Sprint distance measurement

[JK]

A few points:

1. calculating height climb (although of course the potential algorithms for deciding this consistently can be tricky) is of use to the planner (and future planners!) for comparing this course with past courses on the area for checking you have the course length about right. The combination of the 2 (height climb x10 added in) is used for mins/Lkm time in Switzerland. I once had a 75km mountain marathon in France which was 25km day 1 and 20km day 2, the other 30 km coming from 3000m of climb.

2. Since this is Venice w/e, did they use number-of-bridges instead of height climb (they always used to)

3. Sprint is similar to Ski-O (and I suspect MTB-O) where the actual course length is irrelevant so knowing shortest route is more useful to the competitors. In Ski-O competitions (international anyway) the courses are quoted as both straight line and "shortest skiable".

4. For Elites then 12-15 mins is what they expect (if I recall the guidelines) so actual running distance isn't relevent (and neither is straight line) as mentioned above. Knowing rough %ages of tarmac vs grass vs forest might be of interest in shoe selection though (the equivalent of this is given in SkiO too).

5. For non-Elites then they don't know much about their course except it will be a %age of the Elite course (I am assuming same rules as for non-sprint O) so letting them know the straight line and/or shortest runnable distance would be useful. If the planner doesn't know the shortest runnable distance how can (s)he be sure it is the correct length for this age category?

I think the first important thing is to state on pre-race information whether the course distances are straight line or shortest runnable. I believe it is important to have at least one and you should say which one it is. You can of course give the straight line distance and say that the actual running distances will be "about double" or something like that.

JK

[greywolf]

IOF...Rule 16.3 states that “The course lengths shall be given as the length of the straight line from the start via the controls to the finish deviating for, and only for, physically impassable obstructions (high fences, lakes, impassable cliffs etc.), prohibited areas and marked routes.”

If sprint courses cross open terrain with areas of gorse or rhodie etc - mapped as 410 Vegetation difficult to run (but not impassable or forbidden) are course lengths to be measured on a straight line through the dark green or on the fastest route around?

[NeilC]

Straight line. The planner will of course take into consideration the fact that most competitors will go round when assessing the likely winning time.

[greywolf]

That's what i thought - but DJM was arguing that planners should publish optimal route lengths, which obv wouldn't be the case.

[JK]

BTW if you use CONDES-8:

• Convert you Sprint course to be MTB-O instead of Normal
• You should see a grey (or maybe blue) line from start to finish. That is used for shortest route - you use the usual buttons to shape it round your course. Remember to swap back to normal course after

JK

[binman]

BTW if you use CONDES-8:

[list]
[*]Convert you Sprint course to be MTB-O instead of Normal

JK

How do you do that? I can see how to set up an event for MTBO etc. but can't work out how to change it once the event is set up.

[graeme]

IOF...Rule 16.3 ...

... hasn't been changed since long before sprint and ISSOM were invented. I suspect if they'd actually thought about it, they'd change it. Especially if they'd ever had to do the measuring!

[JK]

BTW if you use CONDES-8:

[list]
[*]Convert you Sprint course to be MTB-O instead of Normal

JK

How do you do that? I can see how to set up an event for MTBO etc. but can't work out how to change it once the event is set up.

Go to the Edit Courses, double click on the course and you can change the course type at the top left hand side.

JK

[DJM]

Anyone found a good way of doing the same in OCAD CS?

[graeme]

Here's a good method for sprints... According to the (important bits of the) rules

The winning time should be 13.5 mins.
The terrain should be very runnable, so that elite men are running at 3.5mins/km (edit: made up number - see below where greywolf checked the facts).

The M21E optimal distance is therefore 13.5/3.5 = 3.9km. If you claim a signficantly different optimum distance, you're saying that you haven't done the planning correctly

You can then use the time you saved to test run another course...

[greywolf]

3.5mins/km may be optimistic in some areas e.g. at the 2009 scottish sprint champs the A course was 3420m straight line, 4060m optimal route (and there was minimal climb) so about 4% long by your calculation (not a criticism of the planner)...top three finishers were Murray 17.36, Oleg 17.54 and Jamie Stevenson (M18) 19.47

[EddieH]

What a tragedy if we try always to shoehorn sprint areas into 3.5 mins/k terrain.

That would kill all the best sprints like the amazing Portuguese one in another thread. And University of Surrey? the best British urban sprint area I've been to.

Rules like that worry me about the future of our sport.

We like the different formats because of the variety, but if sprints (and urban) become simply a matter of left or right of 2 equally balanced routes then they won't hold my interest for long.

[NeilC]

Rules like that worry me about the future of our sport.

Is it Graeme's made up rule that worries you or the idea that sprints should be held in runnable terrain with a winning time of 12-15 minutes?

[graeme]

Surrey Uni would be OK, but I'd be rather certain that Portugese terrain would be vetoed for WOC. I didn't see much sprinting or even running in the video, and I don't think it should be called a sprint, any more than a hilly muddy 5 mile cross country race should market itself as a "10K" just because it has a similar winning time. It's different, and in some people's opinion, better.

[EddieH]

Maybe that's my point.

Loads of People make derogatory comments about bog standard colour coded courses, yet these take place on all types of terrain with a wide variety of lengths.

If sprint terrain is limited to runnable urban stuff then it will surely become boring run of the mill same as last week mch more so than a typical old C4. And where's the adventure element in running round a campus?

I enjoy sprints but if we don't allow variety it will only be because I do them so rarely. My most memorable and favourite sprints/urban have been those which have a bit of variety within them - Zermat, WMOC in Portugal, Uni of Surrey, Scarborough, and the first St Andrews come to mind. I could love running on areas like these week in week out.