A Capital Weekend - City Race & Southern Champs

[buzz]

I second the exceptional planning at Epping - there wasn't a single second where you could let concentration slip.

Can I third it? Fantastic planning on a great area. English orienteering at its best.

[denbydale]

There's a good video of last Saturday's race here
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vsizB0hj6bE

[Happy]

There's a good video of last Saturday's race herehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vsizB0hj6bE

Looks like the Men's Vets (M40+) and Women's Elite Course.

[King Penguin]

headcam wearer got caught by the fence by the water fountain !

[denbydale]

headcam wearer got caught by the fence by the water fountain !

He still managed to finish second though!

[HOCOLITE]

Brilliant Video wish I was there I love the passage ways, if urban races were not so long and full of those I'd be there everytime

[oo_wrong_way]

headcam wearer got caught by the fence by the water fountain !

Looking at the vid, even though I know it was wrong to take that route, I feel somewhat vindicated. I was an early arriver and the gate was still open. I don't recall seeing the gate or the fence and the video shows that with the gate open the fence was not really visible as you run through the arch. I know its no excuse and I have DQ'd myself but it was still good to see so many runners in the video not realising the uncrossable feature was there until they almost ran into it

[jtc]

I spent a while on SplitsBrowser looking at 3-4 on Mens Supervets and reached the conclusion that the fastest 27 on this leg had taken advantage of the fact that the uncrossable fence on the direct line had become crossable (i.e. unlocked) for a while.

On course 7 it's obvious from the splits who went through the gate, because the illegal route was very short and the legal route much longer. But if you DQ them what do you do about course 8, which had a longer leg to the same control, making it much less clear who transgressed. Only one person has an impossibly fast (for a W50) split for the leg, but is it fair to DQ her alone on that basis when she's unlikely to have been the only person who went through the gate?

I think you need to reassess how quickly the direct (illegal) route would take. 2-3 is longer than illegal 3-4 and took me 47 seconds. Illegal 3-4 would have taken me about 20-25 seconds. I went the long way round (didn't even attempt the illegal route - it was clearly a no-go) in 1:13. The illegal people stand out but none of them are in the top 20.

[Angry Haggis]

headcam wearer got caught by the fence by the water fountain !

Looking at the vid, even though I know it was wrong to take that route, I feel somewhat vindicated. I was an early arriver and the gate was still open. I don't recall seeing the gate or the fence and the video shows that with the gate open the fence was not really visible as you run through the arch. I know its no excuse and I have DQ'd myself but it was still good to see so many runners in the video not realising the uncrossable feature was there until they almost ran into it

All those, who I believe ran through, (I know I've missed one so far) have now been giving a 2 minute penalty rather than DSQ'd. The gate was opened at 10:06:30 by a resident who had seen the first few people running up to it, then blocked by the controller who discovered it at 10:52:00 and locked shut again by another (or the same) resident a few minutes later. I reckon around 80 people went through the gate - around twice as many avoided it - when it was open. Also interesting to note that overseas competitors were much more likely to go through it.

[graeme]

All those, who I believe ran through, (I know I've missed one so far) have now been giving a 2 minute penalty rather than DSQ'd.

Good decision.

[andypat]

Agreed! It might not be in the rules but it better fits the crime than a DQ.

[EddieH]

Common sense. I hope those that self dqd will be reinstated on this basis.

Interestingly I have just put the results on Winsplits and it is clear that there is an anomoly on course 9 leg 13. The first four have impossibly fast splits (impossible to have run legally OR illegally). Therefore the ONLY conclsion is that an SI unit (in this case the one before) uploaded the wrong time for these 4 people.

If this can happen it makes you wonder about dqing people on splits data.

[EddieH]

And looking further on leg 19 it happened again This time just 3 runners were affected, and it changes my performance from an error of over 1 minute to a rare leg win.

[Mr Chips]

@EddieH: if you are talking about course 9 of the City Race, the anomalies you report aren't visible on WinSplits Online.

[andypat]

Therefore the ONLY conclsion is that an SI unit (in this case the one before) uploaded the wrong time for these 4 people.

If this can happen it makes you wonder about dqing people on splits data.

I'd a similar split fault for control 3 (medium thistle)on day 1 of the Purple thistle this year. I got a split time of 1:08 which was the fastest split - it stood out as an anomaly for that reason - and looking at routegadget it looks like the split for that control is about a minute fast and the next control about a minute slow. I can race myself with the GPS versus the splits and it shows the GPS falling behind on 3 and catching up on 4! Not sure if its the SI unit or a corruption inn data on upload buty its definitely an error