I had another experience at the MV regional worthy of a grumble.

I went with my brother’s girlfriend to enter her on an orange course (her first colour coded entry at a regional) and being a non-BOF member with dibber hire she was asked for £14!

To me this seemed a ridiculous amount of money to pay for an adult beginner to do an orange. How will this encourage anyone into the sport?

After much sensible mass debating, the kind MV ladies on registration allowed her a junior rate of £5 (+£1 dibber hire).

But, now that we are moving to this colour system, how do we differentiate between the old colour coded entries and the new ranking colour courses at regionals? Or level 2 events (or whatever they are called!).

I’m glad you could negotiate a discount, £14 is outrageous and cannot be justified by any stretch of the imagination!Increasing participation not!
There are lots of aspects of this brave new L2 world that need to ironed out.
How are newcomers encouraged to go a regional (L2)? Actually if you just want to orienteer whats the point there’s plenty of L3 events for less than a fiver.
Juniors on the white,yellow,orange in particular can’t be differentiated from those that go round accompanied. Previously those on their own would be JM/JW and others on colour coded. There should be some kind of subset or way to compare like for like. If a youngster needs accompanying thats fine but thats a different ball game from doing it on your own at the age of 9 or 10.
How will SE League cope with junior points? How will SEGallopen work?
I could go on and on but I think I’ve bored everyone enough at the moment..........

two points spring to mind:
1. what was so wrong with the old system? it must have been really bad but I certianly didn’t notice it…
2. how useful are the SOGs, and how excellent and what fun. week after week, different areas, well organised, a real bonus for experienced and novice alike. and for just a few quid.

There are many points to be ironed out, but at the old events you ended up with 2 people entering the same course with different names but for a different price, which didn’t make much sense.  Also is anybody really sad to see JM3, JW5s etc going

At the GO event on Ambersham on the 1st, they have decided to offer two beginners, wayfarer courses at (I think)a lower price.  These are not the same as any of the regional courses.

Also at the GO event it says shadowing not permitted on “regional courses” so that addresses one of my points!

The flyer for the forthcoming DFOK Regional says:

Regional event age classes JM/W1-4; JM/W5S/L; JM5; M/W21L/S; M/W35-70L/S; M75L/S: W75.
Colour coded courses White; Yellow; Orange; Light Green.

Does anyone know whether this is an error or a rebellion?

And, yes, the colour-coded courses are cheaper.

No the DFOK flyer is not an error. I understand DFOK and SO in April are sticking to the “old” system until all the issues are sorted, especially the manual manipulation required for results being submitted for the, yet to be resolved, ranking system.

Julia J - 23 January 2009 10:54 PM

I understand DFOK and SO in April are sticking to the “old” system.

Good for them - and SO!

I wonder whether “British Orienteering” will punish with a downgrading, like they have LOC for having the temerity to deviate from standards for a (former) National?

Message for all really.

I learned that it is not one’s club that decides what to do at an event, it is the organiser and planner. So, in deciding to run the Goodwood Winkins event on the old age class basis, I as organiser have effectively taken responsibility for this. If this turns out to be the wrong decision, the club is not to blame. This decision was taken before any of the new ‘ageless’ events had taken place and was based more on the fact that there was uncertainty as to our ability to pull off ranking data. (the clubs that have already gone ‘ageless’ had little idea how they were going to pull off ranking data when they decided this direction). My view is that the longer standing orienteers come first with newcomers second, so we had to be sure about the ranking data.

In recommending charging £13 for an adult novice, it seems that BOF place adult newcomers third out of two.

On a more positive note, the upcoming Goodwood Winkins event also has a charity team score event attached. Please get the word out, particularly in the work place as it should make a fun day out for corporate teams as well as families, pub teams and so on. Sue Pearson is organising this on the day, with Mike Gammon coming up with the idea and making much of the early ‘running’.

Whilst on, we will need much help with two events and hopefully many newcomers who will need guidance. So, keep your eyes open for further communications.

Cheers

Barrie ‘one the way back’ Pearson