Comments on: WOC 2015 Relay Men: The Analysis

By: Graeme Ackland

Graeme Ackland — Fri, 07 Aug 2015 08:18:19 +0000

I was kind to the printers, there were only 18 variations used (plus a different last lap). By control 6 the course was already split 18 ways. It meant that you could follow a team 18 places ahead at the last WOC: I though that was unlikely to affect the results. It was rather super that Belarus came back in the lead on the first leg (just passed on the finish line) – and they didn’t even have the same forkings as the Swiss.

Thanks for the excellent analysis Jan, feedback really helps us planners too.

By: Terje Mathisen

Terje Mathisen — Fri, 07 Aug 2015 06:00:55 +0000

@Jan: OK, thanks, I’ll check out the winsplits data!

I assumed Graeme had indeed limited himself to a mathematically fair subset of the possible forkings, he already hinted that the full set was too complicated for his course planning sw. :-)

With a 3 + 6 + 3-way simplified forking setup you still get 54 different combinations on the first leg, i.e. sufficient to make sure no two runners had the same course all the way. If the first 3-way split was combined with the last you get down to your suggested 18, and that would make it possible to micro-adjust the expected running times so as to make them extremely close to identical.

By: Jan Kocbach

Jan Kocbach — Thu, 06 Aug 2015 22:26:42 +0000

@Terje: There was an intricate plan behind the forkings, and only a certain amount of forkings were used (I think it was 9 or maybe 18?). In Winsplits you can take a look at all forking combinations used and who used them.

By: Jan Kocbach

Jan Kocbach — Thu, 06 Aug 2015 22:25:04 +0000

@Terje: A great course from an athlete point of view, yes, but I am not sure if that course worked well on TV. At least not the way it was presented (and then I am not talking about the GPS that didn’t work).