BOC Predictions

[HOCOLITE]

If there were an event in the area again. I'd like correct info about the area before hand, so I could decide if I wanted to travel. I do think Neil made a good job planning a poor area and thus making the event, worthwhile, however another planner might not. I was just very disappointed having read the pre event details. I'm not elite but I did speak to an M20E, and a number of M18L's who were expecting more of a techical challenge than they got.
The criticism is not the event or the planning it's the pre event literature showing an area with depressions, which on the map was not substantially bigger than that in the details.

[guest]

why ?

[guest]

Ok - I take the blame too. I tried to make it clear by putting a statement in the final details "Note that all settlements and associated roads and driveways are out of bounds" but maybe in hindsight I should have insisted that the purple OOB was used.

I have also raised the point to a number of "noted" mappers to suggest the dangers of mapping roads and driveways through OOB settlement.

I will continue to learn, even controllers can't get everything right, but we try!

Guilty - controller

[HOCOLITE]

why what? Why would I like to know that an area is not overhyped before I travel a long distance? Because with so much orienteering and such high entry fees I personally like to decide if I want to travel. If there is a closer event offering more attractive terrain I'd choose that wouldn't you. In the case of the British I'd probably travel but at least I would not feel let down. If the event were on the relay area I'd find it infinitely more attractive than the individual. Particularly if the walks were not quite so long.

[Gross]

If it wasn't OOB then as a future tip for planners - two boxes of OOB marked in red over the olive gardens colour with a clear corridor through the middle.

!

If it was olive green anyway... no need for OOB sybol as it already is OOB

[HOCOLITE]

On my course no. 21. I had a route between control 1 & 2 where the route from 1 to the road took you on a small path through a farmyard out to the road. There was no OOB marked at all so I presume this was acceptable as I guess it is probably a public right of way.

[FatBoy]

Yes olive is OOB but what about a road marked through it? I showed the map to a grade 1 controller on Sat evening and he couldn't say whether it was a legal route or not based on what's on the map and felt clarification one way or the other is required. A lower grade controller I spoke to on Sunday thought it was a valid route.

I wasn't the only one going through there at the time and we all were looking totally unsure as to whether it was OK with a fair amount of standing still looking around and at the map. The gate was open at both ends of the property which helped swing the decision to proceed. I understand JSWC did the same but elected to turn around at the start of the driveway and run back some 300m to the only other way out.

I expect to have to make decisions on whether a route is legal in a park race but not in a classic. I read the masses of info on crossing points etc in the final details a few times but you have to make decisions based on the map. The red line was broken across the area but not bent round one way or split into two to go both sides. The decision on whether it was legal or not had to be made in the first couple hundred metres of the M21L course - this was en route to number 1 on our course. It's easy to say "settlements and associated roads and driveways" but what does that actually mean? The road south of the start with all the crossing points on it could be reffered to as an "associated road" of a settlement - but is obviously not OOB. So at what point does it become OOB?

I apologise to those people who's house I ran past but feel with the tools I had in my hand I wasn't to know it was not allowed. I suspect I speak for everybody who did go through.

[Kitch]

Guest - Controller

not guilty.


I did precisely what Jamie described.
What swung it for me was when it became clear to me that I would be going through the gates of someone's house and through their garden.
at that point the "associated roads and driveways" made it perfectly clear in my mind, I turned round for exactly the reasons Jamie gave (not noping up permissions and good will) (if only I could run like him and not just think like him!)

What is annoying me more is Hocolite.
How about a thankyou ? Its not very hard look.....


Thankyou Mr Planner, Thankyou Mr Controller. You did good, you made my legs hurt, I made mistakes, but it was good. Thankyou

[Klebe]

Am I missing something here? I thought if a road was out of bounds it had purple crosses on it.


Just read Kitchs' post, makes more sense now if it was a driveway rather than a road.

[FatBoy]

Yes I should say thanks for all the work as I did enjoy it.

[guest]

some people seem to think that everything should be absolutely perfect - its not possible. There will always be human errors and it doesnt do any good whatsoever endlessly berating people over them. Personally i agree with Kitch that many thanks are in order to all the people involved to provide us with such an enjoyable weekend of orienteering.

Britain doesnt have enough quality areas for us to run in an amazing area every event so some people just need to get on with it, stop complaining and enjoy what's there.

I thouroughly enjoyed my runs on both days and would like to wholeheartedly thank the people who put the effort in to provide those courses for me.

[Stodgetta]

I thought it was a great weekend.
You had a mix of terrain from fast to slow forest, heathland, intricate areas for careful navigation and vague areas for careful navigation, some path routes, some terrain routes, planning that gave route choice, changes in direction, variety in leg length and everything that makes a good course was there for me.
It wasn't the best terrain in the UK (and the best terrain in the UK can still have crap courses if it's badly planned), but best use was made of it and results were a fair reflection of ability. To do well you had to be fast, strong and an accurate navigator.
Thank you everybody involved.

[awk]

I didn't run the individual, but heard much good of it. The relay was excellent - really outstanding. I understand that the planner had to redo everything after losing the original setting in February - remarkable.

The one black mark on the weekend for me came right at the very end, and was nothing to do with the organisers, but with BOF (sorry if this sounds like a BOF chunter, but the fact is the one blight for us was because of them).

We had a prize winning team on the Junior Ad Hoc - which mostly (entirely??) consists of one club teams - it's more of a Junior Mixed than Ad Hoc. It's also the biggest junior relay class (over 5 times the size of W14-!), and bigger than any of the Women's classes (senior or junior), not surprising as it lends itself to the realities of junior orienteering in most clubs rather than the rigid age class structures that BOF apparently want to see at BRC.

However, prize winning was a big misnomer, because there were no medals or any sort of awards for second and third teams (what looked like cheap plastic mugs for the winners). There was instead the very unedifying sight of a BOF official physically restraining one of the organisers from presenting medals.

So...two hours plus wait especially, and nothing but disappointment, not least because there had been no warning that BOF would treat this class as second class citizens. As several of the juniors said "What a waste of time".

All in all - megaplaudits to the organisers, and many thanks for a great weekend; sadly, yet more brickbats to BOF, who still seem to fail to get a grip on basics when it comes to junior development.

[Lizi Beee]

I second that stodgetta, Thanks to all involved putting on this weekend, not just the racing, but the campsite too, it was lovely! Not muddy, great shower and not too far for us to walk to the car park in the morning I enjoyed both my races, which was all i was aiming to do this weekend! Thought the relay area was great fun, especially the run in bit (i like hills )!

[Man of Kent]

Generally, I think we need to look hard at our arrangements for prize-givings as has been said before here. I was involved in helping with both those on Saturday and Sunday and while not one to be critical of any voluntary effort, feel they could have been a bit better. This was the British Championships after all and I wonder how the prize-givings compared with other sports, even given the difficult forest locations?
As to AWK's point, I agree in general (and was slighly embarrased at the time), but I believe that the 'BOF official' was merely carrying out policy determined somewhere along the line by BOF members (i.e. all of us). So make your voices heard for a change to this policy if you think, as I do, that it is wrong.