Occassional thoughts about orienteering
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| okansas.blogspot.com Occassional thoughts about orienteering |
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Wednesday, May 22, 2002 Where should the team to the 2003 WOC be selected?Peter pointed out the similarities between the terrain at Mt. Penn and Switzerland. It got me to thinking about relevant terrain for next year's World Champs. Where might the US find good terrain for selecting next year's WOC team?Here is what Peter wrote about Mt. Penn: I thought it was an excellent course and really fine terrain, similar to some in Switzerland I've run on (and enjoyed). What I liked was the variety, of terrain, of the legs, of the tactics to use. Even the mapping was more like continental Europe in the sense that all the green was better running than green is on most of our maps (i.e. I equate white in the northeast U.S. with light green in central Europe). On this map you could make good time through the medium green. I think Peter is correct. The terrain at Mt. Penn has some real similarities with a lot of Swiss terrain. Take a look at Peter's race at Mt. Penn and compare it to one of his races in Switzerland. Maybe terrain in Pennsylvania is relevant for a WOC selection? I've also heard suggestions that some of the terrain in the San Francisco Bay area would be good. Certainly B.A.O.C. has some terrain that has some similarities to classic continental terrain (which is common in Switzerland). I've run in terrain that feels like continental terrain around Ithaca, NY. But, the WOC will have a huge variety of terrain The real difficulty in finding relevant terrain for the WOC is that next year's WOC will have a real variety of terrains. I haven't really studied the matter, but it wouldn't surprise me if next year's WOC has the biggest variety of terrain in the history of World Champs. The WOC classic race will be on typical Swiss continental terrain. Here is an old map of part of the area the classic race will be held. But, the short race will be in an entirely different type of terrain. The short race is around Flims. Flims has terrain that doesn't look very continental. It looks almost like Scandinavian terrain. Take a look at some Flims terrain. Here is another Flims terrain map. Then there is another entirely different type of terrain for the sprint champs. The sprint will be street orienteering. Take a look at Brugg street orienteering and another Swiss street map. What about the relay? Well, I don't actually have any idea where the relay will be. I can't imagine there are any other types of terrain. If I had to guess, I'd guess it'll be typical Swiss continental terrain. The variety of terrains makes it difficult to set up relevant selection races In some ways, thinking about relevant terrain for the selection races isn't very important. The depth of competition in the U.S. is low enough that you don't get very different results in different terrain types. Kenny Walker will probably be in the top 5 no matter where the selection races are held. In addition, there aren't usually a lot of clubs bidding for the selection races. The U.S. team doesn't have a lot of choices -- if a club is willing and able to host the trials, they'll probably get it. But, thinking about relevant terrain might be useful for the people who are likely to be going to the Swiss WOC. If you're reading this and thinking about trying out for the WOC team, you might give some thought to how you'd handle the variety of terrain in Switzerland. How will you train? Where might you have a training camp in the U.S.? Would you focus on one particular type of terrain (street, Flims, continental)? The variety of terrain raises some interesting questions. posted by Michael | 7:26 PM 
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