The Australian Orienteer – March 2006

Urban Orienteering – a learning experience

w w w. o r i e n t e e r i n g . a s n . a u President: Bob McCreddin Director (Administration): Dave Lotty, PO Box 740 Glebe NSW 2037. Ph.‑(02) 9660 2067‑(w), (02) 9569 2380 (h) orienteering@sydney.net Director (Finance): Kathy Liley, 83 Kenmare St., Watsonia VIC 3087 Ph. (03) 9432 4023 Director (Development): Bob Mouatt, PO Box W49 Wanniassa ACT 2903 Ph. (02) 6231 2463 Director (Technical): Andy Hogg, 23 Aston Crescent Cook ACT 2614 Ph. (02) 6251 9777 1 June 2006 Director (High Performance): Mike Dowling, 17 High Street Bellerive TAS 7018 Ph. (03) 6244 7173 Contributions deadlines: Manager (Coaching Programs): Neville Bleakley, 30 Gledden Street Chifley ACT 2606 Ph. (02) 6207 3723 Time-sensitive April 21 Badge Applications: John Oliver, 68 Amaroo Street Wagga‑Wagga NSW 2650

Next issue

Other contributions April 14

STATE ASSOCIATIONS Queensland OA: PO Box 114 Spring Hill QLD 4004 Secretary: Robin Spriggs Ph.‑(07) 3369 0880 (h) qoa@qoa.asn.au OA NSW: PO Box 740, Glebe NSW 2037 Secretary: Dave Lotty Ph.‑(02) 9660 2067 (w), 9569 2380 (h) orienteering@sydney.net Orienteering ACT: PO Box 402, Jamison Centre ACT 2614. Office - John Suominen ph (02) 6251 3885 actoa@iimetro.com.au Victorian OA: 332 Banyule Rd, Viewbank VIC 3084 Secretary: Warwick Williams Ph. (03) 9459 0853 voa@netspace.net.au OA South Australia: State Association House, 73 Wakefield Street Adelaide SA 5000. Secretary: Phil Stoeckel OA Western Australia: PO Box 234 Subiaco WA 6904 Secretary: Cath Chalmers Ph.‑(08) 9380 4049 (h) catheoin@ozemail.com.au Orienteering Tasmania Inc.: PO Box 339, Sandy Bay, TAS 7005 Secretary: Warwick Moore Ph.‑(03) 6248 6405 secretary.oti@trump.net.au Top End Orienteers (Northern Territory): PO Box 39152 Winnellie NT 0821 Secretary: Susi Bertei Ph.‑(08) 8981 5841

CONTENTS ISSN 0818-6510 Issue 1/06 (no. 141) MARCH 2006

FROM THE PRESIDENT....................... 5

The national magazine of Orienteering Australia Inc. ABN 77 406 995 497 Published four times a year: First day of March, June, September, December. Print Post Approved PP 236080/00011

N E W S .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6

Editor: Michael Hubbert, P.O. Box 165, Warrandyte, Victoria 3113 mikehubbert@ozemail.com.au Phone/fax (03) 9844 4878 Magazine Design & Assembly: Peter Cusworth, 8 View Street, Avonsleigh, Vic. 3782. Ph. (03) 5968 5254 cusworth@netspace.net.au Magazine Treasurer: Kathy Liley Printer: Priden Printing Services, 21 Century Drive, Braeside, Vic. 3195 Next edition: Cover date: 1 June 2006 Contribution deadlines: April 14. Time-sensitive material, April 21.

Deadline dates for contributions are the latest we can accept copy.

Publication is normally planned for the 1st of March, June, September & December. Copies are dispatched in bulk to State associations in the week prior to that date.

Regular Contributors: Badge Awards: John Oliver; Coaching/Training: Nev Bleakley; Competition: Blair Trewin; High Performance: Mike Dowling; MTBO: Blake Gordon; Official News: Dave Lotty; Running the Business: Bob Mouatt; Ski-O: Ian Baker; Nutrition: Gillian Woodward; Training: Steve Bird; Psychology: Jason McCrae.

Contributions are welcome, either directly or via State editorial contacts.

Prior consultation is suggested before preparing major contributions.

Guidelines for Contributors are available from the editor or from state contacts.

State Editorial Contacts Qld. – Liz Bourne 07 4683 6374 (h) batmaps@halenet.com.au NSW – Ken Sinclair 02 9639 9675 sicad@ozemail.com.au ACT – Philip Purcell philippurc@hotmail.com Vic. – SA – Claire Davill 08 8226 4381 (w) davill.claire@saugov.sa.gov.au WA – Cath Chalmers 08 9380 4049 catheoin@ozemail.com.au Tas. – Mary Hawthorne 03 6243 8616 (h) editor.oti@trump.net.au Subscriptions: State Association members via State Associations. Contact relevant Association Secretary for details. Other subscribers: Write to The Australian Orienteer, PO‑Box 165, Warrandyte, Vic. 3113. Within Australia: $36 inc GST. Overseas: Asia/Pacific (inc. NZ) $40, Rest of World $45.

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Subscription renewals (direct subscriptions only). The number in the top right-hand corner of the address label indicates the final issue in your current subscription.

Opinions expressed in The Australian Orienteer are not necessarily those of Orienteering Australia.

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2 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2006

L E T T E R S .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 CLASSIC INJURIES........................... 12 DID YOU KNOW?.............................. 16 MARKETING ORIENTEERING............... 17 INTERVIEW – Sue Key....................... 19 COACHING...................................... 20 T I P S & T E C H N I Q U E S F O R R A D I - O.. . . . . . . 2 2 SPORTS PSYCHOLOGY...................... 26 A P O C 2 0 0 6 .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 7 H I G H P E R F O R M A N C E R E P O R T.. . . . . . . . . . . . 3 0 THE FUTURE OF MAPPING................. 31 T O P E V E N T S.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 2 EFFICIENT MAP READING.................. 33 MTB-O TIPS.................................... 35 M T B - O C O U R S E S E T T I N G.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 6 URBAN ORIENTEERING...................... 38 MTB-O NEWS ................................. 41 TRAINING....................................... 42 IT’S A THOUGHT SPORT.................... 44 RUNNING THE BUSINESS................... 46 OFFICIAL NEWS............................... 47

Front Cover: The next generation – sisters Megan and Lauren Jennings and Tess Torr learned their Orienteering skills in Melbourne’s western suburbs events. (photo: Mike Hubbert)

MARKETING ORIENTEERING

MARKETING SUCCESS – The Swiss Story

Left: Simone Niggli is interviewed on the TV program Sportpanorama.

Below: Simone and Matthias Niggli on the cover of the magazine Schweizer Illustrierten which ran a multi-page feature inside.

(compiled by Mike Hubbert) SWITZERLAND can boast top-10 tennis players, top orienteers and they even won the Americas Cup. Names like Federer and Hingis regularly appear in news media and magazines around the world.

How does this nation of just 7.4 million people produce such numbers of sporting stars?

Orienteering is a growth sport in Switzerland with annual growth rates of around 14% in the numbers of regular orienteers since 2001. One reason for the growing popularity is the recent international success of Swiss orienteers such as Vroni KonigSalmi, Simone Niggli, Daniel Hubmann and Marc Lauenstein.

Switzerland now has over 8000 member orienteers.

Swiss sporting successes are marketed to the Swiss public. No better example is the way Simone Niggli has been feted since she returned with four gold medals from WOC2005 in Japan, repeating her feat from WOC2003.

When Simone Niggli arrived back home after winning an unprecedented second bag of four gold medals she was met at the airport by her train. She had previously won all four golds at WOC2003, held in Switzerland, and to honour the occasion the Swiss railways had named an Inter-City train after her and painted her image along the side of the front carriage.

Sure enough, this year that same train met her at the airport to take her home to Munsingen. Some 500 people were waiting at the airport to welcome Simone home. She said, “It was really exciting to see how many people were there waiting for me.” As they travelled on the “Simone” train back to Munsingen a TV crew interviewed Simone on her triumphs in Japan.

Then, late in 2005 Simone was acclaimed Swiss Sports Star of the Year, following her domination of world Orienteering. The award is made by votes from the public and is the second time that Simone has been awarded this crown. She had previously won the award in 2003.

“After the World Championships in my own country, where I won all four gold medals, I’d never thought that it could happen again,” said a beaming Simone. The ten times gold medallist was asked about her next targets. “I enjoy my Orienteering and the fresh challenges of competing in different terrains. My next aim is the 2006 World Championships in Denmark.”

All this raises the question – does the popularity of Orienteering amongst the general public depend on success at international level by the best orienteers in the country?

Certainly, corporate sponsorship and funding support from government instrumentalities is more prevalent amongst those sports with a high public profile. Australian Prime Minister, John Howard, meets and greets medal winners from high profile sports, but not orienteers.

Let’s go back to Switzerland - Federal Swiss President Samuel Schmid entertained the Swiss Orienteering team at a special brunch in the capital, Bern. President Schmid said, “I have every fifth Saturday free and I’d really like to spend some of these Saturdays with you.”

When French champion Thierry Gueorgiou first won a World Championships gold medal in 2003 he was invited to meet with French President Jacques Chirac on his return to France. Gueorgiou later said that he hoped to meet the President several times again by winning more gold medals.

Australians are knocking on the door of major Orienteering success at international level. Adrian Jackson already has four medals from World Mountain Bike Championships and Hanny Allston has a medal from JWOC and a podium finish at WOC.

Left: Simone Niggli poses for photographers and reporters beside ‘her train’.

Others such as Julian Dent are achieving very promising results. But which of our politicians have put their hands up to congratulate them?

Should we in Australia be making more of these successes by our top orienteers to help promote our sport to the general public, potential financial supporters and to government instrumentalities?

In other words, should we use their successes to raise the media and government profile of Orienteering in Australia?

On one hand we do not want to place too much pressure on our young emerging stars and perhaps interfere with their training and future success, but on the other hand we do need to clearly demonstrate that Orienteering is becoming a force in the Australian sporting world and that we deserve a higher media profile and enhanced financial support to fund development.

It’s a delicate path to follow but other countries such as Switzerland, France, and more recently China, seem to be finding the right balance and are reaping the rewards of creating a higher media and public profile for Orienteering in their countries.

Schweizer Sport is running a lottery to raise funds for sport.

Brochures feature Simone Niggli and Olympic fencing medallist Marcel Fischer. A ticket costs the equivalent of $A20 and the total prize pool is valued at over four million dollars. The top prize is ten kilos of gold bullion sponsored by Credit Suisse and worth over $A180,000. (Hint for Tabcorp ?)

Yet the Swiss Orienteering federation says it must do more.

In a recent edition of their magazine OL-fachschrift the finance chief and vice-President, Hansruedi Walser, said the federation must intensify its sponsorship drive. The federation has just one major sponsor, the bank PostFinance, and so must actively search for a major co-sponsor. “Above all, the orienteering magazine and a visitor-friendly web page are important platforms to sell Orienteering, making it attractive to sponsors and to help us keep them,” he said. “A greater sensibility to sponsorship matters must be developed in the federation.”

Simone Niggli photos courtesy OL-fachschrift.

Translations – Ian Baker MARCH 2006 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 3

FROM THE PRESIDENT

Bob McCreddin, President, Orienteering Australia

ONE of the fascinating aspects of the conduct of Orienteering across Australia for me is the extraordinary high level of personal commitment that all orienteers make to ensuring that events of all levels are conducted regularly, efficiently and smoothly, using challenging and interesting courses on so many varied and excellent maps.

The commitment that orienteers in all regions across all States make to ensuring that there are regular events of a first rate standard throughout the year is a staggering achievement.

There is a marvellous sense of community among orienteers.

It exists at the club level due to the need to support one another in competitions and in the conduct of events. It exists at the State level because of the cooperation provided and the commitment given to seeking to provide first rate experiences for friends who have previously done the right thing by us. It similarly exists at the national level because of the appreciation of the efforts made by all State groups to conduct first quality events for appreciative orienteers from across Australia who have become genuine friends.

I am, personally, enormously proud of the manner in which clubs and States so genuinely and successfully conduct such first rate club, state and national programs of Orienteering events.

However, this extraordinary commitment by so many participants may also be part of the reason that Orienteering fails to appeal to so many who visit our sport. We can all recount stories of people who came to try Orienteering, enjoyed the experience, but were worried about getting too involved because of the obviously high levels of volunteerism sought of our members. We consciously choose an organisational pattern for Orienteering that in comparison to other sports and recreations is high on volunteerism and low on fees.

We can all quote examples of huge event entry fees levied in other sporting and recreational activities. We may need in future years to again seriously review the model for the conduct of Orienteering in order to decide the most appropriate funding model.

The commitment that orienteers have shown to competition and organisation at the State and national level has increasingly resulted in Australian orienteers participating in events and activities internationally. With the Junior World Orienteering Championships in Dubbo in July 2007 and the World Masters Orienteering Championships out of Sydney in 2009, Australian orienteers again have the opportunity to demonstrate their commitment to the sport and its competitors at the international level, so please start to plan your participation accordingly – recall that the JWOC Carnival will include the normal October activities of the Australian Championships and the Schools Championships with the Oceania Championships then being conducted in Canberra in October.

- Keep spiking those controls!

Bob McCreddin

Sports Au s t r a l i a n

F o u n d a t i o n

Support your Sport through taxdeductible donations to the Australian Sports Foundation Check out the details and download the donor’s form from

www.orienteering.asn.au

VICTORINOX AWARD Orienteering has always been “The Thought Sport” but in recent times that image has been taken to a higher level by Jason McCrae’s excellent articles on Sport Psychology. He has made us think about our preparation for Orienteering in a different way. His advice and suggested action plans for major events have meant a whole new approach for many of us.

Jason is a worthy winner of the Victorinox award. He receives a Victorinox Voyager with 20 tools and features including a watch/alarm/timer; retail value $109.95

MARCH 2006 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 5

NEWS

NEWS

National Training Centre at ACTAS

World Record claimed

Julian Dent (NSW) and Danielle Winslow (Tas) have been granted National Training Centre scholarships that enable them to be members of the ACTAS Orienteering Squad and yet compete for their home National League teams. As well, David Meyer (NSW) has been granted a National Training Centre scholarship funded by his home State. He, too, will be able to compete for his home State “Ultimax Stingers” in the National League.

In the calendar year 2005, Mike Hubbert (M60) of Victorian club Bayside Kangaroos completed 180 courses. This achievement is being claimed as a world record in Orienteering.

Along the way Mike visited 2292 controls and covered 1038km in 210 hours. Mike ran in the first event (of the modern era) held in Upper Beaconsfield in 1969 and has been orienteering ever since. In 2004 he completed 176 courses.

In 2004 a Norwegian orienteer, Frode Konst of the Oslo club IL Tyrving, claimed to have set the record at 142 courses completed, beating British runner Mark Thomson’s claimed record of 140 courses.

Mike’s tally of courses was closely followed by Jenny Sheahan (W60) and John Sheahan (M65), of Bayside Kangaroos, who both completed 173 courses. A number of other Victorian orienteers have chalked up high numbers of courses completed in 2005 and an article appeared recently in the international magazine Orienteering Today.

Bob McCreddin (left) President, Orienteering Australia, seals the deal with a handshake with Ken Norris, Manager ACT Academy of Sport.

Uproar in Sweden Some 800 Swedish elite orienteers have petitioned SOFT, the Swedish national orienteering body, protesting at the way recent changes to event programs have seen Classic (long-distance) events being replaced by Sprint and Middledistance events.

In an “Open letter to SOFT” they single out the programs for the Swedish Elitserien 2006 and O-Ringen 2006 Super-Elit in which they claim there is too much emphasis on Sprint and Middle-distance formats. The Elitserien 2006 runs from April to June and comprises one Ultra-long-distance race, two Long-distance, two Middle-distance and two Sprints. In the O-Ringen Super-Elit in July there will be one Middle-distance, one Sprint and one Long-distance event.

BOOMERANGS – new name for National Senior Team The National Senior Team will now be known as the BOOMERANGS, a name which well suits our team of flying orienteers who will spin their way through the bush and come rushing back to the finish in spectacular fashion. OA registered the name last December.

Royal Patron for WOC2006 Denmark: WORLD ORIENTEERING CHAMPIONSHIPS 2006 Patron: His Royal Highness Crown Prince Frederik.

Does this mean that the WOC2006 Patroness is a Tasmanian?

Future WOCs to be spread In the future the International Orienteering Federation board will make decisions on where world championships are to be held, seeking a better geographical spread. So-called “poorer countries” have an advantage in that they can offer less costly WOC packages.

Swiss orienteering grows 27 per cent Orienteering is a growth sport in Switzerland. At the end of 2003, the number of regular orienteers had grown by no less than 27% compared with the number at the end of 2001. It is clear that this is the result of sCOOL (schools program) and WOC2003 in Switzerland.

Figures published in the Swiss magazine Sponsoring show the growth sports are skate boarding (+72%) and football (+16%). Sports which have lost numbers include handball, cross-country skiing and tennis. The report says that more recently cross-country skiing has shown increasing numbers and tennis has stabilised.

OL, Switzerland

Lifetime Most Courses Tally Mike Hubbert (VIC) has edged ahead of Dave Lotty (NSW) in the Most Courses duel, thanks largely to the extensive Summer Series programs held in Melbourne. At time of publication Mike had completed 2125 courses while Dave’s tally stood at 2094.

We’d like to hear from other orienteers who are recording their tally of courses completed. There must be some out there who are approaching 2000 courses. Write to the Editor, The Australian Orienteer.

6 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2006

NEWS Carry-O Early Orienteering events in Bulgaria were held in the format we now know as Long-O. Teams of 3 or 4 members competed over two days on courses which were 30 to 40km long. Teams camped out overnight and had to carry all their equipment in the same way that Mountain Marathon competitors have to do today. But there was a catch – usually each team had to carry one of their members for 1 or 2 kilometres as well.

Honour for Hanny In early February, Hanny Allston was named the Tasmanian Junior female Athlete of the Year for 2005. Hanny’s achievements at State, national and international levels last year were recognised, making her a very worthy recipient of the award.

Bill Jones (President, Orienteering ACT) leads by example as he prepares to donate blood to the Australian Red Cross Blood Service. Bill was one of nine orienteers who made a group donation on 21 December. The others were: Kerryne Jones, Colin & Colleen Mock, Jenny Hawkins, Tom de Jongh, Murray Scown, Emma Murray and David Osmond (a local distance runner).

LETTERS

The Australian Orienteer welcomes letters. Preference will be given to letters which are concise and which make positive points. The editor reserves the right to edit letters, particularly ones which are longer than 300 words.

Tripping Hazards

More Oldies

During the 2005 Victorian Orienteering Championships at Barambogie an incident occurred at the downloading tent that resulted in a great deal of pain and distress to one of the competitors. After downloading, Libby Hassall began to move away from the tent and immediately fell heavily to the ground. She had tripped over the tent guy rope which was in the path of those leaving the tent.

I note that in the December’05 AO ‘letters’, G. Jones again raised the point I tried to make many times to your predecessor (Ian Baker), that AO is too heavily weighted to the elites. Your answer was a re-run of his - including the supposed comparison with golfing magazines that only feature elites, not hackers.

The fall resulted in a torn rotatorcuff and ruptured supraspinatis tendon in the left shoulder. She was referred to a surgeon who doubted that he would be able to repair the tendon as it had retracted so far that he would not be able to re-attach it. If this was the case normal use of the arm would not be possible.

The surgeon scheduled an operation to see what could be done for the injury. The operation took place late at night and the result was not available until the next morning. It was a great relief to read the report stating that the procedures had been completely successful …… but the rehabilitation period would take several months and full use of the arm would take two years. In the meantime the arm must be totally immobilised in a brace for six weeks.

This incident shows how easily an injury can occur from simply tripping over a tent rope. At every Orienteering event there would be tripping hazards resulting from the setting up of the infrastructure. Perhaps a safety assessment should be made when the setting up is completed so that the risk of such an accident occurring is lessened.

Ian Hassall (IK-N) Libby Hassall at the AUS Relays in 2004 - she’s now well on the way to recovery.

I will now make the same point to you as I did several times to Ian - this is NOT a valid comparison. I can choose to purchase a golfing magazine, or not. I do not choose to purchase AO - much of the price is thrust upon me compulsorily as part of my registration as a member of a State association (required to compete in Champs, etc). In answer, please find me a golf club that requires compulsory purchase of a golfing magazine as part of their membership.

Ian used to defend this compulsion to purchase AO as it being necessary for its survival. If so, AO is in a completely different market, and should listen more to the wants of its readers. Who is your front cover with elites supposed to be appealing to - the already committed orienteer, or an ‘outsider’ we wish to impress? I suggest that you can’t have it both ways - either AO is a compulsory rag for members, or it is a commercial publication setting whatever standards it wants for the marketplace.

Alternatively, if it is primarily an advertising tool, let us all be levied say $10 per year for promotion of O, and let us off having to buy the magazine.

Glenn Bridgart (WE-A) (Ed: Glenn – In obtaining your AO through your membership of OACT you’re getting it at a sizeable discount – currently 42% discount and soon to be more when non-member rates are raised. We can only offer such a discount by ensuring we achieve reasonable circulation levels.

We try to make every edition of AO the ‘best read possible’ for our subscribers. You clearly do read AO so getting it via your membership is probably the best option for you.)

MARCH 2006 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 7

NUTRITION

Too much of a good thing Julie Flynn (Evan Barr’s mother) This article has been written with Evan’s consent.

Orienteers rarely experience life-threatening conditions related to their sport. This is a story about such an event. As usual with these incidents, it followed a series of unfortunate circumstances, this time at the Christmas 5-Days. The condition is hyponatremia, and it happened because of heavy sweating and an attempt to recover from dehydration by drinking too much water.

Hyponatremia: deficiency of sodium in the blood.

It can be fatal if the salt levels in the blood are too low. Sodium, potassium and chlorine are vital for every muscle cell contraction and every nerve cell transmission in our bodies. These salts are lost through our sweat and urine.

THE Christmas 5-Days promised to be an enjoyable opportunity for bush orienteering in some great terrain and time to relax with friends at Buckenderra. After having spent Christmas with relatives in Canberra, we drove (in two cars) to the first event site just south of Cooma. En route we bought our supplies, including sports drinks to help with hydration, knowing that we’d get pretty hot running on the first evening. The first unfortunate circumstance was that the shopping, including these drinks was in the parents’ car.

It was a hot day and, typically for the 5-Days, the first event was run in the late afternoon. Water on the courses ran out quickly, so that those of us who ran later and didn’t carry water, missed out. Thirsty runners had emptied the containers of water at the finish well before many of us arrived back. The second unfortunate circumstance was that Evan didn’t run with water, had none on his course and had none at the finish after his 7km run in the heat.

Soon after returning to the finish area following our run, Neil and I (his parents) headed off to Buckenderra, to set up our tent for the next four days in a good shady position (third unfortunate circumstance). We expected Evan and his sister Ilka to follow along soon afterwards. The kids didn’t get to Buckenderra until after dark; they’d got themselves lost relying on the ambiguous copied map from the program (fourth unfortunate circumstance). Some hours had passed since the orienteering event, and Evan was feeling very dehydrated, with headache and nausea. He tried to slowly re-hydrate but couldn’t eat dinner. Ilka offered to lend him her hydration pack for the event the next morning, and Evan agreed that he’d probably run with it. He wasn’t up to pitching his tent that night so, feeling sorry for him, a couple of us did it for him.

Next morning he wasn’t 100%, but decided to run anyway.

Evan had been training consistently for 3 months, so he could run 8 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2006

competitively, and dropping the second day would have been very disappointing. I had a late enough start to watch Evan finish, and noticed no hydration pack on his back. Speaking to him about it later he said he decided he didn’t need it due to the cooler weather in the morning. This was the next unfortunate circumstance. Later he reported that he hadn’t noticed water at any of the control sites, and there wasn’t any at the control indicated on the clue sheet.

It was actually at a different control site to the one marked on the clue sheet, but he hadn’t noticed it. At the finish he headed straight for the water containers. He drank several cups of water after finishing.

Evan felt worse as the afternoon progressed, and recognising his headache as a sign of dehydration, drank as much as he could over a few hours. He drank mostly water, but included one sports drink and a couple of sweet carbonated drinks. His body reacted by vomiting, and he did his best to replace the lost fluids, as he was feeling worse. He and Ilka have estimated that he probably drank about 5 or 6 litres over the day.

Just before 4pm, Evan had a seizure, while sitting in the park in Cooma. Ilka and his friends called an ambulance, and put Evan in the recovery position. Ilka accompanied him to the Cooma hospital. It was very fortunate that this fit happened in town rather than at the campsite, and that there were people around who cared for him. Thanks go to Jim Russell and Daniel the Swede.

He was in the emergency department hooked up to sophisticated machines. The beeping became very familiar through the night. Every time it faltered, we woke up.

Evan spent the next 12 hours very agitated, disoriented and not conscious of anything except that he was very sick. He doesn’t remember anything except feeling very sick and being unable to see. The medical staff at Cooma were alarmed when they discovered fluid in his lungs and rang for advice from a specialist in Canberra.

At this stage, Evan was breathing pure oxygen from a mask, as his blood oxygen levels had dropped, and was hooked up to a saline intravenous drip. Blood tests were ordered, and an ECG and a chest X-ray carried out. A catheter was inserted so that his urine could be measured. He was still vomiting regularly. It was very scary to watch our son going through all this.

After a couple of hours, Evan was airlifted to the Canberra Hospital where medical staff with experience of this condition could take care of him. Neil, Ilka and I followed by car, arriving close to midnight. He was in the emergency department, hooked up to the sophisticated machines that measure blood oxygen, pulse, blood pressure, and respiration rate. The beeping of this machine became very familiar through the night. Every time it faltered, we woke up.

Evan regained full consciousness at nearly 4.30am and wanted to know what had happened and why he was in hospital. He was shocked to find himself connected to so many tubes (particularly the catheter). A blood test that morning revealed that his blood salts were back within the normal range, and he was allowed to leave.

On the following day, Evan was able to get an appointment with a sports physician in Canberra. His case was interesting enough for the doctor to fit him in before leaving town for the New Year long weekend. Evan expected a check-up and advice on appropriate hydration for orienteering. He didn’t get much advice, but had another blood test, expecting the results 5 days later. The pathologist who looked at Evan’s blood test was alarmed by the very high levels of Creatine Kinase, an enzyme that indicates muscle damage. He tried to contact the now absent referring doctor. When that failed, he made some further calls that eventually lead to the

NUTRITION

emergency department at Canberra Hospital. That evening, the doctor from Canberra Hospital rang us (we’d abandoned the 5Days, leaving our lonely tents where they’d been pitched on the first day), and asked that Evan return to hospital immediately.

They wanted to flush out his system to make sure his kidneys were coping. There is a risk of renal failure with these high enzyme concentrations.

Evan had a second night in hospital, with an intravenous drip and providing regular urine samples. His blood Creatine Kinase level rose to over 21,000 during the night. The normal range for this enzyme is less than 200. He left the hospital the next morning when these levels had started to fall, but they were still around 19,000. Evan recovered from the hyponatremia, but it’s taking a while longer for his muscles to recover. They are still very sore some three weeks later. He won’t be running for some weeks yet.

I’m left wondering what we can learn from this story, so that it doesn’t happen again during orienteering events. Evan has learned a very important lesson or two. It’s important to replace not only water, but also salts soon after a sweaty run. Sports drinks are the easiest way to help replace both. It’s also very useful to have ambulance cover.

There is evidence that some individuals may be predisposed to hyponatremia. The trick is it’s hard to discover if you are one of them. So until there is evidence to the contrary, assume that you are susceptible.

• Carry your own water when running a race. Do not assume the organisers will have water on the course. It may be short in volume, it may have spilt, or it could be in the wrong place. Hydration

packs and belts (with small bottles) can be quite comfortable. It is good to be able to swig when thirsty, rather than waiting to get to a water control. A general rule of thumb is to drink 500ml per hour of race. For longer races or races in hot weather, you can fill the hydration pack with an isotonic drink rather than just water.

• Learn to gauge how much fluid you tend to lose when exercising by weighing yourself before and after training runs of different lengths and in different temperature and humidity conditions. Get used to rehydrating with about the right amount for your body after each run. Digital scales are reasonably accurate and cheap to buy these days. Using them will help you know how much water is too much.

Losing a kilo of weight does not mean you have dehydrated by one litre. The water lost during running is partly from sweat and partly from the metabolising of glycogen.

You only need to replace the sweat component after the race. Certainly drinking beyond your body weight loss is over-hydrating. The Lore of Running has detailed information on the subject.

• Always have spare water and sports drinks when attending orienteering events. The powder is cheaper ($10 worth of powder can make up 8 litres) than bottled sports drinks ($3.50 for 600ml).

Evan’s problems were the end of a sequence of events that led from dehydration to hyponatremia. There is not much that organisers can do to minimise the risk of hyponatremia. It is an individual runner’s responsibility to manage his or her fluid intake.

But organisers can help minimise the risk of dehydration.

1. There is a culture in our sport of relying on the organisers for water. This can lead to problems if organisation slips up. If you are promising to provide water on the course, then you need to provide enough. The quantity provided must be sufficient for all competitors to be able to drink some, and its location must be accurately marked on clue sheets, so runners know exactly where to find it. If the terrain doesn’t make water drops easy to organise, plan the course around practical water placements. This is more important than the navigation challenge of the course.

2. Sufficient water should be available for all participants at the finish. In hot weather or at longer events consider providing water, with electrolyte powder added, at the finish to help people fully recover from their fluid and salt loss. It costs more than water, but could be a good investment in preventing further cases of hyponatremia.

3. If, because of workload and logistical problems, you are assuming orienteers will have their own water while running or after the event, make sure they know this well before the event.

For more on this topic see “Provision of Water by Organisers”

by Andy Hogg on page 13.

MARCH 2006 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 9

NUTRITION

Hydration – There’s more to it than Gillian Woodward fluids alone!

In the December’05 edition I wrote about hydration, briefly touching on electrolyte balance. Now let’s look more closely at the importance of getting our sodium and potassium levels right. These two electrolytes need to be kept in perfect balance for the body to function well.

NORMALLY blood sodium level is very tightly controlled, remaining within 136 – 142 mmol per litre. The main way sodium is lost from the body is through sweating. However, the blood level of sodium can also be reduced when large quantities of low sodium drinks such as juice, cordial, soft drinks or water are consumed. Overzealous drinking of such beverages prior to prolonged exercise performed in mild to warm conditions (when sweating is profuse), sets the scene for hyponatremia (low blood sodium levels of less than 125 mmol per litre) to occur.

A continued fall of sodium in the blood causes water to move rapidly into the brain, resulting in swelling. The faster and lower the fall in blood sodium concentration, the more serious the consequences. While very mild symptoms like nausea or stomach bloating may be experienced at a blood sodium level of 125 – 135 mmol per litre, a further drop to less than 125 mmol per litre produces vomiting, throbbing headache, swollen hands and feet, wheezy breathing, extreme fatigue, confusion and disorientation.

Below a sodium level of 120 mmol per litre, respiratory arrest, seizure, coma, brain damage and death become more likely.

The athlete most at risk of hyponatremia is: 1) one who drinks too large a quantity of low sodium beverages before and during prolonged exercise; 2) the smaller, slower person who sweats prolifically or who has a very salty sweat; 3) those who rely too heavily on water as their main fluid; 4) a person with abnormal water retention (diluting blood sodium levels).

Drinking too much fluid, especially water, during exercise can cause problems too. Usually the kidneys are able to deal with such excesses, by excreting the fluid as urine. However, during exercise,

Electrolytes & Hydration Bill Gookin (San Diego Orienteering, USA) How dehydration can affect your Orienteering performance.

The first symptom of dehydration is mental. Long before you begin to feel thirsty, when you are down less than 1% of your body weight (1 litre in a 70kg person) because of fluid loss, mental sharpness is affected. You don’t even start to feel thirsty until you’re down 3% of your body weight and, because you’re not thinking as clearly as you should, you may not even notice that you are thirsty, especially if you are trying to concentrate on a task ... like Orienteering.

10 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2006

the flow of blood to the kidneys is reduced (because blood flow to the exercising muscle is the body’s priority), and hence urine production is decreased by 20 – 60%. Consequently the retained body fluid further dilutes blood-sodium levels.

Prevention – Far better than cure Many sporting organisations have compiled general recommendations/guidelines on hydration for athletes involved in competitive exercise. The wide range in quantity of fluid suggested allows for individual variations in body size, level of fitness, exercise intensity, temperature and humidity of the day, etc.

It is strongly recommended that athletes practise their drinking skills during training sessions, so they can work out an individual plan best suited to their particular needs. This hydration plan, of course, may still need extra modification according to different climatic conditions. The hotter or more humid the weather conditions, the greater the volume of sweat produced and therefore the larger the volume of fluid that will have to be drunk to maintain adequate hydration.

The general recommendations for fluid intake of physically active adults are as follows: • 2 hours prior to exercise, 400 – 600 ml of fluid should be consumed to allow time for excretion of excess water via urination.

• 10 – 20 minutes before exercise, 200 – 300 ml consumed to top up fluid levels.

• during exercise, 150 – 350 ml fluid consumed every 10-15 minutes, depending on individual toleration.

As I indicated in the December’05 edition of AO, sports drinks are the most appropriate choice of drink. They are scientifically formulated to replace not only fluid, but sodium as well and they have the added benefit of supplying extra carbohydrate for a continued energy boost. They can be used before, during and after the event.

For orienteers, this means that it is up to the individual to prepare with adequate hydration, carry their own supply of sports drink on the run (in a belt-pouch or backpack bladder) and have readily available recovery drinks available immediately after the event. Drinking a little extra water which has been placed out on the course can be helpful, but orienteers should learn not to rely on this as their major source of hydration. It makes much more sense to be independent where fluid is concerned.

Gillian Woodward is a Practising Dietician and has been providing advice in the field for over 25 years. She has been an orienteer since 1984.

This level of dehydration affects judgment, memory, reactions and the ability to make quick decisions. For me, my first sign of dehydration is when I can’t remember a word or name that I know ... you’ve been there ... the “It’s on the tip of my tongue” syndrome.

Or I’ll stumble over a word, starting to say another word instead but not the one I wanted. One Search & Rescue instructor describes the sequence of dehydration symptoms as “mumbles, grumbles, fumbles and stumbles”. This amount of dehydration can affect everyone in their daily activities and you can imagine the effect on your Orienteering, “the thinking sport”.

Water, water everywhere Water is the medium for all of your cellular functions. Even a slight level of dehydration of 1% can result in a 5% decrease in metabolic efficiency. This translates to a decrease in athletic performance of

NUTRITION 3-5% for every percent of fluid loss. Couple this physical decrease in performance with the even more significant decrease in mental acuity and you are really compromising your Orienteering results.

And, as you get even more dehydrated, the effects begin to become more serious: you may lose track of the collecting features you were going to look for, miss that attack point and find yourself wandering around, not sure where you are nor how you got there.

You know that you should relocate but aren’t thinking clearly and don’t do it because “you’ll figure out where you are any minute now.” You may even realize that you are dehydrated but, because of this “fuzzy thinking”, probably won’t even drink at the next water stop. There’s one advantage to using a “Camelback” or similar hydration system: you can drink without thinking.

So far your dehydration is having a negative effect on your Orienteering, both the mental and physical aspects: you’re making mistakes and aren’t moving as fast as you should. If it’s a nice day for Orienteering, partly cloudy and not too hot, you’ll finish, or even DNF, maybe not feeling too well and unhappy over a poor performance. It won’t help that the next symptoms of dehydration, along with the increasingly impaired mental functions, include a headache, irritability and loss of appetite.

If it’s hot and dry or hot and humid, these symptoms can progress rapidly from just having a poor day of Orienteering to becoming a casualty from heat exhaustion. In addition to providing the medium for all cell functions, water is the body’s coolant. With increased activity and high ambient temperatures, blood flow to the skin increases and evaporation of sweat helps keep the body’s temperature normal. As you become more dehydrated, less water is available to cool you by evaporation and, in addition to becoming more confused and irrational, your muscles are cramping, you have a splitting headache and you’re staggering ... you’re in big trouble from heat exhaustion and will be very lucky to find and make your way to the finish.

Electrolytes are the minerals that, like water, are necessary for cellular functions.

Precautions Because the early effects of dehydration involve muddled thinking and that probably will mean that you may not drink even if you realize that you are dehydrated, it is important to make drinking before and during competition an automatic routine so you don’t have to think about drinking ... like using a “Camelback” or taking a drink at every water control whether you think that you need it or not. It doesn’t even really work as well to carry a water bottle in a pack unless you have a routine that requires no thinking.

For example, in the last day of this summer’s Colorado 5-Days (August 2005), I was doing pretty well in the first third of my course, visualizing well and “spiking” the controls, but then I must have gone right past a control, didn’t recognize a catching feature and spent much longer than I want to admit wandering around, searching for a feature I could recognize while telling myself that I needed to relocate and that I needed to drink ... and doing neither.

Sound familiar? Finally, I hit a road, sat down on a rock to rest my leg, pulled my water bottle out of its pocket and drank more than half the contents ... and relocated myself. I kept the bottle out the rest of the course, drank from it frequently and at water stops ... and spiked the rest of my controls. A little hydration makes a big difference!

What about electrolytes?

Electrolytes are the minerals that, like water, are necessary for cellular functions. Sodium, potassium, calcium and magnesium are needed in the largest quantities and have to be replaced daily.

Sports drinks contain the electrolytes that are supposed to replace what you are losing and many of them can be of some help.

All but one of these drinks contain more sodium than potassium because sodium helps to retain fluids. Unfortunately, this retention is in the tissues and not so much in circulation where water is needed to maintain blood volume for sweating and muscular and cerebral activity. Now this may be O.K. the day or evening before you compete but during the event and immediately after, you need to have the fluids in circulation and for this you need to have slightly more potassium than sodium in your replacement drink.

Unfortunately, almost all of these sports drinks and all energy drinks contain too much sugar and complex carbohydrates that have to be diluted and digested before they can be absorbed. This pulls water from the muscles, dehydrating you even further and can cause muscle and gastric cramps and intestinal problems ... remember that the function of most laxatives is to pull fluids into the intestines. However, all of this sugar makes the drinks sweet and makes you more thirsty so you’ll reach for another bottle. I think they call this “marketing.”

For most people, plain water sits in your stomach and sloshes around when you run. If you drink enough, hydrostatic pressure forces the water through the stomach wall and into circulation.

This dilutes the blood and, as it passes through the kidneys, they get rid of the excess water ... and you’re still thirsty! Others can get by on plain water during competition but they need to be sure to replace the electrolytes they are losing, especially since the water is flushing out their electrolytes.

This can be very serious during extended efforts like marathons, multiday events and hiking in dehydrating conditions and there have been many cases where people have collapsed with symptoms of heat exhaustion but their fluid volume and blood pressure were up and their urine was clear. They had flushed out so much of their electrolytes by drinking plain water that many have died from what is known as “hyponatremia” which means “low systemic sodium” but it is almost impossible to be that low in sodium without being seriously low in all of your electrolytes.

Gookinaid HYDRALYTE What about Gookinaid HYDRALYTE? I guess I’m going to have to mention this drink because we get so many wonderful reports from people who are using it. I formulated this drink after getting sick on Gatorade during the 1968 Olympic Marathon Trials. It worked so incredibly well that other runners wanted to know what I was drinking and one said that it helped me so it should be called “Gookinaid.” We added the “HYDRALYTE” after the staff at Johns Hopkins University Medical Center told us “You’ve got a great product, but you need a more clinical name.”

I’d made it to have the balance of electrolytes I needed to replace and to be innocuous in my stomach. This turned out to be just exactly the ratios and concentrations of the right ingredients for the most rapid possible absorption from the stomach into circulation, so fast and effective that emergency response teams call it “the oral IV.” Users have found it to be extremely effective in precise tasks to maintain mental alertness, judgment, coordination and quick decisions. Last Spring, while visiting the Grand Canyon, I was introduced to the Incident Coordinator for the National Park and the first thing he said to me was “Your stuff has saved a lot of lives here.”

And it can help you to be more successful in your Orienteering! ...also, if you drink it after your event, you’ll recover faster and feel better the next day.

Visit us at www.Gookinaid.com for more information about Gookinaid HYDRALYTE and how it can help you in all you do.

Reprinted from Orienteering North America, Oct/Nov 2005.

MARCH 2006 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 11

CLASSIC INJURIES

The damage – Above left: Peter Yeates displays the collateral damage. Painful – Above right: Mary Enter hobbled around all week on this.

Right: The culprits – one of the offending pairs of shoes.

Far right: The Editor wears softball shoes and hasn’t had a blister for years.

12 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2006

CLASSIC INJURIES

FOOT “Oh” ANOTHER Xmas 5-Days has come and gone but the scars will remain for a few more weeks yet. I read in a recent edition of The Australian Orienteer that the most common injuries suffered by orienteers are ankle injuries.

There were 20 or so experienced orienteers at the lodge we hired for accommodation in Jindabyne. A quick straw poll found this not to be the case. The largest number were foot injuries and all of them blisters. Not just little or annoying blisters but large, bleeding, debilitating, almost life threatening, blisters.

The Editor was amongst the 20 and he felt moved to photograph the gruesome injuries.

A discussion ensured, lubricated by the Dandenong Ranges Orienteering Club’s special re-hydration fluid (recipe available).

Amongst the gathered we found we had several thousands of kilometres and events experience. Several of us had been logging our events for Mike, who was compiling statistics for another article, and in my case I had competed in 145 events in the year 2005.

I had endured 189 hours running (shuffling) and covered 1062kms. So why was my left heel a bleeding mass at the end of Day One? The answer, unfortunately, lay in the choice of shoe or rather the lack of a choice of shoe. I had completed 45 bush events in a “popular brand” of orienteering shoe with spikes resulting in 45 blisters.

I competed in 93 Park & Street events in a different “popular brand” Gel running shoe resulting in no blisters.

I competed in 7 Rogaines covering 212kms in a “ not so popular” brand of trail running shoe resulting in no blisters.

Aware of the fact that friction between shoe and sock is a common cause of blisters I always wear a popular brand of knitted sports sock costing $30.00 a pair.

I have tried several methods to overcome the problem, using various types of tape etc, with mixed results. I have been able to achieve some protection using the new style “compeed” blister dressings held in place with wound dressing tape but this will eventually give way if it gets wet or I make a mess of the navigation and I am still out there after 50 minutes or so. They also cost about $1.20 each, so two, per event is a significant reduction in the amount of money I can spend on “special re-hydration fluid”.

Back at the Xmas 5-Days, we gathered around a small bin armed with various tweezers, pliers, fish scalers and other sharp implements, removing grass seed. There was on display a smorgasbord of running shoes. What was immediately apparent was the poor quality or complete lack of padding in the heel of “the popular” brands of “O shoe”. We also observed that the amount of shock absorbency was also poor and that the low cut of the sides and heel counter, gave little support when compared to more conventional runners.

Don’t get me wrong, I quite liked my “O shoes” - the security of the enclosed toe and the grip of the spikes gives one great confidence. But the sole is very narrow and this made them a lot easier to stuff into the already full rubbish bin.

I have spoken with Kevin Maloney, Melbourne’s travelling “O Shop” man and he has ordered a new pair of a not so popular brand of spiked orienteering shoe that I have been assured are on a broader laste and have better padding and cushioning.

They sound terrific and I am prepared to give them a go. However Kevin’s a bit worried about the broader laste in case I am unhappy and try to stuff them somewhere other than a rubbish bin.

Name withheld for fear of litigation Initials: Peter Yeates

Provision of Water by Organisers Andy Hogg (OA Director, Technical) Evan Barr’s story certainly makes for scary reading. It’s a good reminder to all competitors that we need to listen to our bodies and learn our limits. This is particularly true for juniors, who are just beginning to learn how their bodies cope with training and racing.

Orienteering also throws down the challenge of multi-day races. The difficulty here is learning the best way to recover between days. I remember being particularly worried about this when I was racing – so I asked the advice of a leading sports nutritionist in WA. I was expecting to hear which sports drinks were best, which foods to choose and so on. But after a moment’s thought, he told me to just eat and drink as much as I could of whatever I could find!

But I digress. The point of this note is to comment on what organisers can learn from this episode about the importance of water on courses. Orienteering Australia is at odds with international convention on this issue. For example, our rules require water to be placed at controls (or compulsory crossing points), while IOF rules allow for placement of water anywhere on the course. Both sets of rules require water every 25 minutes (at the estimated speed of the winner).

The problem with the IOF rule is that frequently the runner might be faced with a choice: should I divert from the best route on my course to take some water, or should I save the time? In Australia, races are frequently run in hotter conditions than European races, and dehydration is a bigger factor. So, we don’t allow the runner to make this choice – water is placed at a point where all runners must pass, minimising the time penalty for taking a drink. Some organisers complain that this rule is an unfair restriction which complicates the logistics of providing water. My only advice on this would be that if water must be placed on a track for logistical reasons, then an

extra control can be added to the course at that point.

In some countries, it is common for runners to take water with them on the course. I ran a British Elite Champs a few years ago; this 90 minute race (actually 1:50 for me) had no water on the course! Luckily it was only 10° and drizzling, so I only needed to open my mouth for a drink! But a situation like this in warm weather would be a debacle. Which is why I will always defend our relatively strict rules on the provision of water.

Of course, when water is provided there must be enough water for all competitors. If water runs out, it is not only a safety/dehydration issue, but also a fairness issue – if early runners have the benefit of a drink but not the later runners this can make a substantial difference to performance. OA has a recommended amount of water (300mL per competitor) for water at drinks controls.

But it’s clear that in warm conditions this may not enough, and it’s not unknown for an entire container of water to be spilled accidentally. It is always worthwhile leaving a large safety margin on the amount of water provided.

Having said this, the Christmas 5-days is usually a low-key event, and is not covered by the OA rules. In low-key events, organisers always need to strike a balance between the organisational load and the requirements of competitors.

From what I hear of the 2005 Christmas 5-Days they balanced the load very well, in general.

But the provision of water, both on the course and afterwards, could have been substantially improved. This may or may not have altered Evan’s case – he suffered from a series of unfortunate circumstances. But Evan’s experience and Julie’s excellent article provides a timely reminder to all organisers to take the issue of water seriously.

MARCH 2006 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 13

W O R L D O R I E N T E E R I N G C H A M P I O N S H I P S 2 0 0 6 WOC DENMARK 1.-5. august 2006

Patron: His Royal Highness Crown Prince Frederik

WOC Tour 2006 30 July – 6 August

The All-Embracing WOC 2006 Experience

Yes, there’s time for everything!

• Cheer on your national team at 7 WOC races • Compete in the 6-day WOC Tour – 3 of the days on WOC terrain!

• Socialise in the Olympic village ambience in Aarhus • Sample the Aarhus cultural scene and its dynamic night-life • Take a trip on the lakes on a 145-year-old paddle steamer • Climb ‘Sky Mountain’ – all of 147 metres high!

• And much, much more!!

Action, excitement and fun for everyone Lots of accommodation and campsites in the region - so a ’MUST ENTER ’ event in your summer break - of course!

Find all you need to know on www.woc2006.dk, or e-mail info@woc2006.dk 14 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2006

Buy yourself a JET this year!

“It’s not by chance that the world’s best orienteers run with a SILVA Jet compass.” says Grant Bluett who runs with a Silva 6 Jet Spectra

SILVA 6 JET SPECTRA

For competitive orienteers who prefer the ultimate in thumb compasses. Features the broad fluorescent Jet needle and the unique time saving ‘Spectra’ colour coded ring. Elastic thumb strap and rubber pad for a safe and sure grip. Map scales in 1:10,000 and 1:15,000.

Available in left and right hand models. $138 from your local O-gear shop at events.

SILVA 5 JET

Features a scratch resistant ‘comfort-fit’ curved back-end baseplate and the unique fluorescent red/white, broad Jet needle. Easy-to-grip housing with enlarged dial. Detachable map scales in 1:15,000 and 1:10,000 and silicon baseplate feet to prevent unintentional slipping on maps. $133 from your local O-gear shop at events.

SILVA 1S JET

Same high-performance Jet needle as in above model.

Large magnifying lens in baseplate for enlarging fine map detail. Other features as in 5 Jet. $145 from your local O-gear shop at events.

Buy yourself a Jet at the next event

Photo: Tore Myrberg

JET compasses have the unique super-fast “Rare Earth” broad magnetic needle for the fastest settling and stability when running over rough terrain. Guaranteed to save precious seconds every time you check your bearing.

DID YOU KNOW? Cranberry compound found to block cancer Compounds in cranberries, thought to help prevent urinary infections, may also fight the development of cancer, report US researchers.

The chemicals, called proanthocyanidins, inhibited the growth of human lung, colon and leukaemia cells in culture, without affecting healthy cells.

They could also stop cancer from spreading, showed the tests. The work

by Catherine Neto at the University of MassachusettsDartmouth, USA, and colleagues is important as it is one of the first studies to look closely at the compounds in this fruit that are responsible for anti-cancer activity.

“Anti-cancer activity has been reported in the literature from way back but there is no good real data on the structures [in cranberries],” Neto told NutraIngredients.com. There are several groups of antioxidant compounds in cranberries that could protect against cancer, she noted, including quercetin and ursolic acid. But while cranberry extracts have previously been shown to inhibit human cancer cells, in most cases the researchers did not identify the active constituents responsible for such an effect.

There are probably several mechanisms for the cranberry’s anti-cancer action, said Neto, but further work needs to be done to clarify this. “We’re hoping to follow up with animal models. It’s really important to do this. These compounds are not at all well-known so I think of this [new study] as opening a door.” source: FoodProductionDaily.com

Exercise for the Brain Leisure-related physical activity in midlife may decrease the risk of dementia in later life according to Scandinavian researchers. They followed 1449 adults, with an initial mean age of 50 years, for an average of 21 years. By this time 117 had dementia and 76 had Alzheimer’s disease.

Participants had been asked, in midlife questionnaires, “How often do you participate in leisure-time physical activity that lasts at least 20-30 minutes and causes breathlessness and sweating?” Those who had engaged in leisure-time physical activity at least twice a week at midlife had 50% lower odds of dementia compared with sedentary participants. This protective effect seemed more pronounced for Alzheimer’s disease and among APOE e4 carriers. source: Lancet Neurology Online

Where are They now ……?

Fred Veler – formerly of Eltham College and Nillumbik Orienteers in Victoria.

Fred now competes for Sammamish OC in Washington State, USA. Last August he finished 5th in M60 in the 2005 Colorado 5-Days and 3rd in M60 in the US Night-O Championships.

Moreover, while proanthocyanidins from grapeseed have been linked to cancer inhibition, the structure of these chemicals is significantly different in cranberries compared with other berries.

Champion tracking

“Unlike most fruit, cranberries contain PACs with A-type linkages between units, a structural feature identified in cranberry PACs with antibacterial adhesion properties and those with LDL-protective properties,” write Neto and colleagues in the Journal of the Science of Food and Agriculture.

A secret weapon in Australia’s bid for swimming success at the coming Commonwealth Games may well be hidden in the swimmer’s trunks. “Traqua”, developed by the CRC for microTechnology for the Australian Institute of Sport (AIS), is used by the nation’s elite swimmers and is being evaluated for other sports.

“Previously published reports have suggested that cranberry proanthocyanidins have anti-cancer properties but there are few data on tumour growth inhibition by well-characterized cranberry proanthocyanidins,” they note.

“It’s all about efficiency - the 1 percent gain: how much you put in, and what you get out of it,” explains AIS senior sports physiologist Dr Tony Rice.

The authors isolated a proanthocyanidin-rich fraction of a whole cranberry extract made from fruit donated by USbased Decas Cranberries. The fractions were tested on several tumour cell lines and screened for their effect on tumour proliferation.

The study showed significant inihibition of the proliferation of cancer cells, not previously shown with other proanthocyanidins, as well as the blocking of tumour growth.

“The activity was at no less than 100ug/mL concentration,” said Neto. “It’s hard to say whether you would get these levels distributed to different tissues to the extent where you would have activity in vivo,” she added.

But eating cranberries or taking supplements of extract could be helpful, she believes. “There are so many compounds in cranberries capable of having some anti-cancer mechanism that when taken together there is potential for benefit,” she said.

16 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2006

“Traqua” consists of an unobtrusive plastic case containing micro-machined, inertial sensors, digital recording and radio equipment. These sense the athlete’s movement and position in the water, analyse and report it to the coach, who can then provide immediate advice on overcoming any flaws.

“Most sports measurements are still fairly basic - often just a stop watch and distance,” says microTech’s Shaun Holthouse.

“Traqua enables the coach to analyse the athlete’s motion stroke-by--stroke in real time.

“We expect electronics to become an integral part of most sports equipment. Whereas today you buy just a tennis racquet, in the future you will buy a racquet that tells how you compare to champions.” The same technology also has potential uses in healthcare - for example in remote monitoring of patients at risk of a fall.

“Traqua” technology was developed within the CRC for microTechnology by Griffith, Swinburne and RMIT universities and engineering firm iWRX.

OPINION

MARKETING ORIENTEERING A STRATEGY for the REBUILDING and REGENERATION of ORIENTEERING Gary Aitken (co-founder of OAWA in Aug 1974) Shrinking Assets Recent articles in both the OAWA Split Times newsletter, and The Australian Orienteer highlight essentially the same situation whilst coming to it from different directions: viz •O AWA (Aug 2005, p10 and AO Sept 2005, p30) Orienteering in Norway.

•A O (Dec 2005, p45; OAWA Dec 2005, p9) - re. animal picture controls. In a four page submissions I suggested using pictures of fruit and vegetables to tie-in with Health Promotions (2F, 5V) at Festival events (such as Hyde Park and the Mandurah Crab-Fest).

•A O (Dec 2005, p5, 46) Bob McCreddin on Sport versus Recreation adherents, and Bob Mouatt on the ASC and the eight P’s.

getting pulled in too many directions, dissipating resources, rather than establishing it’s (their) own cohesive program be it competition or marketing.

It is necessary to be selective, to safeguard against the allure and siren song of the latest bright suggestion, as distinct from a genuine idea.

Problems may be avoided by asking some basic questions: •R ationale (why are we considering this? How does it assist short term, long term? Does it complement? Should it replace? - if so, what?)

•O utcomes (objectives, strategies, overall fit. Can we use meaningful performance criteria? Are we really measuring what we think we’re measuring?)

•R esources (time, effort, finances).

The ASC Challenge The Australian Sports Commission’s criteria for funding is a blessing, a timely opportunity, as it provides associations with a catalyst and impetus to: •R e-evaluate competitions and marketing programs •R eview and assess where we are, and

Purists versus Pragmatists

•F ocus on where we need (not want) to be.

Associations must reform the five P’s - PRODUCT, PRICE, PACKAGING, PROMOTION, POSITIONING - for the ASC (Aust Sports Commission) says.... PLAN for PARTICIPATION OR PERISH.

In marketing terms, Orienteering is an old product, (WA 31-32 years). It needs to be:

In other words, create and maintain a PUBLIC PRESENCE and a PUBLIC PROFILE. The ASC has made it quite clear that future funding must not only reflect but be a measure of •L evel of interest • I mportance • P articipation • R elevance Sport is, and always was, both a prisoner and function(ary) of the PYRAMID OF NUMBERS. Purists need the base. It’s as simple as that.

Attempts To Arrest Decline In Membership Current promotion and development appears to be reliant upon a two-pronged approach: •R ecruitment - whether by on-going passive methods or isolated, sporadic drives.

•E xpanding the activity program for the existing members.

The formula appears to be: new x = retained interest = retained loyalty/membership.

This two-pronged strategy would be familiar to most associations throughout the world. However, each component of the strategy has inherent weaknesses which, in turn, create on-going problems for the associations.

•R EPACKAGED •R EPOSITIONED The challenges keep multiplying. An old product must be transformed to demonstrate (renewed) interest, participation, importance and relevance. This means being innovative and creative, without dragging along some of the problems outlined above.

For OAWA this means: •D ifferent means and forms of communication (ie; selling and/or marketing “the story”) • I dentifying ways to tie-in with other funded programs (eg; WA Health Dept - “Fitter Feet” walk trails) • I dentifying different target audiences (so called niche markets) •D ifferent ways of presenting the Orienteering experience •D ifferent ways of realising/experiencing Orienteering • I maginative use of different venues and settings •D eveloping new ways of teaching Orienteering; developing new teaching aids, resource material

Recruitment is so often based on the tried and true of 10, 15, and 20 years past. Now that is normal human behaviour.

Going with what worked. Past tense. Doing things the same way (over and over), and expecting different results.

• I dentifying ways to provide continuity of the teaching/ learning experience. (One event, one school activity, is very often both the first and last experience, as there is no follow up. The singularity of the event is tantamount to a diversion or distraction).

Secondly, change (“new x”) does not necessarily equate with progress. Adopting ideas and/or events from whatever the source without consideration of setting, life-cycle, culture that produced the concept; without asking hard questions; without clear analysis and assessment criteria, can also create problems, give rise to unintended consequences.

•T hat said, there is a need to identify what motivates children to want to continue, learn more. (viz; excitement at responding to, meeting and overcoming a challenge; the sense of satisfaction, achievement, accomplishment).

In other words, do we properly cater for children and teenagers?

Some proposed events (viz. IOF MICRO-O; AO Sept 2005, p7), and current events (Uni-based Sprint-O) bring to mind the fridge magnet:

• I dentifying ways of getting children and teenagers to bush events. (When and where parents are not interested in supporting their children).

•A lert but not aspiring

And yet there is one over-arching condition: neither losing nor compromising the sheer essence and real spirit of (bush) Orienteering.

•A mused but not amoured.

In common with other associations and countries (eg. NZ-AO March 2005, p3 & 7; Sept p22-23) the OAWA appears to be

continued next page MARCH 2006 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 17

N AT I O N A L E L I T E R A N K I N G

Double for Tasmania at top of 2005 National Elite Rankings HANNY Allston (TAS) was a clear leader at the top of the W21E with 6408 points (best 5 races over 12 months). Her World Championship Long-distance scores of 1398 (final) and 1316 (qualification) were the best ranking scores since Nicki Taws’ World Cup medal in 2000 at Honeysuckle Creek. Fellow WOC Relay team members, Jo Allison (ACT)(6079) and Tracy Bluett (NSW)(5741) complete the placings.

Recent World Ranking Events in China provided David Brickhill-Jones (TAS) with the opportunity to climb to the top of the ranking list for the first time. With top placing in high quality international fields, his 1312 points in the Yunnan Orienteering Festival Sprint race and 1223 in the Middledistance enabled him to leapfrog Grant Bluett (ACT) and finish the season as Australia’s number one ranked M21E orienteer.

With another consistent year including his first Australian Long-distance title, Bluett led the rankings until BrickhillJones’ late surge. Easter 3-Day winner, Troy de Haas (VIC) moved down to number 3.

Full 2005 ranking details for M/W21, 20 and 18 are available at http://www.orienteering.asn.au/rankings/. 2006 Rankings continue will be updated as soon as possible after each ranking event.

Bruce Arthur, Elite Rankings Compiler

Hanny Allston

W21 Name 1 TAS Hanny Allston 2 ACT Jo Allison 3 NSW Tracy Bluett 4 VIC Natasha Key 5 TAS Grace Elson 6 ACT Allison Jones 7 TAS Danielle Winslow 8 TAS Clare Hawthorne 9 ACT Anna Danielsson 10 VIC Kathryn Ewels 11 ACT Nicki Taws 12 QLD Anna Sheldon 13 SA Susanne Casanova 14 NSW Orla Murray 15 QLD Julia Davies 16 VIC Jasmine Neve 17 VIC Mace Neve 18 ACT Rebecca Minty 19 NSW Briohny Davey 20 WA Rachel West

Total 6408 6079 5741 5417 5305 5170 5106 5059 5029 4985 4900 4870 4784 4752 4703 4701 4679 4580 4402 4375

M21 Name Total 1 TAS David Brickhill-Jones 6412 2 ACT Grant Bluett 6380 3 VIC Troy de Haas 6222 4 ACT David Shepherd 6192 5 NSW Julian Dent 5965 6 ACT Rob Walter 5699 7 NSW Eric Morris 5615 8 NSW Rob Preston 5606 9 ACT Tom Quayle 5433 10 ACT Ben Rattray 5283 11 VIC Rune Olsen 5279 12 ACT Gareth Candy 5117 13 VIC Bruce Arthur 5086 14 SA Kerrin Rattray 5061 15 WA Craig Dufty 5041 16 VIC Blair Trewin 5022 17 WA Andy Hogg 4827 18 VIC Warren Key 4808 19 VIC Adrian Jackson 4715 20 NSW Peter Preston 4710

W20 Name 1 TAS Hanny Allston 2 VIC Jasmine Neve 3 WA Erin Post 4 ACT Sophie Barker 5 WA Kellie Whitfield 6 QLD Ainsley Cavanagh 7 SA Zebedy Hallett 8 TAS Emma Warren 9 NSW Clare Murphy 10 NSW Jayde Livingstone

Total 6408 4701 4262 4011 4002 3858 3814 2724 1526 1069

M20 Name 1 NSW Julian Dent 2 NSW David Meyer 3 VIC Christopher Naunton 4 TAS Ryan Smyth 5 TAS Conrad Elson 6 NSW Matt Parton 7 ACT Murray Scown 8 TAS Lee Andrewartha 9 WA Cody Whitfield 10 TAS Matthew Hope

Total 5965 4689 4123 3768 3661 3384 3283 3200 3150 2786

W18 Name 1 SA Vanessa Round 2 ACT Heather Harding 3 SA Rebecca Hembrow 4 WA Sarah Dunnage 5 VIC Clare Brownridge 6 VIC Bridie Kean 7 WA Kendal Sutherland 8 SA Mallory Hughes 9 QLD Laurina Neumann 10 VIC Melinda Jackson

Total 4327 3951 3728 3727 3561 3258 3105 2777 2772 2718

M18 Name 1 SA Simon Uppill 2 TAS Louis Elson 3 WA Rhys Challen 4 QLD Daniel Stott 5 VIC Rob Fell 6 QLD Kieran Sullivan 7 TAS Nick Andrewartha 8 VIC Steven Cusworth 9 VIC Morten Neve 10 SA Sam McNally

Total 4488 3736 3546 3166 3101 2977 2858 2856 2823 2548

David Brickhill-Jones

continued from page 17

and Finally Too many associations appear to be their own worst enemy.

The common characteristic is the attitude created by the Purists which permeates down through all functions. The perception is that of a cloistered, secretive order that has taken a vow of silence. Contact us via the internet.

That silence carries across to event results.

Detailed comprehensive results in State dailies such as “The West Australian” immediately after an event are an important marketing tool. It tells people we’re still active. Results provide interest and (public) talking points.

Another perception is that associations are turning in on themselves. Less and less is in the public domain. More and more is in-house.

All of which is incompatible with the ASC’s set of four criteria: •L evel of interest • P articipation • I mportance • R elevance

18 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2006

Which, in turn, leads back to the conundrum: PURISTS versus PRAGMATISTS. Where do all the State associations start?

OVERCOMING ALL SORTS OF MIND-SETS to create and maintain a PUBLIC PRESENCE and a PUBLIC PROFILE.

Footnote Further to Bob McCreddin’s “From the President” (AO Dec 2005, p5) re. Sport versus Recreation proponents, c.1978 the OAWA introduced event `White Cards’, for participants (not competitors) who wanted the full bush-experience and all that Orienteering entailed, but for whom time was irrelevant. (Plus other reasons: recovering from injuries, illness; mentoring; age and fragility). The participant’s time was not made public.

On display boards, and in newsletters, they were listed as `White Card’ and placed ahead of DNS, DISQ, MP, DNF. Shortly after the idea was taken up by the ACTOA, and the QOA. The concept is still relevant and valid. Encouraging its use may prolong interest and membership. It is the best of both worlds.

INTERVIEW

Women’s WOC Coach – Sue Neve Late last year Orienteering Australia announced the appointment of WOC Foot-O Coaches for 2006-07.

Previous teams to the World Orienteering Championships have taken one manager and one coach. In 200607 OA has appointed a men’s and a women’s coach who will share the managerial duties. The men’s WOC Coach will be Brett Weihart and the women’s coach Sue Neve.

The Australian Orienteer caught up with Sue at the Christmas 5-Days: AO: Congratulations on your appointment. I see you’re already holding Squad meetings during this event.

SN: It is a great opportunity to assist in an official capacity. The elite women are not together often so it was appropriate to make a start and how could I leave the guys out!

AO: You’ve been coaching the Bushrangers for the past two years. Will there be much difference for you in this new position as WOC Coach?

SN: Yes I think so. I am already sensing that at this level the demands are higher, the athlete expectations are greater and they have a quality about them. The Bushrangers is an excellent training ground to make this step. WOC would have to be more intense for the athlete. With the new coaching positions structure there will be greater support and each coach can offer their strengths and complement each other.

AO: You probably know most of the Squad members well. Are there any who you haven’t worked with previously?

SN: Yes, I am familiar with many of the elite women and men. I like what I see. I think that the depth of talent is excellent and this year some places will be highly contested. Different runners have various needs and at WOC level many have done a lot of work already. My role will be to keep the athlete on track and prepared. I cannot think of any I am not familiar with as most have come through our system where a lot of the good work is already done, it just takes something special for the next level.

AO: You were a long time at the Elite level and now you’re back winning Age titles. How does this experience kelp you as a Coach (and manager)?

AO: What are your goals for the Women’s team at WOC2006 in Denmark?

SN: Denmark is fast and navigationally less demanding, so it is a great opportunity for the Australian women to run well. However, it will be a high pressure race with no room for error. The girls by their nature have always run consistently well and if we have three excellent runs anything is possible in the relay. Each year the girls results look better and we are nudging closer to the podium. My goal is for those girls to run their hearts out. The results will come from that.

AO: We’ve all read of Hanny Allston’s recent achievements and Grace Elson is doing well at this Christmas 5-Days. Is there something in the water in Tasmania?

SN: …I have to agree Tasmania is a good training ground. It seems to build a strength of character that pays dividends in Orienteering. The lack of visibility prevents bad habits developing perhaps and just the more difficult terrain. I thought their water was quite nice but I did not grow hairs on my chest if that is what you meant.

AO: Who else will we see coming to the fore this year?

SN: I do not like to put names up but I think we have a good depth and some are already being noticed, which will lift the standard in general.

Experience and encouragement will help these people. However, the oldies are keeping them honest.

AO: What makes the terrain in Denmark special?

SN: Denmark is fast and reasonably flat. The undergrowth of felling can be quite extensive and difficult for the less aggressive. It is more like continental running than Scandinavian terrain and so it brings the fast runners to the fore with the added pressure of speed on the course and determination in the difficult undergrowth. Most of the competitors, including the Australians, would have been well exposed to this terrain. In this situation the experience of racing hard will be good preparation for the Australians who are not as readily exposed to big races. It will be a good WOC where running ability is important.

AO: Getting prepared physically is one thing, but what about mental preparation?

SN: I am intrigued by mental preparation. It distinguishes the champions in this sport. Mental strength is a key component and no matter how well prepared we can be there is that unknown dimension to which we can be vulnerable. In this case it is hard to train for a WOC as they only come around once a year. Australians can still have difficulty with the aura of it all. Mental strength is the noticeable difference in making the grade. To be able to deliver on the day takes incredible belief in oneself and this is a reflection of where a trained athlete is at. Mental strength is not text book knowledge but you can tell who has it.

AO: Does visualisation of the race ahead help in pre-race preparation?

SN: So they say. You have to think you can do it before you actually do. It is called creating your world. Visualisation must assist with creating the scenario. More importantly knowing and believing something special is about to happen can be very strong at times and so you make it happen. It is a good day when you can decide “I am going to have a good run today”.

AO: What about team uniform – some other countries seem to be going for the streamlined look. Is there a new look coming for the Aussie team?

SN: Good girlie question. I like this question and I am already thinking of it.

I hear avocado and buttercup are in this year. I do know that my daughters will be keen to offer lots of advice. I thought we looked good in Japan but we must keep up with the fashion to run well.

SN: Yes, it does help. What I am finding is that I learn from them as they would from each other. It is a process that works both ways and so when we gather as a group and discuss what we are thinking for today’s race someone My only obsession? The next control. is making the point required. There is so much to learn just by listening. I now have My only enemy? The clock. a wealth of experience that just gets better with age.

Thierry Gueorgiou (France) – king of world Middle-distance Orienteering

AO: I’m sure all our readers wish you and the women’s team the very best of luck in Denmark. I know you’re very busy so thanks for your time.

MARCH 2006 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 19

COACHING

Preparing for WOC2006 – The Need for Speed Sue Neve DENMARK will be fast and so at a Squad meeting I decided to speak to the elite runners on speed as this will be the deciding factor in the selection races at Easter and highly relevant to Denmark. It occurred to me afterwards that all orienteers may be interested in what elites are discussing. It was basically thoughts on how to run a race fast or faster using the talent or ability you have.

It is ways an orienteer may utilize more effectively the speed they have but are not using during the race. I am referring to a refined level of technique - race technique - once fitness and orienteering technique have been looked at.

First of all, I must say that fitness is always the basic criteria. This will go a long way in improving your running speed and improve race results. It is all too obvious - improve your fitness and your speed will naturally improve for the duration of the race. Take note though that once you have a good base fitness level you can improve the running speed by doing lots of faster work. Examples of this include interval work (all sorts), fun runs, track work, athletic clubs, street orienteering, sprint orienteering. The more precise you are with this the better the results however any speed work will improve your running pace which usually will transfer across to the terrain. If you feel you are naturally a slower runner compared to the rest do more speed work.

If you are slow in the terrain do more in the terrain.

The next level for improvement in speed is technique.

Speed is not much use, in fact detrimental to you, without the technique to match as many can relate to.

We are so often in a hurry to run without the ability to know where. Work on your technique to match your running speed. Concentration levels need to improve to match the new speed and this can be done with practice. Poor technique is the major reason why we are not fast enough. This is the nature of orienteering. Mistakes are costly and need to be avoided.

Now, after all that getting the basics right, these are simple thoughts on ways in which to improve your time. It involves training and the styles I am familiar with to utilise speed are: 1. To run hard right from the start. To make the extra effort required especially for this important race by giving it your all. It may work for some on a good day. Beware - the risk factor is quite high.

It is good to be pumped but you may go over the max here. My argument is that this is not what you normally do and you will experience difficulty eventually at a new tempo. One of the legs will catch you out.

2. Alternate legs with every second leg at an increased speed. It is one way of making you aware of not wasting time and to make a conscious effort to try harder for the fast legs.

To gain momentum during a race I have found this quite effective as you work hard with the fast legs but the normal legs stabilize you. The added bonus is that by the end of the race I find myself not slowing down for the normal legs. You can make any variations on this to suit you. One example is to select certain control numbers as triggers and they are the 20 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2006

fast legs, if appropriate of course. Gaining 10 to 30 seconds faster per leg here can add up noticeably and will refine your technique.

This technique not only applies to consciously running faster but also not wasting time. The emphasis being to do what you were going to do but just do it more quickly.

3. Coming home fast is another variation on this to improve your race speed. I can remember world champions who have won the race in the last part of the course. Of course this could be because of better fitness but it also may be a conscious effort to enhance their speed. The idea is to trigger when to come home fast.

This may be 4 or 5 legs out. I like this also because by this stage you are comfortable with the map and the terrain. Sometimes the legs get easier in this part of the course. For most people however, the danger is being tired and you may stop concentrating or the terrain/legs may change. I personally find it increases my focus when for many it may start to lag. It’s up to you to judge how far out but it is a good feeling heading for home and hanging on whilst utilizing the fitness you have. Once again, an awareness of speed has upped the tempo in a sector of the race.

4. An easy way to increase speed is to run parts of leg fast. Some legs stand out as technically less difficult as they may have a track on them or a catching feature or a saddle or anywhere you can see a long way ahead. Train yourself to automatically pick up the tempo for that safe part of the leg. It can add up to a significant percentage of the course. The hard part however in this is knowing when to slow down. It has less risks for orienteers who can relocate readily. It is also useful to develop a skill where you are able to look at the course and ascertain the difficult legs. The skill here is to develop more parts of the course that you can use speed safely.

5. Looking at the map less. Certainly, reading a map takes time and the less you need to look the faster you will be. However, there are risks involved.

The skill here is to find the balance between looking enough times and looking too much.

This also applies to reading too much or just keeping it basic. At times, the control can still be found on only the basic information, the art lies in sensing it. Push it too far and you will get caught out. A thorough technique is invaluable but at times it can be time consuming.

Speed is only one aspect of race preparation, although a very important one.

If you have trained in speed you will be able to apply it as the race indicates.

Another factor with speed is rhythm. Something world champions speak of. A consistent pace and technique under control is experienced as flow. From my experience this is excellent for concentration. A high consistency of rhythm throughout the race will make for a fast race, even though it will not feel fast at the time.

Speed is fraught with dangers, of course, as it all becomes so much harder and therein lies the skill for those who do it well. A highly trained athlete will learn to respond well and have an automatic trained response for speed. A refined orienteer will also run the race utilizing a selection of refined techniques. These orienteers transfer across to international level more readily. The true champion comes from those who can produce rhythm and speed. It is then that the race becomes effortless, which is what Cathy Freeman refers to when she speaks of running like the wind and Ian Thorpe who feels the water splitting in front of him. Work on speed and then let it go!

AUSSIES OVERSEAS

George Reeves (M65 - Tintookies, SA) takes the plunge in Littlechild Creek at the 2005 AUS Championships.

Photo courtesy The Launceston Examiner.

Advertise your event in this space The Winter Classic Bayside Kangaroos present

Monday 12th June 2005 at Barambogie For information contact Greg Tamblyn (03) 9803 9082

You can have a 5 x 8 cm event ad for just $50.

In colour, if we have room, otherwise black and white.

Xmas 5-Days Day 1 map, Mt Gladstone (near Cooma) Scale 1:10 000

Send artwork to The Editor: mikehubbert@ozemail.com.au

MARCH 2006 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER

21

F E AT U R E

Imagine you are given a map with only the Start and Finish marked. You have to find five unmarked controls and get back within a certain time limit. Your only aid is a portable antenna which will (hopefully) point you in the right direction to each control. But each control only transmits for one minute in every 5-minute period. You have to get a good bearing whilst the control is “ON”, then find it.

This is RadiO Orienteering.

Tips and Techniques for RadiO Orienteering Bruce Paterson, VK3TJN (VIC) AS I started to write it became increasingly obvious I would have to split this up since there was way too much to cover in one go. Therefore I’ll firstly deal only with something familiar to orienteers - the map.

What is an ARDF Event ?

An Amateur Radio Direction Finding event following championship rules has 5 transmitters (control points) which take turns transmitting, so each transmitter only broadcasts for one-minute in each five-minute cycle. Only the Start triangle and Finish circle are shown on the map and there is a fixed time limit in which to find a certain number of controls (like in a Score event). Time limits of two hours or more are common so often there may be a long way between controls.

Why use a map ?

I’ve been asked “why not just follow the signal from each radio beacon ?”. Well, some competitors do this; they stuff the map in the back pocket and bee-line for the transmitters in turn. Though this technique, with easy terrain, might even get you to the first transmitter faster, your rate doesn’t improve during the event and you most probably end up doing the transmitters in the wrong order. You will do poorly.

The map can be used for navigation around bad terrain (eg. rivers, jungles, ravines), location, remembering bearings, transmitter guesstimation, choosing the control order and getting to the finish quickly.

Location Knowing where you are on the map, at least approximately, is essential to succeed at Radio Orienteering. Obviously you can’t take advantage of good fast routes to where you think the transmitters might be if you don’t know where you are on the map, but you also cannot draw bearings on the map since you don’t know where they are being taken from. A good coarse navigation ability is essential and normal foot Orienteering events are excellent training for this. Re-location is also important since when very close to a transmitter you sometimes have to sprint to “catch” it whilst it is still transmitting in its one-minute period and it’s very easy to lose contact with the map. When you find a control in foot Orienteering you at least know exactly where you are on the map; not so for Radio Orienteering. Finding the transmitter is no help at all for location.

22 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2006

Bearings One technique nearly all competitors use is to draw bearings on the map. Bearing lines are drawn from your current position in the direction of a transmitter as determined by peak signal from your radio direction finding gear.

When a number of bearings to one transmitter taken from various points as you travel around the course start to cross near each other (pray they do!), the intersections are your guesstimate of that transmitter’s location. You have to use your compass to relate a bearing from the gear to a bearing on the map.

Originally, I used to sight a plate compass arrow where the antenna pointed, turn the dial to align North, put the plate on the map with the North lines aligned to magnetic North and draw a bearing using the side of the compass from where I figured I was at the time. Luckily there are much faster techniques that are nearly as accurate.

I now affix my compass to the antenna and simply read the degrees where the North arrow points. Note this is not the actual bearing, but the Y-axis reflection (eg. a reading of 350º is a bearing of 10º). I then use an A4 compass rose printed on an overhead transparency showing “reflected” degrees to hand draw a bearing on my map. I merely need to be able to draw a line parallel to the appropriate degrees line on the transparency. Other techniques using a rotatable transparency rose can give even more accurate results (fewer inaccuracies in estimating a parallel line) at the expense of a little more manipulation, but still heaps faster than the original method.

Preparation Before the event you need to have your map board well prepared.

• You need a reasonably hard but light-weight backing behind the map to be able to draw a straight line quickly whilst on the run.

I use 1.5mm clear polycarbonate.

• A plastic sheath for the map is a very good idea in case of rain.

Bags are not provided in ARDF due to the huge variation in the way people attach their maps. Time is given at pre-start for you to prepare your map board. I have a thick A4 plastic pocket which will contain the board, the map and the compass rose.

• Draw exclusion circles around the start and finish once you get the map. The rules stipulate the distance any transmitter must be from the start and from each other. For championship events the start exclusion is usually 750m and from each other 500m.

Since the finish chute has a homing beacon transmitter you can also draw a 500m radius circle around the finish. Often templates are provided for this at the pre-start, but it’s safest to assume not and have your own.

• Have compass rose transparencies pre-printed for both landscape and portrait formats so you can use the appropriate one for the map.

F E AT U R E • Chinagraph pencils (from some newsagents) are great for drawing bearings on the plastic sheath. Some competitors have just 1 pencil and write transmitter numbers beside their bearing lines. Others have 5 different colours. I compromise and have 3 coloured pencils bound together. I then use dashed bearing lines for 2 of the 5 transmitters.

• I use a velcro patch on the board to hold the triple pencil. Some people tape a pencil to a finger or have piece of string. Others use a special 5-pencil holder on the map board.

• Some like to be able to attach their map board to their DF (direction finding) gear, others attach a small rotatable board to their arm. It all comes down to freeing up a hand since the other has to carry the DF gear.

Memory Bearings aren’t only a means of guesstimating the transmitter locations but they are your memory. In the first 5 minutes each transmitter has been on once and you have (hopefully) 5 bearings.

From this you have to determine which transmitter will be your first. Choosing something in the opposite direction to the finish is normally a good strategy. Be flexible and willing to change your order if it seems necessary as you gather more information.

Beware - sometimes bearings can be wrong from your gear (I’ll cover that another time). Another reason bearings can be off is if you weren’t sure where you were when you took them. It’s easy to forget this. It might be worth rubbing some bearings out if you suddenly find yourself somewhere unexpected.

Since each transmitter is off for 4 minutes out of every 5 the better your guesstimate is the more chance you’ll be able to find the control flag when the transmitter is off and not have to wait around precious minutes for it to come back on.

Take particular care with bearings of the transmitter you are going for and the one you plan next, but don’t ignore the others in case some earlier bearings were bad (I have done this to my peril!). You don’t have to draw them all on the map especially if they haven’t changed much. Too many bearings and you can’t see the map anymore!

A Valuable Tool All the normal foot techniques about navigation, linear features and orientation apply equally in Radio Orienteering. In some cases you have to keep even better track of where you are, rather than going to sleep and waiting for a catching feature, since you might have to take an important bearing on the way.

The map is your tool to do better than the “bee-line” method which can vary so much depending on the terrain. It represents your growing picture of the event, and the better the picture the better your confidence.

In championship events it is paramount you aren’t late back to the Finish, letting down your team. If you find you have to drop transmitters off in order to make it, your map lets you plan.

Without a map it is certainly still a radio direction finding event, but it is not really Orienteering.

Frequently Asked Questions What’s an ARDF event ?

ARDF stands for Amateur Radio Direction Finding, but the term is often used to refer to a particular style of radio event; the 5 sequenced transmitters conforming to International Rules. Since it’s run like a score event with a fixed time limit, you can take your time and find a couple, or strive competitively for all 5. There are walkers and runners categories offered.

What’s Fox-or-ing ?

A much simpler and easier event to tackle initially. On the map there are control circles, just like Orienteering, but they are bigger (say 100m diameter on the ground), and they need not be centred on the control location. All you know for sure is that the low powered radio transmitter should be able to be heard from within the circle. It combines navigation (to get to the circle in the first place), route choice (in what order do I find the controls?) and radio techniques to find the transmitter control somewhere in the circle. A mini flag with punch is located at the transmitter. It’s basically a scatter-O style of event.

A sniffer? (Do I need to bring my dog?)

The sniffer is the name of the piece of handheld radio gear you carry on a

radio event to work out the direction (bearing) to a transmitter. They are divided into two overall groups: 80metre and 2metre sniffers. The term ‘metre’ refers to the wavelength of the radio band (another way of saying frequency). These two sniffers are for different sets of transmitters and usually only one type is applicable for an event. 2M sniffers look a bit like a TV antenna, and 80m sniffers a small box. Spare sniffers can be borrowed from the ARDF group at events. They will show you how to use one.

Are the radio waves dangerous ?

No. The transmitters use low power levels (under 2 Watts).

How is this Orienteering ? (Don’t you just follow a radio signal ?)

In practice taking a bee-line between transmitters is very cumbersome and slow, and you never know where you are. The Orienteering skills become essential to know exactly where you are, plan how you’re going to get to where you think you want to go and most importantly let you triangulate the transmitter locations Look I can’t even set a digital watch ! How have I got any hope with all this techy equipment ?

The sniffers really are quite easy to master the operational aspects, and

we’re not going to insist you take them apart and reassemble them in the forest.

Why do people carry around cumbersome map boards ? I’ve never needed those before in Orienteering.

They allow you to draw lines (bearings) on your map, or better, on a plastic sheath over the map.

Chinagraph pencils are excellent for this.

Why a plate compass ? Isn’t that a backwards step ?

The thumb compass is a great way to quickly follow a direction on a map, but if you need to plot a bearing-off line from where you are heading currently a fair bit of guesstimation is required. A plate compass with its degrees markings can actually be better for RadiO events.

It still sounds all very complicated. Can someone show me ?

Yes! Don’t be afraid to ask any RadiO people at the event. Make sure they know you haven’t tried before and we’ll get someone to go with you all the way to a control. This is the best way to get the hang of it.

Why do this Radio Orienteering ?

Those orienteers who helped out or even competed at the International

Asia-Pacific Championships held near Ballarat in 2004 can attest to the enthusiasm and dedication of the overseas competitors. Also, since RadiO is only just beginning in Australia, your chances of competing on the Australian team are far higher than in bush Orienteering. Maybe you’re looking for an extra challenge ?

Someone mentioned radio foxhunting? Is that the same thing ?

Some Europeans do refer to ARDF as foxhunting (the fox is the transmitter, not a furry animal). In Australia we use ‘foxhunting’ to refer to another ‘sport’ involving teams of people in cars and hidden radio transmitters.

Many radio orienteers have done or do radio foxhunting as well.

So what now ?

Look for a RadiO event held in conjunction with a regular event. If you want to do both you can (maybe pick the short bush course to give you time and left over energy).

Radio Orienteering is only established in Victoria so far, but we’d be very happy to hear from interested people in other States. More details about Radio Orienteering and events can be found on: http://www.ardf.org.au

MARCH 2006 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 23

RadiO

Redrawn map “Sailors Creek” showing route taken and bearings to transmitters

24 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2006

RadiO

The real thing - Adam Scammell’s map from the Asia-Pacific Region 3 Championships held in Japan. The reddish areas are rice paddies.

MARCH 2006 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 25

SPORT PSYCHOLOGY

Jason McCrae – Intern Psychologist

After a mistake – how much time are you losing?

working on with athletes. While all orienteers are probably working to eradicate mistakes the reality is that navigational mistakes do happen and will continue to happen, be they 20 second or 20 minute errors. If an orienteer can recover from a mistake and be back to full concentration and orienteering at their best efficiently and quickly then no further time will be lost post-mistake.

Ideally after a mistake the main goal is to get back to full concentration on navigating as soon as possible. This can be done by having a couple of key steps you follow to get your mind back on task and can be similar to how you navigate at the start of a race – slowly and thoroughly with a focus on navigation rather than running: 1. First step should always be to focus on where you are. By identifying some features in the forest, where they are on the map and in turn exactly where you are on the map, your mind focuses away from mistake analysis and back on to orienteering. This first step would also include a decision to physically stop, thus calming your body, increasing oxygen to the mind for navigation and concentration and countering the ‘rush’ response.

2. Next, plan how you are going to navigate to the next place where you want to go (presumably the next control). By planning and slowly starting where you go next you are regaining control of your concentration, attention and orienteering.

3. Finally tell yourself to ‘build’ back into the course. By doing this you are further countering the desire to rush post-mistake and encouraging the return of focus and concentration to orienteering.

Other ingredients in recovering from a mistake might be to make a conscious decision to analyse mistakes and their consequences after the race. By deciding that you will work out what went wrong and how much time you lost in a mistake, but after the race, an orienteer is satisfying the need to analyse the error but delaying this analysis till after the finish when the job of navigating and completing the course is finished.

It may also be a benefit to set some minigoals for the remainder of the course. These might be technical and process in nature such as using the compass more for the remainder of the course or stopping and reading the map every time you feel the features in the terrain don’t quite match the map. These sorts of mini-goals give a focus to the remainder of the course that can be achieved while distracting the mind from the analysis and disappointment of a mistake

Jason McCrae NAVIGATIONAL mistakes are often the most discussed, disputed and analysed aspect of any orienteer’s race. At any given event competitors can be seen pouring over maps and dissecting where they went wrong and at multi-day events this analysis can be seen at club dinners and camp grounds well into the night. Yet for all this analysis and discussion it is rare that we give thought to how well an individual orienteered on the legs after the mistake(s) occurred. The period immediately after a navigational error often produces additional time loss and possibly even more time loss than the mistake itself.

What happens after a navigational mistake?

After an error has been made, whether an individual has corrected themselves or is still trying to find their way out of being ‘temporarily misplaced’, there are certain common responses that occur. Firstly our thinking and concentration is often diverted to analysing what we think the consequences of the error might be.

Common thoughts post-error might be: • How much time have I lost?

• Is that enough for Dave Lotty (or some other relevant competitor) to catch me?

• What place can I still come given the time lost?

• I’m a fool / dud orienteer / joke / sledger (insert your own selfcriticism) I’m often amazed at the number of people who as soon as they finish can reel off in great detail exactly what their mistake was, how much time they lost, and what time they could or should have done. This analysis can be explained to fellow orienteers before an individual has reached the end of the finish chute and indicates that at least some of the runner’s mental energy while racing has been focused on this mistake-analysis rather than navigating and orienteering.

While these questions are thought, analysed and answered, an individual is not focusing their full attention on navigation and the process of orienteering. This almost certainly means an increase in the chance of more navigational mistakes and, at the least, not orienteering as efficiently and effectively.

There are also often other ‘non-thinking’ responses to mistakes. Swearing, cursing, yelling and blaming the mapper and/or course setter are not unheard of after a mistake! A drop in confidence at the realisation that this is not going to be a perfect race can also have an effect on an orienteer’s performance. Perhaps one of the most common responses after a navigational error can be to rush – this might be running off fast in the approximate direction of where the next control is without reading the map thoroughly or rushing thinking and navigation in general. Often it’s motivated by the perceived need to regain the time lost.

Putting it into Practice Mental skills, just like physical and technical skills, need training and practice to master. Set out your own error recovery routine and choose some events where performance or result is less important and practice the routine. These races can include street events where navigation is less difficult but mental skills can still be practiced.

The practice should occur when a mistake has been made and this might involve artificially encouraging mistakes – run for a while without looking at the map and then re-look at the map and implement your routine.

Jason McCrae is a Sport Psychologist at the ACT Academy of Sport. He is also a keen M21Sledge competitor. He can be contacted on Jason.McCrae@act.gov.au

Error Recovery Recovering from errors or mistakes is an important part of a good competitor’s skills and one which Sport Psychologists often spend time 26 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2006

Troy de Haas made a mistake in the latter part of his 2005 WOC Sprint race however recovered well enough to finish in 7th place, his best-ever result at WOC.

ASIA PACIFIC ORIENTEERING CHAMPIONSHIPS

Hong Kong welcomes you to APOC 2006 24 December 2006 to 1 January 2007 APOC is a biannual grand occasion in the Orienteering world.

This year the event will be held in Hong Kong in December over the territory’s most beautiful outskirts areas. This time the event is listed as a World Ranking Event and it is expected that most top runners from around the world will come to enjoy Orienteering in Asia’s most prosperous city.

Brief information about APOC This is the third time that Hong Kong hosts an APOC carnival. APOC, which originated from Pacific Orienteering Championships, provides an opportunity to improve the competitive standard of Orienteering in the Asia-Pacific region and encourages interaction among orienteers in this region and the rest of the world. Asia-Pacific titles are reserved for those from Asia or countries bordering the Pacific Ocean (since 1992, this has been interpreted to exclude those from the European part of Russia), but the event itself is open to all. A full range of age classes is offered.

Yuen Long – Tai Tong, Tai Shu Ha (APOC – Sprint and Middle-distance) • contains the largest “white” forest area of all Orienteering areas in Hong Kong. This area is described as one of the most technically demanding for Orienteering in Hong Kong.

Lantau – Lo Fu Tau, Tung Wan Tau (APOC – Long-distance and Relay) • next to Discovery Bay (famous resort and low-rise residential area) and Hong Kong Disneyland. You may also have a chance to run next to Discovery Bay Golf Course.

Orienteering in Hong Kong

Join the festival!

Orienteering is a small sport here in Hong Kong, but not in terms of number of participants. Every year there are over 15 open events held during the competition season (October to May), including Annual Championships, Ranking Events, Colour-Coded Events, Sports Festival Relay Events, etc.

Each event attracts several hundred or even thousands of competitors. The largest ever event in Hong Kong, the MSF Orienteering Competition, attracted 2400 participants in 2005.

The Orienteering Association of Hong Kong was established in 1981 and now has 40 affiliated clubs and 839 individual members.

Asia Pacific Orienteering Championships 2006 is not only a major international Orienteering event; it is also the greatest ever Orienteering “carnival” in Hong Kong. From Christmas Eve to New Year, there will be 7 competitions in the 9-day period. No matter whether you are a novice in Orienteering or an elite runner, you may enjoy the fun of Orienteering close to a major world metropolis, find your direction using compass and map, and run with the topmost runners from all over the world.

Typical terrain You will encounter mainly hilly areas with some steep slopes.

Most competition areas are very runnable open area (yellow), or dense scrub (dark green) with extensive paths/roads network.

New Area, New Experience

Come to join us! APOC 2006 is waiting for your participation!

You may visit our website http://www.apoc2006.hk for the latest event news. You may also contact the Office of Orienteering Association of Hong Kong (OAHK) for event leaflets and entry forms: Address: Room 1014, Olympic House, 1 Stadium Path, Causeway Bay, Hong Kong Phone: (852) 25048112; (852)25048111 Fax: (852)25775595, Email: info@apoc2006.hk

Even those who participated in APOC 1996 in Hong Kong will still enjoy a completely new experience at APOC 2006 because we offer completely new competition areas this time:

APOC PROGRAM

Tai Po Waterfront Park (Hong Kong Championships – Sprint)

Date Event

• this 22 hectares park, where the symbolic Spiral Lookout Tower is located, is the largest park in Hong Kong. (Parks in Hong Kong are always crowded so park Orienteering events are seldom organized).

24 Dec 2006 (SUN) Hong Kong Championships – Sprint Course 25 Dec 2006 (MON) Hong Kong Championships – Middle-distance Course 26 Dec 2006 (TUE) Hong Kong Championships – Night Orienteering

Ngau Liu (Hong Kong Championships – Middle-distance)

27 Dec 2006 (WED) Registration for APOC 2006

• a popular area for camping and hiking, this area contains a typical mixture of terrain in Hong Kong, including “white” forest hills, steep slopes, open swampy area, dense scrub, etc.

28 Dec 2006 (THU) Model Event

Braemar Hill (Hong Kong Championships – Night)

30 Dec 2006 (SAT) APOC 2006 – Middle-dist Course (World Ranking Event)

• THE best location to view the beautiful night scene in Hong Kong Island. (It is exactly the reason why we arrange night Orienteering here).

31 Dec 2006 (SUN) APOC 2006 – Long-dist Course (World Ranking Event)

Opening Ceremony 29 Dec 2006 (FRI)

APOC 2006 – Sprint Course(World Ranking Event)

01 Jan 2007 (MON) APOC 2006 – Relay Closing Ceremony MARCH 2006 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 27

ASIA PACIFIC

APOC – International Orienteering close to home David Hogg

Typical terrain in Hong Kong - hilly area with some steep slopes, most areas are runnable rough open area (light yellow).

ONE of the great attractions of Orienteering is the opportunity to use it as an excuse to see the world.

Sooner or later, most committed orienteers take the opportunity to travel to other countries in order to experience popular and memorable events such as the World Masters Orienteering Championships, the Swedish Five-Days (O-ringen) or the spectator events attached to the World Orienteering Championships.

Dense scrub (light green/dark green) with extensive path/road networks are also commonly found here.

Some runnable forests (white) can be found in Hong Kong, but they look quite different to those in Scandinavia.

The first “Asian Cities Orienteering Championships” held in 2004 here is a milestone of orienteering development in this region.

Map is of Pak Sha, venue for the APOC’86 Relay.

28 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2006

ASIA PACIFIC Australia has its own home-grown international event, the Asia Pacific Orienteering Championships (or APOC) which began near Canberra in 1980 as the Pacific Orienteering Championships (POC). At that time Australia, together with the other Orienteering nations in the Pacific region (New Zealand, Japan, USA and Canada) were very much in the developmental stage in terms of international competition.

POC was initiated to provide an opportunity for orienteers from those nations to compete amongst themselves at their own level. It also had a second agenda, namely to provide local experience in organising an international event and particularly to demonstrate to the International Orienteering Federation Australia’s capabilities in support of its bid to host the 1985 World Orienteering Championships.

POC’80 was a success in all respects, although the international competition came mainly from New Zealand, with a few Japanese entrants and nobody from North America. It nevertheless inspired Japan to conduct the event again in 1982, and from there it has continued on a regular biennial cycle.

With Hong Kong entering the Orienteering scene, the event’s name was changed to the Asia Pacific Orienteering Championships when New Zealand hosted it in 1984. Hong Kong hosted APOC in 1986 and again in 1996, Canada in 1990 and 2002, and it returned to Australia in 1988 and 2000, to New Zealand in 1994 and to Japan in 1992. Two of the most memorable APOCs for those who attended were in China in 1998, when the Orienteering itself was fairly basic but the other experiences were fantastic, and in Kazakhstan in 2004, a country which is unlikely to have been high on one’s travel agenda, were it not for the Orienteering.

Particularly in the cases of China and Kazakhstan, APOC offered the opportunity for the host nations to stage an event for international visitors without necessarily being subject to the technical and financial rigours associated with an IOF-sanctioned event. Most APOC carnivals, however, are nevertheless conducted to a very high standard. Combined with the travel experience to places such as the Canadian Rockies, the Great Wall of China or the mountains of eastern Kazakhstan, APOC offers a trip which most would look back on with much satisfaction.

The competitive standard of APOC depends largely on where the event is held, with the toughest competition usually experienced when it is held in Australia or New Zealand. In contrast to the World Masters or O-ringen, however, competent Australian orienteers need not fear being consigned to the middle of the field behind dozens of Scandinavians. While Europeans also attend APOC, they are usually the ones who are there for the travel experience rather than for the competitive glory. In any case, the formal titles of APOC Champion are reserved for residents of the region.

One of the successful aspects of many previous APOCs for Australian orienteers has been the organisation of tour groups. In particular, the late Keith Curry organised many successful tours for Australians (sometimes with a few New Zealanders) to those countries where making your own arrangements is not always easy.

Barry Hanlon overcame many difficulties in arranging a successful trip for Australian orienteers to Kazakhstan in 2004. Others have also organised tour parties on occasions. It is normal practice for participants from Japan and Hong Kong to travel en masse, and Sweden’s Peo Bengtsson has organised European groups to many past APOC events.

APOC 2006 in Hong Kong In December 2006, APOC will be in Hong Kong for the third time.

The political scene has changed significantly since APOC was last held there, with the former British colony reverting to Chinese control, but Orienteering keeps going.

As described in a separate article, at least some of the terrain will be quite new to previous APOC visitors, with two days of competition held on Lantau Island. Most of the other days will be in the New Territories where the terrain, while different from what most Australians are used to, can still provide challenging competition.

Apart from the Orienteering, Hong Kong has much to offer the visitor, as one can find out from travel guides or the internet. It is also a relatively easy place to visit from a language viewpoint, with English being widely spoken.

At this stage, I am not aware of anyone with plans to organise a tour group, but am willing to act as a contact point for anyone thinking of going to Hong Kong who would like to co-ordinate with other Australian visitors. My e-mail address is dhogg@homemail. com.au or phone (02) 6254 2325 of you prefer to talk directly. If anyone is interested in organising a tour, please let me know, as there should be many potential takers. The event organisers are offering some accommodation and local transport options for those who wish to travel independently.

The Future of APOC The international Orienteering scene has changed significantly since the days of POC’80. The nations for which the event was originally established have become increasingly competitive at the international elite level, and more active in organising major competitions for the IOF. On the other hand, there are many new Orienteering nations emerging in the Asia Pacific region, and some of these may have desires to host international events in due course. APOC can continue to serve the needs of these developing O-nations in providing such an opportunity without extreme expectations by competitors.

The competition to attract international participants is also becoming more intense, with the annual World Masters Orienteering Championships catering for what has become the main visitor participation base of APOC, namely the older orienteers who have the time, money and relative freedom from other commitments to make overseas trips. The World Masters tends to move between the stronger Orienteering nations, which have the resource base to meet IOF expectations, while APOC has the flexibility to travel to some of the smaller countries, which may be more exotic in both an Orienteering and a travel sense.

At the elite level, the IOF is developing the concept of regional championships. This may sometimes fit comfortably with the APOC concept, although the APOC region is different from the IOF regions. When (A)POC first started, there was a strong emphasis on elite competition, but this has declined over time. The IOF regional championship model has the potential to restore elite interest.

APOC should continue to prosper if, but only if, there are nations willing to host it and orienteers willing to travel to it. The issue of hosting is of some concern, as to date there is still no confirmed host for 2008, although a couple of the newer Asian Onations have expressed some interest. Eastern Russia (Vladivostok) has been suggested as a possible future venue, and the USA is the only one of the original partners not to have hosted APOC. In the longer term, there are several South American nations fronting the Pacific that have joined the IOF recently, although whether their international ambitions are likely to reach across the ocean rather than within their own continent has yet to be determined.

Whatever its future, APOC has played an important role in the development of Orienteering outside Europe for nearly 30 years, and brought some memorable experiences to many Australians and other orienteers within the region.

David Hogg is the current APOC Secretary and organised the inaugural Pacific Orienteering Championships in 1980 near Canberra.

MARCH 2006 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 29

HIGH PERFORMANCE

Mike Dowling, OA Director, High Performance

THE 2005 Annual Conference of Orienteering Australia saw the adoption of the new High Performance Strategic Plan for the conduct of our high performance activities over the next three-year period. The new plan will seek to build upon the achievements of the previous strategic plan taking into account the new financial environment resulting from the 2005 Australian Sports Commission review of Orienteering Australia’s operations, the adoption of ACT Academy of Sport as the National Training Centre, the international competition program and new coaching developments.

• I mprove the competition program for MTBO through the establishment of an Aust Sprint-distance Championships for MTBO from 2007, annual Aust/NZ test matches for MTBO from 2007 and an MTBO National League from 2008.

It is timely therefore to remind readers of the key outcome areas that will drive our High Performance program over the next three-year period which are as follows: 1. National Teams: To form men’s and women’s teams that will finish in the top six in the World Championships relay competitions and for individuals to win medals in the World Mountain Bike Orienteering Championships and the [foot] World Orienteering Championships.

2. National Orienteering League: To have a National Orienteering League that offers the best competitors from all States well organised and technically demanding races against quality fields in both foot and mountain bike orienteering.

3. National & Regional Training Centre Network: To consolidate on the establishment – in 2005 – of a National Training Centre at the ACT Academy of Sport, and to establish one other Training Centre in another State before 2008.

4. High Performance Coaching Network: To have a wellestablished and effective high performance coaching network that serves the needs of elite orienteering nationally and in each State.

5. Support Staff: To have a pool of support staff who excel in their field of expertise and provide value to high performance programs.

6. GPS Technology & Video: To use GPS systems to monitor orienteers’ fitness levels and performances in competitions; to utilise video footage of relevant terrain to prepare Australian teams for international competitions.

7. Media: To raise the profile of Australian high performance orienteering through increased promotion and media coverage and have a pool of athletes with well-developed media skills.

8. Resources: To have sufficient resources to execute the program.

In the context of off all this, the following areas are the key new initiatives of the new three-year plan: •A ppoint a Head Coach to provide strategic leadership in the development of improved high performance coaching and competition outcomes and thus slightly change the emphasis of the previous Manager, High Performance role.

•R estructure the National Senior (foot) administration team where there will be a two-person coaching team sharing management duties from 2006 on.

•E stablish a National Junior Development Squad for talented juniors and have them participate in National Junior Squad training camps in 2006 as the first development pathway for future high performance senior orienteers. It is envisaged the squad will be selected from the best W/M16 orienteers.

The exact nature of the composition of the Development Squad and selection procedures will be determined by a working group with a formal recommendation to be made at the 2006 AGM of OA.

30 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2006

•S eek the establishment of at least one Regional Training Centre to support the National Training Centre at ACTAS.

New Coaching Team for Foot WOC Teams Orienteering Australia were delighted to appoint the new foot O coaching/management team for the next two World Championships to be held in Denmark and Ukraine. Sue Neve and Brett Weihart will make a great team and bring a wealth of experience in the continuing improvement of our international competitiveness at World Championships.

2006 – The Year Ahead We have a busy year ahead for High Performance. By the time you read this column Orienteering Australia will have appointed our new Head Coach to provide strategic leadership for our high performance development program.

The National League promises to be an exciting series with a number of fascinating events this year with the opening round of events to be held in NSW a month prior to Easter, the Easter Carnival in Victoria in classic Victorian countryside, competitors travelling to Queensland in August and finishing off in WA for the National Championships carnival.

On the international front we will be sending teams to the WOC in Denmark, JWOC in Lithuania and the MTBO WOC in Finland. Good luck to all athletes aspiring to represent their country in this great sport of ours.

Perception: The Ongoing Challenge One of the ongoing challenges for our sport is getting more recognition of the many outstanding athletes we have in Orienteering. To that end perception is everything. We in Orienteering all know what it takes to be a great orienteer - supreme physical fitness, high level technical ability and great mental strength. We must all do what we can to present our sport to the wider community in a most positive way in all aspects and in particularly how we present our premier competitions and how our top athletes present themselves both in competition and in the media when such opportunities arise.

Some good things are happening. National League teams have begun to present themselves in more snappy uniforms, States are gaining naming rights sponsors for their teams, our major competitions conducted in regional areas are receiving good quality exposure and some of our top athletes have been receiving due recognition for their efforts. The ongoing challenge for us all is to continue to work hard to show off our awesome sport to the wider community at all levels in a way that can capture the imagination of those who have not yet been orienteering. Who knows what can be achieved.

Let’s give it a go!

Mike Dowling, 17 High St., Bellerive 7018 Tel: (03) 6244 71773 Email mdowling@tassie.net.au

Orienteering Australia – National Training Centre

MAPPING

The future of mapping?

Craig Feuerherdt and Neil Barr Bendigo Orienteers, Victoria HAVE you ever stopped to consider why it costs so much to attend a major Orienteering carnival? The main reason is the time and effort put into creating the high quality Orienteering maps we have come to expect at such events.

It’s accepted practice to create new maps for Australian Championships and the Easter carnival. Cost of the maps is the major component of the entry fees. When mapping new terrain the cost is mainly mappers’ time. Consider a new map created by Bendigo Orienteers for the 2006 Middle-distance Championships.

The terrain is previously unmapped, high quality granite. Only part is being mapped for the 2006 event, but we have a longer-term plan to map the complete area for an Australian Long-distance Championships. With the partial map almost complete, we can reasonably estimate the cost for completing the full map - about $12,000 give or take a square km or two.

It’s worth asking whether the Orienteering community can continue to justify making this scale of investment. Our club did some simple financial modelling and quickly came to the conclusion that we cannot repay an investment in professional mapping for anything less than a national carnival event. And we wonder whether we can justify the investment in a highly detailed (eg granite) map for future carnivals if participation continues to decline. Here are some thoughts on potential solutions to reducing the costs of maps.

If participation rates continue to fall, we will have to get used to fewer maps of virgin terrain and more remaps of existing Orienteering maps. The number of virgin areas close to major population centres is declining but there are still suitable areas remaining. In Victoria we know of half a dozen high quality granite areas that have not been mapped. We believe NSW has found at least that many in the Dubbo area alone. But do we need all of these areas mapped?

How many maps are needed?

Each State can expect to host Easter and a National Championships about every five years. Assume a cycle of 15 years map life (10 years of use and 5 of rest) then at a minimum we need 12 high quality maps in each State. If we include Middledistance Championships as a major event, the total rises to 15 maps. Allowing for contingencies such as fire might lead to a more realistic total of 20 maps. Once those 20 maps exist on OCAD, future remapping should be relatively cheap. By limiting our mapping to these 20 areas, the mapping component of the entry fee for major events should be reduced.

Orienteers being orienteers, our love of the novel will guarantee we won’t limit ourselves to this small portfolio of maps. We will keep looking to map new classic terrains. Then there are the mapping needs for Sprint and MTBO. With so much mapping to be done, can we simplify the process and thus minimise the costs?

GPS technology Our new 4 square km granite map was made using traditional mapping techniques. Aerial photographs were given to Chris Wilmot for photogrammetric interpretation. He extracted contours and approximate vegetation boundaries, as well as visible rock for the whole map. The interpretation, completed by Alex Tarr, took four weeks of field-work, including a week for transcribing everything into OCAD. Skilled interpretation by the human mapper will always be required for new maps however, there are technologies that can save time and make field-work easier. The obvious technology is

the Global Positioning System (GPS). Like several clubs, Bendigo Orienteers has been experimenting with GPS. The conclusions we reached are mixed.

Using a standard GPS receiver (from any outdoor shop), the technology is of little use due to limited accuracy. Manufacturers only guarantee being within a maximum of 15 metres from the true grid reference. Our experience suggests this is an optimistic claim.

The error can make a huge difference in the simple task of logging track networks. These receivers are capable of better accuracy, given the right conditions, however they should probably only be used for mapping tracks on Rogaine maps. The alternative is a GPS capable of correcting itself in real-time. We have mapped the tracks in virgin terrains using one of these (borrowed) devices and a bicycle. The GPS receiver is connected to a handheld computer (HP IPAQ) with tracking software, making it possible to visualise the output in real time. The results were accurate to within 30cm when we had full signal. The main shortcoming is signal drop-outs which occur when the vegetation canopy restricts the signal from the correction satellite. The thicker the canopy or the further south the location (i.e. Tasmania), the more likely drop-outs will be.

Data captured by GPS can be superimposed on a standard base map, vastly improving the base map. This technology suggests that standard Orienteering maps may be relatively accurate but absolutely inaccurate. When attempting to transform a standard Orienteering map into a real world coordinate system we found it to be 1:14,500 in one axis and 1:16,000 in another. So if we want to use GPS technology and the latest functionality provided in OCAD 9, we will need to rectify our existing maps to a standard topographic projection. It makes sense to use a base defined in real world coordinates when one starts photogrammetric interpretation or has other base data. This step may future-proof the mapping investment.

These are some of the issues associated with attempting to incorporate GPS technology into data collection and field-work. It would help if real-time GPS became a lot cheaper ! The model we used is a little old now but cost close to $20,000, an investment not likely to be made by the Orienteering fraternity.

Portable computer and GPS unit.

Other technologies Craig had the opportunity to attend the 22nd International Cartographic Association conference held in Coruna, Spain in July 2005. A whole session was dedicated to Orienteering mapping.

Four speakers, all European, presented a range of topics. Of most interest was one by an Austrian who was involved in a trial exercise using LIDAR (Laser Identification Detection and Ranging) data to regenerate a small portion of an existing Orienteering map. continued Hedges bordering road

Farm buildings

20-50 year old deciduous woodlands with 50-75% canopy cover

20-50 year old deciduous woodlands with 50-75% canopy cover

Example LIDAR data – Shaded relief of a 1 square kilometre area using 1 metre resolution data.

MARCH 2006 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 31

TOP EVENTS 2006

2007

April 14-17 Australian 3-Days, Castlemaine, Victoria. www.vicorienteering.asn. au/easter2006

Jan 3-7 Christmas 5 Days, Orange NSW

April 22 Australian Middle Dist Champs, Inglewood, Victoria

April 6-15 “Burra to Barossa 2007” Aust 3Days & Middle-dist Champs, SA www.oasa.asn.au/2007

July 1-7 WMOC 2006 Wiener Neustadt, Austria www.wmoc06.com/

July 7-14 WMOC 2007 Kuusamo, Finland www.wmoc2007.fi/

July 2-7 JWOC 2006, Druskininkai, Lithuania www.losf.lt/jwoc2006

July 8-15 Tour O Swiss www.tour-o-swiss.ch

July 7-15 JWOC 2007 Carnival, incl NSW Champs, Aus Champs & Schools Champs, Dubbo, NSW. http:// orienteering.asn.au/events

July 9-14 World MTB-O Champs, Joensuu, Finland. mtbwoc2006.orienteering.org

July 22-27 O-Ringen Sweden

July 15-22 Swiss O Week 2006 Zermatt, Switzerland www.sow2006zermatt.ch

August 16-26 WOC 2007 Kiev, Ukraine e-mail: info@woc2007.org.ua www.woc2007.org.ua

August 19-26 WMTB-O 2007 Nove Mesto na Morave, Czech Republic www.mtbo.cz/woc2007/

October 4 Australian Sprint Championships, Canberra ACT

October 6-7 Oceania Championships, Canberra ACT

November Australian MTB-O Championships, NSW

Dec 27-31 Christmas 5 Days, NSW

July 16-21 O-Ringen, Halsingland, Sweden (250 km north of Stockholm) www.oringen.com

July 29-Aug 5 WOC 2006 and Danish WOC Tour 6-Days, Aarhus, Denmark www.woc2006.dk/

29 Sept-12 Oct Australian Championships Carnival York, Western Australia http://wa.orienteering.asn.au/ auschamps 2006

10-12 Oct Australian MTB-O Championships Collie, Western Australia http://wa.orienteering.asn.au/ auschamps 2006

Dec 29-31 APOC 2006, Hong Kong http://www.apoc2006.hk

continued from page 31.

The LIDAR data, collected the same way as aerial photography, provides highly detailed, fine resolution elevation data. Data points collected may be as close as 20cm, producing a very dense cloud of points. Each data point is attributed with various elevations, including height of the terrain (impenetrable surface) and the top of the vegetation. Such a dense cloud of points means individual features differing in height by no more than 50cm, can be distinguished. These may be boulders, high points, or even fallen trees! This dense cloud of points can be post-processed to extract smooth contours at an appropriate interval.

The LIDAR technique allows most of the base data (contours, vegetation boundaries) to be extracted in a digital format. The raw data could be used by mappers to better locate specific features reducing time spent in the field. Data could be augmented with other information including aerial photography (maybe multiple images from different times) or a scan of an existing map to assist the mapper to interpret features. All this data could be taken into the field on a laptop or tablet computer and, with the assistance of a handheld GPS to determine position, the mapper could create the map ‘on-the-fly’.

The mapper would concentrate on interpreting the existing data sources rather than explicitly collecting data. We don’t suggest the mapper would be creating the final version of the map in OCAD 32 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2006

whilst in the field, but rather collecting enough data, in a digital format, to inform the final drawing process.

LIDAR data is expensive to collect and would never be considered for the sole purpose of creating an Orienteering map. However, LIDAR data is being collected across broad areas of Australia by government authorities for a multitude of purposes. In Victoria, for example, a growing proportion of the state is being covered by LIDAR data of varying resolutions. We have seen a LIDAR image of the terrain around the Wimmera River with the road network being clearly visible because they are slightly raised above the surrounding terrain.

We, as an Orienteering community, should be exploring ways to reduce the time taken to create high quality maps of exceptional terrain. Techniques being used and explored in a range of disciplines may (or may not) be useful for our purposes. One thing is for certain, with fewer volunteers supporting Orienteering, anything that saves time should be explored.

You can get a sneak preview of the Middle-distance granite terrain by visiting and checking out the terrain photos at: http:// www.mapmedia.com.au/bendigo-orienteers/

COACHING

Orienteering Australia recently appointed Grant Bluett (ACT) to the national position of Head Coach. Grant has been one of Australia’s most successful orienteers in recent years at most forms of foot Orienteering on the international stage. It is legend that he won the inaugural World Games Men’s title in Japan in 2001.

Grant now takes on a new role in high performance Orienteering and no doubt intends to pass on much of his experience to our up and coming Orienteering athletes. The Australian Orienteer welcomes Grant as a regular correspondent for the magazine.

More efficient map reading Grant Bluett YOU are running through the bush at full speed; you clear every obstacle effortlessly; you’re running strong and with purpose.

You have a clear plan for where you are going, you have a clear picture of what each section of the terrain looks like before you reach it. You are reading the map relentlessly, knowing that reading each detail is saving you time, and knowing that reading the map isn’t affecting your running speed. Each decision you make is made automatically, you have come across every problem the course setter throws at you in training, and you instantly know the fastest way to the control.

The previous paragraph is a picture of my dream Orienteering state. This is the goal that I believe elite orienteers should strive to meet.

Some parts of this picture are quite obvious - that you want to run as fast as you can through the terrain.

I don’t think anyone will argue with that. Others are a little less obvious, and I will spend a bit of time talking about them in the rest of this article.

How often should I read the map?

The fastest orienteers read the map through a detailed section of Orienteering more often than the slower ones. They read the map on the run, and with frequent, short glances at the map. The slower orienteer will spend less total time looking at the map, will read the map less frequently, but when they do read the map they will read it for a longer period, and have to slow their running speed to focus on the map. If you add to this that faster orienteers understand what they are

looking at on the map quicker than do the slower ones, you can see that they are spending much more time with a clear picture of what the terrain ahead of them looks like.

Map generalising Think of an Orienteering map as being like a newspaper. A newspaper is full of headlines that give you a vague understanding of what an article is about, the opening paragraphs give you a little more information, then the article itself is full of text that gives you the full details. You can read a newspaper by flicking through the headlines, reading a couple of opening paragraphs of articles in which you have an interest to get a feeling for the article, then you continue reading the entire text of those articles which are important to you.

It is the same with reading an Orienteering map. You scan it by reading the ‘headlines’ and gaining a general picture of what is important to you, then read more information in the sections of the map that will help you get to the control as fast as possible.

The challenge here is to know what sections of the map you need to read in more detail. The best way to know this is through experience, spending lots of time orienteering in different terrains, and analysing your races. Studying maps and visualising what the terrain will look like will also help you get a faster and more accurate mental picture of the terrain in race situations.

Decision making When we make conscious decisions they are affected by stress to a far greater extent than an automatic response. Think of when you learned to drive a car - you had to consciously think about when to change gears, what pressure to put on the clutch, when to start breaking, when to start turning into a corner, and so on. It was quite stressful and you often made mistakes. Now when you can drive a car confidently it all comes automatically, you don’t make mistakes, and it’s all pretty relaxing.

Try to think of getting to the same state when you are orienteering.

When you read the map you instinctively know how to run the leg, what parts of the map you have to read detail, and which route choice is fastest. The more time you spend orienteering and thinking about orienteering the greater part of the orienteering process will become automatic, and the lesser part will be spent on making decisions that you aren’t confident about, and that you are more likely to make mistakes over.

As a course setter I think, “I’m going to make these people make as many decisions as possible”, as an orienteer I think “I’m going to train so that I have to make as few decisions as possible”.

My aim with this article has been to give people a better understanding of what you have to train towards to be a better orienteer, now it’s over to you to get out there and do the training!

MARCH 2006 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 33

34 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2006

MTB-O TIPS

How to jump logs Adrian Jackson (2004 World MTB-O Champ) shows you how.

Often during MTB-O events, obstacles can block your path meaning a loss of valuable time if you stop and lift your bike over them. It is possible to get over a lot of these obstacles with virtually no time loss. Adrian shows you how.

Photos: Peter Cusworth

1. Approach

2. Up… Approach the obstacle at a reasonable speed to begin with. Many beginners start too slow which makes it harder not easier. As your skills progress you should barely have to slow at all. Be looking past the log at where you need to ride afterwards, definitely don’t look at the log unless you want to hit it! Keep your arms bent and stay relaxed.

As your front wheel approaches pull upwards on the bars, and throw your weight backwards. It’s very hard to throw too much weight back, so don’t be afraid of being quite vigorous. You can add a small hard pedal stoke as you lift up to help get the front wheel up, but for small obstacles you should be able to lift enough without it. Timing this move just right can only be learnt by practice.

Too early and you will bring the front wheel down on the log, and too late and your rear wheel will hit the log.

3. …and over 4. Home & hosed

As soon as the front wheel is happily traveling above and over the log, you need to push the bars down away from you, whilst having your weight over the centre of the bike. It’s kind of the same action you see sprinters like Robbie McEwen do as they ‘throw’ their bikes at the finish line. To get the right action it may help to imagine you are trying to rotate your grips forward. You also need to pull upwards on the pedals, which is made much easier with clipless pedals. Point your toes down as you pull up, this is how to lift the rear wheel when not clipped into your pedals.

ADRIAN’S NEW RACE BIKE

Remember to keep looking ahead, and don’t shift your weight back to normal too quickly. Forgetting either of these things is the reason why lots of people get the wobbles or run off the track shortly after clearing an obstacle. The best way to begin is on a grassy area, practicing to lift your wheels over an imaginary log such as a hose or stick. Once you feel you are lifting your wheels enough graduate up to a bigger obstacles!

Scott Genius RC–10 Specs: Frame: Scott Genius RC-10 (Carbon / Alloy) Fork: Fox F100RLT, Wheels: DT Swiss Drivechain: SRAM X.O / Shimano XTR Brakes: Avid Juicy 7 Carbon Handlebar, stem, seatpost: Ritchey WCS

Adrian Jackson has a new race bike for 2006, a Scott Genius RC-10 dual suspension, on which he has already raced to success in the Wildside MTB stage race in Tasmania in January. Adrian says that the benefits of a dual suspension far outweigh the small weight penalty such a bike brings. “I can ride faster through rough technical sections whist feeling more in control, and it’s more efficient so at the end of the race I can be riding stronger.”

Race oriented dual suspensions such as the Scott Genius line employ clever linkage designs, that eliminate pedal-induced bobbing of the rear suspension. The Scott Genius bikes also come with a 3-position lever to switch between the rear suspension modes; ‘lockout’, ‘traction mode’ and ‘full travel’. “The three different modes mean the bike is fast in all situations, lockout for road sections, traction mode for general riding, and full travel for rough stuff.”

Adrian would like to thank Warren Key of Melbourne Bicycle Centre (Clifton Hill) and Netti Atom who distribute Scott bicycles in Australia.

MARCH 2006 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 35

MTB-O

Course Setting Paul Darvodelsky

This article is aimed at course-setting for MTBO but most of the principles are from and also apply to Foot-O. COURSE setting varies a lot around the world. Mostly different places develop their course setting style to suit the terrain they have.

In Australia, compared to many parts of Europe, we are really spoilt for choice with big forests which are fabulous for orienteering. As a result our course-setting was probably not as imaginative or good as some countries which have small and less interesting forests, however the advent of SPORTident has seen more interesting courses.

In MTBO there are a number of differences in the terrain and therefore how they set courses. In Slovakia at WOC last year they had lots of pastures, shown as yellow on the maps (which you can ride on) and they use them liberally. So you get check points in the yellow and not necessarily on the tracks. This makes a very interesting change in thinking.

Generally most of the areas in Europe are smaller than we have (and probably slower riding overall) and they use 1:15,000, or even 1:10,000. MTBO courses are often set much more like foot-o courses, with more check points than we usually use. It’s also much more common to use short legs often to make people think faster and break up the course which is a good thing because it makes the rider change their mental and physical rythym.

Another interesting feature in Europe is there are many more tracks which are much less distinct than we have in Australia.

In spring the grass grows up and can make some tracks almost invisible. This is part and parcel of MTBO over there and the courses demand that you navigate accurately enough to pick them up. They do not highlight tracks with streamers or the like as we have sometimes in Australia.

The points above are all things which MTBO can use to make courses more interesting. MTBO courses should encourage riders to use more than just the track network for navigation. After all it’s MTB-O, not just MTB. For major competitions the standard way of showing tracks and paths is to use 3 symbols, fast, medium and slow although Australia has informally taken the view that we will use a 4th symbols to experiment a bit and because it more fairly and better shows track conditions.

When it comes to setting the courses there are a few good rulesof thumb which apply equally to MTBO and foot-O. The golden rule is that a check-point should always be on a feature which is on the map. If it’s not on the piece of paper in your hand then you either have to add the feature to the map or not use it.

Each check-point should have a purpose. That purpose is to start a good leg, finish a good leg or avoid a dog-leg. Now for MTBO we allow (and sometimes encourage) dog-legs so the last point is not so important. Check-points can also be used to make people cross at a certain point.

Each leg created by two check-points should have some orienteering merit. It may be route choice, it may be navigational difficulty or it may be to set up the next leg (for those occasional times when you get boxed into a corner of the map which hasn’t much to work with). For MTBO the aim is to have route choice for every leg on the course.

Each leg should put pressure on the rider (or runner) to keep thinking as much as possible and keep moving as fast as possible.

For MTBO it’s also very important to think about the speed at 36 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2006

which people can go on a bike. So care must be taken about possible 2-way traffic. It’s not essential to completely avoid it that often limits route choice too much - but having other courses coming up a hill the elites are coming down at 40+ kmh is asking for trouble.

When setting courses a really good start is to look for the essence of a map. Detailed maps are great for lots of intense, fine navigation. Maps, or parts of maps, with big relief but not as many tracks are better for long legs with big route choices. So the map and terrain really dictate what sort of course you can set.

Legs should vary in length and direction. The more you can change the pace and direction of a rider the better. At the same time a course should flow. It’s more fun if you can keep moving smoothly around the course.

Another very important point is the quality of the map. If parts of the map are not accurate then the course-setter either must update the map or avoid these. Courses should always be set to minimise the element of luck as far as possible.

Speed of the different riders has to be considered when setting routes. The fitter riders are much faster on rough tracks and single track than the average rider and this can affect route choice quite a bit. The fastest way for Adrian Jackson might not work for the rest of us!

Courses should generally run in the same direction, not in opposite directions. Otherwise we create a potential safety issue with two way traffic and more importantly people leaving a checkpoint can give it away to people coming into the check-point.

MTBO doesn’t have the same navigational difficulty grading as foot-O. Perhaps the presumption is that courses are all easy, so only the length changes?! It is important to make sure that the short courses are simpler so they are suitable for newcomers and the many now taking their kids around them. Courses for kids, newcomers and older riders should also consider the rougher and steeper terrain before heading off into the wilds. If this sort of terrain must be used then the courses must be appropriately shortened as people will move much slower on rough tracks and up big hills.

For MTBO finishes require special mention. A sprinting rider might hit 50 kmh, or more if the finish is downhill. So the finish should always try and finish on an upward grade. Where-ever possible the start and finish areas for MTBO should provide a safe and visible spectacle for all in attendance.

A key check that should be made at all stages of course planning is the most important question of all. Will this course be fun to ride? Get familiar with the map and look really hard at how you can get people riding through the nicest and most fun parts of the map. Courses are supposed to be fun!

Long dash track from Slovakia

MTB-O “Donovaly”: 1:15 000, 5m contours World Cup 2000 Relay course and area for 2005 WOC. This shows how you can use lots of short legs, changing direction in the yellow.

WILDSIDE Wildside is a mountain bike stage race held on the West Coast of Tasmania that was run in 2006 from the 28th to 31st January.

The race begins in the high country near Cradle Mountain and finishes in Strahan on the coast. Seven racing stages in four days through hilly and tough terrain make it one of the legendary MTB races in Australia.

This year MTBO stars Adrian Jackson and Alex Randall competed, and were challenging for top places throughout the race. Adrian was 3rd in the general classification up until the last stage where he was passed by Al Farley, a top Australian XC racer. Adrian finished 4th overall, and 2nd in the under 23 division. Alex Randall also had an excellent race, finishing 7th overall, giving him 3rd place in Open Men. First place was taken out by Chris Jongewaard (SA), and second place was Sid Taberlay (TAS), both in the MTB team for the Commonwealth Games.

Results: 1. Chris Jongewaard 2. Sid Taberlay 3. Alistair Farley (U23) 4. Adrian Jackson (U23) 7. Alex Randall

5:33:07 5:39:50 5:47:31 5:51:13 5:57:40

“Ylamylly” Finland: Lots of tracks!

1:10 000

MARCH 2006 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER

37

URBAN ORIENTEERING

How the west is being won Debbie Dodd (VIC) With thanks to Ken Moore (TKV), Peter Beggs (TKV), and John and Jenny Sheahan (BKV), for information provided.

Park & Street Orienteering in Melbourne’s western suburbs has grown dramatically in the past few years, thanks to a small but dedicated team of organisers and promoters. Numbers have almost doubled in the past 5 years – so what’s the secret of their success?

URBAN orienteering in Melbourne has traditionally centred on the eastern suburbs, with a Summer Series that has run very successfully for over 25 years. It was Tuckonie club member Ken Moore who provided the impetus to start another series west of the city. After experimenting with a couple of events in 1986 and 1987, some sponsorship from Silva was obtained, and the Western Sunset Series was born. Tuckonie and Central Highlands (CHOC) clubs ran four events each, taking in the western metropolitan area as well as the Sunbury-Macedon-Woodend region. In those days, line courses were run and competitors copied their courses from master maps. “The sprint to the first control was usually vital, as queues often formed at controls”, writes Peter Beggs (TKV) in an article published in “O-Vic” magazine in winter 2004. “Probably the slowest control ever involved climbing the steps to a sportsground scoreboard”.

As numbers grew, the Scatter-O format (visit a set number of controls in any order) was adopted. Other clubs became involved, using their stocks of colour park maps (Eastern Series was predominantly using black and white street maps). The coverage expanded within Melbourne’s north and west. “In 1999, the last ‘copy your own course’ was run at Sunbury. This was also CHOC’s last Sunset Series event”, wrote Peter. From summer 2000/1, the focus shifted back to the western metropolitan area. Nowadays, the Northern and Macedon Series both cover those areas served by the original Sunset Series.

In the past five years, average attendances have increased dramatically from 43 in 2001/2, to 110 in the first half of the current series. No other Melbourne summer Park & Street series has ever seen this level of growth. Ken Moore, and John & Jenny Sheahan 38 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2006

(BKV), have been the driving force behind a highly successful marketing campaign. I asked them what methods they used.

“We’ve had good results with coloured brochures placed in libraries, community and leisure centres; articles in local newspapers; flyers placed at popular walking/jogging venues; approaching local clubs, schools, scouts and guides; and asking participants to bring friends”, Ken explained. “Community radio is one avenue that hasn’t been successful – we’ve done several interviews over the past couple of years but with no response”. Efforts are focused on specific areas, with a promotions officer in each of Williamstown/ Footscray, Werribee, and Essendon/Strathmore regions.

“Walking seems to be a popular pastime in the west, and we have tapped into this”, said John & Jenny. Walking for exercise has been heavily promoted in many local communities, and the Western Series team have targeted libraries and leisure centres with their brochures to attract walkers. The percentage of walkers to runners is significantly higher in the west than in other series. Twothirds of newcomers opt for a Power Walking course, compared to just under half in other series. Power Walkers comprise approx 39% of Western Series regulars, in contrast to a little under 30%

URBAN ORIENTEERING elsewhere. Walkers tend to bring their family and friends, and enjoy going around the course together.

The other feature of the Western Series is that the majority (65%) attend only Western Series events, and 75% of competitors live in the area covered by the series. This compares with the Northern, Eastern and Southern Series, all of which are still reliant on regular competitors travelling out of their local area for 50% of their numbers. The obvious reason for this is the difficulty of crossMelbourne travel in evening peak hour – driving east is much more difficult than coming west. Ken told me “the highest percentage of competitors from outside the area are runners on the longer courses. Many work in the CBD and travel to the west before going home to the eastern suburbs”. (As an aside, it will be interesting to see if higher petrol prices have an adverse effect on competitors’ preparedness to travel to events further from home this summer).

It also demonstrates that marketing within the local community is working. In earlier years, the Western Series relied on a core of orienteers travelling from the CBD and beyond. Thanks to promotional efforts, this is no longer the case, and the Series now enjoys a very healthy number of local regulars, successfully meeting its objective of providing Orienteering to western suburbs residents.

In any summer series, approximately 50% of the total attendees are “one time only”, and another 25% come along only 2 or 3 times.

Most clubs around the country have experienced this problem in any form of Orienteering – having attracted the newcomer, how do you keep them coming and convert them into a regular? There are no easy answers, but Ken, John and Jenny believe they are slowly making progress here. They recognise that event organization is just as important as marketing. I asked, “what are the things that

keep competitors coming back?” They replied, “a welcoming atmosphere; a variety of maps with plenty of parkland, and new maps added each season; easy access with less traffic congestion; and a well organised, consistent program”.

Recognition that the social side has a very important role to play has been a major plus for Western Series competitors. Refreshments are always provided, and the program includes several post-event dinners and barbecues, which are always popular and help new orienteers get to know the regulars. A prominent display of the winning courses at each event provides a talking point, and there is plenty of information available about other Orienteering events.

As with all series, local sporting clubs, scouts and guides often come along only once per season, as a way of varying their training or providing a different activity. Ken puts a lot of effort into liaising with these groups; even if they don’t take up Orienteering on a regular basis, at least they add to the growing number of the general population who know what the sport is about, and who come away with a positive experience.

I asked Ken about future plans for the Western series. “We are extending current maps and mapping new developments,” he answered. “We also intend to be more specific in our promotion.

We find that word of mouth from family, workmates, and friends is the most popular answer to “how did you find out about the series”. We plan to target more sports clubs and popular jogging tracks to get more runners”.

This success has led to the recent introduction of a Night Series of 10 events in Autumn continuing straight on from the summer events. Numbers for this series averaged 63 in 2005 (compared to 39 in the first night series in 2003), which is very impressive considering that just five years ago that was the Summer participation figure.

So how is the West being won? The answer lies in persistent promotion and consistent organisation – over time, both will definitely pay off !

MARCH 2006 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 39

melbournebikes.com

AUSTRALIAN MTB-O CHAMPS ACTION

Melbourne Bicycle Centre CL I F TON

HILL

Congratulates Adrian & Alex on their stunning performance at WILDSIDE

Leon Keely (VIC) won both the Long and Middle Aust Champs in M16

Peter Jackson showed the benefit of good orienteering skills with an excellent 2nd placing in M50 at Maryborough ahead of several reputedly quicker riders.

Adrian Jackson 2nd Under 23 and 4th Outright

Alex Randall 3rd Open and 7th Outright

M BC SU P P O RTI N G MT B O R IE N TE E R IN G

Ring Warren or Natasha for a special deal

03 9489 3555

37 Queens Parade, Clifton Hill Victoria

melbournebikes.com

Photos: Peter Cusworth

The MTB-O pages supported by Warren and Tash Key from The MELBOURNE BICYCLE CENTRE, CLIFTON HILL – ph. 03 9489 5569

MTB-O NEWS THE hot summer has come and Blake gone – and our attention has Gordon shifted from cricket and tennis to the Winter Olympics in Italy, the Commonwealth Games in Melbourne and the new season of Mountain Bike Orienteering! This year, with the World Championships (July) in Finland, the World MTB-O Ranking Events (25th/26th March) in NSW and the Australian MTB-O Championships (October) in Western Australia, the MTB-O scene will shift from its 2004-2005 Victorian-centred major events to new horizons around Australia. “Thanks be for that” I hear the Victorian event planners and organisers saying, but it is time for our major events to be staged outside the golden triangle of Ballarat, Daylesford, Castlemaine, Bendigo and Maryborough in the central Victorian goldfields. First allow me a couple of reflections on the past season.

2005 Australian Championships – a terrific weekend Bendigo and Maryborough were the sites of the best racing we’ve seen since the 2004 World Championships. The Longdistance Championships held at “Wildflower Hill” in the suburbs of Bendigo provided some of the most challenging route choice and technical riding on the maze of rocky singletracks. Even the winners (chart below) were often running their bikes on the narrow uphill tracks and then flying safely down the steep descents. A good measure of the excellent course setting (John Chellew, Bendigo) were the groups of tired riders clustered round at the finish comparing route choices and splits. The Middle-distance Championships at “Mosquito Flat” the next day were completely different – relatively flat and fast terrain. But careful route choice and keeping contact with the complex track network made Helen Edmonds’ (Nillumbik) courses a real navigating challenge.

The colourful finish area, “instant results” on the big result boards, and “O-flag stained glass” awards - a perfect conclusion to the championship weekend. The participation of a talented contingent from New Zealand, plus a good roll-up of interstate riders, was encouraging to the organising clubs (Bendigo, Eureka and Nillumbik) and set a record (101) for the Middle-distance Championships.

2005 Long-dist Australian Champions “Wildflower Hill” Bendigo M-16 Leon Keely BG.V 92.13 M-18 Bryan Keeley BG.V 94.22 M Open Adrian Jackson MF.V 94.42 M40- Piotr Czajkowski VOA 102.49 M50- Rob Garden NW.NZ 74.52 M60- Tim Dent YV.V 80.47 M70+ Graeme Cadman YV.V 82.20 W Open Carolyn Jackson MF.V 82.09 W40- Kay Haarsma TT.S 126.08 W50- Peta Whitford YV.V 93.57 W60+ Dale Ann Gordon EU.V 85.51

2005 Middle-dist Australian Champions “Mosquito Flat” Maryborough M-14 Timothy Jackson MF.V 43.58 M-16 Leon Keely BG.V 61.34 M-18 Brett Merchant TJ.S 73.01 M Open Adrian Jackson MF.V 59.40 M40- Fabrizio Andreoni AW.V 68.39 M50- Rob Garden NW.NZ 50.58 M60- Tim Dent YV.V 49.45 M70+ Graeme Cadman YV.V 47.01 W-14 Reanna Clark BK.V 43.01 W-16 Louise Krstic CH.V 90.20 W Open Anna Sheldon UG.Q 57.59 W40- Kay Haarsma TT.S 61.39 W50- Roz Clayton PA.NZ 48.15 W60+ Dale Ann Gordon EU.V 43.31

2005 Australian Longdistance champs at Bendigo. W Open podium, from left: Marquita Gelderman (NZ) 3rd, Anna Sheldon (QLD) 2nd, Carolyn Jackson (VIC) 1st.

2005 Australian Long-distance champs at Bendigo.

M Open podium from left: Grant Lebbink 3rd, Adrian Jackson 1st, Tom Walter 2nd.

IOF Helsinki MTB-O Meeting The Mountain Bike Orienteering Commission meeting (21 - 22 January) provided some interesting outcomes for our developing sport.

•N o Sprint event in WOC 2006 so the Sprint will be contested for the first time at WOC 2007 in CZE (19-26 August 2007).

•E vent advisers for WOC 2007 (Tamas Janko, HUN) and European OC 2006 (Alexey Kuzmin, RUS) were appointed.

•C ountries interested in organising a WOC in 2009 and 2010 (Estonia, Italy, and Portugal) will be evaluated in early February 2006.

•S coring for World Ranking will be similar to that used in 2005 except that points scored at any event will stand for 1 calendar year – with the best 6 scores during the past 12 month period counting for the ranking. (2005 World Ranking - Adrian Jackson 2nd, Alex Randall 7th, Anna Sheldon 8th and Mary Fien 19th).

•W OC and EOC will be annual in the immediate future but this principle will be re-evaluated every year.

•D eadline for applications for the 2007 World Ranking Events is 15 August 2006. (Australia will stage our first WRE’s in NSW on March 25th /26th 2006.)

•A revised edition of “Guidelines for Organisers” will be coordinated by Blake Gordon, AUS. •S everal new mapping symbols were adopted. Federations will be made aware of these changes.

2006 Wildside – Adrian and Alex are surprise placings in the MTB scene Wildside is one of Australia’s premier MTB stage races, running from Cradle Mountain to Strahan on Tasmania’s wild west coast. With 7 race stages over 4 days it’s one of Australia’s toughest MTB races and attracts the best riders in Australia. Adrian Jackson just got pipped overall and ended 2nd in Under 23. Alex Randall was 3rd Men Open. Overall AJ was 4th and Alex 7th in the 7- stage endurance event which attracted over 250 riders. These stunning results against the best riders in Australia show the strength of Australian MTBO and auger well for the upcoming World Championships in July in Finland.

MARCH 2006 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 41

TRAINING

Steve Bird

When Not to Train

The presence of an injury could be another occasion on which training or competition should be missed. If you do consider training or competing with an injury then remember the running could make it worse. In such cases taking a few days off may be preferable to the weeks or even months of inactivity that could result if you aggravate it. An alternative to taking a complete rest could be to change your activity for a few days. For instance, if you have sore shins then try swimming or cycling. This will take the stress off the injury whilst helping you to maintain your fitness and enabling you to get your regular dose of healthy exercise.

In general, for the major traumatic and overuse injuries, it is obvious that you shouldn’t run. However, there are many occasions when you have a twinge or slight soreness that you can run with, albeit with some difficulty. These are the occasions when you don’t know whether you should run or not. Unfortunately, there is no set of strict rules or guidelines to help you. Most sports doctors and physiotherapists recommend rest up to a point and then suggest light exercise as part of the rehabilitation process for an injury.

The question is when to run and how much? As a general rule if you have an injury that is causing you discomfort seek the advice of a sports doctor or physiotherapist. If for some reason this is not practical, try resting it for a few days (injuries take time to heal up so don’t expect 24hrs to be sufficient). If it feels all right then try some light training, not a hard session, and build up gradually from there.

Listen to your body, pain is a warning mechanism that something is wrong! When you are recovering from an injury remember that just because the pain has gone, doesn’t mean that the muscle, tendon or ligament is back to full strength. That can take many weeks, and until that point is reached the injured area will remain under-strength and vulnerable to further injury. So hold your enthusiasms in check for a few weeks and try to build up again gradually, rather than trying to do what you were capable of before the injury, and end up re-injuring it.

One of the problems with an injury is that in the excitement of competition or even in training you don’t feel the injury. Warming up may often cause the pain to lessen or go away but not necessarily the injury. Remember that most of us have on occasions finished an event and only then noticed that we have a pain in the leg and have to limp back to the car or have an impressive set of cuts that we can’t remember getting.

If you do pull a muscle, strain a tendon or perhaps twist your ankle, then the immediate treatment should be to put ice on it.

The ice should be applied for about 20 minutes every few hours.

This helps to restrict any internal bleeding and reduce the amount of swelling at the injury, hence this will lessen the time needed for it to heal up. This immediate treatment is crucial to lessening the effect of the injury and speeding up the recovery process. At this stage massage is not recommended since it will have the opposite effect and increase blood flow to the area. After 24 - 48 hrs the bleeding should have stopped, at which time heat and massage may then be applied to promote the healing process.

If the injury is sufficiently serious then medical advice should be sought - the sooner this is done the better. In the case of serious injuries such as broken bones the injury must be left to the medical services and as a general rule of first aid the subject should not be moved unless under medical supervision.

Steve Bird (VIC) Beware of training with aches, pains, sniffs and sneezes Most of the time going out training will be good for your Orienteering fitness and health. Regular moderate exercise is proven to reduce your risk of heart disease, have a positive effect on your immune system and promote your physical capacity. As well as providing opportunities to socialize and benefiting your mental health. However there are a few occasions when it may be wiser not to train or to compete. This may be when you’ve got an injury, feel like you’re fighting a virus, or been overtraining and gone stale. If you are suffering from any of these then not going out running could be the sensible thing to do and be more beneficial in the long term. Always be sensible with your health and fitness.

Going out running regardless of your condition could be putting both in jeopardy.

Running with an illness Undertaking strenuous exercise when you have a virus can be a very risky thing to do. A fact which was brought closer to our attention a number of years ago, with the untimely deaths of 16 of Sweden’s top orienteers 1. (Ed:- and earlier still, one of Britain’s top orienteers.)

It is a mistake to think that you can ‘sweat out an illness’ by running hard. What you are more likely to do is to make your condition worse and slow up your recovery. In extreme cases you may even cause yourself long term, or even permanent damage.

We all know of people, perhaps even ourselves, who in the past have run when we’ve been fighting a cold or something similar.

However, with increased medical knowledge certain potential hazards are becoming apparent and as a consequence running with a virus such as the flu is now considered not worth the risk.

The most severe problems that can be caused by running with a virus concern the heart. Strenuous exercise can result in the virus inflaming the heart muscle (myocarditis)2,3. In such cases the heart can start to malfunction, which in extreme cases can result in permanent damage and may be fatal.

A further long term problem which, whilst still not fully understood, may be caused or exacerbated by exercising with a virus is that of ‘chronic fatigue syndrome’ and the extreme condition of Myalgic Encephalomyelitis (ME)4. Sufferers from this condition experience extreme fatigue and find it difficult to undertake even light forms of activity such as walking. This unfortunate condition can last for months or years and is made worse if the victim attempts to return to exercise too soon.

Also associated with viral infections is a general inflammation of body tissues producing a general all-over ache and stiffness. This may increase the risk of injury, with the inflamed state of muscles or tendons leading to pulls and strains. In addition to these risks, if you are suffering from a viral infection such as the flu then you will not be feeling your best, you will feel weak and your concentration may be below par. Not the ingredients for a successful and enjoyable run. Therefore, for the sake of a few days training or one event, it probably isn’t worth it.

Following any illness give yourself plenty of time to recover.

Don’t go out training on the very first day you feel capable. Give yourself a few more days to recuperate and when you do start training again build up gradually. Spend a week or so gradually increasing the distance you cover and the pace you run at. Don’t expect to feel fit immediately. You may feel weak for a number of days after the other symptoms of the illness have gone. Running an easier shorter course the first time back may be advisable.

Running with an injury 42 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2006

Running when feeling stale Staleness is a general term given to the mental and physical state of an individual who may have lost enthusiasm for the sport and/or be performing below expectations for no obvious reason. It can be brought on by training when, for whatever reasons, the body has been overstressed and unable to recover fully from its exertions.

The condition may be made worse by the mental stresses and pressures of competition.

One of the physical characteristics of staleness is often a disturbance in some of the hormones of the body. Most notably an imbalance between those that are involved in the repair of body tissues and those that are concerned with the breakdown of body tissues and the provision of energy. Some of the outward characteristics of staleness can include irritability, lethargy, loss of appetite, loss of enthusiasm and spots, as well as the reduction in performance in the sport.

Staleness is a very common phenomenon among competitors in virtually all sports.

Children can be particularly vulnerable to it where, through their own enthusiasms and those of parents or coaches, they are overexposed to a sport. As a result they overtrain and over-compete, their results get worse, so they train harder in order to try and rectify the problem, which only makes matters worse and it becomes a vicious downward spiral. In the end they become fed up and disillusioned with the sport. This is a common occurrence among top-level juniors and can be referred to as ‘psychological burnout’. The remedy is to have a short break away from the sport.

This is often achieved in the off-season, such as the summer in Orienteering. The break should allow the mind and body to recuperate and recover. At the same time the enthusiasm for the sport should return.

Up the sand hill forty times - later-to-be Red Kangaroo Herb Elliott follows the coach - courtesy “Athletics” by Percy Wells Cerutty

Conclusion So if you have a virus such as the flu then it would be wise to miss a few days training; if you don’t then it may force you to miss weeks or even worse. Don’t believe that just because you are fit you are invulnerable. Indeed evidence would suggest that, whereas doing a moderate amount of exercise may help to prevent you from becoming ill, overtraining can actually increase your susceptibility to illness 5. A few days off may be just what you need and could prevent a longer, more serious lay off. Of course the difficulty is deciding when the problem is genuine and when you are just being lazy looking for an excuse. Most importantly, if you are in doubt seek expert advice and don’t risk it.

Regular moderate exercise is certainly good and it is recommended that we try to do some on most and preferably all days of the week.

But for those of us who try to go beyond these moderate levels of activity and train hard, it is a mistake to believe that the body can be pushed hard all the time. Training is a positive stimulus and the harder the training the greater the stimulus for improvement, but the body also needs time to recover from these hard exertions and a break involving more moderate levels of exercise should be looked upon as the chance to recharge the batteries, both mentally and physically. If you are ‘stale’ then some easy moderate exercise is what you need, not harder and more severe training. You can’t build good long term fitness upon a foundation of poor health.

sudden deaths among young Swedish orienteers 1979-92. Scandinavian Journal of Infectious Diseases Supplement, 104: 41-49.

3. Friman G, Wesslen L (2000). Special feature for the Olympics: effects of exercise on immune system: infections and exercise in high-performance athletes.

Immunology & Cell Biology, 78: 510-522.

4. Shephard RJ (2001). Chronic fatigue syndrome: an update. Sports Medicine, 31: 167-194.

5. Gleeson M, Pyne DB (2000). Special feature for the Olympics: effects of exercise on the immune system: exercise effects on mucosal immunity.

Immunology & Cell Biology, 78: 536-544.

Professor Steve Bird is Director, Centre for Population Health, Sunshine Hospital, Melbourne. Steve worked with the Great Britain National Orienteering Squad for over 10 years.

References 1. Wesslen L, Pahlson C, Lindquist O et al. (1996). An increase in sudden unexpected cardiac deaths among young Swedish orienteers during 1979-1992.

European Heart Journal. 17: 902-910.

2. Friman G, Larsson E, Rolf C (1997). Interaction between infection and exercise with special reference to myocarditis and the increased frequency of

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Send to PO Box 165, Warrandyte, Victoria 3113 MARCH 2006 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 43

THE THOUGHT SPORT

We orienteers often wonder why we’re struggling over rough ground and gold-mining areas littered with wobbly quartz rocks. Well now we know – it’s all doing us good. If we can avoid twisted ankles or cruciate ligament damage then all this rough terrain will improve our blood circulation and give us a new lease on life. (I always thought Orienteering did that, but now I know why.)

Article courtesy New Scientist, Dec 2005.

Put a Wild Wobble in your Walk THE feet of a typical urbanite rarely encounter terrain any more undulating than a crack in the pavement. While that may not seem like a problem, it turns out that this flat-earth business is not doing us any good. By ironing all the bumps out of our urban environment we have put ourselves at risk of a surprising number of chronic illnesses and disabilities. Fortunately, the free market has come to the rescue. You can now buy the solution - in fact, there is even a choice of products. Indoor types will appreciate the cobblestone walkway, a knobbly textured plastic mat that they can wobble along in the comfort of their own homes. And for the more adventurous, there are shoes designed to throw you off balance.

The technology may be cutting edge, but its origins are deep and exotic. Research into the idea that flat floors could be detrimental to our health was pioneered back in the late 1960s. While others in Long Beach, California, contemplated peace and love, podiatrist Charles Brantingham and physiologist Bruce Beekman were concerned with more pedestrian matters. They reckoned that the growing epidemic of high blood pressure, varicose veins and deep-vein thromboses might be linked to the uniformity of the surfaces that we tend to stand and walk on.

The trouble, as they saw it, was that walking continuously on flat floors, sidewalks and streets concentrates forces on just a few areas of the foot. As a result, these surfaces are likely to be far more conducive to chronic stress syndromes than natural ones, where the foot meets the ground in a wide variety of orientations.

The anatomy of the foot parallels that of the human hand - each having 26 bones, 33 joints and more than 100 muscles, tendons and ligaments. Modern lifestyles waste all this flexibility in your socks. Brantingham and Beekman became convinced that damage was being done simply by people standing on even surfaces and that this could be rectified by introducing a wobble.

To test their ideas, they got 65 clerks and factory workers to try standing on a variable terrain floor – spongy mats with different amounts of give across the surface. This modest irregularity allowed the soles of the volunteers’ feet to deviate slightly from the horizontal each time they shifted position. As the researchers hoped, this simple intervention turned out to make a huge difference over just a few weeks.

Just a slight wobble from the floor activated a host of muscles in people’s legs, which in turn helped to pump blood back to their hearts. The muscle action prevented the pooling of blood in their feet and legs, reducing the stress on the entire cardiovascular system. And two-thirds of the volunteers reported feeling much less tired. Yet decades later, the flooring of the world’s workplaces remains relentlessly smooth.

44 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2006

Earlier this year, however, the idea was given a new lease of life when researchers in Oregon announced findings from a similar experiment with people over 60. John Fisher and colleagues at the Oregon Research Institute in Eugene designed a mat intended to replicate the effect of walking on cobblestones. In tests funded by the National Institute of Aging, they got some 50 adults to walk on the mats in their stockinged feet for less than an hour three times a week. After 16 weeks, these people showed marked improvements in balance and mobility, and even a significant reduction in blood pressure. People in a control group who walked on ordinary floors also improved but not as dramatically.

The mats are now on sale at $US35. “Our first 1000 cobblestone mats sold in three weeks,” Fisher says. Production is now being scaled up. Even so, demand could exceed supply if this footstimulating activity really is a “useful non-pharmacological approach for preventing or controlling hypertension of older adults”, as the researchers believe.

Rocky roads to health They are not alone in extolling the revitalising powers of cobblestones. Reflexologists have long advocated walking on textured surfaces to stimulate so-called “acupoints” on the soles of the feet. Practitioners of this unorthodox therapy believe that pressure applied to particular spots on the foot connects directly to corresponding organs and somehow enhances their function. In China, spas, hotels, apartment blocks and even factories promote their cobblestone paths as healthful amenities. Fisher admits he got the idea from regular visits to the country. In Beijing and Shanghai city dwellers take daily walks along cobbled paths to improve their health. “In the big cities, people take off their shoes and walk on these paths for 5 or 10 minutes, perhaps several times a day,” Fisher says.

The idea is now taking off in Europe too. People in Germany, Austria and Switzerland can visit “barefoot parks” and walk along “paths of the senses” - with mud, logs, stone and moss underfoot - to receive what’s known there as reflexzonmassage. And it is not difficult to construct your own “health pathway”. American reflexologists Barbara and Kevin Kunz, based in Albuquerque, New Mexico, advise that you cobble together a walkway using broom handles, bamboo poles, hosepipes, gravel, pebbles, dried peas, driftwood, fallen logs, sand, door mats and strips of turf.

If your enthusiasm for DIY doesn’t stretch to this, and Fisher’s cobblestone mats are all sold out, there is another option. A new shoe on the market claims to transform flat, hard, artificial surfaces into something like natural uneven ground. “These shoes have an unbelievable effect,” says Benno Nigg, an exercise scientist at the human performance laboratory of Calgary University in Canada, which has done contract research for the shoe’s manufacturers.

“They are one of the best things to have happened to humankind for years.” Known as Masai Barefoot Technology, or MBTs, the shoes have rounded soles that cause you to rock slightly when you stand still, exercising the small muscles around the ankle that are responsible for fore-aft stability. Forces in the joint are reduced, putting less strain on the system, Nigg claims.

Perhaps this all sounds a bit high-tech. If so, hang consumerism and go for the radical solution: search out a patch of Mother Earth that has yet to be concreted over and walk around on it for a few hours. You can even take your shoes off first, at no extra charge. But hurry: this offer is available for a limited period only.

Or ienteer ing Aus tr alia photo ar c h iv e 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

I NANS O P T VOA T I O N

Hysterical History WHEN the Red Kangaroos club produced the map of Mt. Egerton it was the first colour Orienteering map in Victoria. It made its debut on March 18, 1973, when the club put on a major State event there.

The map was printed on synthetic paper which was quite an innovation at that time. It was proudly proclaimed by the organisers that the map was water-proof and impossible to tear. This so incensed members of the MUMC club that at the next event at Bacchus Marsh on April 1st (clue?) they produced a very poor black & white photocopied map which they claimed was “wholely biodegradable and guaranteed to disintegrate within 30 minutes of coming into contact with water.”

MARCH 2006 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 45

RUNNING THE BUSINESS

Bob Mouatt, Director (Development)

Importance of having facts at your fingertips

• attended six or more events, and • made up 78.6 % (6,037) of all participations (7,678).

However, the much more important data cannot be extracted until most of the key data on participants has been entered. With OACT acquiring a new computer and the Participation database remaining on the old machine, I will be seeking volunteers to go through the vast paper and electronic records maintained by OACT to populate and purify the participant data records. The main purpose of the database will be to enable better analyses of the profile of Orienteering in the ACT and as more data becomes available, in Australia.

Another interesting fact is that an analysis of the postcodes in the OACT membership database reveals that around 53% of memberships have postcodes in the Belconnen and North Canberra, but the total residents in those areas would be nowhere near 50% of the total population of the ACT. It does, however, explain why events held in the northern suburbs of Canberra always attract a much higher number of participants. It will be interesting to see, when most postcodes are in the participation database, whether the same distribution applies.

I don’t like starting with an ‘I got it wrong’ statement, but it gives me an opportunity to raise the matter of having facts about Orienteering and orienteers at one’s finger tips. My error was in saying “Julian Dent’s 22nd in the Middle Distance final was a best ever by an Australian on debut” in one of my ‘elevator’ speeches in the December 2005 edition. I had used the statement previously and as nobody challenged it, I assumed that it was correct. Then when Blair Trewin produced a list of first WOC first appearances, I suddenly realised that Tom Quayle’s 14th in Norway in 1997 was the best ever debut by an Australian.

Orienteering is one of those rare sports which does not collect a plethora of statistics about its competitors and competitions.

I never cease to be amazed these days, when commentators and journalists are able to drag out the most obscure statistic. As I am writing this column, to prove my point, the Channel Nine sports presenter says, “NSW cricketer Phil Jaques has just blasted a record score for an Australian opener on debut in a one day international match....”

What Orienteering needs is the equivalent of a Miller’s Guide, which is produced each year before the Melbourne Cup. It has most of the information that you are likely to want to know about horse racing and a number of other sports. One of my many long-term goals is to produce such a publication and when I start on it I will be seeking help from everyone who has something to contribute.

Participation Database One of my other goals is to establish a national participation database. Now, with the work that Andy Hogg is directing in regards to a national results database on the Orienteering Australia website and the work that Kay Grzadka has done over the past five years in creating and developing an OACT participation database, I might be getting a little closer. The OACT database now has over 7,000 names recorded, with many of those names being interstate and international orienteers who have participated in one of the four major carnivals staged by OACT since 2000, ie OzE2000, Oz2001, SnowE2005 and 2005 Snowy Christmas 5-Days, as well as numerous other major events. The key data maintained on participants is: • PID (personal identifier) • Given Name (some are only initials) • Family Name (usually accurate) • Sex (mostly blank) • YOB (mostly blank) • Club (mainly accurate for ACT participants) • Postcode (mostly blank) • SI card (mostly blank) OACT is able to extract some useful data on the total number of participants in a year, etc and a variant of the Pareto theory (80/20 rule) on the number of participations by the highly active orienteers, eg in 2004, 26.6 % of participants, ie 378 of the total of 1,420 who participated in the 76 events staged:

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Prices for bulk orders available on request. Orders should be addressed to Orienteering Australia, PO Box 740, Glebe, NSW 2037, with cheques made payable to Orienteering Australia. Email: orienteering@dsr.nsw.gov.au 46 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2006

OFFICIAL NEWS

Dave Lotty, Director (Administration)

Annual Conference

IOF World Rankings

The Annual Conference was held in Canberra over the weekend of 3 - 4 December 2005. This is the policy meeting of Orienteering Australia with representatives of all States present to discuss the future directions of the sport in Australia. Some of the matters discussed at the Conference were: •T he OA Constitution was amended to eliminate the (elected) position of Director (Administration) and replace this with an employed Executive Officer effective from the 2006 AGM. •T his change to the Constitution and other matters raised in the review of OA last year required a number of changes to Duties of Officers (Operational Manual 1.3) and Role of Councillor (Operational Manual 1.6).

•A number of changes to the selection processes for Foot and MTB World Championship teams were agreed and this necessitated changes to Operational Manual 3.2 and 3.4.

•A number of changes to OA Competition Rules were agreed. These included changes to the rules on starting order, complaints/protests and AUS Relays classes/courses.

The winning times for a number of older age classes were lengthened from 45 minutes to 50 minutes (for both men and women) following changes to IOF rules. A new version of the Rules incorporating these changes is available from the Orienteering Australia website www.orienteering.asn.au •T he Strategic Plan, High Performance Strategic Plan and the Operational Plan for 2006-09 were reviewed for adoption at the Annual General Meeting.

Selection Panels Selection Panels for the 2006-07 period were appointed at the Annual Conference and these are: •S enior Panel – Paul Liggins (chair), Karen Staudte WA, Geoff Lawford VIC •J unior Panel – Blair Trewin VIC (chair), Fiona Calabro QLD, Paul Pacque TAS •M TBO Panel – Ann Scown ACT (chair), Anitra Dowling VIC, David Hatley NSW

Election of Orienteering Australia Officers Elections for Officers of Orienteering Australia for 2006 will be held at the Annual General Meeting in the afternoon of 16 April 2006 (the Sunday of Easter) in VIC. States are invited to forward nominations to the Director (Administration) by 10 March so that details can be circulated with the AGM agenda. If no advance nomination is received for a position, a nomination may be made from the floor. Voting is by the Councillors and Delegates of the States and the Elite: 15 in total.

The International Orienteering Federation World Ranking Scheme is based on points scored at World Ranking Events, full details of which can be found at http://www.orienteering.org/. The current standings for men and women are given in the following tables: Men – Foot-O 1 Valentin Novikov 2 Mats Troeng 3 Thierry Gueorgiou 4 Daniel Hubmann 5 Jarkko Huovila 6 Jani Lakanen 7 Andrey Khramov 8 Anders Nordberg 9 Chris Terkelsen 10 Øystein Kvaal Østerbø 11 Mats Haldin 12 Holger Hott Johansen 13 Niclas Jonasson 14 Petteri Muukkonen 15 Jörgen Wickholm 16 Emil Wingstedt 17 Marc Lauenstein 18 David Andersson 19 Tero Föhr 20 Damien Renard 38 David Brickhill-Jones 59 David Shepherd 82 Grant Bluett 83 Troy de Haas

RUS SWE FRA SUI FIN FIN RUS NOR DEN NOR FIN NOR SWE FIN FIN SWE SUI SWE FIN FRA AUS AUS AUS AUS

Men – MTB-O 1 Ruslan Gritsan 2 Adrian Jackson 3 Margus Hallik 4 Tönis Erm 5 Stefan Surgan 6 Ants Grende 7 Alex Randall 8 Christian Gigon 9 Jussi Mäkilä 10 Beat Schaffner 11 Peter Entenfellner 12 Jaroslav Rygl 13 Dietmar Dörfler 14 Krzysztof Sokalski 15 Donatas Celkys 16 Rémy Jabas 17 Ctibor Podrábsky 18 Rene Ottesson 19 Matthieu Barthélémy 20 Beat Oklé 124 Anthony Darr

RUS AUS EST EST SVK LTV AUS AUT FIN SUI AUT CZE AUT POL LTU SUI CZE EST FRA SUI AUS

Women – Foot-O 1 Simone Niggli-Luder SUI 2 Vroni Koenig-Salmi SUI 3 Jenny Johansson SWE 4 Anne Margrethe Hausken NOR 5 Minna Kauppi FIN 6 Marianne Andersen NOR 7 Heli Jukkola FIN 8 Emma Engstrand SWE 9 Paula Haapakoski FIN 10 Heather Monro GBR 11 Karolina Arewång-Höjsgaard SWE 12 Karin Schmalfeld GER 13 Annika Billstam SWE 14 Martina Fritschy SUI 15 Tatyana Riabkina RUS 16 Lena Eliasson SWE 17 Dana Bro_ková CZE 18 Lina Bäckström SWE 19 Hanna Palm SWE 20 Lea Müller SUI 22 Hanny Allston AUS 56 Jo Allison AUS 80 Tracy Bluett AUS

Women – MTB-O 1 Michaela Gigon 2 Anke Dannowski 3 Ramune Arlauskiene 4 Anna Füzy 5 Hana Bajtosová 6 Anna Wlodarczyk 7 Hana La Carbonara 8 Anna Sheldon 9 Päivi Tommola 10 Markéta Jakoubová 11 Stanislava Fajtová 12 Regula Mühlemann 13 Christine Schaffner 14 Dagmara Panas 15 Nina Phillips 16 Michaela Lacigová 17 Anna Kraj 18 Olga Lep_iková 19 Mary Fien 20 Yvonne Gantenbein 31 Carolyn Jackson 40 Melissa Thomas

AUT GER LTU HUN SVK POL CZE AUS FIN CZE SVK SUI SUI POL IRL CZE POL CZE AUS SUI AUS AUS

BOOKS ON ORIENTEERING There are a great number of books on all aspects of orienteering. For a list and prices contact:

Orienteering Services of Australia

44 Alexandra Parade, Clifton‑Hill VIC 3068 Phone (03) 9489 9766 Email info@macson.com.au MARCH 2006 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 47

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