Wow! [SELOC Urban Weekend]

[tomtom]

Want the chance to run in a exciting urban race alongside skyscrapers, Granada Studios (home to Coronation Street), a Roman fort, canals, Old Trafford and the new BBC television centre?!

Then go to http://www.seloc.org.uk/component/conte ... Itemid=141 to enter and for further details.

Don't miss out on the chance to run on a brand new area.. potentially one of the best races in the calendar!

[DM]

Heard it's a really good map, which I'm sure you know already!

[denbydale]

If you're making a weekend of it and going to Horwich on the Sunday - in amongst the running and cycling events there is going to be (at 1.05pm)
The UK’S First National Open Unicycling Road Race

The mind boggles!

[tomtom]

Cheap entries close tonight!

[IanD]

Useful piece of information for those running from Manchester on Saturday (haven't spotted it in the Final Details so sent the organiser an e-mail):

There is a clothing transfer from Manchester
At 1pm (arriving salford about 1.30) and 2pm (arriving salford about 2.30)
otherwise there is a tent at salford to leave kit in as well

[Carnage Head]

Great event today! It's not very often you get the chance to do a point-to-point orienteering race. The most interesting parts were near the start of the longer courses (Manchester), when we had to deal with canals, train lines and tram lines as well as the usual urban complications. Thanks to the mappers, the planner (Pete Kidd) and the whole organising team! Looking forward to the chance to use the area again sometime. I
wonder if the leg with the open gate will be voided- I ran around as the fence was marked as uncrossable, but some others, inc three friends I brought who were new to o, ran through. The joys of urban orienteering!

[JK]

Great event - the map and courses were great.

Regarding the fence ...

I was out at the dodgy fence with one of the control collectors who took photos of it. 1/2 the fence was there, 1/2 was missing and had recently been removed - you could see the dry wood on the ends of the struts. The red plastic barriers that were presumably used to surround it while they cut it down were still there so it was probably this week it vanished.

IMO [and if it is within the remit of a planner/controller to do so] then I'd remove the leg. The reasons for this is that people are split into the following categories:
1. Avoided that route because the fence was on the map and ran round
2. Went down that route, realised, but seeing it were confused and then went round
3. As 2. but then decided to go through anyway
4. Didn't notice it on ground or map and ran through it, later realised and did a voluntary DQ
5. As 4. but won't be asking to be DQd since they know so many others won't
6. As 4 but still don't realise they were wrong

This would only be 30+ seconds lost but since it wasn't the planner/controller's fault, some got an advantage but accident, some may well self-DQ, and others will feel guilty (you should do - you are supposed to read the map, it isn't a road race!) then removing the leg seems the best solution for everyone.

As for me, I was 2, but getting distracted seeing all the guys running that way got sloppy and ran past it to punch the other one 50m later so I'm DQd in any case!

[DM]

Enjoyed the course, only 1 leg that was not interesting. Well done to all the SELOC team, and mapper Tom Fellbaum. I heard positive comments from several people about what a good map it was. Urban maps will change all the time so spotting all the lat minute changes is a challenge.

Next year MDOC are running an event using the interesting Manchester bits from today plus more the city itself, adding to the variety we saw today.

[slang]

The most interesting parts were near the start of the longer courses (Manchester), when we had to deal with canals, train lines and tram lines as well as the usual urban complications.

Castlefield will be used in June next year for all courses as part of Twin Peak. I briefly lost contact with the map a couple of times, especially where the train lines went over the canals.

A great event, thank you SELOC.

[Spookster]

I wonder if the leg with the open gate will be voided- I ran around as the fence was marked as uncrossable, but some others, inc three friends I brought who were new to o, ran through.

Why would you void a leg because of an open gate? It was very clear on the map that it was an uncrossable fence, so anyone who went that way did so illegally (assuming we're talking about the fence that joined a large building to one of the docks quite near the finish).

It'll be interesting to see whether the organiser says or does anything about it in the results.

I enjoyed the race and the map, but didn't enjoy getting disqualified for stupidly missing a control. Thanks SELOC!

[JK]

Martin:
I assume there were others apart from us who went round and they (assuming unlike us they didn't mispunch elsewhere) were therefore at a disadvantage for reading their map. I'd be surprised if 1/3 of the guys who ran along there self-DQd since many won't realise till they start to type into Routegadget and the ones I spoke to didn't seem that way inclined.

Had I been the planner I wouldn't want such an accident to tempt people into unintentionally transgressing and then DQ themselves so I'd have thought it would be a sensible move.

[awk]

Enjoyed the course, only 1 leg that was not interesting. Well done to all the SELOC team, and mapper Tom Fellbaum. I heard positive comments from several people about what a good map it was. Urban maps will change all the time so spotting all the lat minute changes is a challenge.

Agreed - good map. On the race itself, I had expected a more technical course. As it was, it was one of the more straightforward urban races I've done; a nonetheless enjoyable run through Manchester and Salford.

[Homer]

I spotted the fence which had been removed and ran round.
I tend to agree with JK that the leg should be removed, but can also see Spooksters point of view. Not quite sure how you'd decide who'd transgressed though...

Thanks SELOC. Good day out and enjoyable run, although as awk says, maybe the planning could have set a few more challenges.

[andypat]

I always find this a difficult ethical conundrum. We are trying to market Urban orienteering as a more accessible version of the sport to runners etc, but try explaining to a newcomer why they should be DQ for crossing a fence that was (essentially although through no fault of the mapper/planner) incorrectly mapped.

If you think that the map is sacrosanct, presumably you think GG (WOC 2010 sprint qualifying) would have got away with climbing the uncrossable fence at where the non-existent gap was shown?http://grahamgristwood.blogspot.co.uk/2010_09_01_archive.html

I don't know the answer but I think it probably happens often enough to deserve a "special treatment" in the rules

[RS]

Which leg are we talking about on course 2?