Ripon

[Mrs H]

but i'm so unpopular already - i don't want to do anything to make it any worse

...and i don't accept that we shouldn't take the races seriously either Graeme - I've never felt so motivated to try hard and travel for events.

I suppose the answer will be that eventually we will all carry GPS trackers - I can't imagine it will take long enough for the technology to become readily available and cheap enough - perhaps they could be built into our di**ers and the trace downloaded at the same time as the rest of the information

[mappingmum]

Mrs H I take it you'd volunteer for gunner duty -who else?

Me

[awk]

it doesn't take many instances of people being caught before the instances of rule-breaking decline dramatically.

Why do you think that? It's over two years since we DQ'ed a third of the field in Edinburgh
http://www.rstrain.ndtilda.co.uk/results_08/euoc/
and I've yet to see this decline.

I don't think it's going to go away.

Well you can't do it once, and then expect it to have any form of lasting effect, especially two years later with a field that only includes 2-3 people who were at Edinburgh! I did say "not many" instances, but meant that to mean more than once!

But I agree, it's not going to go away - sport will always incorporate a certain amount of cheating, even when much more closely supervised than in orienteering. But I do think actually applying the rules more regularly will have an effect.

[andypat]

The obvious question for someone like me who wasnt at the event is - why was the easily crossable wall mapped as uncrossable?
If people were nipping over it to go to the loo it sounds like maybe it should have been mapped as light grey (crossable)- or possibly yellow (to be avoided unless you want wet feet )

And by the way - Mrs H unpopular?! Surely not.

[awk]

The obvious question for someone like me who wasnt at the event is - why was the easily crossable wall mapped as uncrossable?
If people were nipping over it to go to the loo it sounds like maybe it should have been mapped as light grey (crossable).

Because it was a wall directly alongside a busy-ish road (no pavement) on the other side from the assembly/finish. Runners bursting out of the undergrowth directly onto the road wasn't the safest idea, so it was redrawn as uncrossable for the race. Not really an issue outside a racing context. (Can see it clearly on street view in Google Earth, but don't know how to reference it here).

[Garnon]

the link to streetview is here:

http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?hl=en&q=ripon&ie=UTF8&hq=&hnear=Ripon,+United+Kingdom&gl=uk&ei=B-L6S4XRHsO64QbDqYBk&ved=0CCUQ8gEwAA&ll=54.135776,-1.528789&spn=0.001848,0.005681&t=h&z=18&layer=c&cbll=54.136141,-1.528725&panoid=uCMI9F96nQYIRfc2lEqFrw&cbp=12,260.13,,0,17.41

The wall in question is on the left and the open area to the right is where the start/finish/assembly etc were.

And looking at the splits for the last leg, it seems obvious who crossed the wall.... or maybe they were just extremely fast and/or didn't have for wait to cars to pass to cross the road!

[paw]

Despite the debate above - there cannot be any excuse for crossing an area mapped out of bounds, as I saw a fellow competitor do yesterday on the pitch to the south of the rugby club. I shouted over to tell him....and also noticed that he had finished slightly before me so asked the finish officials if anyone had voluntarily disqualified themselves. You can probably guess the answer......

[DaveK]

the link to streetview is here:

A nice picture. All it needs is someone in bright green 'O' bottoms and a lurid orange top rushing out of the bushes straight onto the road in true Mrs. H. 'style'.

[awk]

and also noticed that he had finished slightly before me so asked the finish officials if anyone had voluntarily disqualified themselves. You can probably guess the answer......

Having gently advised a previous Nopesport race prizewinner that what they did was not allowed, and seen them still collect their prize for their class in that race (they achieved it by a margin well less than they gained by their illegal if at the time inadvertant move), I've decided to in future simply report people, rather than go for voluntary self-disqualifications. My respect for that orienteer has plummeted too, but fortunately they reckoned they weren't going to be (m)any more urban races.
Thanks for the link Garnon.

[RJ]

......I've decided to in future simply report people.......

Unfortunately that won't have any effect, and may lead to people accusing you of wrongly accusing them! It is not a fair system of justice.

Either we solve the problem in a practical fashion, with controls, mapping changes, education, providing information, GPS, or having numerous marshalls then we have to live with it. The 'risk assessment' for each breach of a 'forbidden route' should be decided by the mapper, the planner and the organiser. If there is a safety issue (as apparently with this wall) then the course should avoid it. After all you don't take a course over the edge of a cliff! If it is future permissions, as with the debate we had some time ago about walls on Angle Tarn, then we have to live with the consequences of losing the use of the area.

The debate here nicely demonstates the desire of the event organisers to achieve an aim (perhaps safety) by designating a feature as 'not to be crossed' when it patently was crossable in reality. It is important that the competitor is informed so that they understand the reasoning behind the designation, but more important, the competitor mustn't be made to make such decisions in full flight. Not everyone is capable of absorbing all the map information for a particular leg while running at full tilt! Mistaking map and terrain synchronization is the nature of the sport!

[awk]

Unfortunately that won't have any effect, and may lead to people accusing you of wrongly accusing them!

Maybe, but I can live with that. As to fairness - I will leave that to the organisers, juries etc to judge that one. I certainly see it as fair - the person accused can still defend themselves (incidentally, in the specific case I quoted, it was witnessed by more than one, and was pretty cut and dried - the individual 'fessed up to me that they'd done it, inadvertantly).

I think all your measures are totally appropriate - and that's something planners will need to think about, although it's impossible to cover every base. Certainly, in hindsight (a wonderful thing!), I would put a control on the exit gate and/or position the finish official to keep an eye on the wall, but it does come back to the perennial challenge of walled areas - when to put controls on compulsory crossings and when not. Whatever, there is still no excuse for crossing a not to be crossed wall.

One point: knowing 'why' something is not to be crossed is simply impractical - you can't tell competitors for every item, and we don't need to know - the fact that it is not to be crossed is and should be enough.

In terms of being asked to make decisions, there was no 'decision' to take - there was only one legitimate route to the finish, and it was clearly shown on the map.

[yted]

As controller at Ripon I've been very interested in the discussion on cheating. A control on the park gate would have removed the problem but it seems a shame to have to do this and in many other instances it would spoil what are great legs. I decided that a. the wall was too dangerous to cross (due to lack of the pavement and the fact that the wall was enamelled and slippy when wet), b. the last control was perfectly positioned by the planners to give a superb penultimate leg c. the bending of the line to the finish would make it clear to even the most oxygen-starved competitor that the only gap in the uncrossable wall had to be used. It's VERY hard to believe that some one crossed it without realising they shouldn't. Looking at the splits, it seems to have happened. I'm quite willing indeed keen to investigate on the basis of the splits! But is that allowed? Or if some one tells me they saw some one cheating and can give me a name. The accused will always get their say as is right and proper of course. But we need to get a grip on this. Getting permission, planning, risk-assessing and controlling urban events is hard enough without cheats and those who defend them.
Thanks for all the positive comments on the planning and organisation - a great CLARO event.

[graeme]

I'm quite willing indeed keen to investigate on the basis of the splits! But is that allowed?

De facto, yes. I did it (see above) and I haven't been struck off yet! I invited people to ask for reinstatement: surprisingly a few even did, but faced with the question "So
where did that 20%-faster-than-rocky pace on that leg come from?" they backed down. Anyone who went through the OOB and blundered will have escaped the axe, but you can't win them all.

without cheats and those who defend them

Steady on... I don't think of the people we axed as "cheats": but I have no more hesitation in DQ'ing than, e.g., a long jumper who overstepped the mark.
With hindsight, we could have done things better (as could you) and avoided this outcome. Live, learn, let live...

[King Penguin]

After all you don't take a course over the edge of a cliff! !

I have seen it. At one of my early events I had one leg which was a straight run through some woods, across a major track (thick black line) and the control is just beyond. You guesed it - the thick black line (no tags) was an uncrossable cliff and I was approaching from above.

At Ripon, I did go through the aforementioned gate on the run-in and not over the wall - but only just stopped myself in time from cutting the corner just to the right of the path just before the gate where there was a small area of flower-bed OOB.

[Spookster]

It's VERY hard to believe that some one crossed it without realising they shouldn't. Looking at the splits, it seems to have happened. I'm quite willing indeed keen to investigate on the basis of the splits! But is that allowed? Or if some one tells me they saw some one cheating and can give me a name. The accused will always get their say as is right and proper of course. But we need to get a grip on this. Getting permission, planning, risk-assessing and controlling urban events is hard enough without cheats and those who defend them.

I didn't see anyone illegally cross the wall, but I can see fairly clear evidence in the split times that it happened. Oli ran the leg in 48 seconds, I ran it in 61 but could perhaps have done it in 50 if I'd gone over the other wall into the finish area which was ok to cross. I don't believe that an M55 can have legally run it in 43 seconds, when Bill Hanley (the leading M55 and a quick runner) took 67.

The logic you describe for the leg is good, and you also had a sign at the park exit warning runners of the road crossing and to take care. Had the runner who took the illegal route been hit by a car, we could now be discussing all sorts of unwanted knock-on effects for urban orienteering as a sport, not to mention a nasty accident or worse for the runner.

I think you should disqualify him.