Today’s leg in Route to O-Season 2020 is another one from EYOC 2019 in Belarus. This time there is no possibility to run around on the field, do you dare to go straight?
The leg is as usually first provided without routes – you may take a look at it and think about how you would attack this leg (if the image is too small, you may click on it to get it larger):
Location
You find other maps from the area in omaps.worldofo.com here. See also latest additions in 3DRerun from this area in order to learn more about this terrain type.
Webroute
Next you can draw your own route using the ‘Webroute’ below. Think through how you would attack this leg, and draw the route you would have made. Some comments about why you would choose a certain route are always nice for the other readers.
Then you can take a look at how the runners have solved this leg below. This is a leg where simplification is the key to not lose time. As you can see, most runners chose to use the valley on the left as their approach to simplify the control in this green forest. When running left, the best way to approach the control would probably be the vegetation boundary which Basset (fastest on the leg) seems to follow, but it is probably not that easy to find it. Still, this definitely seems like the best option. The route to the right looks very tempting when leaving the control (path, white forest), but when looking at the approach towards the control it looks a lot more tricky with lots of darker green. How would you simplify this control?
Density map
See below for a density map of some of the ones who have drawn their routes so far (available during the day when some readers have drawn their route).
Additional information
You find the complete map in omaps.worldofo.com at this location.
Route to O-Season 2020 series
Route Choice Challenges while waiting for the real action: With the upcoming orienteering season indefinitely on hold in large parts of the the world due to COVID-19, regular orienteering route choice challenges may be one way to make sure those orienteering skills don’t get completely rusty. I’ll try to keep these coming daily, but need help from all of you out there to keep them coming and to keep up a certain quality.
Tips on good route choice challenges – either from races/trainings (even cancelled ones) or theoretical ones with accompanying analysis – are very welcome (please e-mail to jan@kocbach.net).
Not all legs are taken for the interesting routechoice alternatives – some are also taken because the map is interesting – or because it is not straightforward to see what to do on a certain leg. Any comments are welcome – especially if you ran the event chosen for todays leg!