BOC Weekend

[graeme]

It makes no sense to specify the EWT for an orienteer who is not eligible to win the competition - surely it should be the best British orienteer?

I don't think that makes any sense. Supposing Kasper Fosser became British - that would mean the W80 course gets 20% longer -why? Should all the JK courses get extended by 20% when Fosser's entry arrives? If we go with "gender equality" and Tove shows up, do you make the women's course longer than the men to get equal winning times?

To me, the only sensible thing is to follow the IOF definition of a Long course. Or, if you like the status quo, be honest about it and say the British Champs are 80% the length of an IOF course.

If we had a full length elite course, 21E might be seen as a aspiration rather than an obligation for anyone under 35. And that would be a good thing.

[graeme]

Having previously planned BOC Long, I asked that same question, "who is the M21E EWT aimed at".

When I did it, I was told the winning times for men & women should be 85-95 and 65-75. The winners were slap-bang in the middle of the range. Hoorah for me? Not really: the winning margins were 8 & 9 mins. nobody else was close to those ranges so it was just dumb luck.
If I had planned this year, I would be very happy with the course lengths (except M21A, which is stupidly long, but that's not the planners fault).

[NeilC]

When I planned BOC long I reckoned that in typical southern hilly, but vegetation dominated, terrain the top UK runners would be running around 4.5 mins per (height-adjusted) km. On the day Jamie Stevenson ran at 4.4 mins/km with GG just behind. Last weekend, and at Arnold's BOC, the winners were going at 4.1/4.2 mins/km.

As Graeme says it's a large mixture of guesswork and luck.

[SJC]

except M21A, which is stupidly long, but that's not the planners fault

Both M21L and M21S are really too long for the average non-Elite runner.
Hard to encourage a relatively new M21 to even run the Short course when at 9.2km it is longer than the Brown course will have been at most events.

[Atomic]

I don't think that makes any sense. Supposing Kasper Fosser became British - that would mean the W80 course gets 20% longer -why? Should all the JK courses get extended by 20% when Fosser's entry arrives? If we go with "gender equality" and Tove shows up, do you make the women's course longer than the men to get equal winning times?

I agree the idea that the course length is based on a winning time at all is somewhat odd. Imagine if Marathons were not 42195m long, but as winning times reduced over the last 100 yrs the marathon had got longer to compensate for it? Or if some marathons were shorter because they were hillier? Or if the 100m became the 110m because Usain Bolt was faster than the guys in the early 1900s, but now had to get slightly shorter again because the next generation of runners aren't quite as fast. There are sports where time determines the course length - but these are strict time like "furthest you can cycle in an hour" or "30 minutes then finish the lap you are on" not the judgement of the person designing the course.

The point is it's an expected winning time - if you don't expect Fosser, Tove or indeed Gristwood to show up then it seems reasonable to plan accordingly; if you don't expect 20 deg heat or hail storms you don't need to presume there will be.

I realise why we define it these ways but I think there's probably a bit too much obsession and dissection of the results afterwards with people complaining courses were too short/long etc. Personally, if I was creating the rules I would have set a minimum distance and allowed the planner to exceed this where it was particularly fast running terrain and they anticipate the leading runners are likely to complete it less than X minutes. However, I also don't think it makes that much sense to set the other courses simply as multiples of the M21E. The "scaling" will be totally different from M21-W80 if the terrain is steep, heather and bracken-strewn hillside crossed by many fences rather than fairly level, fast runnable forrest.

[Len]

Both M21L and M21S are really too long for the average non-Elite runner.

I'd be interested in how you define a 'non-elite' runner?
Or even a 'non-elite' orienteer, as the two are different things.

[Arnold]

Ah but trying to hit the EWTs at least for the Elite is part of the "fun" of planning a BOC, and you do need to have some sort of guidelines.

Interestingly M21E Long has the narrowest % range to hit, with the longest time (100) only just over 10% more than the shortest (90). BOC Middle is 17% (35/30) and Sprints 25% (15/12). There's also more likely to be a dependency on a single runner so one big mistake (or not) can easily skew things.

[Snail]

I agree there is too much obsession with the 'right' length / winning time. I would rather have an excellent course that is 10% too long or short than a good course of the right length.

That also means I would be happy for the number of courses to be reduced. The current guideline indicates that the recommended course combinations are designed for an entry of 3000, and we are now nowhere near that.

[NeilC]

if I was creating the rules.... I also don't think it makes that much sense to set the other courses simply as multiples of the M21E

How would you write that rule? This is what it currently states:

2.7.3 Applying the course length ratios – points to watch out for:
• M21 (or Black) probably uses the whole area. The shorter courses use only part of it, and this might be more or less runnable, or steeper/flatter, than the average
• rough terrain has a greater effect on the running speed of younger and older competitors than of M21s
• older competitors are significantly affected by steep terrain, particularly downhill
• older competitors find dense tree growth more of an obstacle – suppleness decreases with age
• There is no magic formula for allowing for these variables.

[maprun]

When the worst storm in the south-east for 35 years hits the area 5 weeks beforehand, though not as badly as many other areas, what does the planner do? Plus there was the incessant rain that only abated a week before, that turned large swathes of the flatter areas into "unseasonal" marshes. I would blame the planner's weather runes, except my age group long and short course winner's time were within EWT range.

[SeanC]

Instead of thinking about expected winning times, what about the expected slowest times? And what is too long even for a long event?

Middling people like me can look at the final details and opt for a B/Short course if we don't fancy being out for a massive time, but what about people doing the shortest course for their age class who are out for 3 hours etc? Without a genuinely short option the answer might be 'I'm not going to that event again'. Is that what we want?

The simple answer would be to scrap the current B/Short course system and offer 4 or 5 B/Short courses for anyone to choose from, say 8km, 6km, 5km, 4km and 2.5km.

Here's the longest time by age category (number of runners on that course)

M10B: 56:59 (1)
M12B: 34:45 (1)
M14B: 97:23 (3)
M16B: 138:58 (2)
M18B: (0)
M20B: (0)
M21B: 195:43 (9)
M35S: 167:32 (3)
M40S: 129:21 (2)
M45S: 146:04 (12)
M50S: 114:24 (4)
M55S: 171:51 (20)
M60S: 119:52 (16)
M65S: 128:02 (11)
M70S: 108:35 (14)
M75S: 105:05 (14)
M80: 157:13 (16)
M85: 96:06 (6)
M90: 125:32 (3)
W10B: 109:44 (2)
W12B: 57:42 (1)
W14B: (0)
W16B: 102:47 (1)
W18B: 108:19 (2)
W20S: (0)
W21S: 140:46 (2)
W35S: 68:48 (3)
W40S: 100:16 (6)
W45S: 113:20 (7)
W50S: 136:37 (13)
W55S: 129:54 (16)
W60S: 138:54 (7)
W65S: 149:00 (9)
W70S: 110:22 (10)
W75: 141:04 (16)
W80: 160:20 (9)
W85: 65:22 (1)

[Atomic]

if I was creating the rules.... I also don't think it makes that much sense to set the other courses simply as multiples of the M21E

How would you write that rule? This is what it currently states:

2.7.3 Applying the course length ratios – points to watch out for:
• M21 (or Black) probably uses the whole area. The shorter courses use only part of it, and this might be more or less runnable, or steeper/flatter, than the average
• rough terrain has a greater effect on the running speed of younger and older competitors than of M21s
• older competitors are significantly affected by steep terrain, particularly downhill
• older competitors find dense tree growth more of an obstacle – suppleness decreases with age
• There is no magic formula for allowing for these variables.

OK - so are you saying the earlier statement that the only fixed rule was M21E should be 90-100 minutes and all other courses are then a simple multiple of that distance is misleading? I've never planned a BOC so haven't studied the competition rules in depth - so took at face value the claim above that the rules said it was simple maths rather than judgement for all the other courses.

[Atomic]

Instead of thinking about expected winning times, what about the expected slowest times? And what is too long even for a long event?

Middling people like me can look at the final details and opt for a B/Short course if we don't fancy being out for a massive time, but what about people doing the shortest course for their age class who are out for 3 hours etc? Without a genuinely short option the answer might be 'I'm not going to that event again'. Is that what we want?

The simple answer would be to scrap the current B/Short course system and offer 4 or 5 B/Short courses for anyone to choose from, say 8km, 6km, 5km, 4km and 2.5km.

I agree - but I do get the point that it is supposed to be the British LONG Champs. However, if you are (like me) in the "definitely not winning the L course" camp - there would be more incentive to join the S course if there were a decent number of people there to make it more interesting and so it would likely be better to combine classes. Anyone ever congratulated their W14B competitor for winning only to see their face when they realise they were the only W14B!

Perhaps more surprising is there doesn't seem to be an M/W21N class - so adults can only compete at the British Champs if they are at TD5 level. There does seem to be an Orange colour course but the results suggest those weren't people out for medals. I'm guessing in large parts of the country with limited terrain to train on that will take most adults about 3 years to reach that standard. Is the only realistic way to end up as an "M/W21 Elite" to have started as a junior?

[NeilC]

The starting position is that you try and get the 90-100 min winning time right for the M21E based on whatever knowledge is to hand regarding how to do this (the rules have some suggestions for this as well). Once you have that, ratios are provided for all the other age classes to avoid having to go through the same process for each - the ratios are based on historical data comparing age class speeds with M21E speeds. These provide a starting point (and often an end point) for the age class distances but then some adjustments can be made if the area is atypical or non-homogenous.

[Atomic]

I'd be interested in how you define a 'non-elite' runner?
Or even a 'non-elite' orienteer, as the two are different things.

For Orienteering (at east in the UK) it is essentially a self-selection process. Elite runners enter the M/WxxE course. Anyone who doesn't fancy that level of competition enters the M/WxxL or M/WxxS and therefore are "non-elite".