Author: craigf

The IOF has decided to include ‘MicrO’ as part fo the Middle Distance race at next year’s WOC. Below is some info that might help elites to understand what MicrO is. OA HP is currently endeavouring to have some MicrO races organised next year as part of NOL.

Here is a Grant Bluett translation of what Bjorna Valstad wrote about Micro-O on his web site http://www.staff-valstad.com/

The question I’ve asked myself is, “what is the difference between micro and regular orienteering?” Looking at the maps from the middle distance champs shows the course in three loops, one of them is micro. You have to race a course on a map. The course includes a certain number of controls. You had to visit the controls in the right order and punch at the right controls. Do you recognize the idea? What is the main difference between micro and a “regular” O’ race? Seen from this point of view, isn’t micro just a short O’ course on a large scale map. That isn’t something new. What is new with micro? 1. We are forced to adapt to a different scale during the middle of the race. 2. We have to actually orienteer all the way to the feature and not just run to the circle and look for the marker. Both of these things mean that the orienteer is stressed and it increases the demands on orienteering technique. It is tough. Micro…is demanding. I have no doubt that the concept favors the best orienteers. The legs are short and that puts a huge demand on map reading and concentration. A second’s lapse or running at the wrong speed can cause significant time loss. Forget about the name micro. It is orienteering and so the name should remain “orienteering.”…

Jo Allison from the Canberra Cockatoos and Eric Morris from the NSW Stingers dominated the ACT Championships as Orienteering was welcomed back to the Captains Flat area for the first time in several years. Competitors were challenged by classic spur-gully terrain, course setters Ann and John Scown made great use of the map, setting difficult route-choices on long legs and making good use of steeper contour detail and flatter vague areas.

In a very strong but small women’s field Jo Allison was challenged early on by fellow World Championship representative Tracy Bluett; but a two minute mistake at the third control by Tracy gave Jo a clear lead which was never challenged. Nicki Taws finished third with yet another solid performance. After a tough international campaign Jo has decided not to travel to Tasmania for the National Championships, although her performance at the ACT Championships, fastest for nine out of twelve legs, suggests she would have been hard to beat.

In the men’s race Eric Morris, Rob Preston and Kerrin Rattray swapped the lead for the early part of the course before Eric Morris asserted his dominance, putting a minute into the field on each of the two long legs, and then increasing his lead all the way to the finish. Rob Preston finished second with Kerrin Rattray, continuing his great long distance form, a close third. Although local World Championship representatives Grant Bluett and Dave Shepherd were absent, Eric Morris’s performance here and at NSW long distance championships suggests he will be one of the favourites to win the National Championships in Tasmania, before he flys out to Italy for the World Cup Final.

All eyes will now be focused on next weekends National League Race, the Tasmanian long distance championships on Pittwater Dunes, as a final form guide for the National Championships. A race report will be posted here so make sure to log in.

2005 ACT Championships – Results

2005 ACT Championships – Splits

It was a day for firsts at the Victorian long distance championships, with Danielle Winslow and Blair Trewin both claiming their first wins in the event at elite level. Trewin’s win, in particular, was the kind of drought breaker that the professional meteorologist can usually only dream about. Not since 1987 has he been able to proudly hold aloft the badge of ‘Victorian Champion’ when, as a canny Canberra M16, he took the race from a bunch of lanky locals.

When questioned about his form going into the race, Trewin deflected suspicion with his customary ‘there or thereabouts’ demur, an answer that students of the Trewin vernacular immediately translated as ‘in the bag’.

Course setters Rob Lewis and Michael Magasanik made the most of the Barambogie North map, with long route choice legs and tricky direction changes providing plenty of opportunity for runners to come unstuck. Trewin’s technical skills didn’t desert him, however, and in his 14th attempt at the M21E title, he was able to claim victory by less that a minute over last year’s champion Bruce Arthur. In third place, an injured Rune Olsen did well to complete the tough 14.1km course, while South Australian junior Lachlan Hallet also ran strongly to take fourth place. Caught by Trewin half way around the course, Hallet kept pace through the middle section before tiring in the final loop.

In the women’s race, Danielle Winslow claimed her second state title in as many weeks. A technically difficult start to the course saw her drop time early on, and while she was disappointed with her navigation, her fitness was able to get her over the line ahead of last year’s champion Emma Prime. Third place went to former top junior Kirsten Fairfax, who this year has been making a quiet comeback to competition at the elite level.

It’s been a good late season for Winslow, whose early 2005 form was uncharacteristically inconsistent. Now, with the NSW and Victorian Championships under her belt, increased confidence and a little local knowledge, she will be the athlete to watch at her home championships in Tasmania in two weeks time.

2005 Victorian Orienteering Championships

Needing to drastically reduce its annual expenditure following severe cuts in government funding, Orienteering Australia has just completed a thorough review of its activities in order to establish new priorities for funding.
The state associations and interested orienteers prepared and shared input papers, which were subsequently addressed by a meeting involving one orienteering administrator from each state. The process has resulted in a series of recommendations to the OA Board and Council about the future activities of Orienteering Australia.
The following is summary of the key areas identified in the input papers and the major recommendations from the meeting.
What is ‘Development’?
The role of the Director Development should be to direct a range of facilitation strategies which aid the states to share and exchange information about the role of media, sponsorship, marketing and promotion in the enhancement of participation.
Services for which OA should Pay rather than Seek to use Volunteers
Two contracts, each for approximately $20 000, should be let, for an executive officer and a head coach, with possibly one person occupying both positions.
The Conduct of the Council
No changes should be made to the composition or election of the Board or to the conduct of the Annual General Meeting and the Annual Conference, but whether the Council consists of two or one representative per state should receive further consideration.
The Management of Committees
The management of the committees should be improved, particularly in relation to the flow of communications between meetings.
The Australian Orienteer
The compulsory subscriptions to The Australian Orienteer by the state members should be increased to offset the loss of the ASC funding and there is a possible need for the magazine to adjust editorial practice to match budgetary constraints.
Participation by Australia within the International Orienteering Federation
Although OA should seek to be represented on committees of the IOF, expenditure should be restricted to being represented at the biennial Congress [this recommendation to be implemented after Hugh Cameron’s current term as a Member of the IOF Council ends].
The Priorities within High Performance
The Australian aspects of the program should be retained in their present form.
The international aspects of the program should be retained, but with a slightly reduced total expenditure
The selection of the WOC team should be retained at a maximum of six males and six females, with the selectors continuing to stringently apply the selection criteria relating to benchmark performances.
The OA should retain its commitment to increasing the funding of MTBO activities, with the Board and the MTBO Committee working towards an agreed strategy based on parity of participation.
Sources of Income
The states should pay a small levy on each event they conduct, ie a new levy on all non-National fixture events.
The online systems of the website should be enhanced in order to provide improved data that will assist in devising new strategies to increase participation and hence income.

Men

1 Finland 179.14 (Timo Sarkkinen 61.53, Mika Tervala 58.46, Jussi Mäkilä 58.35)
2 France 182.55 (Matthieu Barthelem62.15, Stéphane Toussaint, 58.14, Jérémie Gillmann 62.26)
3 Switzerland 184.17 (Beat Schaffner 61.58, Simon Seger 61.18, Rémy Jabas 61.01)
7 Australia 194.46 (Anthony Darr 73.19 Alex Randall 61.50, Adrian Jackson 59.37)

Women

1 Germany 158.52 (Anke Dannowski 48.10, Gerit Pfuhl 57.05, Antje Bornhak 53.37)
2 Czech Republic 162.08 (Michaela Lacigová 56.14, Markéta Jakoubová 52.04, Hana La Carbonara 53.50)
3 France 164.45 (Karoline Finance, 53.05, Madeleine Kammerer 60.49, Aurélie Ballot 50.51)
Disq Australia (Mary Fien 56.49, Carolyn Jackson 61.05, Anna Sheldon DISQ)

Carolyn Jackson, Mary Fien, and Anna Sheldon have qualified for the long distance final, as have Adrian Jackson and Alex Randall.

The first race of the 2005 World MTBO Championships in Banska Bystrica, Slovakia produced two top 10 performances from the Australian Team in what turned out to be very tough and long middle distance races.

Queenslander Anna Sheldon raced to 6th place and a spot on the podium, after starting very strongly, recording the third fastest time through the first radio control, and taking the lead half way through her race, before coming unstuck on the vague tracks that caught out many other competitors. New Zealand’s Marquita Gelderman rode an almost error free race to record a 4th place finish.

The defending Middle Distance champion, Adrian Jackson, finished in 8th place after a great start, where he also briefly held the lead. Adrian had mechanical problems early – he got to the start and discovered that one of his pedals was nearly falling apart! Adrian was forced to ride the entire race with the malfunctioning pedal. He came unstuck in the last few checkpoints in an area with some vague mapping.

For more Middle Distance reports, photos and maps see the Australian Team Blog

The Tasmanian Middle Distance Championships resulted in wins to Lee Andrewartha in M21A and Grace Elson inW21A on a day of perfect Tasmanian spring sunshine. Held on the little used north eastern section of the Risdon brook reserve map near Hobart, the championship course setter Patrick Saile produced a very technical and challenging set of courses. The terrain consisted of a vague, undulating hilltop with a range of complex sandstone cliff lines falling away down the hillside back to the dam & reserve. Many runners came unstuck on the critical fourth leg across and over the side of a hill by drifting out to the right.
In W21A Grace Elson had a comfortable victory over Hanny Allston in the excellent time of 34.48 for the tough 4.1km course. Elson’s run was one of the highlights of the day in all age groups and shows she has very much thrown off her injury problems of last year. In M21A Lee Andrewartha had a good margin of 5 minutes from veteran Bernard Walker with fellow veteran Mike Dowling a further two minutes back.

After 14 years of international competition, 7 years living and competing as an elite in Sweden, a World Games gold medal and numerous top 10 and top 20 performances the legend of Australian elite orienteering, Grant Bluett, is retiring from international competition.

Grant has led the charge for Australia in international orienteering since 1991 when he finished the 1st leg of the 1991 JWOC relay in Berlin, Germany in 3rd place. In those days for an Australian to be in the top few at any level was fairly unheard of. When Grant followed up the following year at JWOC in Finland with a 15th place he was sending a message to all back home that we were good enough. Orienteering Australia’s High Performance Manager and regular Voice of the Forest commentator Jason McCrae spoke to Grant about whether he really is finishing up now and asked for a few reflections on his wondrous career.

Jason McCrae (JMc): Well GB the whisper in the forest is that Japan WOC was your last. Is it true?
Grant Bluett (GB): Yeh that’s it Jase. Maybe if I could just do the races I’d continue on but I’m not really enjoying it anymore, I don’t enjoy the travel, and especially not enjoying training for races. I still enjoy training but I’m sick of spending all year training for a particular race – looking at what’s required for that race, focusing my training on those requirements and making sure each session is directed towards being ready for that race – I’m tired of that. I will still keep training and competing in Australia however I just want to be able to do whatever training I feel like doing and not the intense focus.
JMc: No possibility that come next year you’ll change your mind?
GB: It’s possible I guess but I don’t want to be like Hakan Eriksson (Swedish orienteer) who announces every year he is retiring and then every year comes out of retirement. In fact I was talking to Hakan at WOC in Japan and he was encouraging me to go on. He said he would coach me and set a program for me and I was getting a bit excited thinking ‘yeh maybe I will keep going’ but then towards the end of our conversation he said ‘yeh you should go on – as long as you are enjoying it’ and it was then that I realised no I wasn’t enjoying it anymore so time to call it a day.
JMc: Well sounds like you’ve had a fair think about it. If it is the end Grant, looking back, what have been your best performances at an international level?
GB: Ahh I don’t know. I guess I look back on my World Games victory in Japan in 2001 and my long period of good results in the Park World Tour (PWT) as my best. PWT was particularly good as I had many good results over a decent period of time. It was also an exciting time for orienteering with PWT and sprint or park racing being new. It was really attracting crowds and television coverage in Sweden and it was great to be running so well in an exciting era for world orienteering.
JMc: Any time when you consider you had the perfect race?
GB: Yeh maybe in the PWT in Shanghai. I didn’t miss anything technically and I just felt so strong. I felt like I was running hard the whole way and felt strong and invincible. I won by 45seconds which doesn’t sound much but in a PWT sprint race that’s heaps.
JMc: What about disappointments?
GB: I wish I’d had a good run at WOC – I never had a great run in a final. I had great run in the Swedish sprint and qualified really well but was far from perfect in the final where it all went bad. Every single final WOC race have been disappointing. Even the 8th place which was my best result it could see so easily have been 2nd place but instead a little mistake meant I came 8th in stead of 2nd. A lot of the other finals I feel like I could’ve won the race but did not run well enough, whereas the time I came 8th I couldn’t have won but a little thing took me from 2nd to 8th.
JMc: Have you had a chance to reflect on your Japanese performances?
GB: Yeh that was hugely disappointing especially since it was probably the WOC where I had my best physical preparation for a long time or maybe ever. From when I moved home to Australia (January 2005) I only had a week off from my physical training and that was after hurting my back at the ACT tree-athalon and really a week is nothing in the scheme of things. I felt really good physically until the week before WOC in Japan but then I started to feel flat. I kept telling myself it was nerves but maybe I lost my shape too early. Everything else had really gone perfectly to plan in preparation.
JMc: Who were the big influences on your orienteering career?
GB: Warren Key is the obvious one. And John Porter when I started really encouraged me a lot. And then everyone I raced again from you up mate, from that Easter in 1988, (GB and JMc were competitors in juniors) I always wanted to be like them, beat them, and I tried to learn from everyone I was competing against.
JMc: And how do you see the future of Australian elite orienteering? Who do you think are the future Grant Bluett’s and how good can they be?
GB: I think the future will be a lot better than I ever was! Julian Dent and Hanny Allston especially. Hanny is already better than I ever was. I definitely think Hanny, if she continues, then I can’t see who can stop her from being world champion. There’s always things that can happen – she’s still young and might get injured or burn out however she’s way better now than Simone Luder or Hanne Staff was at 19.
JMc: And your plans for the future if international competition isn’t going to dominate your life?
GB: I don’t know (laughing). Coaching will always be part of my life even if I just am coaching a couple of people. It will be my future in orienteering rather than myself. I have an interest in coaching at a national team level also. I don’t attach my coaching as something that makes an orienteer win but you associate with it and that gives you a high, knowing you’ve helped them a little bit.
JMc: OK Grant thanks for giving us a few words and for being a legend of Australian orienteering.
GB: Yeh no worries Jase. You know you were awesome that Easter at Badja in 89.
JMc: Yeh, yeh I know mate. Thanks.