Stuff
You Need To Know
When
does it happen?
The
Auckland region offers a variety of orienteering experiences. Here
is the Event Calendar for the next few months.
The
Summer
Series runs on Tuesday evenings between November and March. Starting
between 5 pm and 7 pm in the major urban parks and reserves, the courses
are short and simple and these events are specifically designed for beginners
and casual runners. Each of these events is run by the Central Club;
the NorthWest and Counties-Manukau Clubs also run a few similar events
each year in North and South Auckland. The Summer Series Calendar
for 2002/3 is not yet available.
The
Autumn
Series takes place on Sundays between April and July. Sunday
is the traditional day for orienteering; you can usually start between
10 am and 1 pm, sometimes starting later and finishing earlier. These
events offer more than the Summer Series, and are held on farmland or forest
by all three Auckland Clubs, usually within an hour's drive of the City.
Club
Events occur all year round in forest, farm or park.
The
Orienteer
of the Year series happens fortnightly through late Winter and Spring.
It's the major regional competition with high quality maps, course setting
and organisation. Events are organised by each of the Auckland region
clubs, as well as Hamilton and Whangarei clubs. If you're keen to
know about all of these events, join the Club and you will receive a monthly
newsletter with full details of coming events.
The
Orienteering Map
Modern
orienteering maps are specially made by experienced orienteers. They
are different from other maps in many ways.
Their
north lines point to Magnetic North, not True North. In New Zealand,
Magnetic North is 22° east of True North.
The
scale of the map is usually much larger than other kinds of map, so a lot
more detail can be shown.
When
you first see an orienteering map, take a good look at the legend, which
tells you what the symbols on the map mean. They generally appear
in only five colours; let's look at each colour in turn.
For
a novice orienteer, the black symbols are the most important.
They show man-made features like roads, fences and walls, as well as rock
features like boulders and cliffs.
Naturally,
blue
shows water features, either larger obstacles like lakes, rivers, sea and
marshes, or smaller details like ditches, water troughs and streams.
Brown
shows the shape of the land, mainly by use of contours. A contour
is an imaginary line connecting points of the same height. If you
are crossing contours, you are going up or down hill. The height
difference between contour lines may vary from map to map, but it's always
shown on the map.
Contours
can be tough, because they're not actually painted onto the ground, so
you have to imagine them! As your orienteering improves, the information
in the contour shapes will become both easier to understand and more important
to you. Don't worry if they look like meaningless squiggles at first.
One
peculiar feature about orienteering maps is that trees which you can run
through or under are shown as white; only denser bush or forest is shown
as green, in different shades. The darker the green, the more
difficult the bush is to get through. Open areas appear as shades
of yellow.
Orienting
the map
This
is the first skill taught in orienteering after you've got the idea of
the colours and the symbols.
With
your map held in front of you, stand still and take a look around.
Let's imagine there's a road to your left and a river to you right.
Now rotate the map in your hands until the road on the map is to the left,
and the river to its right. Your map is now oriented.
As long as you always keep it the right way round like this, it will be
much easier to read.
On
the day
If the
weather is atrocious, don't go; if it's just bad, dress up well, the event
will still be on unless the road is washed away! (By the way, the weather
in Auckland City is often completely different from the weather out in
Woodhill Forest.)
Pack
good footwear, a change of clothes, a compass and a whistle if you have
them, a few dollars for the fee, and some food and drink for afterwards.
Find
the point on the main road mentioned in the newsletter, then follow the
orienteering signs to the venue. Don't worry, sometimes you have
to travel some distance between signs.
Read
the course descriptions at the registration tent/caravan and choose a suitable
course. 100m of climb typically adds 1 km of running effort to a
course, and you are likely to take at least 10 minutes per kilometre.
Don't aim too high and remember that the technical difficulty described
for each course is for real: if you're a beginner, don't do the courses
designed for experienced orienteers, you won't enjoy them.
Pick
up the correctly coloured clipboard, and fill in all of the details on
all of the segments of the card. Don't bother with the address if
you are already a Club member.
Pick
up the appropriate control descriptions slip. (Look out! This
is your first opportunity to make a mistake! There are many more
to come...) You may wish to copy the codes and descriptions into
the boxes on the card for convenience when running. If the descriptions
are hieroglyphic or puzzling, ask someone for help.
Take
the card and your money to registration to buy a map.
Check
if there are any map corrections and if so, draw them onto your map.
Choose
a start time which gives you plenty of time to get everything ready and
walk to the Start, which may be some distance from the Event Centre.
Pencil your name into the appropriate slot on the Start Times board at
the Event Centre. Write the time onto all of the sections of your
Clipboard.
Now
change, warm up, stretch, stash your car keys at the Caravan, familiarise
yourself with the map scale, contour interval, and legend.
Work out where you are on the map, and look around to familiarise yourself
with the style of the map and the character of the terrain.
Go to
the Starter and show him/her your card. You may be asked to hand
over the stub of the card which acts as a reminder to the organiser of
who is out on the map.
Check
your clipboard, map and compass. Make sure you know which way is
north so that you can orient your map correctly at the Start.
Present
yourself to the Starter three minutes before your Start Time, and listen
carefully to his/her instructions.
When
told to Start, follow the tapes to the Master Maps and copy your course
onto the map (unless it is pre-marked.)
Alternatively,
follow the tapes to the Start Triangle, which may be some distance away.
Go for
it! Navigate the marked course in the correct order, taking any route
between controls, and clip your card at each control.
Return
to the Finish, no matter what, and hand in your clipboard so that we know
you are OK.
Ask
if you can help the Event Co-ordinator with anything!
Safety
Major
calamities very rarely happen at orienteering events, because we prepare
ourselves to avoid them. Here's what you should do. Bear in
mind that when you are orienteering, you are typically tired, possibly
too cold or too hot, often dehydrated and hungry, and certainly under pressure!
You physical and mental ability can therefore be grossly impaired without
you realising it. Take care - it's a jungle out there!
No
dogs, no litter, no smoking, no fires
Farm
and forest owners are very sensitive, and we MUST stay in their good books.
Dogs, litter, smoking and fires are complete No-Nos.
Take
care of fences
To cross
a fence, use a gate if possible - climb at the hinge end. Vault fences,
or climb alongside a main post or strainer. Avoid bouncing off the
top wire, and take great care of electric fences which are usually flimsy
(and they bite).
Drive
sensibly
As you
approach the event, runners as young as 6 years old may appear without
warning from out of the trees. They have other things on their minds!
Few
of us have a lot of experience in dirt roads. Remember that overloaded
family saloons with road tyres are not suited to stopping quickly on gravel
roads. Contrariwise, following a car at snail-like speeds along 10
km of dirt road isn't my idea of fun. If there's someone behind you,
pull over and let him past.
Dust
clouds hide oncoming traffic, so stay well back from the guy in front and
don't eat his dust.
Park
sensibly
Park
close together, and use only one side of a narrow road. Turning around
before you park may seem like it saves time for a quick exit, but in fact
it just annoys the people waiting in your dust for you to finish so that
they can park too!
Carry
a whistle
Organisers
don't always insist that you carry a whistle, but you should always carry
one in thick bush or hilly areas. Why not tie one to your compass
or sew it into your O-suit so that it's always there when you need it?
The
recognised distress signal is a series of short blasts on a whistle - never
mind how many. Use your whistle if you need urgent help because of
an injury, or if you are horribly lost. Remember that one blast on
your whistle will ruin the event for everyone who hears it, because they
will all stop orienteering and come looking for you.
Sit
tight if you get completely lost
If you
get lost, try to retrace your tracks to a recognisable position on the
map. Never wander aimlessly without a plan, because you may thereby
leave the potential search area. Listen and wait for another runner;
they are very visible and noisy. Use your whistle to attract attention
if you have to.
Find
a control or a major track, stream, ridge or landmark, then sit and wait
for searchers. They will check these areas first.
Becoming
hopelessly lost usually results from one of two equally avoidable errors:
·
Biting off more than you can chew, and running a course which is too long
and tiring, or too technically difficult.
·
Making a horrendous navigational error, running off the map, and being
unable to retrace your steps to the last control because you ran around
in circles.
Act
when you hear a whistle, but never search alone
A runner's
safety is more important than your run, so always respond to a whistle.
But if you lose a companion, or hear of someone missing, NEVER dash off
to search without instructions from the Event Controller.
Dress
appropriately
Events
go ahead in almost any weather, so prepare for cold and wet by always packing
insulating clothes and wearing them on bad days. Better safe than
sorry, and you can always abandon them at the Start or at one of the controls
if need be. Wool or Polypropylene under a windproof layer will protect
you when it gets rough. Open-weave nylon or cotton will not.
Full
body cover
The
rather odd-looking O-suits, shoes and gaiters worn by experienced orienteers
are designed to protect you from vegetation, shin bruises, and falls.
O-suits dry out very quickly as you run, are somewhat windproof but not
at all rainproof.
Water
Your
ability to shed excess heat as you run is a function of temperature, humidity,
exertion and body fluids. Only the last can be controlled effectively,
and it is your responsibility to make sure that you drink PLENTY of water
before, during and after your event. When you are hot and dehydrating
you may not realise the threat, so force yourself to drink plenty on a
hot day. Overheating is the single greatest threat in good weather.
Lotions
and potions
Avoid
sun with full body cover and a hat if necessary; ALWAYS use sunblock on
a sunny or overcast summer's day. The usual problem areas for orienteers
are the areas exposed around the neck of the O-suit. Keep a First
Aid kit in the car; the most needed items are antiseptic cream, sticking
plaster, and “punch-ice” for sprains (a package which chills when the tab
is pulled, or whatever).