OPINION

New Format for Events

An-O-nymous, the Esk Valley Troll

TOWARDS the end of most orienteering seasons various discussions about the coming O-year flare up again. Orienteers never seem happy with the existing system and year after year we find better ways of doing things, only to change them again the next. The number of available courses, age class groupings, course lengths and climb, recommended winning times, dates for particular events, etc… they never seem fair. Why should a M55 run the same course as a W18? For some the courses are always too long, for others too short. Or the course setter has no idea what a “moderate” course should look like. And why do “they” always insist on organising important events on Father’s Day or Grand Final Day? At a recent board meeting, Orienteering Tasmania has come up with the perfect solution which should once and for all end all controversy and stop disagreements between OA, the state associations, the clubs and individual members about these touchy subjects. From next year on, for any Tasmanian event, all that will be provided are a relatively modest number of controls (e.g. 30) of different technical difficulty (from very easy to extremely difficult) scattered throughout the mapped area. So far nothing major changes (bar maybe a significant reduction in controls for some event). However, instead of the usual selection of courses, only master maps showing all controls plus a list of control descriptions will be available at events. Just like a score-O you will say. Wrong! Because now comes the idea that will revolutionarise orienteering. Using the available controls, competitors will design their own “personal” course of the appropriate length, climb, technical and physical difficulty and with a number of controls of their choice. That way each individual can take into account their technical competence, general fitness, fatigue levels, motivation and their mood of the day. After all, there is no point running an overly long course with a hangover or after a tiff with your partner. After marking their course on their map, competitors head for their start and run their race. The advantages of this new system are numerous: The work load of course setters, controllers and event organisers will be reduced: only a few master maps with all controls will have to be drawn up. No more need for hours and hours spent at the kitchen table trying to design courses which will be criticised anyway. In fact course setting becomes so easy and straight forward that course setter courses will become unnecessary. No more bad feelings at events either: since we all become our own course setter there will be no reason to abuse or blame anyone but our self if we didn’t like the course. Pre-marked maps will be a thing of the past. We will all become winners. No more disappointed and disgruntled faces at events where it is always the same few who win all the medals and badges. We all become orienteer of the year in our own individual class. As an added bonus, this system will promote orienteering enormously: a sport where everyone is a winner every time they participate will attract a lot of people. If a control goes missing, is misplaced, or if we cannot find it straight away, it doesn’t matter. We simply cancel that control from our course and go on to the next one. That way we haven’t spoiled our whole day (and that of our passengers on the car trip home). Rather than ruining our event it just becomes a good topic for conversation afterwards. There will be no more DNF’s and DSQ’s since everyone will always finish their course. There will be no more justification for cancelling courses and protest juries will become obsolete. Because everyone can start where and when they want, gone is the need for pre-entry and start draws. There will be no more annoying long walks to the start nor the need to set up a complicated start system. Timing systems will become obsolete as we will all time ourselves. The competition rules will be reduced from the current tome to a few basic rules, easy for all to understand. No more problems with people following us and getting upset about it. Why should we? We’ll be most likely on a different course anyway. Talking on the course could become acceptable. It won’t matter if we loose a bit of time catching up with a good friend, asking former rivals where we are or helping a youngster in trouble. It makes no difference if we complete our course in one or two hours, so why not get the most out of our entry fee and socialise a bit on the course. We could even take a picnic and sit down by that creek we wanted to have a closer look at for years. No more need to differentiate between club events, state events, Classic, Middle Distance, Sprint or Badge Events. We decide for ourselves how important every race is and we can all become State Champion at the event of our choice. The OA and state statisticians’ jobs will become very easy: as we’ll all score maximum points at every event we’ll all top the rankings and become Orienteer of the Year. No more wasted time in long post mortems after the race. We won’t have to pretend any longer to be interested how others went from control 6 to 7 on their course because it will be different from ours. Instead we will now be able to discuss more serious matters like the political climate in Middle Tasbekistan, the value of the Van Diemen Peso on the Kabul stock market, or global warming. Finally, consider the financial savings: there will be no more need for expensive map overprinting, control cards, Sport Ident equipment, result boards, etc, etc… In terms of human resources, as events will only require a few people to run, the burden of having to volunteer for more than one event a year will disappear. As a consequence it will become much easier for clubs to fill their rosters. The rest of us will be able to just relax. Orienteering will become fun again and we will be able to enjoy it more instead of taking it so seriously.

DID YOU KNOW?

Orienteers in Australian Cross-Country Championships

Two orienteers competed in the Women’s Open Championship held in Tasmania. The event was won by Anna Thompson in a time of 27:45. Bayside Kangaroo Lauren Shelley finished a very creditable 5th in 28:45 and Tasmanian Hanny Allston came home in 15th place with a time of 30:15. Lauren has her sights firmly set on the Olympic marathon in Beijing in less than two years time.

Wrong + Wrong = Right? - Wrong!

Rob Crawford

(former President, NZOF) (reprinted from his blog site)

Crystal Ball gazing

Recently retired as President of NZOF, Rob Crawford muses on the future of Orienteering in New Zealand:

AT this year’s European Orienteering Championships, half of the women’s field in the final of the Long Distance race were issued with control descriptions that contained an error - a wrong control code I believe. Such a basic error should result in the race being declared invalid. Period. Half of the runners were affected and it certainly had a significant affect on the results to the point that they are meaningless (save for the fact that the winner, Simone NiggliLuder, would still have won), so why are the results allowed to stand and be recorded in history? Orienteering has a problem in that its competitors are reluctant to complain - it happens in New Zealand, and it seems to happen in international elite events. We all recognise that a huge amount of work is involved in organising an event, and when mistakes occur, while some competitors are left seething, the majority don’t want to penalise organisers for the amount of work they have put in. Orienteering needs to grow up. Guess what - mistakes sometimes occur, it’s part of human nature. Rather than get embarrassed about how such imperfections can invade our perfectionist sport, and allow sympathy to get in the way of making rational decisions, we need to accept than when mistakes occur, it is not in the interests of our sport to allow meaningless results to stand. While it would be unfortunate in this case for Niggli-Luder not to be crowned European Champion (there is no question she deserves to be so recognised), a race is not just about one person, it is not held to just find the winner. There were over 50 competitors in the race, half of them were sent on a wild goose chase - their rights are also relevant. In House-Of-Honcho land, ideally common sense would prevail and someone would make the decision to invalidate the race, but it is probably too late. The IOF Event Advisor should not be in charge of an international event again - not for allowing the mistake to happen, but for allowing the results to stand. Part of his role is to (Rule 31.6) “ensure rules are followed, mistakes are avoided and that fairness is paramount”. Well, rules were not followed, mistakes were not avoided and fairness has gone out the window. That the Senior Event Advisor allowed the results to stand just because no-one protested the result is wrong, and it is time in such situations that some balls are shown and the correct decision made. Two wrongs do not make a right. If I had three things to say “watch out for” to the new President, it would be these: 1. ACCESS In New Zealand, we have been fortunate that getting access to areas we wish to orienteer on hasn’t really been an issue. I’ll never forget my first trip to Europe and talking with people there about the trouble they sometimes have gaining access and the conflicts they have with other recreational groups (e.g. hunters). However, I fear that may be about to change. The Auckland clubs are reliant on Woodhill Forest and the owners, Carter Holt Harvey, now charge for recreational use and I suspect will also restrict access. The Taupo club had a problem with the Dept of Conservation over one area. We are not blessed with a huge amount of runnable forest here and if forest companies such as CHH start charging for, and restrict, access it will have a negative impact on our sport. It’s one thing we need to be pro-active about. 2. MAPPING To orienteer you need a map and a compass. Well, the compass bit is easy - you just go out and buy one, but the map? These are finely crafted works of art that take an extraordinary amount of time (and usually money) to make. Take a look around at our current stock of mappers - they are few, and more to the point, they are getting old. We can’t rely on the likes of Michael Wood and the Aspins for ever, so unless we can convince some of the younger brigade that mapping might be a good way to earn some dollars (the days of making maps for free are going the way of the Moa), we might find in 10 year’s time we have to use overseas mappers, and that will be even more expensive and a hindrance to the development of our sport. 3. VOLUNTEERS A problem that is not peculiar to our sport – a dark cloud that hangs over us and sport in general. In many respects, Orienteering is more fortunate than most – most of the time the people who voluntarily contribute to our sport in whatever form, are generally competent and extraordinarily generous with their time. Will it last? In some repsects, I think we’ll be OK as I see the likes of Flynn, Addison, Kerrison, Peat, Smith (apologies to any young’un that I’ve missed) already putting back something into the sport - fine young men who will be the role models of the future. On the other hand, reading the local paper here in Waiuku and seeing soccer teams without coaches, badminton cancelled because no-one is available to organise it, how long before Orienteering has similar problems? Hopefully never, but it is not something we can ever take for granted.