SO GPS League (SOGL)
SO is introducing a GPS based orienteering league through this winter season. The objectives are to enthuse you to ‘get out there’, keep fit and hone your techniques.
New courses will be released for the league on the MapRun website and announced on the SO website. To count for the SOGL you will need to run the course with your GPS device (smartphone or GPS watch) within the adverstised ‘time window’ for that course. SOGL results will be compiled and publicised regularly using SO members’ results extracted from MapRun.
It is fun and flexible, yet there is still the motivation of competing against other members.
BOF has confirmed MapRun courses can be run through the current lockdown. However, travel is generally discouraged. Therefore, the ‘time window’ for the first few courses will extend into December, to give you more flexibility as to when you run the course. Once we are out of lockdown, the intention is new courses will have a 3 week ‘time window’.
The SOGL is all about fun and ‘getting out there’during Covid times, rather than replacing our SOGs as our top level league.
Courses
SOGL courses will be of green/’reddish’ standard (c. 5km long), on open-access land. They will be loaded onto the Maprun website (under UK/Sussex/SOGL), from where you can download them to your phone using the MapRunF app. Most will use orienteering maps although a small proportion may be based on an OS map. The list of events with links to the results will appear in a separate news item.
Scoring
The SO league will be calculated and publicised regularly (at least monthly). All SO members who have started at least one of the courses (in the applicable ‘time window’) are included in the league whenever it is published. Their best time on each course, in the ‘time window’ is included (duplicate runs are not included).
The leader is given 1 point, 2nd place 2 points and so on.
Competitors who MP (mispunched)/DNF (started but did not finish) are placed at the end of the list and all receive the score of the last valid run +1.
SO members that have started one course but do not start any one of the other courses are allocated a score for their ‘DNS’ (Did not start) courses which is equal to the total number of entrants in the series of eligible couses at the date the league results are published +1.
A competitor’s total score for the league is the sum of their lowest n scores where n represents half of the total number of events (rounded down if odd). Thus if there are 8 or 9 events 4 scores will count.
Using MapRun
Advice on using the system appears elsewhere on the SO website. You have the choice of using MapRunF on your phone, MapRunG on certain Garmin watches or uploading a .gpx file afterwards via the MapRun online console and these instructions. Generally our members are finding that the system works well but it is advisable to pick up the various tips for optimising your phone’s settings from the interweb.
However, you may find some controls don’t ‘bleep’ to confirm a ‘punch’. If you are adamant you were are at a control site, then you can use the HITMO function within MapRun to claim those controls - or upload a .gpx file using the link above.
Safety
All of the courses have been risk assessed by the planner - but please remind yourself of SO safety guidance notes.