios, not winning times (They proved very helpful and accurate in providing the times we expected).

[Homer]

And, as a future one, I'll be doing the same.

[pete.owens]

And so would I given that the assumptions about entry numbers and start window are likely to be realistic; it is a very useful short cut. However, the point remains that those CLRs are calculated to result in appropriate EWTs to the range of classes allocated to them given the likely entry numbers, age distribution and a 4 hour start window. The rules do not insist on those particular course class combinations and indeed explicitly refer to the possibility that they may be different.

If more courses need to be provided - if for example the start window was restricted or perhaps using top notch terrain in a centrally located in an attractive part of the country and attracting international competition to a WRE, or the demographic drift of the orienteering population resulted certain courses likely to be oversubscribed then you would need to look again at the CLRs of the effected courses to make sure that they produced acceptable EWTs for the range of courses allocated to them.

Similarly, if you were expecting a particularly low turnout, you could decide to eliminate some of the courses, but you would need to check that the EWTs were still within range for the reallocated classes.

[pete.owens]

So my revised estimate for M21E is 14km and 600m climb. Or around 10 minutes less suffering for me

I would guess they would aim for a somewhat longer than that.

Back in 2015 JK Day 3 was a WRE in the same area
The M21E course was 15.4km with 720m climb and was won in 86.29

[pete.owens]

Or are you saying that henceforth at WREs elite course lengths should be different from non-WRE elite events: longer for women and shorter for men? That would make the ratios work, but seems deeply weird.

Henceforth, I would imagine that UK Elite courses will be brought into line with the WRE spec - just as Junior Elite middle distance courses are aligned to JWOC EWTs.

At that point it will need to be decided whether the principle of equal winning times for M/W courses should apply throughout the age range, or just for elites. And if so whether this means longer courses for women's classes or shorter courses for men's classes.

If it is decided to keep courses as they are then that is just a simple matter of adding 5% to all the non elite CLRs.

If EWTs are equalised then the course class combinations will need to be completely rejigged.