GETTING AT BOF TIME AGAIN :)

[Mrs H]

I've had this idea about making the elite things more relevant to the everyday orienteer which might make people like LOT enjoy the articles more but I don't know how to make it work it goes like this:

You know when you get the maps with the elite courses and the routes the winners took - its really interesting to see but you can't truthfully say how you'd do the courses because you already know how they did it. What if their courses were printed on in some special invisible ink so you could draw your imaginary route on first and then lick the map or something and their course would be revealed I think it would be brilliant interactive fun and very instructive and educational - what do you think? Nick are you reading this?

[NeilC]

That's what I, and I'm sure many others, do with Routegadget. Look at the courses - decide your routes and then see what others actually did.

[brooner]

i have written an article and that wasn't published.

Well (within reason) there's no censorship on Nopesport. Why not publish your article on this thread. Then we can decide whether the Focus editor is being unfair.

Or submit it for our main news, we don't have much time to write stuff ourselves these days so any would-be hacks are more than welcome to submit things for the site news, just click on that big old "Submit Story" button up top.

[NFKleanne]

Totally love Mrs H's idea, wud be a bit unhygienic in my house with 7 people reading the magazine, may be heating the winners route would be better - as in onion ink (or something less smelly)

[mharky]

Well (within reason) there's no censorship on Nopesport. Why not publish your article on this thread. Then we can decide whether the Focus editor is being unfair.

ha ha ha ha ha ha ha

[AndyC]

I like Mrs H's idea - but much easier to print the map twice once without the routes and then over the page with route/s and comments about choices from the runners ( maybe add photograph showing that "open land " was really a jungle -that sort of thing)

[graeme]

You know when you get the maps with the elite courses and the routes the winners took - its really ...

... dull because they're the routes you'd have tried to take. What's interesting in any sports coverage is to see the moments that decided the race. Orienteering is basically a "negative" sport, in that the winners are those who do nothing bad, rather than something good. I never saw a "route choice that won the race". So, more interesting would be to see the really decisive moments - where potential winners messed it up. It would also be more informative for the rest of us to see how elites deal with (what I find) the hardest thing - identifying the potential time-losing legs ahead of time.

[Mrs H]

There you go Graeme - being elitist - you just don't see things as close to the ground as us humble folk. My idea is definitely fun for your less than average punter like LOT (Ooops sorry LOT - I meant like me!) - a bit like scratch and sniff - i think i'll call it "Line and Lick". Onion flavour yum yum

[Duncan]

... I never saw a "route choice that won the race".....

It is rare but it does happen some time. There have been times in Tio Mila long night for example when someone has taken a bold route choice and got away. E.g. in 2005 Anders Nordberg pulled out 2:26 over the pack. See here (scroll down to map on April 25th and subsequent posts). Sadly it was a relay and the rest of his KOK team first lost the lead then got DSQ...

[harry]

I never saw a "route choice that won the race".

Tio Mila a few years ago, the long night leg, Anders Norberg went over a hill instead of round it, almost everyone, at least the pack he was in went round.

What with blogging and internet forums (never before have so many people with so little to say said so much to so few) everyone has the opportunity to publish content. Clearly the vast majority of this is going to seem like a load of chod to most people and a small minority will enjoy it.

"Route choices that won the race" sounds like a good idea for an article / blog post faktist.

ah i was too slow..

[greywolf]

print the map twice once without the routes and then over the page with route/s....

As was done in Compasssport earlier this year wrt the Culbin Classic - don't know if Nick got any feedback about that? Did Nopers play?

What if their courses were printed on in some special invisible ink so you could draw your imaginary route on first and then lick the map or something and their course would be revealed

Have you tried licking CS & Focus Mrs H? amazing what you find...

[SeanC]

One thing I think the average orienteer could see more of is expert analysis. It would be nice to have some more expert analysis to explain how to do the most challenging orienteering. I thought Dave Peel's Compass Sport articles were really good - and very accessable to us punters. It would be great to see more of this type of article. For example some of us down south don't see contours so often and are all at sea when they get complex, and the various O books tend to concentrate on the intermediate standard orienteer - up to TD4 level. Blogs etc are all very well, but not the same as an edited magazine with map extracts, pictures, diagrams.

A kind of Alan Hanson type character? Probably someone with the right combination of skill, experience (coaching background?) etc is not so common, but there might be such a person reading this.

[harry]

Seems Nick's busy elsewhere just now
http://www.orienteering.asn.au/news/?ItemID=4886

[King Penguin]

Totally off-topic, but great result from Nick.

[Gross]

I never saw a "route choice that won the race".

Egil J won the 1978 World Champs taking a route choice... over a monstrous hill... you can't test run it anymore as it's a housing estate