A PRESIDENT’S PERSPECTIVE
A Final Tetralogy Bob Mouatt
A
s I will be standing down from all official positions in Orienteering Australia and Orienteering ACT after Easter 2008, this will be the fourth last article I will write for The Australian Orienteer. Given I have been involved in the management of both organisations for over 10 years I thought I should close my last year with a Tetralogy on the four key areas which have changed significantly during the last decade, starting with High Performance.
A High Performance Program – It didn’t exist in 1997 Before I was introduced to Orienteering I had been a very successful Rugby administrator and coach. I consider my main attribute as a coach was an ability to teach people: • how to train, and • how to win. I started Orienteering in 1977 and like most orienteers I had little connection with the elite aspect of the sport before I joined the management team under the then title, National Development Director, some 20 years later. Given my background in Rugby, I was surprised in 1997 to find how little structure, sophistication and science was applied to the preparation of elites for national and international competitions. The scene in 1997 was: • an orienteering league of four teams with little or no team identification and no overseer to manage and promote it; • biennial World Championships (odd years), biennial World Cup series (even years), and annual Junior World Orienteering Championships; • national senior and junior squads; • a national and junior coach who conducted one or two training camps a year; • a few athletes with scholarships to the ACT Academy of Sport, South Australia Sports Institute, and Tasmanian Institute of Sport. but there was no overall structure for the development of elite orienteers.
As for results at World Championships, the best by individuals before 1997 was in Australia in 1985, when Madeleine Sevior was 17th and Rob Vincent 21st. Both Australian teams had finished 6th in the Relays in Switzerland in 1981. However, a group of young orienteers with ACTAS scholarships were showing a lot of promise at JWOC with Tom Quayle achieving 4th in consecutive years (1994-95), Grant Bluett 15th in 1992, Cassie Trewin 13th in 1995 and Jo Allison 15th in both events in1996. While I had no direct authority to be involved in the ‘elite’ program I considered that if I didn’t do something, nobody else would, and I needed successful elite athletes if I was going to raise the profile of Orienteering, so that I threw most of my energies, behind the scenes, working in providing the necessary structure and support.
The first step towards a High Performance Program My first step was to convince the then Orienteering Federation of Australia at the 1997 Annual Conference that there should be a part-time paid National Coaching Director, with responsibility for the national coaching program and a high performance coaching program and to convince the then A.C.T. Orienteering Association Inc that the same person should be the Head Coach at ACTAS. Nev Bleakley was appointed to both positions in early 1998. Together we developed into a reasonably successful team in implementing a High Performance program. And after a few early misunderstandings with the national coach, Warren Key, we were able to start Australian elite orienteering on the road to success.
The ASC Sets New Benchmarks In 1999, Orienteering made an unsuccessful bid for an AIS program. In the feedback, the ASC advised Orienteering that it needed to establish a national training centre at a State/Territory academy/institute of sport. So the next step was to strengthen Orienteering’s relationship with ACTAS and this lead to the formation of an Orienteering squad at ACTAS in around 2000. This relationship developed into ACTAS becoming the national training centre for Orienteering in Australia. In January 2001, the ASC moved to a more formal process for assessing the level of support it would provide national sporting organisations. Apart from having to have a HP program, NSOs had to have a High Performance Strategic Plan, and sports were given about three weeks notice to submit their plans. Orienteering did not have one on 2 January, but we did by 23 January, thanks to plagiarism and a lot of dedicated effort. That first Plan has been the basis of Orienteering Australia’s ongoing HP program and the basis on which the ASC funds Orienteering HP activities.
PERFORMANCES OF AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEERS AT WORLD CHAMPIONSHIPS SINCE 1991 [1]
Top 3 Top 8 Top 16 Top 30 [2] Top 45 [3] Top 51 Top 60 DNQ [4] Total Starts [5] Men’s Relay Women’s Relay
1991 1993 1995 1997 1999 2001 2002 2003 2004 2004 2005 2005 2006 2006 MTB MTB MTB MTB CZE USA GER NOR GBR FIN FRA SUI SWE AUS JPN SVK FIN DEN 1 3 1 1 2 1 8 2 4 2 1 1 1 2 5 2 2 10 3 6 2 2 1 2 3 6 6 7 12 16 9 8 3 6 5 3 5 6 7 12 10 12 16 19 15 8 7 11 5 4 7 9 11 14 15 15 20 8 7 5 4 9 12 10 16 15 23 8 8 9 12 7 4 6 2 1 3 2 1 3 4 4 6 14 16 16 16 16 18 16 18 18 24 18 12 12 17 17 11 13 11 10 6 8 9 10 3 15 7 dsq 20 10 12 12 6 7 11 5 14 16 3 8 dsq dns 4
46 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2007
[1] All totals are cumulative and include the totals above [2] At least top third of initial field, ie before qualifying
heats, and top 2/3 of foot finals from 2004. [3] Number in final reduced from 60 to 51 in 2003 and
to 45 in 2004. [4] Includes MTB-O riders not in top 60 in Middle
Distance final [5] Total number of competitors who started in a
qualifying heat or a final, when there was no qualifying heat
