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Daily thoughts about orienteering


Monday, October 01, 2007

Breaking control circles

 

Breaking control circles that obscure detail - that's a topic I came across at Attackpoint today. There wasn't much discussion, but a couple of examples came up from last weekend's New Hampshire meet (as an aside...that's sweet terrain).

Control 2, approached from the north.



Control 9, approached from the southwest.



I guess you can make a case that the control circles obscured some of the detail. But, it seems like both controls could be simplified so that you wouldn't need the detail if you've got a good picture of the entire control circle and the big features just outside of the rings.

Which brings me to an aside...One of indicators that I'm out of orienteering form is when I look at a control and see just the control feature. The converse is that one of the indicators that I'm orienteering well is that I have a vivid and broad picture of the terrain.

An example makes it clearer. If I was running to control 9 and thought to myself, "I'm looking for a rootstock" them I'm not orienteering well. If I were orienteering well, then I'd have thought, "I'm looking for a spot with a distinct vegetation boundary/marsh just outside of the ring to the east (and bending behind the control), with a north/south running open area leading from south of the circle to just left of the spot I'm looking for (with a distinct vegetation boundary and a few rootstocks), and the control sits at a place where the contours bend and get close to each other just north and west of the spot I'm looking for." When I'm orienteering well, the two types of thoughts consume about the same amount of mental energy. But one of those thoughts gives me a much clearer picture of what I'm looking for.


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posted by Michael | 8:12 PM

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