LETTERS

JWOC report

I would like to point out some inaccurate reporting in the last edition of The Australian Orienteer regarding JWOC 2005 in Switzerland. The editorial (page 3), the article by Hilary Wood (page 18) and the caption on the photo accompanying Jason McCrae’s article (page 27) suggest that there was a sprint race at JWOC 2005. This is incorrect as till now a sprint race has never been included in the JWOC program. The event in which Hanny Allston came 4th in the junior women and Ryan Smyth 8th in the junior men took place prior to JWOC as part of the PostFinance Sprint race for elites. In both junior classes the field was limited (25 men and 21 women) and not representative of the JWOC field. A sprint race will be included for the first time in the JWOC program in Lithuania in 2006. I would also like to point out that the team of Jasmine Neve, Erin Post and Hanny Allston came 7th in the women’s class of the JWOC relays rather than 8th.

Paul Pacque Coach Australian JWOC 2005 team

(Ed: the Australian Girls JWOC relay team finished in 11th place in the race but, with four No.2 teams ahead of them, they were the seventh-placed national team. With so many unofficial teams in the race it was clearly difficult to confirm places on the day and Hilary Wood’s report for AO claimed eighth place for our team. Hilary did a great job getting reports and photos back from JWOC and I’d like to take this opportunity to thank her for the tremendous effort.)

Plastic Map Bags

A well-packed Orienteering map is a joy to use. A poorly packed one can be a nightmare. Yet still there are major events where the map packing is very inadequate. For 20 years in Queensland we have followed what we consider is the ideal formula. Firstly, the bag thickness must be 75micron. Bags at 50micron do a poor job, yet it’s still commonly used elsewhere. 75micron bags aren’t always easy to buy off-the-shelf, in which case a special run should be ordered, 5mm wider than the map and 15mm longer. (If the off-the-shelf 75micron bags are smaller than the map, consider cutting or folding the map.) The bag with map inserted should be exhausted of air before heat sealing. A swipe of the palm on a tabletop does a reasonable job but the gold standard is to roll out the air with a heavy roller. (We use a 90mm PVC pipe full of concrete). This makes the polythene cling to the map. The final stage is heat sealing (NOT sticky taping !) The result is a map that is a delight to use, takes multiple folds easily, is 100% waterproof, and doesn’t “scrunch”. Finally, a word about self-sealing bags. These are worse than useless. The seal is rarely waterproof, it is impossible to evacuate the air, they are hard to fold, they usually “scrunch”, and worst of all they are always 50micron. They should never be used.

Trevor Sauer (Qld) Give us more Oldies

I enjoy The Australian Orienteer very much. As you keep saying – it’s a good read. But I’m getting tired of seeing all those young and fit elites on the front cover. The majority of orienteers are not young and fit and they’re certainly not elite. Why don’t you show some ‘real’ orienteers on the front cover of your magazine? Show some of the older and lesser lights who are the true mainstays of our sport. Show Orienteering as it really is instead of trying to dress it up.

G. Jones

(Ed: It’s true that the majority of orienteers are not elites but that’s also true in all sports and, in most of them, the majority taking part are the older and less fit variety. But please remember that, along with the OA web site, The Australian Orienteer is the public face of Orienteering in Australia. I believe that we should present our sport in the best possible and most attractive light and the front cover of AO is the first thing people see when they pick up the magazine. It’s on the front cover that we should first celebrate the achievements of our best orienteers – by definition they’re the elites. The achievements of others amongst us are well covered in stories and photos inside the magazine. I try to make the coverage as wide as possible but, of course, space is limited. Golf probably has a similar age demographic to Orienteering. So when you next buy your golfing magazine will you expect to find Annika Sorenstam and Tiger Woods on the front cover, or the local weekend hacker? )

Orienteering Australia photo archive

PETER CUSWORTH maintains an archive of the digital photo files which have been used in The Australian Orienteer. These photo files can be made available for press releases or special promotional projects. Any material costs will be passed on to users. Contact Peter on 03 5968 5254 or cusworth@netspace.net.au

Creatures-O

Peter Hobbs (VIC)

Animals as controls; a large-scale colour map; some enthusiastic juniors, and a sunny Melbourne day is all that was required to conduct a fun and unusual Park-O event for both ‘big’ and little kids alike.

THE event was staged in conjunction with a regular Saturday series Park & Street-O event at Yarrunga Reserve in Croydon Hills on October 15th, 2005.

“Animals as controls?” I hear you ponder. This was achieved by using standard bushO controls with large pictures of animals attached to the stands. The animal theme did not stop there. The same images were miniaturised and used on maps in place of control numbers, and the images were also printed onto special control cards in place of numbers. Animal location descriptions such as ‘elephant at track junction’ also added to the theme.

Participants in the little kids’ course visited as many of the nine animals as they pleased in any order, whilst the ‘big’ kids’ course, 2.2km as the crow flies, was similar to a sprint event requiring competitors to visit the animals in a set order. The ‘big’ kids’ course contained an element of surprise and required some map memory as competitors were told only that: (1) you must visit the zebra first, (2) the zebra will inform you which animal you must visit next, and (3), the next animal will inform you which animal you must visit next, and so on.

Although the little kids event was by no means a race, the highly enthusiastic participants stayed out on the course for 20-45 minutes with most visiting all of the animals. Inquisitive passers-by, Nicholas Collins and his big sister, having noticed animals strewn around their local park, approached the registration table enquiring, “are all the animals yours?” In the blink of an eye they visited all of the animals in the fastest time of the day – nine minutes!

The ‘big kids’’ performance of the day came from Ian Dodd (DROC) who covered the course in 10min 30sec, followed by Bruce Patterson (BK), and Jenny Mitchell (BK) who lost valuable time locating the ‘bird at creek end’. Most competitors completed the course in 15-30 minutes.

The concept of ‘visiting the giraffe’ instead of ‘visiting control 12’ and the associated banter (e.g. “if you look over there you might be able to see the giraffe poke his head above the trees” and “its been 20 years since I’ve been to the zoo”) made for an entertaining and original Orienteering event. It was hugely gratifying to see the juniors so keen and excited about Orienteering, whilst the ‘big kids’ also enjoyed fine tuning their navigation skills on a short course with plenty of obstacles. Due to the success of the event it is likely that another will be organised in 2006.