We should discuss what to do against pack building and not discussing individual runners.

Someone mention that co-running/following also affect runner’s ranks already in the Q races which have same effect for some runners. If one athlete is out of Final for some seconds, it is unfair if he/she see in results that not just one, but several runners improve their ranks after they were caught by other runners.

Maybe orienteering could apply in Q races some sort of Q method from Ski-jumping or athletics to minimize affect “following” and give more pressure on tactic. In each Q heat we divide runners in pairs or groups (2-4 runners) on the basis of their WRE ranking position. First vs last, etc. Each group: First start better runner after him weaker runner, etc. It is battle just between them who will go in Final. Only winner go to Final and at the end also some lucky losers based on time of all (2nd placed runners in the group). Start interval between runners 2’ and groups 3-5’ (To prevent cooperating between runners from different groups with minimal effect of time length of Q race).

@Pascal
What could happen in the forest? If the better runner will be caught (error) by a weaker runner, he/she will be forced to run away and not to cooperate if he wants to win the battle against him or he/she must take a risk to go in Final as lucky looser. In case of more runners in Q races organizers could make groups of three or more runners and put event larger pressure on better runners. If weaker runner will start to following and batter runner can’t run away he/she will probably decrease the speed and start waiting for weaker runner to go in front (like cycling). In this way both runners risk to not qualify and third runner take a win in this group.

I agree that some solutions must be found for this problem but not to spoil real orienteering.

I think that when it comes to the situation where a runner is catched by another one and when the split times are starting to be almost the same, then we have an obvious cooperation between them, especially when the punching interval is less than 10-15s for over a half of the race.
I think that you simply can’t ignore your rivals when navigating into the same direction and then being influenced is a logical consequence. And it is simply a fact that navigating and running in groups or simply the eye contact with other athletes leads to a significant gain of speed and precision.

I think that the analysis of Henning Spjelkavik is very significant and, absolutely agreeing with jan kocbach, a developement of separation methods is needed to provide a “fair” competition.

Yes: running in packs gives you unfair advantages, whether you run in the lead or behind it. This should be avoided by minimizing the possiblity for grouping in future races.

No: Disqualifying someone without fool-proof evidence is not going to work. No matter how elaborate the statistical analysis is, one cannot rule out false positives. Now, what is worse: Not punishing the guilty, or mistakenly punishing the innocent? In ‘real’ crimes, the answer is quite obvious.

Don’t forget that when looking at the splits, you only get maybe 30 snapshots of the entire race. What happens between those snapshots can only be guessed. The runners might take different route choices, but still be only a couple of seconds apart at the next control.

So, please stop complaining about ‘who-run-with-who-for-how-long-and-possibly-gained-how-much’ and rather focus on how one can minimize grouping in future.