Run Challenge

[tropso]

[quote=

Just out of curiosity does anyone know how much are BOF paying them?

Run Challenge has similarities to Parkrun. If BOF's structured it in the same way as the Parkrun organisation it should generate income.

http://www.parkrun.com/about/startyourownevent/ explains the setup costs for each Parkrun and how they expect £3,000 to come from the local area with the balance from Parkrun's sponsors and donations.

[tropso]

I'll point out that some of us are actively using county sports partnerships to promote orienteering. I'm intrigued by RunChallenge but as the nearest to me seems to be a whole county away it will be a while before I find out personally.
In the meantime we've only had reports from one organiser's events and they may not be typical (I hope they aren't)

In my experience County sport partnerships are very helpful.

I also hope my Run Challenge experiences aren't indicative of others held so far.

Steve

[Sunlit Forres]

Did you never talk to someone who said "I tried orienteering once at school/scouts/army and it was crap?".

Yes, and I've talked to plenty who said they enjoyed it too - I guess, like Run Challenge, it all depends who's delivering it and what support they had to get it right. Let's see what the feedback's like from other Run Challenges. Incidentally Graeme, much as Mini Moray had lots of new people trying (and apparently enjoying) orienteering (and proper orienteering at that, with all the controls in the right place) I can't think of one single person who has joined as a result.

It was great experience for the 11 teenagers who organised it, and it certainly captured the imagination of a lot of the newer club members, but it remains to be seen if there's much effect on getting more beginners to join a club, or even enter the 6 Days which was the idea in the first place. Despite loads of local publicity, there are so far only 43 people from Moray on the start list for the 6 Days, and all of them are club members. If local entries don't start picking up they'll be "sending me homewards to think again"!

[SeanC]

Just in case anyone isn't aware of this, BOF aren't really funding RunChallenge. BOF got the money from SportEngland.

I don't think it's fair to compare Run Challenge with MADO. Perhaps the 'explorer' events are a better comparison as these are aimed at young families.

SLOW have been putting on street events for years with clues as controls. In the winter it's the mainstay of their timetable. It doesn't seem to be damaging their club.

And it's clearly branded as RunChallenge not Orienteering. I don't think we need to worry about damaging the orienteering brand. It's different when a group of scouts get taken on a hike with welly boots on and it gets called orienteering. This isn't called orienteering.

What new project works perfectly first time? Come on, lighten up please.

In the hope that people will lighten up I ask you to find the typo on the 'About Run Challenge' page.

There are some things we (the o clubs) could learn from the format.

- Using OS maps. Might seem like the dark ages but it makes the events scalable. No relying on the club mapper to get through his or her backlog in 2014 before a new map can be drawn. An alternative might be Open Orienteering Map but I guess OS symbols are more familiar to newcomers.

- Score format of extra 10 points for arriving every minute early. I quite like that. It's much simplier than the mix of points and times in a normal score event.

I think the challenge will be the marketing and publicity. This takes time and eats up the budget if you're paying people. You also need to find someone who can organise an event and do publicity. Most people have skills in one or the other. Many of the club nights faced this issue.

I can't find Run Challenge's listed on Runners World, which I would have thought would have been the easiest and first thing to try. Perhaps this is deliberate, keep it low key whilst the teething troubles are sorted out in the first weeks?

I think Steve has the idea right. Go to these events, enjoy a midweek training run and see how it can benefit your club.

[Mrs H]

I don't think it's fair to compare Run Challenge with MADO. Perhaps the 'explorer' events are a better comparison as these are aimed at young families.

I'm not comparing Run Challenge with MADO - I'm contrasting it!

Does anyone know anything about the Explorer events?

[Oldman]

http://www.xplorer.org.uk

[Paul Frost]

And it's clearly branded as RunChallenge not Orienteering. I don't think we need to worry about damaging the orienteering brand. It's different when a group of scouts get taken on a hike with welly boots on and it gets called orienteering. This isn't called orienteering.

If it's clearly not "orienteering" why is the governing body of orienteering involved?
Even if it's "free" money, it's still distracting the organisation.

Don't get me wrong, I don't have a problem with putting on street events with non-standard orienteering maps, or using street furniture as control locations etc. I think it's a good idea, especially for winter training and to get orienteering into the public view. Joining up with local running and triathlon clubs to share the workload is also a good idea.

These are good ideas when part of an orienteering clubs calendar of events and activities. But why set up an new commercial organisation and divorce it from the core?

Couldn't the "free" money have been used to fund maps, volunteers and marketing support to existing clubs?

[besty]

It's because the NGB now considers itself a business rather than a sporting organisation. You just have to go back to editorials in recent editions of Focus to realise that this is the case.

[oo_wrong_way]

And it's clearly branded as RunChallenge not Orienteering.

Orienteering links appear on every page of the RunChallenge site. I would say it is quite clearly branded as a form of orienteering.

[greywolf]

... it remains to be seen if there's much effect on getting more beginners to join a club, or even enter the 6 Days which was the idea in the first place. Despite loads of local publicity, there are so far only 43 people from Moray on the start list for the 6 Days, and all of them are club members. If local entries don't start picking up they'll be "sending me homewards to think again"!

maybe the idea was rather unrealistic. if you were a complete beginner the 6 Days might be rather daunting, and even if you were going to give it a try you'd be going for the colour-coded courses, for which EOD is available. might be going for that myself some days

[Paul Frost]

Orienteering links appear on every page of the RunChallenge site. I would say it is quite clearly branded as a form of orienteering.

I don't agree that it is branded as a form of orienteering. Read the "About Run Challenge" text and there is no mention of likening it to orienteering. In fact none of the content text anywhere mentions orienteering. The only mention of orienteering is the "About orienteering" button in the navigation and the British Orienteering logo in the footer, neither have any reference as to why they are there or their relationship to RunChallenge.

In the introductory text why not include an explanation that RunChallenge is a simplified form of orienteering (with that linking to the about orienteering page), then on the about orienteering page you start it with a suggestion that if you enjoyed RunChallenge you might find orienteering a step up and a new challenge and then go on to explain the differences.

[DM]

MDOC Countryside score, Chelford, 12th June

Numbers; 45 ish
Age profile; 13 to 75

Mix of O club members, Running club members and independents, some coming along due to our winter street league and some by word of mouth.

No complaints about misplaced controls, compliments about the clues. Several queries from locals. Good atmosphere in the pub afterwards.

Next one will get more at the Vale Inn, Bollington, hopefully because people want to run and not only because they want to sample the micro brewery beer afterwards.

[Mrs H]

It looks like the Xplorer series is due to kick off this weekend in the EM/NE - if these have been properly promoted then they may do a lot better than the Run Challenge in attracting numbers - is anyone going along to see what it's like?

[AndyC]

to correct MrsH (I'm brave enough to) it looks from the website that Xplorer doesn't start in the NE until 28th June. I've heard nothing locally but I'm at the wrong end of NEOA and it's an hours drive from Newcastle to Stockton so maybe I'm not in the catchment area?

[denbydale]

One last night in Huddersfield but from 4pm to 5pm - Not exactly the best time to be going into Huddersfield and I see next one there Weds 10 July is also scheduled for 4pm to 5pm