The Flinders 3 Day event attracted a great crowd of orienteers. The rain abated on Friday giving weather most suited to orienteering. Thanks to the Southern Arrows, OH and Wallaringa the courses provided challenging orienteering on country best suited with subtle features. The event being over three days provided an opportunity for socialising, both young and old at the bunkhouse, restaurant and OH’s fireside get together.
There is a significant amount of effort being put into orienteering by our members this year. The preparations for the Australian Orienteering Championships is now gathering apace. Training sessions are provided for all ages during the week and weekends. Orienteering in schools is gathering momentum with dedicated involvement. The establishment of permanent courses has gained support from the State Government which will assist in the provision of many more over the next few years.
This effort is in addition to the ongoing club organisation of our scheduled events. Thank you all for your valuable support.
Rob Tucker
From the editor
This Newsletter includes an update on planning for the Australian Orienteering Carnival and an overview of some of the planned courses. There is also a report on the recent Flinders weekend, and many other articles that I hope will be of interest to readers. The new Newsletter format has allowed a YouTube video to be embedded and other web-friendly features to be included.
Please send any comments you might have using the contact page below. I am especially interested in ideas readers might have on future content, and any comments you might have on this Newsletter and the March Newsletter, which was re-published in the new format.
Frank Burden
2018 Australian Championships Carnival
Entries for the carnival close on Sunday August 26th (although late entries at a premium entry fee will be accepted for a few days after that).
For those who are selected in the SA Schools team, entries to the schools events are made by the team manager, however you will need to enter the other events yourself.
And for the less experienced orienteers the carnival offers some additional A Short and B (moderate) classes, so there is something for everyone. At the two Middle Distance events there extra AS classes - M and W21AS, M and W45AS, M and W65AS are available, as well as M and W45B classes on top of M and W OpenB. For the Australian Relays, some of the senior orienteers find the 55A and 65A age classes too long when participating in a relay. So we have M and W 55AS classes as well. At the Australian Long Distance Championships the additional M and W65AS M and W45B classes are offered.
The following areas are embargoed for the Championships:
Keynes Gap - current map area
Gumeracha Gold Fields - all areas west of the Birdwood to Williamstown Rd except the area used for permanent courses around Chalks, the forest blocks including Rocky Paddock Camp Ground and the blocks to the north of this campground.
Crooked Straight - previous map area
Wirra Wirra - all the current map area
Mount Crawford - Jenkins Scrub and all the map area to the north around Mount Crawford and the pine plantation west of the road.
For the event program and some photos of event areas – see the Championships event program, event area photos, as well as below. Information to help you enter is here. Also, you can follow us on Facebook by clicking here.
All entrants to senior classes will receive a free re-usable coffee cup with their entry.
2018 Australian Championships Carnival Can You Help?
The OSA members shown in the tables below have been working towards the carnival and will require help in late September – early October. Those involved hope as many SA orienteers enter in the carnival events, however we also need our members to help on the day.
The events require more set up than our normal Sunday bush events, so if you can help at one or more days in setting up or packing up equipment please contact Robin Uppill using the OSA contact page.
Role
Name
Carnival Coordinator
Robin Uppill
Finance
Sue Bament
Technical Director
Robin Uppill and Jenny Casanova
Mapping Coordinator
Adrian Uppill
Publicity and Promotion
Olivia Sprod, Robin Uppill, Bridget Anderson
Merchandise
Jan Hillyard
Sponsorship
Peter Mayer, Bridget Anderson
Schools Championships – Orienteering Coordinator
Clive Arthur
Schools Championships – Accommodation and Social
Ben Cazzolato - Adelaide
Equipment Coordinator
Barry Wheeler OSA needs those participating and who do not have a role to help event organisers in setting up and taking down equipment at all events
Computing/IT/Entries
Ken Thompson, Phil Davill and others
Live Centre Coordinator (Living It Live)
Chris Naughton – to provide live and online results, and radio controls at each event.
• Contrast panels and piping
• Knitted collar with contrast placket
MALE GARMENT MEASUREMENTS
Size
S
M
L
XL
2XL
3XL
5XL
Garment ½ Chest (cm)
52
55
58
62
65
71
79
FEMALE GARMENT MEASUREMENTS
Size
8
10
12
14
16
18
20
22
24
Garment ½ Chest (cm)
46.5
49
51.5
54
56.5
59
62
65
68
CHILD’S GARMENT MEASUREMENTS
Size
4
6
8
10
12
14
16
Garment ½ Chest (cm)
36
38
40
42
44
46
49
Bucket Hat
Medium / large / extra large - $15
Your order for clothing is available through the carnival website. Final orders for clothing will be the same as for entries ie. 26th August 2018. www.sa.orienteering.asn.au/general-information
The JUNE edition of The Australian Orienteer is now available on-line here - in the on-line version the reproduction isn't great, particularly the fine detail of maps. For perfect reproduction you should download the 47 MB file to your device and then view it.
The JUNE edition features major events in most forms of our sport including the Melbourne Sprint Weekend, the Easter carnival and the MTBO Challenge in New Zealand. Michele Dawson tells us of her Orienteering year in Denmark; ONSW coaching scholar Tuve Möller gives an insight into how his Swedish club OK Linné promotes Orienteering; there’s a discussion on mapping for colour-blind orienteers and Duncan Currie's "Jeff" wonders about his splits. The 2018 AUS Championships carnival in SA is previewed as is 2019 Easter in WA; O-SPY gives us some quite interesting facts (Stephen Fry would be pleased); Great Legs is back and Spot the Difference will test your map reading skills.
At orienteering events you are generally required to pay event fees, with non-members charged a higher fee to encourage those who participate regularly to join a club. Currently younger junior members (under 14) can participate for free if they are doing the course alone or with another younger junior.
So where do the event fees go. When the event is run by a club, the fees need to cover:
Map and control description printing
Other consumables used at the event
Levies to Orienteering SA and Orienteering Australia. Both receive levies for all our events, the amount varies depending on the event type. Both organisations need this income to run their activities
Hire of venues e.g. in some areas such as Belair NP venues have to be hired
Land owner fees for some events e.g. some in National Parks and events in land held by SA Forestry
Reimbursement of travel costs to those involved in planning the event, this varies between clubs and the distance to the event
Hire of portable toilets for some events
After all these and other expenses are covered, the clubs may make some profit from an event to put aside for other costs e.g. mapping, equipment purchases, social activities for their members.
Some events are run by OSA, again the costs are as above. For some event series any profit is for a dedicated purpose e.g. towards travel by Southern Arrows to National League events that are not part of a major National carnival.
So remember that these events are being run by volunteers whose time is freely given. The event fees are quite low or members considering the costs and effort to run events.
A limited amount of OSA running clothing (shirts - $38, pants - $25 and jackets - $50) is available for sale. Not all sizes are available.
And for new members who would like to purchase an SI Card, these are also available. The type is SI Card 8 which is fast and can hold 30 controls, enough for events for almost all people except elite runners on some courses at major events. Cost is $45.
If interested contact Robin Uppill on the OSA contact page
Having trouble understanding orienteering control pictorial descriptions? This year, the International Orienteering Federation updated the international specifications, and a comprehensive 32 page PDF booklet showing how to represent and interpret current control descriptions can be downloaded by clicking here.
Shorter guides have been produced. The best so far found on-line was created by Simon Errington (also known as Maprunner), a UK orienteer who produced a one-page single-sided (A4) guide that displays control descriptions alongside their map equivalent symbols. The guide can be downloaded from here.
Simon also produced one-page guides for symbols used on normal (ISOM 2017) and sprint (ISSOM 2007) maps. These can be downloaded from here.
For those of you who don't know, Simon is the main contributor of updates to Routegadget, a mapping program that enables orienteers to trace their routes manually or using GPS-generated tracks on competition maps. Routegadget is maintained for South Australian orienteers by David George of the Tintookies club, and can be accessed here.
World Orienteering Day was held in South Australia on 23rd May, and around the world similar events were held between 23rd to 29th May. In 2017, nearly 290,000 participants world-wide took part and in the previous year, the first year it was held, over 250,000 took part. This year, 75 regions or countries registered 1970 events with over 300,000 participants.
The goals of WOD are to:
increase the visibility and accessibility of orienteering to young people,
increase the number of participants both in schools' and clubs' activities in all countries of national federations,
help teachers implement orienteering in a fun and educational way and
encourage more new countries to take part in orienteering.
The Adelaide event was held in Thorndon Park and organised by Clive and Marian Arthur. The objective of the event was to find as many countries (controls as in the photographs) as possible within 45 minutes. Controls were on top of play equipment and many other interesting places. The event was followed by a sausage sizzle.
Each person was assigned a random country and the winners were:
New Zealand 3770 points, represented by Max Grivell, Phil Hazell, Aylwin Lim and Jacqueline Stephens.
USA 3490 points represented by Joanna George, Peter Kreminski, Harry Waterhouse and David Tilbrook.
Argentina represented by Erica Diment, Abigail George and Adrian Uppill.
The June long weekend saw SA orienteers travel to the Flinders Ranges for 3 days of orienteering. The weekend commenced on Saturday afternoon with a warm-up event on Rawnsley Park station presented by the Southern Arrows, and courses by Simon Uppill. The area is a typical spur gully terrain with complex watercourses, native pines, open areas and rocky ridges.
Sunday moved to the Mannawarra – Prelina map, with a long OY event by OH and course planner Craig Colwell. The area is more subtle spur gully but with many small knolls, native pine cover and open hills, and many watercourses. The area offers fast running, but the opportunity to easily lose map contact as some orienteers found. Low cloud obscuring the distinctive hills early in the event added to the navigational challenge. Craig’s long courses offered a great mix of leg types, with some long legs, combined with more technical sections with short legs, especially near the end of the course requiring you to maintain concentration to the end. The fast terrain was exemplified by Simon Uppill who completed the 15.5 km M21A course in 77 minutes, a running rate of 5 mins/km! This was after putting out and collecting controls for the Saturday event. Bridget Anderson was fastest on the W21A course – 12.6 km in 96:45 minutes.
The long first leg on Course 4 was especially challenging (see article below). Jack Marshall completed this most successfully and won the course (top red line from the Win Splits graph for this course). Unlike this leg, for some other long legs, due to the absence of big obstacles, relatively straight routes were often the best option, but challenged you to maintain map contact. The extract from Course 1 shows some long legs, mixed with shorter legs with varying directions.
Click to see full size.
Click to see full size.
Both legs 6 – 7 and 13-14 do not present major obstacles to be avoided, the challenge towards control 14 is to continue to identify the low spurs before the control. For the beginner orienteers, the very easy course offered the younger juniors a chance to orienteer off track, but with frequent controls to keep them on track.
Tyson Hillyard was the course planner for the WA Middle Distance event on the Monday. This was the northern part of the same map, with some overlap in area with the Sunday event allowing the use of the same finish area. The subtle terrain, with some complex areas again offered a technical challenge in the courses set by Tyson. The sun also appeared for the day, with Rawnsley Bluff being a backdrop to the event. Again the fast running terrain required you to maintain map contact, being a little off course could lead to confusion and difficulty relocating.
All results are available on the OSA web site Results page. Here you will also find links to Route Gadget where you can view all the courses, and to Winsplits to see where you and others may have made errors:
Mannawarra Long OY Event – A long route choice example
Course 4 at the event held on Sunday June 10th provided a long first leg of approximately 1800m. This was especially challenging to some juniors on this course not accustomed to such long legs. However the course planner was relatively kind in offering an early catching feature and then a liner feature to follow for much of the route.
A preferred route is to head east south east from the start triangle towards the fence as a catching feature (first arrow). Then identify your location on the fence based on the east-west spur crossing the fence or just follow the fence SE to the bend before the fence turns south. So the first section of the leg is done.
From here the next task is to cross the southern end of the north-south open ridge into the major east- west creek system (second arrow). This creek can be followed, you don’t need to be in the creek, but follow it by being on the north side. Check your progress by identifying the major features of the creek e.g. the S-bend loop about 200m east of the number.
The next point to reach is the smaller water course junction near the number 3 (third arrow). This can be followed on its south side into the semi-open area. Then use boundary the bushy area (green stripe) to follow to the control.
So although this leg was on a hard course, it offered linear features to reach the control, and could be broken down into a few major parts.
Other less favourable options were:
Use the north-east trending track as an alternative to the major creek – but this lacks a distinctive attack point from which you would leave it for the control until the open area is reached
Straight line – it! Much harder choice for the second part of the leg.
The championships were held at “The Paddocks” Para Hills on Monday May 21. Yalanga Orienteering Club with the assistance of other clubs hosted this year’s event.
234 students from 28 primary and secondary schools competed over 12 courses. The map terrain was generally flat and comprised sports grounds, tracks, mounds, parklands, wetlands and suburbs. Only the harder courses extended into the suburbs.
The weather conditions were overcast but mild. A southerly breeze became slightly gusty late morning. There was no rain. There was ample parking space for cars and buses. The veranda of the Para Hills West Soccer Club provided shelter for Registration and the Finish computers. The event went smoothly apart from a marquee upturned by a wind gust.
Competitors used Pcards. This year teachers on registering were handed a pack containing Pcards for distributing to students. Previously these were handed to students at the start. This seemed to work well saving time and labour at the start.
The courses were suitably challenging particularly for students who were not regular orienteers. The seven volunteers (“Pink Hats”) out on the courses assisted dis-orientated competitors. The majority of competitors completed their courses and good times were also achieved.
Congratulations to all individual place getters. Click here for results. Congratulations also to the schools that were the place getters for the two shields. Woodside and Goodwood Primary schools jointly won the Primary Schools Williams Shield. East Adelaide PS came 2nd and Stirling East PS came 3rd.
The Brian Wales shield was won by Pembroke School. Trinity College was 2nd and Heathfield HS 3rd.
Article by Doug Fotheringham (Event Organiser, Yalanga Orienteers)
Paradise Lost - A belated account of UK orienteering, Sept 2017
By Ben Cazzolato
Article reprinted from April Tjuringan Star
What do you do when work drags you half way across the globe and away from a two-day carnival in the state’s midnorth, including the middle-distance champs at Paradise? Do what any mad orienteer would do and find an event nearby to your travels.
Work took me to the southern city of Cork in Ireland to attend a conference on Ocean Renewable Energy. I arrived in Cork on a Sat 26th Aug to a lovely morning. Still recovering from the flu and having travelled for 30 hours I decided to stretch the legs and go for a short run. 1km in I suddenly cramped up and collapsed onto a stone wall. It was terrifying experience and took me half an hour to hobble back to the hotel. Not a good start to my training for the Aus Champs a month later!
Cork Mid-Summer League, Ballincollig Regional Park
The next day I jumped on a bus that took me out to an event run by the Cork Orienteering Club at Ballincollig Regional Park. The park measures 134 acres in size and is located on the South bank of the River Lee, with much of it on the river’s floodplain. Gunpowder was manufactured there from the 18th century to the start of the 20th Century. From here it was transported to Cork City and the Port of Cork for supply to the British Armed Forces worldwide. The park itself comprises the now defunct Gunpowder Mills complex and the networks of sluices and canals installed in the grounds and used in the manufacturing process still remain today along with most of the 55 buildings (ruins).
One of the many bridges crossing the Lee.
A channel off the Lee.
One of the 55 ruins in the forest.
Don’t be fooled, there be nasty nettles in that grass.
It was a relatively cool drizzly morning, and everyone was dressed in their longs. I figured they were soft – it was a park after all and not that cold! Well, I was wrong. Running to control 5 (see map), ploughing through the long grass I discovered nettles. Not just the odd one but a field of them. If the cramps from the previous day weren’t enough, now my legs felt like they were on fire. Somewhat perturbed I continued on, this time avoiding any long grass if possible. This strategy however pushed me continually into bramble thickets which added scratches to the welts from the nettles. I completed the course worse for wear taking 68:44 to complete. Not a great effort, with the winner M50 completing in 25mins quicker. If only I had longs on!
Click map to view full size.
I had planned to do a mid-week event at Currabinny Wood, Ringaskiddy but after the nettle and bramble experience I gave it a miss and went to the pub for a Guinness or two.
The Caddihoe 2017
With the conference over and a weekend to kill before I needed to give a presentation to Plymouth Uni I found “The Caddihoe 2017”, a long-standing fixture in the UK orienteering calendar, comprising a middle-distance, sprint and long-distance event. From Cork I flew to Bristol on Friday morning, hired a car and drove down to Cornwall for an evening practice event at Holywell Dunes/Polly Joke (between Newquay and Perranporth). Magic spot, with massive dunes and beautiful views. Found I could even find controls (see map) with little trouble, unlike the NZ dunes.
Training on the Holywell Dunes/Polly Joke. Big dunes and expansive views.
Middle-Distance
Feeling cocky after smashing the practice event came the Middle-Distance race at Hayle Towans (towans is the Cornish word for dunes) on the Saturday. Alas, my self-confidence was short lived. I ran the M45 course of 5.1km and 110m climb (see map) taking 58mins, 22min slower than the winner. I struggled at times with the detail but had a great time.
Click map to view full size.
Sprint
The sprint event was held at the Camborne Campus of Cornwall College. The mens vets (M40 category) had a longish course at 3.7km with 36 controls! I had a great run finishing in 31mins but somehow missed punched control 8 (see maps - two parts). Not sure what happened there but would have finished in the top third.
Part one. Click to view full size.
Part two. Click to view full size.
Long-Distance
The two days provided very different events – whilst the middle-distance was fast and furious in late summer sunshine, the long-distance on Hayle Towans was a stark contrast in early autumn rain, wind, drizzle and eventually mist/fog, with the most common comment ‘hmmmh – that was challenging. The M45 course was 8.8km long and 240m climb. Now that doesn’t sound like much but there was plenty of soft sand!
Part one. Click to view full size.
Part two. Click to view full size.
It was a repeat of NZ. I had a shocker on the first half of the course as I came to terms with the terrain and the mapping style. It took me 133mins and the winner completed in 71mins. I had a great time nonetheless and my second half splits weren’t too far off the top runners despite running in fog with very low visibility at times. Perhaps a few more days out there I would have got the hang of it.
History: Upton Towans was the site of the National Explosives Works (known locally as the Dynamite Works) which was established in 1888 to supply explosives to the local mines. The dunes were flattened and small enclosures made to house individual buildings for the manufacture of the explosives. The enclosures were built to avoid chain reactions when an explosion occurred and although overgrown with vegetation, are still clearly seen today as is the network of single-track railways. On one occasion an explosion occurred in a nitroglycerine plant which broke windows in St Ives and, it was said, was heard on Dartmoor. During the First World War 1800 people were employed and the works supplied cordite to the Royal Navy. The company went into voluntary liquidation in 1919, closed in 1920 but the storage of explosives continued until the 1960s.
For the original of the above article and other Tjuringan stories, download the April Tjuringa Newsletter (PDF 5.7MB).
Going on a holiday, want to earn some money to pay your way?
Can you help? TEO has a backlog of permanent courses which need building. The areas have been mapped, but the checkpoint locations still need to be selected. TEO will pay $300 per course of twenty checkpoints set in any of the areas listed below: Howard Springs Pine Forest Howard Springs Nature Park and Scout camp Fred’s Pass Katherine Sports Ground Batchelor Township To find out more, please talk to a TEO committee member. Setting will be easier if you have at least a Moderate course standard of navigation. TEO is also looking for someone to make a map of Humpty Doo Primary School for $300. Base maps will be provided by TEO. Most of the mapping can be done from Google Earth, but a field check visit will be needed to confirm the armchair mapping. If you are familiar with OCAD mapping software, estimated time required is 4 hours on the computer and 2 hours on the ground.
If you are heading north for a while and are interested, please contact the mapping coordinator, Lachlan Hallett, email topendorienteersNT at gmail.com and he will give you an update on what mapping is still required. Some of the jobs have been completed/allocated now but we are looking for anyone interested in mapping the Territory Wildlife Park, which would be a great place for orienteering.
SA Championships weekend in August - a feast to look forward to
The weekend of 18th and 19th of August will be a feast of spur/ gully orienteering in SA.
Those who attended the last day of Easter in 2015 may recall the intriguing “Mulga Valley” mallee map with complex drainage systems and steep erosion gullies. This year it will be used on the 19th of August for the SA Long Champs and will be excellent practice for the events near Renmark early in the Australian Championships carnival only 6 weeks or so later.
The SA Night Championships (to be held on Saturday 18th ) will revisit Tundarri – (used on day 2 of the same 2015 Easter carnival) with mallee coverage over complex creek systems.
There will be bush camping available amongst the mallee, which will give a great opportunity to socialise with your fellow orienteers.
Second half of 2018 - A big orienteering year in SA
The Sunday event program began in late March and the main program of SA events ends in early October with the 2018 Australian Championships and Australian Schools Championships. The full Championship program is listed here. The program for the period up to and including the Championships organised by Adelaide and surrounds clubs is as follows:
The standard series of events, comprising primarily of bush events with some metro events. Events include:
State Championships:
In each of Sprint, Middle, Long, Night and Relay
Orienteer of the Year (OY) Events:
In these events participants earn points toward the Orienteer of the Year Award in their age category
City to Bush Events:
These events are held in the Adelaide metropolitan area utilising both park/street and bushland areas
Metro Events:
Park/Street events in the Adelaide area
Courses:
Classic Bush Events: Standard cross country bush courses from very easy to hard navigation, generally with full SPORTident timing City to Bush and Metro Events: Short to medium courses (1.5 – 4 km) of easy to moderate difficulty, unless otherwise indicated
Start Times:
10:00am to 12:00pm unless otherwise indicated
Course closure at 1.30 pm unless otherwise indicated
Directions:
Event locations and details in the previous article are of a general nature. See here for more detailed information closer to the event date
Pre Entry:
Pre Entry for most events is available via the Eventor entry system from the OSA website events page Note: Pre Entry is required for all championship classes at Championship and Long Distance OY Events, and at these events only limited enter on the day courses will be available.
Entry Fees:
Sub Juniors (≤14)
Junior (15-20)
Senior (≥ 21)
Group
Family
Standard
Members
Free
$5
$10
$15
$20
Non-Members
$10
$10
$20
$30
$40
OY
Members
Free
$5
$15
$20
$30
Non-Members
$15
$15
$25
$40
$50
City to Bush, Metro
Members
Free
$5
$10
$15
$20
Non-Members
$10
$10
$15
$30
$40
Notes:
Any senior on Easy and Very Easy courses pays the Junior fee
Entry Fees for Long Distance OY and Championship Events may differ and will be specified in the event information/entry form
Entry Fees include all land access fees that may apply such as ForestrySA Levies or entry fees to national parks
The National Easter Carnival is coming to WA in 2019
Although this seems a long way off, preparations have already begun and now’s the time to block out your calendars so you can come along to participate in the events, and also spread the word to encourage friends from interstate to come too. All events that are open to everyone to enter – not just the most experienced orienteers. There will be courses for all ages and abilities. It’s a great opportunity to take part in a National Event without having to fly anywhere.
When is it?
Easter weekend for the Prologue and Australian 3-Days is 19-22 April 2019. The Prologue is planned for Scotch College, and the other 3 days will be in the Helena Valley. For the second weekend – 26-27 April 2019 – we will be holding the Australian Sprint and Middle Distance Championships in Narrogin, a totally new area for orienteers to explore.
What’s the logo?
Thanks to Noel Schoknecht and Damien West for their work on the logo for the carnival. The little creature is a woylie, or brush-tailed bettong, which is an extremely rare small marsupial. Although woylies once inhabited much of southern Australia, they are now critically endangered and Dryandra Woodland, close to Narrogin, is one of the three areas left where woylies can be found in the wild. Here you will find more information on the woylie.
Please consider supporting the Australian Wildlife Conservancy in the protection of this and other threatened native animals.
Orienteering will once again be in the 2018 Alice Springs Masters Games from October 13-20th 2018. This will enable people to have a few days rest after the Australian Championships carnival in SA and head up to experience outback orienteering. There will be three foot orienteering events and one mtbo event.
Media Coverage of EOC2018 - A Great Learning Resource?
Although the 2018 European Orienteering Championships is strictly not SA news, media coverage of it and similar events has potential to benefit orienteers of all abilities. Comprehensive coverage of events by video and GPS tracking show how champions excel in the sport, but it also shows them making big mistakes!
YouTube has an enormous store of orienteering videos. These include live broadcasts of major orienteering championships, headcam videos made by competitors during forest, urban and sprint events, and training videos introducing newcomers to the sport.
One YouTube channel worth looking at is Orienteering Tube, which has nearly 50 professionally-produced videos of the men's and women's finals (sprint, sprint relay, middle, long and forest relays) of World, World Cup and European orienteering championships dating back to 2014. The videos provide start lists and results for each event, and commentary in English on the progress of competitors supplemented by TV cameras positioned at strategic points around each course. In addition, live progress and routes taken by competitors are displayed on orienteering maps using GPS data broadcast by miniature transmitters carried by leading orienteers. Where the terrain allows, runners carrying cameras follow competitors and provide live broadcast back to the commentary centre.
Among the latest group of videos published on the Orienteering channel are those of the 2018 European Orienteering Championships held last month in Switzerland. An example below is of the long distance championship finals (video can be viewed below). The video runs for nearly 4½ hours, and, as the preview image shows, the terrain is rugged and provided many route choice options for competitors. The women's long course is 11.3km with 680m of climb, and the men's 14.9km with 910m climb. Although it was the European Championships, Australia and New Zealand had competitors there because it was a World Ranking event.
Click arrow to start the video. The more interesting video starts about half way though. However, beware: the video, if playing at high definition (HD), might exceed your internet's bandwidth or download limit. You can reduce your internet demands by selecting a lower screen resolution by clicking the HD settings symbol (only displayed if your device is able to receive high definition video) when the video is running, then click Quality and select a lower resolution (for example 360p - should be OK on mobile phones). If you would like to play the video at full screen, for example on a desktop PC or smart TV, click the YouTube symbol (if displayed) and a resizeable video will open on the YouTube website.
In addition, maps and routes taken by competitors for many major championship events can be found here. The women's European long course maps and routes are here and for the men's course are here. Results for both events are as follows.
Routes taken by the first three competitors on each course are shown below. Click on map to see fill-size version. Course controls are difficult to see, but if you look closely at the full-size maps they should be discernible.
Women's long routes
Men's long routes
A detailed analysis of routes taken on the women's and men's long courses are on the World of O website. The results for the long finals are here, and all other results can be accessed from here.
If you have any thoughts on what you would like to read or see in future newsletters, would like to submit an article or photo, or have comments on this or previous newsletters, please let the editor know using the form here.