The Australian Orienteer – March 2023

MARC H 2 02 3

ALEX TARR OCEANIA 2023 XMAS 5 DAYS

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www.sportaus.gov.au 2 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2023

THE CHAIRMAN’S PAGE

The Chairman's Page MIKE DOWLING – CHAIR OA BOARD

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elcome to the 2023 orienteering year which is now well under way. As I write this column, I am in the midst of a festival of orienteering in my home state of Tasmania with the Oceania Championships having just concluded and The Hobart Shorts underway. The Oceania Championships will be reported elsewhere in this edition. From my part it was gratifying for us to finally be able to conduct the Regional Championships, to use the wonderful maps made by the late Rob Plowright and to catch up with many O friends.

I have written extensively in the past as to the importance of acknowledging and recognising the amazing amount of volunteer work that goes into our sport for us to enjoy it. Bert Elson is an amazing example of such a volunteer. Not only did he coordinate all the equipment for the Oceania Championships, but he was also the driving force behind The Hobart Shorts, six events in four days. Thank you, Bert, for such amazing energy. Kate Lucas is another. We all know that to get timely and accurate results is important. Well, Kate was the person behind both competitions.

And thirdly, parking can be a logistical nightmare but a necessity of great importance for our big events. Julian Roscoe undertook this management role for both competitions, a vital but often thankless task. Thank you, Bert, Kate and Julian. It is people like you and countless others in our sport that make our enjoyment possible.

On the OA Board front, we are gearing up for another busy year.

By the time this issue hits your inbox, letterbox, or your hands at an event we will have or be very close to finally completing the transition to a company limited by guarantee as required by Sport Australia. The Board will have agreed its 2023 Activity Plan and finalised its budget for the year. Speaking of the OA budget, it is always a fine balancing act between income and expense. The reality is that OA could expend much more on core activities than the income it receives. This year we will run a deficit. The Board is working on ideas to look at a longer-term financial strategy and the financial relationship between our member States and OA. Connected to this is the rebranding of OA, the development of a branding strategy and building this into a better communication strategy. In addition, we will be working with States through 2023 to look at further improving our ways of building engagement and participation in our sport.

May the force of the map be with you in 2023.

Looking ahead on the competition front, we have our National League in the first part of the year, the Easter 3 Days in the Jindabyne region organised by ACT and the Australian Championships carnival later in the year in WA. For our Elite we will have WOC in the alpine areas of Switzerland, JWOC in Romania, the World Cup in Norway, Czech Republic, and Italy, and the MTBWOC in Czech Republic. For our masters the WMOC will be in Slovakia in sensational karst terrain that I ran a World Cup in 1988 on and loved it.

2023 Round 1

7-10 January

LAUNCESTON/ST HELENS, TAS Sprint, Middle & Long Distance

Round 2

11-12 March

SYDNEY, NSW Individual Relay Knockout

Proudly supported by

Round 3

7-10 April

EASTER, JINDABYNE, NSW Sprint Mass Start, Middle Distance, Long, Chasing Start

Round 4

6-7 May

CASTLEMAINE, VIC 2 x Middle Distance, Forest Relay MARCH 2023 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 3

NEW EDITOR

Introducing Your New Editor

W21AS for the next event. My biggest orienteering achievement followed a week later, when slowly limping and putting SPORTident stations on stands at Kooyoora I discovered that one control for the World Masters Games seemed to be in a wrong gully. Consequently, my impression was validated and the control location was rectified for the event. Glory to those who are not afraid to speak up and potentially look silly.

ello fellow orienteers and readers of this magazine. I am thrilled and honoured to be appointed the new Editor of The Australian Orienteer. Thank you to the Board of Orienteering Australia, all the well-wishers and, of course, Michael for being a great mentor and for editing this issue with me.

Being someone passionate about nature conservation, who has enjoyed orienteering, bike riding, cross-country skiing and hiking, I wanted to pursue a career of a scientist working outdoors. Several academics advised me that to carry out fieldwork I needed to do a PhD. So I did. Orienteering skills proved very useful during my studies of molecular ecology of the yellow-footed antechinus, Antechinus flavipes. Random sites were established in forests using grid paper, and twice a day I efficiently checked 180 traps by running with a piece of paper and a compass. It helped that all the investigated forests were river red gum or box-ironbark ones, so relatively easy to move through. Sadly, although my colleagues found this method amusing, it did not catch on. If you are wondering; all animals were released at the point of capture, including non-target species such as red-bellied black snakes, Pseudechis porphyriacus. The most rewarding outcome of this work was my submission to the Victorian Environment Assessment Council in 2007, in which I provided evidence supporting establishment of new national parks.

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In 2009, catastrophic Black Saturday fires engulfed our neighbourhood. To survive we could rely only on our bushfire preparation, chance and instantaneous actions. The emergency system was totally overwhelmed. Subsequently, I wrote two submissions to the 2009 Victorian Bushfires Royal Commission.

The first submission contained a description of the events and suggestions how data could be collected and analysed to inform future actions. In the second submission, names of scientists who had bushfire expertise were proposed based on their published record, in hope that at least some of them will be consulted. I still dislike the smell of smoke, and avoid bush orienteering events on above-30-degree days.

Hania Lada

Autobiography of an Average Orienteer

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have been an orienteer for most of my life. When growing up in Poland that we jokingly considered “a fourth world country” for its oppressive regime (our family friends were prisoners of conscience), pollution and dire economic situation in the 1980s, it was a great relief and a wonderful experience to participate in orienteering training and competitions. My club, Start Gdańsk, was relatively small but provided a good rivalry in the National League to several large, well-resourced army clubs. Regularly competing in regional and national events involved travelling as a group on crowded overnight trains (after the craziest among us had jumped onto moving carriages to reserve a compartment), running the next day and sleeping in school halls. I most fondly remember winter training camps, especially running in snow in mountains, exploring ruined castles and staying in mountaineering villas.

We had relatives in Australia, and my dream was to move to this exotic country, which I knew only from letters, books and postcards that showed beautiful landscapes and intriguing wildlife. After obtaining the permanent-residency visas and migrating to Australia with my parents in the 1990s, my dad and I joined Yarra Valley Orienteering Club in Victoria. At my first event in the Southern Hemisphere, the Victorian Championships on Glenlyon Roses, I was confronted with the map full of contours with hardly any tracks. It took me over 100 min to find all the controls! Eventually, I developed my enthusiasm for such spur gully terrain. If contours mystify you, do not despair, there is hope.

From 2001 to 2005 I competed in orienteering in the W21E class, usually placing in the bottom half of the field. In 2002, my Victorian W21 relay team came second in the Australian Relay Championships. Unfortunately, I missed the ceremony due to my knee being stitched up after a sudden collision with a Flinders Ranges’ rock on route to the first control. The emergency doctor in the Hawker hospital was dismayed at the orienteers who had completed their courses while injured. I am wondering if he was the person who rang the organisers and requested to move me to 4 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2023

When my partner and I became parents, weeks away from home turned into fieldwork as a family. Our daughter, Ella Maja, learned in forests how to walk and ride a bike. Her kindergarten teachers

Yellow-footed antechinus fieldwork. Photo

by Quentin Lang.

After publishing scientific papers on Australian birds, mammals, invertebrates, frogs and plants, I was ready for a new challenge and to inspire the next generation, therefore I became a primary school teacher. I used orienteering and bird surveys as brain breaks for my students, and during remote learning I most enjoyed creating fiction and non-fiction texts for them as well as working with small groups online. Eventually, full-time work as a teacher at an International Baccalaureate school turned out to be rewarding and incompatible with a balanced life because it did not allow enough time for family, friends, orienteering, creative activities, science and exercising in a physiotherapy gym. Consequently, becoming a mathematics and VCE biology tutor, and a coach with Orienteering Victoria providing activities to primary and secondary schools, proved to be an excellent choice.

Orienteering among rocks. Photo by Quentin Lang.

were very enthusiastic about exposing children to orienteering and science, so I made maps of the kindergarten backyard and of the nearby playground. It was awesome witnessing how four-year olds enjoyed running with maps or re-enacting scientific fieldwork that involved catching antechinus I had knitted. This influenced me to start a small business, Merry Maps Education, while still working part-time as a scientist. Subsequently, when voluntarily preparing and delivering science and orienteering activities at the local school I decided to make a major career change.

In addition to my family and friends, Yarra Valley Orienteering Club, has been the most constant part of my life in Australia. Even when I was too preoccupied or too injured to attend orienteering events I still felt as a member of the orienteering community. I enjoy all forms of orienteering but am yet to try underwater events.

My favourite map is Kooyoora Spur because rocks are magnificent and when present in a high density pose a great navigational challenge.

I look forward to editing The Australian Orienteer, and know that I will put too much effort into it as is always the case with things I care about. While I enjoy experiments, I do not plan to make radical changes, just tinker a little, informed by readers’ comments.

My intention is to include a regular section catering for novice and moderate-navigation orienteers, and to continue the legacy of the past Editors. Constructive feedback is most welcome, and I have much experience dealing with mutually exclusive advice. All the best and happy reading.

Australian WOC, JWOC and MTBO teams are outfitted by

MARCH 2023 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 5

EDITORIAL

Former Editor’s scribble Michael Hubbert

Wherefore O in Asia? oon after the Sydney 2000 Olympics China began recruiting some of their best runners to Orienteering. And they did quite well, particularly when running ability was a major factor for success. Their women orienteers were the best, particularly Zhu Mingyue, Hao Shuangyan & Li Ji who, as a Relay Team, placed 7th at the 2008 World Championships in Czech Republic. That was a major achievement for a national team that had been attending World Orienteering Championships only since 2004.

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19 pandemic had to be postponed), and have thus far never sent a team to the Asian Orienteering Championships or World Orienteering Championships.”

“But to think of Indonesia as a country with little Orienteering activity is a gross underestimation and a highly biased view. With well over 200 million people, cultural proximity to other Orienteering countries (especially Malaysia and Singapore), and mandatory scout participation at school since 2013, it’s impossible for Orienteering to stay under the radar for so long.”

Much of the interest for China in Orienteering was created by Park World Tour which initiated a series of events in 1998 and the years that followed. Chinese orienteers have continued to compete at most World Championships but since those heady days of success they have mostly finished much further down in the results.

By comparing Orienteering Instagram accounts, posts and followers in Indonesia with similar data in established Orienteering countries in Europe, Raphael Mak estimates there may be around 16,400 interested orienteers in Indonesia. He says: “16,400 orienteers in Indonesia - far more than you’d expect, isn’t it?”

Japan is another Orienteering nation to note. Japan has been an IOF member since 1969 and has staged a World Championships in 2005 (only the third outside of Europe). But Japanese orienteers haven’t had much success at the top level despite Japan’s long history of running excellence.

While the direct comparisons with European Instagram accounts may be a little “rubbery” there is no doubt that Orienteering is gaining a foothold of interest in Indonesia.

Orienteers from other Asian nations such as Hong Kong China, Republic of South Korea and Chinese Taipei have attended World Championships for more years than those from China but have never achieved much success. Other nations such as India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Nepal, Philippines, PRK North Korea, Singapore and Thailand are also members of the IOF. So what is holding Asian nations back? There are many factors not least of which is the lack of suitable forest terrain in which to train and compete on in their home countries. Other factors could be economics, nutrition and suitable coaching. Sprint terrain seems more likely to be available and certainly more suitable and events have been held in cities and villages with much interest and a modicum of success.

The founder of the ORIEN.ASIA website, Raphael Mak, has been promoting Orienteering City Races for some years (though COVID interrupted recent ones). Now he is developing a program for 2023.

He writes: “ORIEN.ASIA is helping Thailand with creating a new generation of orienteers who will take initiative in forming Orienteering life of the country, with nationwide events and representation in international events. With the large and active running community here, we also hope to attract more runners to try Orienteering

by Landrunning events, which combine elements of running with Orienteering.”

He also writes of Indonesia: “Indonesia still doesn’t quite get included in the list of usual Asian orienteering countries in our minds. To start with, they haven’t quite gotten into holding a major event yet (World Ranking Events were scheduled for 2020-2021 but due to the COVID-

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Mak says: “Orienteering in Indonesia is much bigger than you think.

We’ve underestimated it all along.”

He asks: “Why is that? To start with, there appears to be a tendency to underestimate the scale of Orienteering outside of Europe. Orienteering is still a Europe-dominated sport, and if you’re from Europe you’d probably not even think of Hong Kong and Malaysia as places with Orienteering unless you’re well informed (or travelled there yourself ).”

“Orienteering is biased towards Europe not just because of geography and language - the increasing technical demands of the sport, brought by the improved quality of Orienteering mapmaking, is related to a “standardisation” and “idealisation” of the typical Orienteering terrain to that of a Scandinavian forest with considerable complexities in terrain.

The World Orienteering Championships have never ventured outside of Europe since 2005 ( Japan). While navigational challenges in forests are fun for those obsessed with Orienteering, it effectively shuts out a large part of the population living in non-temperate climates - and even a lot of people in Europe who find it too hard or too inconvenient (especially for those without cars) to try Orienteering.”

“We should recognise the inherent bias in our sport against nonEuropean countries and, consequently, consider Indonesia’s Orienteering activities in a more positive light.”

We in Australia can also recognise Raphael Mak’s claim that “Orienteering is still a Europe-dominated sport”, though it must be said that the recent introduction by the IOF of Sprint World Championships in alternate years should go a long way to spreading the Sprint World Championships program to locations outside of Europe.

www.orienteering.asn.au PO Box 3379, North Strathfield, NSW 2137 Chair & Director – International (IOF) Director – Finance Director – Technical Director – Operations & MTBO Director – Director Coaching & High Performance Director Media & Communications Director – ex-officio National Integrity Manager General Manager OA Head Coach OA Assistant Head Coach High Performance Administrator Manager Coaching Development Anti Doping Medical Officer Editor OA Enews National Sporting Schools Coordinator Coach & Controller Accreditation Badge Applications

Mike Dowling international@orienteering.asn.au Richard Mountstephens finance@orienteering.asn.au Anna Sheldon technical@orienteering.asn.au Craig Steffens craig.s@orienteering.asn.au Brett Weihart brett.w@orienteering.asn.au Clare Hawthorne clare.h@orienteering.asn.au Troy de Haas troy.d@orienteering.asn.au Blair Trewin blairt@orienteering.asn.au Andrew Shipton integrity@orienteering.asn.au Árpád Kocsik gm@orienteering.asn.au Natasha Key headcoach@orienteering.asn.au Jim Russell assistantheadcoach@orienteering.asn.au Fredrik Johansson hpadmin@orienteering.asn.au Brodie Nankervis coaching@orienteering.asn.au Mark Freeman markfreeman@hotmail.com Linda Burridge oa_enews@orienteering.asn.au Jim Mackay sportingschools@orienteering.asn.au Jim Mackay accreditation@orienteering.asn.au John Oliver 68 Amaroo Street, Wagga Wagga, NSW 2650

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STATE ASSOCIATIONS Orienteering Queensland: PO Box 275, Ferny Hills DC, QLD 4055. Secretary: Sue Campbell secretary@oq.asn.au Orienteering NSW: PO Box 3379 North Strathfield NSW 2137. Admin Officer: John Murray, Ph. (02) 8736 1252 admin@onsw.asn.au Orienteering ACT: PO Box 402 Jamison Centre ACT 2614. Secretary: Stephen Goggs, Ph. (02) 6182 1815 office@act.orienteering.asn.au Orienteering Victoria: PO Box 1010 Templestowe VIC 3106. Secretary: Aislinn Prendergast secretary@vicorienteering.asn.au Orienteering SA: 1 Windsor Rd, Glenside SA 5065. Sec: Fi Pahor secretary@sa.orienteering.asn.au Orienteering Western Australia: PO Box 234 Subiaco WA 6904. Secretary: Ceri Pass, oawa.secretary@gmail.com Orienteering Tasmania: Secretary: Julian Roscoe secretary@tasorienteering.asn.au Top End Orienteers (Northern Territory): PO Box 39152 Winnellie NT 0821. Secretary: Susanne Casanova topendorienteersNT@gmail.com

NEXT ISSUE DEADLINE April 6. Time-sensitive: April 14

CONTENTS

ISSN 0818-6510 Issue 1/23 (no. 208) MARCH 2023

THE CHAIRMAN’S PAGE..............................3

The national magazine of Orienteering Australia Inc. ABN 77 406 995 497 Published four times a year: First day of March, June, September, December. Print Post Approved PP 236080/00011, (100023602 for NSW).

NEW EDITOR ...........................................4

Editor: Hania Lada, P.O. Box 165, Warrandyte, Victoria 3113 magazine@orienteering.asn.au Phone 0493 615 203 Magazine Design & Assembly: Peter Cusworth, Ph. 0409 797 023 pcusworth53@gmail.com Printer: Ferntree Print, 1154 Burwood Hwy Upper Ferntree Gully.

Contribution deadline: April 6; Time-sensitive – April 14.

Deadline dates for contributions are the latest we can accept copy.

Publication is normally planned for the 1st of March, June, September & December. Copies are dispatched in bulk to State associations in the week prior to that date.

Regular Contributors: Competition - Blair Trewin; MTBO - Craig Steffens Contributions welcome, either directly or via State editorial contacts.

Prior consultation is suggested before preparing major contributions.

Guidelines available from the editor or from state contacts.

State Editorial Contacts: VIC, WA and TAS – vacant QLD: Liz Bourne – batmaps.liz@gmail.com NSW: NSW Marketing – marketing@onsw.asn.au ACT: John Scown – scown@light.net.au SA: Erica Diment – ericadiment@adam.com.au – tel: 0408 852 313 Subscriptions: State Association members via State Associations. Contact relevant Association Secretary for details. Other subscribers: Write to The Australian Orienteer, PO‑Box165,Warrandyte,Vic.3113.WithinAustralia: $40 pa. Overseas: Asia/Pacific (inc. NZ) $A49, Rest of World $A58 pa.

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Opinions expressed in The Australian Orienteer are not necessarily those of Orienteering Australia.

EDITORIAL ..............................................6 2023 OCEANIA CHAMPIONSHIPS...................8 XMAS 5 DAYS ........................................ 20 ALEX TARR'S MAPPING AND ORIENTEERING .. 24 SPOT THE DIFFERENCE............................. 33 MAPPING ADVICE FOR EASTER 2023 .......... 34 I CAN DO THIS! ..................................... 35 RACING IN SPRINT ORIENTEERING .............. 36 COURSE OF THE YEAR 2022 ...................... 39 O-SPY .................................................. 42 2022 NATIONAL RANKINGS – NON-ELITE ...... 44 OA NEWS ............................................. 46 TOP EVENTS .......................................... 47

Cover: Alex Tarr at Oceania Championships Relay 2023 near St Helens – photo by Quentin Lang.

MARCH 2023 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 7

2023 OCEANIA CHAMPIONSHIPS

Oceania Orienteering Championships 2023 HANIA LADA

Oceania Long Distance - Katherine Babington (NZ). Photo by Peter Yeates.

fter an olympic-like wait the Oceania Orienteering Championships took place in January 2023 in Tasmania, Australia. The previous Championships had been in 2019, also in Australia, organised by ACT, NSW and Victoria. Normally, the Championships are held every two years but the planned 2021 Oceania events in New Zealand were postponed until 2022 due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Subsequently they transformed into Not the Oceania Orienteering Championships when travel between Australia and New Zealand in January 2022 was banned because of the first Omicron SARS-CoV-2 Variant of Concern wave. Finally, a year later, the Oceania Championships were back!

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Tasmania welcomed participants from Australia (AUS), New Zealand (NZ), New Caledonia, Hong Kong, Japan, Great Britain (GBR), Sweden, Germany, Czech Republic, Switzerland and Ireland. Some had been enticed by the World Ranking status of the events, some were keen to be competitive in non-Elite classes, and some were just happy for summer orienteering holidays in Tasmania. The Australia–New Zealand (ANZ) Challenge was run in ten classes in the Sprint, Middle Distance and Long Distance individual competitions, and for nine classes in the Relay.

Ten athletes won all three individual races in their respective classes: Aston Key (AUS) in M21E, Lizzie Ingham (NZ) in W21E, Matthew Crane (AUS) in M40A, Bruce Arthur (AUS) in M45A, Carsten Joergensen (NZ) in M50A, Jennifer Enderby (AUS) in W55A, Jenny Bourne (AUS) in W65A, David Scott (NZ) in M75A, Alex Tarr (AUS) in M80A and Naomi Penton (AUS) in W12A. The Bells Marsh and Hunt Tin Mine maps used for the Long Distance and Middle Distance Championships, respectively, had been produced by Rob Plowright. His two sons Rui and Caio, who live in Japan, attended the Middle Distance awards ceremony, and in a moving tribute to their late dad they were given Rob’s framed maps as gifts. They also assisted with presenting awards to the top competitors.

Australia was experiencing a summer of floods, bushfires, toxic “baby spinach”, contaminated baby cucumbers and the nth peak of Covid-19 wave, so it had been hoped that disasters will spare the Oceania Championships 2023.

Fortunately, they did. Overall, the organisers and competitors could be pleased. Weather was fine, maps and courses had a high standard, and some expected and surprising results were delivered.

The International Orienteering Federation (IOF) medals and diplomas were awarded in the Sprint, the Long Distance and the Middle Distance to the three fastest citizens of Oceania in the Men and Women 16A, 18A, 20A and 21E classes, and to the top three intra-national teams from Oceania in W16A, M16A, W18A, M18A, W20A, M20A, W21A and M21A in the Relay. In addition, awards were given to the top three finishers in each class, except for W20A, M20A, W21E and M21E, in which the top six were acknowledged. Across the four events, the podium finishers came from Australia, Czech Republic, Hong Kong, New Caledonia, New Zealand, Sweden, Ireland and Great Britain. Results for the Elite and A classes are compared and reported here.

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Oceania Sprint - Grace Crane (AUS). Photo by Peter Yeates

Oceania Championships Sprint

of Toby Scott (NZ), and Ewan Shingler (AUS) took 1:26 longer than Aston.

ild weather, mostly cloudy and the maximum of 24 ˚C, welcomed competitors to the Oceania Championships Sprint at the University of Tasmania campus in Launceston on Saturday 7th of January. The number of competitors per class ranged from one (M10A, M35A and W85A) to 31 (W21E) and 32 (M21E). There were 463 starters, of whom 94% finished their courses without mispunches.

A similar gap,1:24, separated the first and the sixth placefinishers in M20A. Alvin Craig (AUS) won in 16:40, 1:03 ahead of Zefa Fa’avae (NZ). Cooper Horley (AUS) was 3 s behind Zefa, 1 s ahead of David Stocks (AUS), and 2 s faster than Sam Woolford (AUS) in fifth. Toby Lang (AUS) came sixth.

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Elite classes W20A, M20A, W21E and M21E In W21E Lizzie Ingham (NZ) won gold in 16:26 on the 3.4 km course, leading all the way. Caitlin Young (AUS) earned silver in 17:36, and Evalin Brautigam (AUS) got bronze 19 s behind Caitlin. Two seconds separated fourth-placed Kaia Joergensen (NZ) and fifth-placed Grace Crane (AUS). Emily Sorensen (AUS) was sixth, recovering from her relatively slow start after she had been 12th at the seventh control.

In M21E Aston Key (AUS) was first in 14:42, the only runner delivering the average speed of sub 4 min / km. Patrick Jaffe (AUS) came second 0:53 behind Aston, and just 4 s ahead of Brody Nankervis. Angus Haines (AUS) was fourth, 1 s ahead

W20A also delivered a great race. Nea Shingler (AUS) was the fastest in 16:42 on the 3.4 km course, 1:34 from Milla Key (AUS) who in turn was 22 s ahead of Eszter Kocsik (AUS resident). Mere 12 s separated the third and sixth, Erika Enderby (AUS) placed fourth 6 s behind Eszter, Anna Babington (NZ) was 4 s slower than Erika but 2 s faster than both Mikaela Gray (AUS) and Justine Hobson (AUS) who tied for sixth.

Junior classes In W18A, Sophie Best (AUS) led from the start and won 56 s ahead of Ingrid Shelton Agar (AUS) and 2:49 from Sophie Arthur (AUS) who had been second until the eighth control. In M18A Liam Dufty (AUS) took and retained his lead at the sixth control from Marcus Degenaar (AUS). Oliver Freeman (AUS)

2023 Oceania Championships Sprint University of Tasmania Launceston - W20A Eszter Kocsik’s route.

Isaac Madden (AUS) and Toby Lang (AUS).

Photo: Peter Yeates

Sophie Best (AUS). Photo by Peter Yeates Oceania Sprint - Mikayla Cooper (AUS) and Daniel Gray (AUS). Photo by Peter Yeates

Tide Fa’avae (NZ) and Kyla Moore (NZ). Photo by Peter Yeates

MARCH 2023 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 9

2023 OCEANIA CHAMPIONSHIPS came third 44 s behind the winner, swapping places with Marcus on the way to the 20th control. In M16A, Euan Best (AUS) won 2:35 and 3:28 ahead of Matthew Greenwood (NZ) and Eckhart Bossman (AUS), respectively. Rebecca Craig (AUS) was first in W16A, by 13 s, after the race leader, Meri Yau from Hong Kong, mispunched the 13th control. Amy Dufty (AUS) came second and Yoki Wong from Hong Kong was third, 1:01 slower than Amy.

Jenny Bourne (AUS) - W65A. Photo by Quentin Lang

In moderate-navigation classes three Australians and three New Zealanders won the podium. Anna Wright (NZ) won W14A, her compatriot Torun Joergensen was second, and Katie Clauson (AUS) placed third. In M14A Alton Freeman (AUS) finished first, Callum Degenaar (AUS) second and Tahi Harris (NZ) third.

Veteran classes Among the veteran classes, 35 and older, the closest race was in M50A, in which Carsten Joergensen (NZ) and Craig Dufty (AUS) were both on 14:35 at the 20th control. Carsten pulled away and won by 5 s from Craig, while Jonathan McComb (AUS) was third, 45 s behind the winner.

In contrast, the three most comfortable victories or the biggest winning-time margins were in W70A in which Janice Nisbet (GBR) outpaced Jan Hardy (AUS) by 6:02, in M40A Matthew Crane (AUS) was 4:48 ahead of Matthew Cohen (AUS), and in M80A Alex Tarr (AUS) won by 4:33 from Terry Cavanagh (AUS). Janice and Matthew led all the way, while Alex lost the lead early and quickly regained it.

Oceania Championships Long Distance unday was devoted to travelling to the east coast of Tasmania and attending the model event. The night before the Oceania Championships Long Distance the organisers warned participants to allow 2 hours for driving from St Helens, walking 1 km to the assembly area and 1 km to the start. Sunny and warm conditions made the drink controls highly desirable. Displeasingly, some competitors encountered snakes. Steep hills, dense shrub cover, bracken, large logs and marshes conspired to be a physically challenging terrain, with granite boulders testing runners’ navigation skills. 84% of orienteers completed their courses.

70% of M21E visited all their controls but only nine out of 33 clocked sub 2 h, and 17 achieved sub 3 h. Also nine W21E competitors completed their course in sub 2h, out of 21 starters.

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Elite classes W20A, M20A, W21E and M21E (Edited version of Orienteering Australia Facebook post) In W21E New Zealand's Lizzie Ingham repeated her victory from Saturday's Sprint Distance with a convincing 12 min margin over Grace Crane (AUS). Ingham took 84:35 to complete the 9.1 km course. Rounding out the top three was Anna Sheldon (AUS), a further 7 min behind Crane to just pip Emily Sorenson (AUS). In M21E it was a somewhat tighter race. Aston Key (AUS) also repeated his victory from the Sprint Distance to take the Long Distance title by a touch under 6 min from Brodie Nankervis (AUS) and Pat Jaffe (AUS) a further 2.5 min adrift in third. Key took 97:43 for the 13 km course. Outstanding New Zealand junior Zefa Fa'avae finished a very credible fourth.

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Aston Key (AUS) - M21E. Photo by Quentin Lang.

Ingham and Key by taking out the Oceania Regional Championship title in Long Distance now have a personal place for the 2023 World Championships in Switzerland.

In M20A it was much tighter race with just 6 min separating the top six. 2022 Australian Junior World Orienteering Championships’ representative Sam Woolford emerged victorious in a time of 91:58 for the 10.3 km course. Over in W20A British orienteer Rachel Duckworth was fastest on the course to just pip Australia's Mikaela Gray (AUS) by 39 s.

Gray is thus the Oceania Regional Champion.

The remaining podium-finishers in M20A included David Stocks (AUS) in second place, only 0:34 behind the winner, and Toby Lang (AUS) coming third. In W20A Natalie Miller (AUS) was third, 3:10 slower than Rachel Duckworth’s winning time of 82:58 on the 6.8 km course, and Justine Hobson was fourth, so earned bronze.

Junior classes Among juniors, six of the eight winners of the Sprint also won the Long Distance. They included Australians Naomi Penton (W12A), Alton Freeman (M14A), Rebecca Craig (W16A), Euan Best (M16A), Sophie Best (W18A) and Liam Dufty (M18A). In M18A the race was tight, Both Liam Dufty and Jamie Woolford made a mistake to the 12th control, with Jamie losing 5 min more than Liam and thus dropping to the second place. Rebecca Craig in W16A gained the lead at the sixth control taking 5:56 on that split, 1:47 faster than Alice Radajewski, and Chiara Mandou from New Caledonia was third. The remaining two classes, M12A and W14A, were won by the third-place finishers in the Sprint, Angus Hewitt (AUS) and Katie Clauson (AUS), respectively.

Veteran classes The only very tight race among veterans was between the two orienteers in W35A, Mace Neve (AUS) and Thorlene Egerton (AUS) with Mace finishing the 7.2 km course in 1:56:16 just 43

s ahead of Thorlene. Other relatively close races, with the time difference 2–6 min, occurred in M45A featuring Bruce Arthur (AUS) vs Angus Shedden (AUS), in W45A Tracy Marsh (AUS) vs Kirsten Fairfax (AUS), in M75A David Scott (NZ) vs James Laver (AUS), in M50A Carsten Joergensen (NZ) vs Craig Dufty (AUS), and in M65A Jeff Dunn (AUS) vs Darryl Smith (AUS).

In W75A Libby Meeking’s (AUS) lead of 2:16 at the third-last control dramatically blew up to 1:13:24 at the finish, delivering the day’s largest winning margin after Val Hodsdon dropped out of contention with a mispunch. The next two biggest winning-time gaps were in M40A with Matthew Crane coming first by 31:12, and in M80A with Alex Tarr prevailing by 29:51.

8:19 from Briohny Seaman (AUS), after gaining the lead at the eighth control. Similarly, Natasha won W50A in 1:06:22, 8:27 from Cathy McComb (AUS), after leading from the second control onwards.

A consolation (or the-most-interesting-mistake) award was given to the oldest competitor, Helen Alexander (AUS) in W85, who lost her map on the course. Sadly and expectedly, there was no perseverance prize for the seven veteran orienteers taking more than 3 h to finish. It was a tough day for many, so the rest day on Tuesday was most welcome.

Shannon Jones (AUS) and Natasha Key (AUS) took a break from W21E for one event, and won their respective classes.

Shannon was first in W40A in 1:13:27,

Jennifer Enderby (AUS) W55A. Photo by Quentin Lang

Carsten Joergensen (NZ) M50A. Photo by Quentin Lang

2023 Oceania Championships Long Distance - Bells Marsh - W21E - Lizzie Ingham’s route

Lizzie Ingham (NZ) - W21E. Photo by Peter Yeates

MARCH 2023 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 11

2023 OCEANIA CHAMPIONSHIPS

Oceania Championships Middle Distance he Middle Distance event on Wednesday was in complex tin-mining terrain. The relatively small climb offered a relief for many after the gruelling Monday. 96% of pre-entered starters completed their courses. Susanne Casanova, a former Australian WOC representative, when asked “How did you go?”, replied “I loved it”, and thus summed up many orienteers’ feelings about the day.

T

Oceania Middle Distance - Simon Uppill (AUS).

Photo by Peter Yeates

Elite classes W20A, M20A, W21E and M21E (Edited version of Orienteering Australia Facebook post) It was a threepeat for both New Zealand’s Lizzie Ingham in W21E and Australia’s Aston Key in M21E. Both orienteers are now the titleholders of all three individual formats being contested at these IOF Regional Championships. On the new Hunt Tin Mine map with two intense zones of old alluvial mining terrain, Ingham was dominant in W21E. After trailing countrywoman Kaia Joergensen by 1 s at the first control, Ingham led all the way to record a comfortable 2:07 victory from Australia’s Grace Crane in 31:39 for the 4.6 km course.

Rounding out the top three was Australia’s Aislinn Prendergast, a further 2:08 adrift of Crane.

Key’s victory in M21E was a much tighter affair, finishing the 5.3 km course in 29:04 with visiting UK orienteer Jim Bailey taking second 46 s behind Key. Bailey briefly led Key through controls 3 and 4 after Key had a small time loss on the third until Bailey lost time on the fifth leg to Key, whereupon Key led all the way to take the title. Rounding out the top three in this class was Australia’s Brodie Nankervis a further 30 s behind Bailey.

In W20 the UK’s Rachel Duckworth continued her good form to record fastest time from Australian resident Eszter Kocsik with Nea Shingler in third. Shingler being the first Oceania region citizen took out the title as Oceania Junior Champion in this class. In M20 the racing continued to be very tight with Sam Woolford just having a touch more speed than Alvin Craig from the pre-warning to take the title by 18 s, with David Stocks taking out third 47 s adrift of Woolford to make it an Australian trifecta. New Zealand’s Felix Hunt was a close fourth finishing 1:17 behind Woolford. A measure of the closeness of the class was that the top 13 were all within 7 min of each other.

Junior classes Among juniors on hard- and moderate-navigation courses all races were close for the first place. In W16A Ella Maja Lang (AUS) won by just 15 s from Alice Radajewski (AUS) and 2:03 ahead of Maggie Mackay (AUS). In W14A sisters Katie and Ella Clauson (AUS) were first and second, respectively, separated by 21 s, and Sanda Halpin (AUS) came third, 2:54 behind Katie. A tight race for gold unfolded in W18A between Australians Ingrid Shelton Agar and Gemma Burley, with Ingrid prevailing by 40 s in 48:59. Sophie Best (AUS) ended up 6:02 behind Gemma.

All three winning margins in Junior men’s categories were sub 2 min. Jamie Woolford (AUS) won M18A, taking 48:29 to complete the 5.2 km course, 1:02 ahead of Isaac Madden (AUS), and Liam Dufty (AUS) came third. In M16A James Wright (NZ) in 32:30 outpaced Australians Euan Best and Eckart Bosman, by 1:06 and 1:21, respectively. Rory Shedden (AUS) coming first in 16:51, Alton Freeman (AUS) second by 1:44 and Will Enkelaar (AUS) in third filled the M14A podium.

12 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2023

Veteran classes Who may be considered an unluckiest second-place finisher of the day? Louise Fairfax (AUS) may, thanks to coming a mere 3 s behind Valerie Baker (AUS) in W70. Lynda Rapkins (AUS) was 4:08 behind Louise. The most popular veteran classes, M55A and M60A had 27 competitors each. Mark Freeman (AUS) won M55A ahead of Geoff Lawford (AUS), with Jeff Greenwood (NZ) and Mark West (AUS) tying for third. In M60A the podium-finishers were less than 1 min apart, Tony Woolford (AUS) in 30:59, Robert Vincent (AUS) 31:09 and Warren Key (AUS) 31:41. In W55A, 37 s separated the winner Jennifer Enderby (AUS) and third-placed Karen Staudte (AUS), with Nicola Dalheim (AUS) coming second just 8 s slower than Jennifer.

Other classes in which winners were less than 1 min ahead of runners-up included W45A (Tracy Marsh first in 30:18, Kirsten Fairfax second +0:25, and Jodie Faavae third +2:27), W50A (Cathy McComb in 35:26, Martina Craig +0:16, Alison Stubbs +3:24), M45A (Bruce Arthur in 32:25, Angus Shedden +0:31, W20A ceremony: Tide Fa’avae (NZ), Zara Stewart (NZ), Eszter Kocsik (AUS resident), Rachel Duckworth (GBR), Nea Shingler (AUS), Natalie Miller (AUS).

Photo by Quentin Lang

Nick Harris +1:56) and M65A (James Lithgow in 34:14, Darryl Smith +0:57, Ted van Geldermasen +1:22). In contrast, the M80A class delivered the biggest winning margin with Alex Tarr (AUS) taking 32:46 and finishing 15:40 ahead of John Hodsdon (AUS) who in turn was 3 s faster than Terry Cavanagh (AUS).

Oceania Middle Distance W16A ceremony - Amy Dufty (AUS), Jessica Jarvis (AUS), Alice Radajewski (AUS), Ella Maja Lang (AUS), Maggie Mackay (AUS).

Photo by Quentin Lang

Oceania Middle Distance - Alton Freeman (AUS).

Photo by Quentin Lang

2023 Oceania Championships Middle Distance - Hunt Tin Mine M21E - Aston Key’s route

Oceania Middle Distance Cathy McComb (AUS).

Photo by Quentin Lang.

Oceania Middle Distance - Katie Clauson (AUS).

Photo by Quentin Lang

MARCH 2023 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 13

2023 OCEANIA CHAMPIONSHIPS

Oceania Relay start. Photo by Quentin Lang.

n Thursday at the briefing, before the mass start of 136 first-leg runners in the Relay, the course setter provoked joy by admitting that the climb was half of what it had been advertised. The event was held on the updated Argonaut map covering alluvial tin mining, granite boulders and a forest recovering from a bushfire.

O

A map-flip at the spectator control confused a few people, the last control proved tricky for many, and some competitors chose the route taking them past the finish. All of these added much excitement for spectators. The areas featuring high density of deep and steep watercourses posed a physical and navigational test. 93% of competitors completed their courses without mispunches.

Elite classes W20A, M20A, W21A and M21A (Edited version of Orienteering Australia Facebook post) The Relay is centred around the intra-regional competition between Australia and New Zealand as part of the broader ANZ Challenge. In the W21A class, the Australian team of Aislinn Prendergast, Lanita Steer and Grace Crane, held off a late charge by New Zealand’s Lizzie Ingham on the last leg to

Oceania Relay - medallists in W21A, and Euan. Photo by Quentin Lang

14 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2023

win by a comfortable margin of 2:34. Crane started the third just behind the then leading team from Tasmania after Mikayla Cooper ran the best time on leg 2. However, Crane who has ran consistently well through the Championships drew away after an early challenge by South Australia’s Emily Sorensen. Sorensen ran consistently to bring home the South Australian team into third position.

In the M21A class, the Australian team of Pat Jaffe, Aston Key and Brodie Nankervis had a comfortable victory over New Zealand with the South Australians taking out third place again to be the best state team in the 21 classes. Australian World Championships representative Angus Haines running the first leg for South Australia was first back in a tight tussle with New Zealand’s Zefa Fa'avae and Jaffe. However, it was Key on the second leg who stretched the lead over New Zealand’s Toby Scott with another fine race to hand over to Nankervis who continued to stretch the lead for the Australians. In the W20 and M20 classes the Australian teams led at every change to record comfortable victories. In the W20 class the Australian team of Nea Shingler, Mikaela Gray and Erika Enderby all recoded the fastest time on their respective legs.

Oceania Relay - medallists in M21A. Photo by Quentin Lang.

Oceania Relay - Alvin Craig (AUS).

Photo by Quentin Lang

The second place in W20 was achieved by the New Zealand team of Anna Babington, Phoebe Hunt and Katherine Babington, ahead of ACT (Natalie Miller, Ingrid Shelton Agar and Justine Hobson). In M20A the Australian team of Alvin Craig, Sam Woolford and David Stocks won 8:31 ahead of New Zealanders Felix Hunt, Riley Croxford and Ryan Moore.

NSW (Oskar Mella, Cooper Horley and Jamie Woolford) completed the podium.

Non-Elite classes Among the junior classes, M/W12A had the most entrants, i.e. four teams, two of which finished. NSW (Euan Shedden, Baxter Peel and Ryder Seaman) won, and ACT were second (Zaf Bluett-Jones, Tessa Radajewski and Banjo Bluett-Jones).

Other classes featured one or two teams. In W16A, the combined ACT–NSW team of Alice Radajewski, Amy Dufty and Maggie Mackay were comfortably first, ahead of Victoria– Hong Kong (Ella Maja Lang, Yoki Wong and Meri Yau). In M16A, the Australian and New Zealand teams were together at the first change, then New Zealand pulled well ahead, resulting in gold for Finn Van Keulen, James Wright and

Oceania Relay - Julia Gannon (AUS).

Photo by Quentin Lang

Matthew Greenwood, and silver for Australians Euan Best, Alex Woolford and Eckart Bosman.

The number of teams in the veteran classes ranged from one (W35A, W75+) to eight (W45A) for women, and from two (M50A) to ten (M65A) for men. Four orienteers, all Australians, won for the fourth time during the Oceania Championships: Aston Key, Jenny Bourne, Bruce Arthur and Alex Tarr. M55A had a dramatic race, the New Zealand team, starting with Jeff Greenwood, led at the first change from Tasmania but Jim Russell from Victoria had the fastest time on the second leg eliminating the time deficit to New Zealand, and Warren Key extended Victoria’s lead. NSW (Mark Shingler, Shane Doyle and Simon George) claimed second, and New Zealand were third.

Six of nine Mixed teams completed their courses, the Club team from Ireland CorkO was first, GBR–New Caledonia team came second, and the Convergence Club from New Caledonia placed third, 35 s ahead of New Zealand.

Australia-New Zealand Challenge 2023 (Extracts from Australia Team Manager’s Report, Ted van Geldermalsen)

Competition Classes

ANZ Challenge results

The Challenge rules specify a minimum set of classes to be contested and a longer list of classes that may be contested.

The visiting nation advises the host nation which of the optional additional classes it wants included and then both countries select teams in all the agreed classes.

In the individual competitions, for each class, the times of the two highest placed team members are added together and the nation with the lowest combined time is the winner.

Due to high travel costs, fewer New Zealanders than usual chose to attend these Oceania Championships. Orienteering New Zealand (ONZ) proposed to OA that the 2023 Challenge be contested in a reduced number of classes that did not include some of the minimum “mandatory” classes, and the Board of OA accepted this. The classes for Sprint, Middle, Long and Relay, i.e. all races, were W20, W21E, W45, M16, M20, M21E, M50, M55, M65. Sprint, Middle and Long only, i.e. no Relay, were W55, W65, M60. Minimum “mandatory” classes not contested in 2023 were W16, W40, W50, W60, M40.

In most classes Australians won all four races (Sprint, Long, Middle and Relay). In M55 Australia won three of the races, and in W21E and M16 Australia won two of the races.

Australia won nine classes to New Zealand’s one in each of the three individual competitions for a total score of 27 – 3. In the relay competition Australian won 7 – 2. The combined result across all individual and relay races was Australia 34 classes versus New Zealand 5 classes.

Although New Zealand had proposed 12 classes for the individual competition it was only able to field teams in 10 classes. The New Zealand manager requested, and the Australian manager agreed, not to include the results of the uncontested classes (M60 and W65) in the points totals. In the relay competition all of the nine proposed classes were contested.

MARCH 2023 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 15

2023 OCEANIA CHAMPIONSHIPS

2023 ANZ Challenge – Long AUSTRALIA Euan Best Alex Woolford

Time 61:07 89:31

M20

David Stocks Sam Woolford

92:32 91:58

184:30

W20

Erika Enderby Mikaela Gray

88:13 83:37

171:50

1

Anna Babington Katherine Babington

89:55 95:43

185:38

Aston Key Patrick Jaffe

97:43 106:00

203:43

1

Zefa Fa'avae Toby Scott

112:44 113:38

226:22

Grace Crane Caitlin Young

97:17 108:02

205:19

1

Lizzie Ingham Kaia Joergensen

84:35 mp

Kirsten Fairfax Rachel West

86:01 91:20

177:21

1

Jenni Adams Jodie Faavae

88:26 96:11

184:37

M50

Stephen Craig Craig Dufty

61:30 58:40

1

Carsten Joergensen Tim Wright

53:19 67:50

121:09

M55

Geoff Lawford Mark Freeman

78:08 80:00

1

Alan Moore Jeff Greenwood

104:30 79:35

184:05

W55

Nicola Dalheim Jennifer Enderby

80:40 62:33

1

Monique Dean Julia Moore

164:55 178:35

343:30

M65

Jeff Dunn James Lithgow

60:58 86:01

1

Malcolm Ingham Pat van Berkel

68:49 174:48

243:37

M16

M21 W21 W45

Sum

Points NEW ZEALAND

Matthew Greenwood James Wright

150:38 1

120:10 158:08 143:13 146:59

Total points

Felix Hunt Ryan Moore

Time 70:15 77:37

Sum

Points

147:52

1

mp mp

9

Nathan Fa’avae (NZ) - M50A. Photo by Quentin Lang

1

2023 ANZ Challenge – Middle AUSTRALIA Euan Best Eckart Bosman

Time 33.36 33.51

Alvin Craig Sam Woolford

33.39 33.21

Mikaela Gray Nea Shingler

34.29 33.12

M21

Brodie Nankervis Aston Key

30.20 29.04

W21

Grace Crane Caitlin Young

33.39 37.43

W45

Tracy Marsh Kirsten Fairfax

30.18 30.43

M50

Stephen Craig Craig Dufty

29.49 30.20

M55

Geoff Lawford Mark Freeman

36.12 33.56

Nicola Dalheim Jennifer Enderby

31.33 31.25

Jeff Dunn James Lithgow

39.39 34.14

M16 M20 W20

W55 M65

Total points Australia’s team manager Ted van Geldermalsen with the ANZ trophy. Photo by Quentin Lang

Oceania Middle Distance M21E ceremony - Jim Bailey (GBR), Brodie Nankervis (AUS), Aston Key (AUS), Toby Scott (NZ), Zefa Fa’avae (NZ).

Photo by Quentin Lang 16 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2023

Euan Best (AUS) - M16A. Photo by Quentin Lang

Sum

1

Matthew Greenwood James Wright

Time 39.29 33.30

67.00

1

Felix Hunt Ryan Moore

34.38 39.34

74.12

67.41

1

Katherine Babington Zara Stewart

39.47 35.47

75.34

1

Zefa Fa'avae Toby Scott

33.27 31.51

65.18

71.22

Lizzie Ingham Kaia Joergensen

31.32 37.33

69.05

61.01

1

Jenni Adams Jodie Faavae

34.55 32.45

67.40

1

Carsten Joergensen Tim Wright

28.32 32.16

60.48

70.08

1

Andrew de L’Isle Jeff Greenwood

51.18 37.59

89.17

62.58

1

Monique Dean Julia Moore

69.52 84.30

154.22

1

Malcolm Ingham Pat van Berkel

44.28 46.58

91.26

67.27

59.24

60.09

73.53

Points NEW ZEALAND

9

Sum

Points

72.59

1

1

2023 ANZ Challenge – Sprint AUSTRALIA Euan Best Eckart Bosman

Time 15:29 18:57

1

Matthew Greenwood James Wright

Time 18:04 19:04

M20

Alvin Craig David Stocks

16:40 17:47

1

Riley Croxford Zefa Fa'avae

18:15 17:43

W20

Milla Key Nea Shingler

18:16 16:42

35:58

34:58

1

Anna Babington Katherine Babington

18:48 19:06

37:54

Patrick Jaffe Aston Key

15:35 14:42

30:17

1

Jonty Oram Toby Scott

19:12 16:01

35:13

Grace Crane Caitlin Young

18:01 17:36

35:37

Lizzie Ingham Kaia Joergensen

16:26 17:59

34:25

W45

Rachel West Kirsten Fairfax

18:09 17:59

36:08

1

Jenni Adams Jodie Faavae

20:18 19:40

39:58

M50

Matthew Stocks Craig Dufty

16:41 15:54

1

Nathan Fa'avae Carsten Joergensen

17:45 15:49

33:34

M55

Mark Freeman Geoff Lawford

20:15 20:14

1

Jeff Greenwood Alan Moore

20:45 22:44

43:29

W55

Nicola Dalheim Jennifer Enderby

20:48 17:12

1

Monique Dean Julia Moore

24:03 28:27

52:30

M65

Jeff Dunn Noel Schoknecht

16:27 21:44

1

Malcolm Ingham Pat van Berkel

20:11 24:43

44:54

M16

M21 W21

Nea Shingler (AUS) - W20A. Photo by Quentin Lang

Sum 34:26 34:27

32:35 40:29 38:00 38:11

9

2023 ANZ Challenge – Relay M16

M20

W20

M21

W21

W45

M50

M55

M65

Time

Points

Matthew Greenwood Finn Van Keulen James Wright

2h 2m 15s

1

1

Riley Croxford Felix Hunt Ryan Moore

1h 59m 50s

1h 49m 38s

1

Anna Babington Katherine Babington Phoebe Hunt

2h 7m 5s

Patrick Jaffe Aston Key Brodie Nankervis

1h 54m 26s

1

Zefa Fa'avae Jonty Oram Toby Scott

2h 7m 42s

Aislinn Prendergast Lanita Steer Grace Crane

2h 14m 16s

1

Lizzie Ingham Kaia Joergensen Zara Stewart

2h 16m 50s

Cathy McComb Meredith Gray Clare Hawthorne

2h 18m 4s

1

Jenni Adams Jodie Faavae Ocean Mercier

2h 47m 36s

Steven Craig Craig Dufty Matthew Stocks

1h 42m 51s

1

Nathan Fa'avae Carsten Joergensen Tim Wright

1h 56m 26s

Mark Freeman Steve Cooper Geoff Lawford

dnf

Jeff Greenwood Alan Moore Steve Oram

2h 49m 26s

James Lithgow Jeff Dunn Rob Vincent

1h 54m 48s

AUSTRALIA

Time

Euan Best Alex Woolford Eckart Bosman

2h 43m 2s

Alvin Craig David Stocks Sam Woolford

1h 50m 19s

Erika Enderby Mikaela Gray Nea Shingler

Total points

Points NEW ZEALAND

1

Points NEW ZEALAND

Sum

Points

37:08

1

1

Nicola Dalheim (AUS) - W55A. Photo by Quentin Lang.

1

Ted van Geldermalsen David Scott 2h 40m 33s Pat van Berkel

7

2 Oceania Middle Distance - W21E ceremony - Kaia Joergensen (NZ), Natasha Key (AUS), Bridget Uppill (AUS), Grace Crane (AUS), Lizzie Ingham (NZ), Aislinn Prendergast (AUS). Photo by Quentin Lang

Group chat at Oceania Middle Distance - Lizzie Ingham (NZ), Aislinn Prendergast (AUS), Kaia Joergensen (NZ). Photo by Peter Yeates MARCH 2023 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 17

18 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2023

2021 Athlete of the Year, Aston Key

MARCH 2023 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 19

XMAS 5 DAYS

XMAS 5 Days MICHAEL HUBBERT

nother highly successful Xmas 5 Days in 2022 with close to 250 competitors on most days. The event was based in the Central Tablelands of NSW in the Lithgow area. Great orienteering maps for 5 days of orienteering and the area offered some spectacular places to visit for après-O.

A

Locations were just a short distance from Lithgow.

Day 1 - “Falnash”; Day 2 - “Mt Piper”; Day 3 - “Baal Bone Junction”; Day 4 - “Gardens of Stone”; Day 5 - “Blue Mountains Grammar”.

An overall competition was run during the 5 Days based on a competitor’s best 4 out of 5 results. Cumulative points were awarded each day, based on a competitor’s placing in that class; (the use of placings rather than relative times is fairer across the range of event formats). Prizes were awarded to daily winners for Days 1 to 4. However, if you had already won a stage you were not able to win a second prize (except for the Overall Class prize, Day 5).

Performances were topsy turvy across the week with some having good and consistent runs, and some not. Stand-out performances were Jenny Bourne in Women D, Tate Needham in Men C, Alton Freeman in Men F, and Maxim Karavaev in M/W Novice who were dominant on their courses with each scoring the maximum possible 400 points. And just one point down on 399 was Andrew Hobson in Men D. Baxter Peel in Men G was also close with 395 points.

But the honours on some courses were closely fought over.

In Women A, Emily Sorensen won two events but didn’t compete in enough events to feature in the overall results, leaving Erika Enderby (381 points) to have a ding-dong battle with Nea Shingler (378) and eventually triumph by just 3 points. In Women B, Justine Hobson (391) found shaking off Jenny Enderby (385) was a difficult task with both winning two events, and in Women E, Elin Schulz (362) only just held off Jessica Dun (360) from NZ, while Linda Sesta (380 points) won Women C and Layla Dent comfortably won Women F with 386 points.

WOMEN A – Nea Shingler made mistakes but her high speed gave her 2nd place.

Nea Shingler

20 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2023

2022 Xmas 5 Days winners.

Similar ups-and-downs were seen amongst the men. In Men A, Martin Dent (379) finished ahead of Ewan Shingler (369) but both were well defeated during the week by Angus Haines and Alastair George. George may have won overall if he hadn’t missed an event and mispunched another.

Layla Dent (ACT).

Counting mispunches – through the week there was a total of 92 mispunches reported in the Results.

The 2023 Xmas 5 Days will be back on the NSW Central Coast.

Owen Radajewski comfortably won Men B with 379 points from Greg Barbour, and Tony Radford was also a comfortable winner in Men E.

Blue Mountains Grammar School MEN C – Dylan Bryant was fast through most of the course finishing a close 2nd to Elye Dent.

Elye Dent.

MARCH 2023 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 21

XMAS 5 DAYS

MEN A – Alastair George struck trouble late in the course but still won narrowly.

1. Alastair George 43:36

Martin Dent (ACT).

Ewan Shingler (NSW).

Erika Enderby (NSW).

22 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2023

Owen Radajewski (ACT).

Jenny Bourne.

Justine Hobson (ACT).

Jenny Enderby (NSW).

WOMEN B – Tracy Marsh showed her navigation experience to take the win.

MARCH 2023 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 23

ALEX TARR'S MAPPING AND ORIENTEERING

Alex Tarr has mapped 1214 km2

Accomplishments DAVID HOGG

A

lex Tarr’s career in orienteering and related bush navigation competitions goes back further than that of any other current Australian orienteer. He was in the winning team in the Melbourne University Mountaineering Club 24-Hour Walk (the forerunner of rogaining) in 1960, 1961 and 1962. He became involved in orienteering in 1970, and was a member of the first Australian team to participate in an international orienteering competition (the inaugural Australia – New Zealand Challenge) in November 1971.

While still competing at the top of his age class (M80), Alex is known particularly for his defining role in the development of orienteering mapping in Australia. As one of Australia’s first orienteering fieldworkers and cartographers, he has played a major role in setting the benchmark for Australian orienteering mapping, particularly during the leadup to the 1985 World Championships in Bendigo, when he was the National Controller for the events. In his later years, he turned his skills and commitment to mapping on a professional basis, producing many maps for national events throughout Australia. Based largely on his contribution to mapping and other technical aspects of orienteering, in 2016 he became one of the inaugural inductees into the Orienteering Australia Hall of Fame. The following are fragments of the citation for Alex.

“Alex Tarr was Yarra Valley Orienteering Club’s founding president from 1972 to 1975. (…) As a competitor, he experienced early success and was selected in the Australian team to challenge New Zealand in 1971 and 1972, as well as on many subsequent occasions, and in the World Championships team in 1974 and 1976. He has been a consistent high performer at the Australian Championships winning M21A twice in 1975 and 1976 and was second in 1977. (…)

Alex’s commitment to the production of a high standard of orienteering maps has been his greatest contribution to Australian orienteering. When planning began for the World Orienteering Championships in 1985 (WOC85), Alex took the role of coordinating all of the forest-based activities (…). Working with Steve Key, who produced the WOC maps and other Victorian maps on professional basis, as well as with volunteer mappers, Alex developed maps of a consistent high standard. This brought Australian map quality and expectations to a new level. He continues to be one of Australia’s foremost orienteering mappers.

24 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2023

As a Level 3 Controller and International Orienteering Federation (IOF) Event Advisor, he has contributed to the improvement of the standard of major events in Australia by activities including the conduct of Level 3 Controller workshops.

Alex Tarr’s Frazel Rock (WA) map - a fragment - a good example of granite.

Alex was made a life member of Orienteering Victoria in 1984. In 1986, with Tom Andrews, he was the second recipient of the OFA Silva Award for services to Orienteering and was awarded the Australian Sports Medal in 2000.”

Alex Tarr’s Rowdy Flat (VIC) map - a fragment hyper technical gold mining, has demonstrated that current IOF mapping specifications are inadequate.

Comments about Alex Tarr’s mapping

HANIA LADA

lex retired from his job as a librarian in 1995, and became a professional orienteering mapper. In 2017, in “Navigating 45 years. A history of the Yarra Valley Orienteering Club 1972–2017”, Peter Black described Alex’s proudest mapping achievements.

A

Kimbolton 1977 – in the early days of Australian orienteering, there was much debate between Australian states as to how to map rocky ground - a distinctive feature of our terrains. (…) Kimbolton was drafted using hand drawn dots to represent rocky ground. The map was used for the Australian Relay Championships in 1977 and met the general approval of the competitors.

At this time, the International Orienteering Federation was formalising international mapping specifications. The Kimbolton map set the standard for the mapping of rocky ground to this day.

Castlemaine 1981 – a number of maps had been earlier made of gold mining areas which failed to show enough detail within the complex mining terrain and associated erosion gullies. Alex instigated a VOA project where a segment of the original Sailors Falls map was re-mapped to show the mining detail. This demonstrated that the detail could be mapped at the 1:15000 scale. Alex then started on the large (16 km2) Castlemaine map. This took more than 300 hours in the field.(…) On the basis of this map, the IOF decided that gold mining was suitable to be part of the World Orienteering Championships in 1985 in Australia.

In December 2022, when hearing about The Australian Orienteer’s plans to acknowledge Alex’s retirement from major mapping and to pay tribute, various insightful suggestions were offered by people who know Alex well. Peter Black mentioned Alex’s great patience in mentoring others. Peter also emphasised that “for safety purposes Alex seldom went out into the bush alone to do his fieldwork and so Janet accompanied him in most of these outings. Given the amount of hours he spent in the bush I think Janet’s involvement is totally praiseworthy and should be recorded with acclaim.” Peter is correct, Janet Tarr’s facilitation of Alex’s mapping trips, and so spending approximately 17000 h on fieldwork and 8000 h drawing, should be greatly appreciated by the orienteering community. Thank you Janet!

What are Alex’s plans? Does he have any advice for new mappers? What has he observed about the development of orienteering and mapping in Australia? These questions are answered in the following interview conducted by Blair Trewin in January at the Oceania Championships 2023.

MARCH 2023 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 25

ALEX TARR'S MAPPING AND ORIENTEERING

Interview Blair Trewin talking with Alex Tarr

You’ve been around through pretty much the entire history of orienteering in Australia. How did you first get into orienteering?

I saw the advertisements for the first event ever, the Tom Andrews’ one, and I couldn’t get to that. But then I looked at the results and they’re all people from the MUMC 24-hour walks. So I thought, “oh well, it sounds like the sort of thing I can do”. So probably about six months1 after that, I went down to an event at Studley Park at Fairfield. I went in and won and thought “I could do this”. And I’ve been doing it ever since.

Because you’d been involved in the MUMC 24-hour walks, hadn’t you?

Yes, I’d done a number of them before, and Janet had too.

The early days we were orienteering it was a bit like the 24hour walks. If you only made half an hour mistake, you’ve probably got a place.

I’ve seen the map from the 1972 Nationals at Steiglitz. Some interesting things there2.

Well, that’s right. They wanted maps that showed the terrain.

The only maps that really showed the terrain were of mountainous areas. So the back of Warburton is where you had 50-foot contours. Mountains of them.

Yes. You can hide an awful lot in 50-foot contours.

That’s right. And between the controls, there might be new tracks and all sorts of strange things. But that was alright.

Everyone was all very forgiving. So, as the sport improved technically, probably my fitness improved at the same rate.

You could keep on being competitive. Whereas now, if you’re coming straight into the sport, you’re two, three years behind immediately.

You were, I think, the inaugural President of Yarra Valley. Is that right?

Yes. So those very early events were set up through Tom Andrews, and then Victoria started to develop a bit of a club system. We went to the club system because, basically, you need a nucleus of people to run events. And you can only lean on your friends and relations so much.

Now, in 1974, you went to your first World Championships in Denmark.

That’s right, yes.

And that must have been quite a culture shock given what Australian orienteering was like at that moment. Did we have any coloured maps in Australia at that stage?

Yes, we were onto coloured maps at that stage. But technical maps, no. We did our training sessions in sandhill country in the south of Sweden at a map made by Peo Bengtsson. It was terrific open terrain, very fast with sandhills. And that sort of got us into the mood of it.

Was that the first time you had done any orienteering outside Australia?

26 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2023

The first photo of Alex Tarr orienteering, which appeared in the program for the 1971 Australia–New Zealand Challenge.

No, there was an early New Zealand trip. We ran the early Australia-New Zealand Challenges on black and white maps.

And that was the first proper Australian team. We’d had Rod Dominish in [WOC] 1972, but this was the first time we’d sent a team [to WOC].

That’s right. And we were not really competitive, although in the relay we beat a few countries that we were not expected to.

I think you were ninth in the relay?

Yes, it would be something like that. We were quite pleased with the relay.

The next couple of years were the peak of your career.

Making the top 30 in [WOC] 1976 and winning a couple of Australian Championships.

You’ve got to do these things while you can. I trained in those days and was pretty serious. We used to run steeplechase and 5000 metres in summer to keep fit. Tim Dent and I used to do that. And occasional race walking still.

So race walking was your thing.

Yes, that was my sport originally. I came into orienteering in good stead because there’s a lot of people who run faster than me, but not many walk faster. Particularly in country like this [the Oceania Long Distance] you’re going up hills. Yes, I walk fast.

That [1976] was your last WOC. Did you make a conscious decision to retire or did you just stop training seriously?

I’d basically had an ultimatum, and that was fair enough. In those days, there wasn’t a tradition of people running elite into their forties. I was 37 or something like that. And for the 1978 WOC, I was selected and I said “I won’t go”, and Geoff Lawford went instead. I think that was a better move in terms of orienteering for Australia.

So, moving on to mapping. How did you first start getting into mapping?

Well, somebody had to do it, that’s the basic thing. You mentioned the Steiglitz map before. I ran [organised] an event the previous day [on the Mullers Creek map] as a warm-up, and that was the first one that I actually plotted tracks for. I had the ability to pace count and take bearings and put a plotted track in. But then, when Roland Offrell came across, he took all the elite runners and said, “OK, you’re responsible for the sport.” And there probably was never a member of the Australian WOC teams, through to about 1980 at least, who hadn’t made maps. After that mapping got bigger, but there were still clubs who made maps. But the fact is that everybody made maps. Because how do you get the sport going? The tradition then was that you course set once or twice a year, you controlled once or twice a year, and you made a map every year and a half.

They were probably simpler areas.

You mentioned that [Mullers Creek] was your first map.

Yes, those black and white ones. But the first real ones were the Reedy Creek and Strath Creek maps. Reedy Creek was supported by the gift from SOFT. And we all worked on it, and then nobody wanted to draw it, so I said that, look, I’ll draw it for $100.

Alex Tarr’s first map.

$100 was a bit of money in those days.

That’s right. But I’ve never enjoyed drawing maps. By the 90s I had finger shake and all that sort of stuff. The old pen and ink, if we were still doing that, I would have given up 25 years ago.

So the move to new technology has been a real boon to you in that sense.

That’s right, yes. And look, it was a bit of a shame for people like Steve Key and Mike Morffew. The Golden Fleece maps were a work of art. It was just beautifully drawn. And of course, we can all do that now.

In your early days, maps were fairly rough and ready. Were any international standards in existence then?

There was a set of standards. It was about 1972 or 19733 when it came out. Pretty well, we conformed to that, or tried to. The big argument was not so much in Victoria, but in New South Wales and the ACT, they wanted to have dashes and eyebrows for various flat rock and rock features. In mapping, I haven’t done very many original things, but I set the standard for rocky ground mapping.

That was Kimbolton?

That was the Kimbolton one. We held an Australian Relays on it. In those days, the Australian Relays attracted 400 people, and virtually everyone ran the longest class. And the consensus after that was, OK, this is the way to do it. So you talk about landmark maps, and there’s only two that I’ve ever made. Kimbolton for the rocky ground dots. Castlemaine Goldfields obviously for goldmining, and Rowdy Flat.

So moving on to Castlemaine Goldfields, before that, had there been any attempts to map goldmining terrain in Victoria?

Kimbolton Forest (VIC) - Alex’s map that set the standard for rocky ground.

MARCH 2023 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 27

28 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2023

The original Slaty Creek map was a Victorian Championship.

The original Sailors Diggings map was a Victorian Championship. Both of them didn’t show any goldmining really. In fact, after the Sailors Diggings Victorian Championship, we had a little competition. OK, we should be able to map this gold mining in detail. And I think it was about 15 different people from Victoria went out and had a little practice on a particular area, and we all went back and presented it. Keith Wade judged it, and I think it was Steve Key and I who had the most successful approach, we each mapped in detail with a different emphasis on contours and embankments.

It [Castlemaine Goldfields] was certainly pretty widely recognised as a landmark map. I remember running on it maybe in 1984, 1985, so would have just been starting to run hard navigation courses, and it was definitely an eye-opener for someone who had grown up in the ACT. That’s right. And, you know, it’s still a good area, and it was then mapped strictly for 15,000. Our first maps, of course, Reedy Creek, Strath Creek, all those ones were 20,000.

Not too many years after Castlemaine Goldfields, we were hosting the World Championships. You were very heavily involved in the World Championships.

There was a story behind that. There was meant to be an Australia-New Zealand match, I think this is probably in the late 70s. There was an airline strike and we couldn’t get there.

So we spent the week just investigating areas around Victoria, to see what’s capable of hosting a World Championships. And that’s where Kooyoora basically came from. And a whole lot of other areas were discarded.

Obviously WOC is a big job, but you probably didn’t realise quite what you were letting yourself in for.

Well, it’s a much smaller job then than it is now. Because the standards and the demands are just immense now. And that’s why Australia is now reluctant to go into it.

I scoped it a couple of times when I was President of OA and our conclusion was, to make it happen – this was before the split into forest and urban – we’d probably need somewhere between half a million and a million in external money.

Technical capabilities we felt we had under control, but we couldn’t find a way to make the numbers work financially.

That’s right. And the argument often was it will build the sport in Australia.

Alex Tarr with his reliable mapping equipment. Photo by Quentin Lang

Coningham (TAS) map, Alex Tarr’s first map in Tasmania.

Toby Scott’s route at Hobart Shorts in January 2023

Didn’t really happen.

It didn’t happen. And all that really happened is that it wore people out. So it was basically counter to what you wanted.

Which is a shame.

We touched on before how the change to computer mapping technology you found very helpful on the drafting side. What other perspectives do you have on how mapping has changed since the 1985 period?

I think it’s a matter of refinement and refinement and refinement rather than new development. I mean, basically the maps improved once you’ve got the computer drawing and you’ve got rid of Letraset. Which changes the picture of the map altogether.

It meant you could shape things much better.

And we were all pretty low tech. We didn’t even know how to get new Letraset. So the triangles used for boulder fields were aligned, and that just didn’t give the right picture at all.

But the big thing that happened after the World Championships was that for the five years afterwards at Easter, we had a three-day mapping workshop. And that really made a difference in each state, working to the same standards. And there were new mappers who came into the field, like Eric Andrews, who cut his teeth on that, and then went on to map all over Australia. And Eric mapping all over Australia probably did more to set a standard, particularly for granite mapping. So that people had examples to work with.

And it really did the sport a tremendous amount of good.

I think that’s a real change probably from the early 90s onwards, that increased professionalisation.

Yes, the professionalisation. But there was never a chance in Australia of people making a living out of it. Eric worked on his army pension, I worked on superannuation. Neither of us needed to map, it was just a very nice lifestyle.

I certainly appreciated it. One of my relatively early major carnivals as a setter was Easter 1994, which was on Eric’s Honeysuckle Creek map. Growing up as a course setter in the 1980s your usual rule of thumb was that you’d have to discard one-third of your control sites when you got into the field. And it was quite a shock to the system to see that we didn’t need to do that any more.

MARCH 2023 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 29

ALEX TARR'S MAPPING AND ORIENTEERING

Greg Hawthorne was just telling me one of their Hobart Shorts is at Coningham. Now, Coningham is the first map I ever made for Tasmania. And Greg said that every feature you mapped is in exactly the right place according to LiDAR. So we, Eric and myself, we worked to a standard which was probably not appreciated very much at all except, you know, by the sense that the controls are in the right place.

thing is that in mapping, you don’t get your feedback until you have put in your 100, 150 hours of work. And that can be pretty soul-destroying. So if you are wanting to just start to map, work with somebody who’s more experienced, and just get out there and make prints of your map and run on it. You can’t tell from a computer screen how good a map is, you’ve got to have a piece of paper in the bush.

That’s always the number one fundamental. The event where we worked most closely together was the 2002 World Masters. We talked a bit earlier about the new possibilities that computer mapping gave to shape symbols. I think one of the things that struck me about the comparison between the 2002 and 1985 Kooyoora maps was that it gave you so much more possibility to represent the terrain.

You’ve mentioned some of your landmark maps, but do you have any particular favourite types of terrain to map in?

That’s right. Of course, most of these symbols that show the shapes are now illegal under the new ISOM, and the ISOMs since the year 2000 have made representation of Australian terrain much more problematic. Up until the year 2000, we had a 25% leeway in size of symbols, and that means you could map goldmining with conformity. And since the year 2000, there’s hardly been a single map that meets the standard in goldmining or tin mining.

What that reflects is that if orienteering is going to be a genuine world sport, the world’s voice needs to be heard on the [IOF] Map Commission.

Yes, it does. But it also needs to be a very technical person with a strong mapping background.

I think a lot of, particularly Scandinavian, mapping culture is that if you have too much, you just leave stuff off until you can fit it on. A lot of places in the world that doesn’t really work, somewhere like the World Cup Middle Distance in China, where we wanted to map at 7,500 and they wouldn’t let us. And you can’t leave off half the tracks.

That’s right. There’s just no room. I think that the specs can be made to work for this country. Not that they did today necessarily, but the map was fine. It was usable. It didn’t quite conform to the IOF specs. Too bad.

So now, do you have any particular advice for new mappers looking to get into the field?

I think they’ve got to accept that the first three maps are not going to be as good as they would like. The most difficult

Depends how fit I am. Easy gully spur, you’re walking up to 35 kilometres a day, and that’s exhausting, you’re just walking the whole time. Whereas a technical area, I might only do 15 kilometres a day because I’m standing around a lot. You have to be careful of picking an area that you’re physically and technically capable of doing. I think they’re always a challenge. What you really want is a good base map.

You’ve obviously continued to be a very active competitor.

Do you have any particular favourite terrain to compete in?

Something technical. Something middle distance is often quite nice. You’ve still got to find the controls and there’s still fun in finding the controls. You go through the bush and do everything right and expect that you go over this next little spur and I’ll be certain then that it works. So that keeps you coming back and back. I’m the only one now who’s been to every Australian Easter and every Australian Long Distance Championship. And I suspect I’ll keep doing it for a few more years. As long as it’s possible. It’s just too nice a sport.

So now that you’ll no longer be mapping actively, do you have any particular plans for “retirement”?

The solving of the problems in mapping is intellectually interesting. Smaller jobs I’ll keep doing, but I can’t see myself doing a big one, say, a full Australian Championship.

Do you have any more big walks on the horizon? You had the big 80th birthday walk with your extended family.

Well, we decided we had better keep on walking while we can. So we’re doing the Three Capes walk after this, and then just before Easter we are doing the lighthouse to lighthouse walk south of Eden.

Thanks a lot for your time.

Alex Tarr’s Transit Flat (TAS) map - a fragment - wilderness granite used for World Cup. 30 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2023

Clarifications

by David Hogg

Alex’s encore Regrets – the number of Australian Championships and Easter events that I could not compete in as I had made the map.

(History Correspondent for The Australian Orienteer)

Every mapper must have a very supportive partner if they are to continue to map. Australian orienteering owes a big debt to my wife Janet.

1. The Studley Park event referred to took place about 13 months after Tom’s first event.

2. The ‘interesting things’ on that Photo by Sandra Hogg map were that it contained two different contour intervals (30foot and 50-foot) in different parts of the map due to two different base maps being used to prepare it and that the watercourses were not drawn, making it rather difficult to work out what was up and what was down in the repetitive spur-gully terrain. The latter issue was addressed by competitors drawing the gully lines in blue on their maps before the event started (maps were handed out in advance). Many other early Victorian black-and-white Omaps were based on 1:50,000 topographical maps with 50foot contours and not much other detail.

Janet Tarr

3. IOF drawing specifications were published in 1975, the same year that OFA published its own. There had been previous IOF specifications in 1969.

Boundary Creek.

December Spot the Difference Solution With the Sprint season upon us it was time in December to give you a Championship Sprint map containing 25 changes. Some of the changes were easy to find and some were not.

DID YOU FIND ALL 25 ???

MARCH 2023 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 31

pretex NEW SHIPMENT ARRIVING FEB, GET YOUR ORDER IN EARLY FOR FREE DELIVERY AT EASTER https://goo.gl/t81zFf

Advertise your event Jim Russell

A colour 6 x 9 cm event ad for just $50 Send artwork to The Editor: magazine@orienteering.asn.au

Ph. 0411 125 178

jymbois@gmail.com

32 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2023

Spot the Difference

MAP 1

With Easter fast approaching it’s time to brush up on your granite terrain map reading.

Here are two almost identical map sections with just 25 differences. The original map was 1:15,000 but we have enlarged these map sections to 1:10,000 for easier reading.

CAN YOU FIND ALL 25 ???

MAP 2

MARCH 2023 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 33

EASTER 2023

Mapping advice for Easter 2023 HUGH MOORE (RED ROOS – ACT)

apping is not just a science. A good map should show the competitor what they expect to see and help them find their way through and to the features they are looking for. This will feed into the imagination of the competitor, so there is an element of art required to produce a map that competitors will find easy to read.

M

Eric Andrews was a master of this art and has produced some of Australia’s best bush maps, as has Alex Tarr. But their approach to showing the relative sizes of rock detail cannot be used under the IOF’s new ISOM mapping rules which mandate and control sizes and shapes to be used for rock mapping.

The Highlands map that I have been preparing for Easter 2023 is in absolutely top-quality granite terrain with many areas of large dense rock features. The challenge is how to produce a map that must use the ISOM rules that now restrict how rock features can be drawn. Mapping rock requires interpretation which can vary between mappers. All can produce maps that show rock features in their correct positions but each can use the available symbols in different ways.

Highlands: Mapper’s Notes

this interpretation will be consistent across the whole map.

For Highlands I have tried to be consistent in how I use the limited number of rock symbols. Because there are now only a few symbols available these need to be used for a variety of rock situations. The boulder field symbol is the most used symbol used on the map. As they move through the map competitors will become familiar with the situations where this symbol is used.

I have prepared the following Mapping Notes to help competitors understand the way the ISOM rules have affected the Highlands map.

At a mapping workshop I attended run

by Eric Andrews he demonstrated the key issue for rock mapping is interpretation. He showed on a screen, as I remember it, four photographs of a rock feature and asked the audience to draw the symbol they would use to show each. The result was that the symbols used were all different, even between members of the audience. Eric then explained that the photographs were all of the same rock feature but taken from different sides!

Each mapper will have their own approach to mapping. When approaching a map that is being used for the first time in a competition it is important to learn how the mapper has interpreted the terrain. For a good map 34 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2023

The Highlands map snippet is enlarged to show readers some detail that they may encounter.

Highlands has been mapped to meet ISOM requirements that constrain mapping complex rock to the use of a symbol set of three different size black dots and two triangle shapes in respect of rock detail. Minimum sizes for cliffs are mandated and required separation distances between symbols are specified. These constraints require greater generalisation so that it is difficult to map the detail in dense rock areas. As a result, many distinct individual boulders cannot be shown separately in dense rock areas.

The approach to mapping rock on the Highlands map has been to make sure that all the most significant rock features are mapped so that they stand out. This can lead to the omission of adjacent smaller sized rocks where there is insufficient space. The boulder field symbol has been used to show areas containing numbers of individual boulders. This approach has been applied as consistently as possible across the map.

For vegetation mapping at Highlands, because it often has inconsistent density, the vegetation cannot always be readily shown with distinct boundaries. The approach has been to map vegetation to show runnability through areas generally so this can be taken into account when deciding on route choice. The vegetation is also affected by seasonality and recent weather, as are the water features.

Because of the separation distance requirements and the numerous black mapped features under or near the overhead power lines, no power lines have been shown on the map. The power poles have been mapped using a black cross designating a man-made feature.

I CAN DO THIS!

HANIA LADA

Polishing Your Skills elcome to the page predominantly aiming to help beginner and moderate-navigation orienteers, and carers of children being introduced to the sport of orienteering. Everyone is different, so some activities may appeal and some may not. The “Universal Map Game for Children” is a reversal of what we usually do. Here instead of making a map, we create the terrain based on the map. The goal is to entertain and teach about map features and their use. This activity was “tested” indoors and outdoors on 28 four- and five-year old children in total. Most were just happy to move between controls, especially through the tunnel, while a couple paid closer attention to the map.

W

Quiz

1. The control description indicates that A. The eighth control is on North-Western top of 0.6m-high cliff B. The eighth control is at the foot of North-Western 0.6m-high cliff C. The eighth control is at the South-Eastern end of the 0.6m-deep ditch D. The eighth control is at the South-Western foot of 0.6m-high cliff

Link to Quiz / Survey / Post-print Corrections This is the link to a new regular feature, Quiz, Survey and Post-print Corrections on one form. Feel free to attempt some or all questions, provide data by completing the survey and check out what mistakes in the current edition have been discovered too late. https://forms.gle/TthQbqavw7FDHNEK6

Celebration of Achievements “Congratulations to Robbie for trying his first moderatenavigation course”. If such recognition appeals and contributions are received, it will continue, otherwise it would be classified as a failed experiment.

Orienteering Crossword Puzzle Use the clues to solve the puzzle. The numbers in brackets indicate that the answers require more than one word, with the number of letters in each word specified.

ACROSS 2. A name of a South Australian event at the end of October 2022 (7,1) 3. An App used for street and park events 6. A name of an orienteering club from Queensland (4,5) 7. The logo for Easter 2023 (10,4) 10. A title of a song about orienteering (3,3,2) 11. Location of 2023 Oceania Championships Sprint DOWN 1. The 2023 Australian Championships will be held there (7,9) 4. A black equilateral triangle in control descriptions 5. Brown lines on a map 8. A number of metres represented by 1 cm on a map with 1:10000 scale (3,7) 9. B in MTBO

Crossword and Quiz solutions on page 46.

MARCH 2023 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 35

SPRINT ORIENTEERING

RACING

in Sprint Orienteering ROSS BARR

Many prefer this high control number course to the earlier example, and it has perhaps become the norm in Australian Sprint O over the years. Tricky, map feature exploitative, short and democratic!

This is real sprint orienteering.

Or is it?

Recent events in Europe, including the Sprint World Championships in Denmark last June, have seen elite Sprint racing at a spectacularly competitive level, including great results from Australian athletes at both WOC and JWOC events. Several things stand out: fewer control numbers per course, long legs with several route options, arena passages, route blockages, travel legs, map flips and obvious control sites that facilitate rapid run-past punching.

I’ll look at all this in detail, but firstly a newish one. Travel legs:

T

o all orienteers looking forward to a new Sprint O event, the length, climb and number of controls for your course is always of special interest – especially the ratio of course length to control numbers. This key ratio can signal quite different course planning intentions and can either excite or puzzle the competitor.

On the one hand, a low control number ratio: Have you often reacted (on discovery that your course doesn’t have many controls) - with that ‘Oh no, too much running’ thought? Not enough ‘cunning’ seemingly being the sub text, where the plodders will just have to make do – out-run by the Flash Harry’s speed over the inevitable longer legs. Ten to twelve controls in a 2+ km course would be a good example where you might have expected 15-20.

On the other hand, a high control number ratio: The higher number of controls, the 15-20 etc, helps the comfortable idea of legging it with the fast runners to take hold.

Every control visit has a time lag, the more controls the more the lag, and the levelling of the playing field. This is especially true if there is a surfeit of dead end, in/out controls – or, in the Australian way, controls that specifically exploit a complex and nuanced map area. The fast and furious are not quite as advantaged in this constant mind-boggling feed of short leg decision making and map site discovery.

Forres East example long leg and travel legs.

36 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2023

I have been a convert to the UK’s David May Sprint O course plan thinking, where he allocated a ‘quality’ to each leg, and where no route choice equalled a zero score, and where the higher the final score, the better the course was presumed to be. The ‘zero’ leg contrasted with a ‘three’ for complex decision making, often only possible over longer leg lengths, and where building complexity allowed such planning (before I go on, I should add that David’s scoring system is agnostic when it comes to the number of controls and can apply anywhere). The ‘zero’ leg from the David May scoring system is in effect the ‘travel’ leg.

Once, the ‘no route choice’ leg was frowned upon here as having none of the cunning (proper) flavour of Sprint O, but in Europe last year it was commonly used at the major Sprint events.

Increasingly used according to race commentary, so what gives?

Looking deeper at the course planning, the travel legs contrast with the route choice legs (often long ones, fewer in number - perhaps only two or three per course), and provide for running speed, and competitive mind games (think Kyburz in the WOC Knockout Semi, holding back early). In some events there seemed more ‘no option’ legs than the other way around, with the commonly lengthy and speedy start legs, being one of these. This is often in huge contrast to our start options - round a corner and out of sight from the beginning!

Forres East example short legs.

What I’m seeing in the travel leg, and the other points noted from recent Europe experience, is the word ‘racing’.

While many in the older fields wouldn’t consider the notion, I’m sure the world’s elite think of Sprint orienteering as ‘racing’.

Perhaps the only aspect of orienteering where sheer speed can play a role in the outcome, and where the best orienteering athletes can rank alongside star track and field performers (think Denmark’s Maja Alm for one such). Racing indeed. But to be able to offer a ‘race’ in Sprint O, and follow Europe in enabling speedier outcomes, course planners need to consider the points mentioned (fewer controls, major route choice options, control sites that enable rapid run-past punching, etc). Also, an awareness that fast travel legs can be a legitimate part of a course – especially late course ones (often in public view).

These aspects have infused recent elite level offerings overseas.

How many of us have tuned in and thought that many of the control sites look puzzlingly straightforward, are on obvious open map areas (as opposed to detail ‘features’ as we have come to know), and that many of the route choices seem ‘quality 1’ stuff (left/right).

Longer European routes can often offer choices that are quite different in length. Perhaps the key to these long leg offerings working well in the plan, is that the speed encouraged by the preceding fast travel legs (if short ones) reduces the time for any planning pause. I understand that this aspect might better apply to Knock Out Sprinting, but the Euro race experience doesn’t appear to differentiate.

One aspect worth a look when comparing Australian experience to Europe is the largely campus style Sprint orienteering here (and in the UK), and the contrast to the fantastic old historic townscape offers in Europe. There, wonderful and complex street patterns (often crazy), and greater contour involvement, make for almost a different event. The JWOC hillside village and olive groves in Portugal last year come to mind, as does the Czech military fort event at Staré Splavy in July 2021 which was the venue for the WOC Sprint events.

Mid-city, mid-town, stadia, canal side, formal gardens, lido’s, castles, ruins – the list goes on. But in almost every case, we never see

anything ‘hidden’, or a control located in a confusing map area and where I note many of these ‘obvious’ control sites are spectator viewing ones, doubling the open nature of them by necessity.

Racing is the game, with the head scratch pause a rare sight.

It's fair to say that our Aussie campus maps encourage a peppering of control site opportunities, and it is often hard to resist that sneaky wall corner (inside) or the middle stair handrail. Longer legs across a more rectangular built environment offer none of the many and confusing road/path options seen in Portugal in July, hence I suspect, the common higher number of control points are a counterpoint here in Oz - and the democratic leveller mentioned earlier. But if we are saying we need more fast racing at the elite level (and shorter winning times) to better prepare for the world stage, how do we achieve this as Sprint orienteers – and not just as runners?

We’ve looked at travel legs, control numbers and open control sites.

Next up has to be another common device in Europe. Blockages.

This has apparently become a big thing overseas, where competitors will often create a map before the race to theoretically test a variety of routes, with the race day blocks becoming the surprise element (Duncan Currie created a map of this kind at 2019 JWOC in Lyseng, Denmark).

Not quite so sure how far competitors are looking in like this here in Australia, but old O maps and Google are no doubt frequently accessed. Anyway, the key to overcoming any map familiarity is to interfere with the road and pathway layout by using OOB blockages. These also work well if the built environment is too simple. Route blocks are very common in European Sprint orienteering as I mentioned (WOC Men’s Sprint in Vejle with 11, JWOC in Donelas with 8, etc, etc) and are a great way to encourage wider route choices on longer legs that are notionally simple ones otherwise. In many cases it can render a well-known map almost as a ‘new’ one, and at least go some way to not overly favouring the locals. Passage block usage adds to the cunning aspects (the thinking time) and may also overcome the tendency down under to break into this thinking time with lots of controls.

MARCH 2023 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 37

SPRINT ORIENTEERING

To finish, run-past punching and map flips: Si Air enables the run-past of course, although our SportIDENT system is perhaps not quite as fast as the slap on the large Emit pads seen at WOC. Nevertheless, when coupled with a sawhorse style control stand, control punching on the fly is part of the speed deal - as is the control site, where clear space around it is encouraged.

And I’m noting quite a lot of map flip stuff going on. A great way to bury the ability to think too far ahead, and something reasonably common in Australia for the longer courses. A very fair course planning tactic.

So, in summary, if we want to push up the racing dial in Sprint orienteering to better prepare for European competition, and to produce Sprint races that have many of the stronger runners well within the 12-15 minute winning time envelope (not just the few falling over the line at 14:50, etc), we need to embrace as much recent Sprint thinking as we can. Get into a fast-running mindset, go fly-by on control site locations, add blocks, throw in wide and long route choice legs, and contrast these with short speedy travel connections.

Above all, think of Sprint O as a race, and not a treasure hunt.

Rosscoe – 01/23

38 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2023

As a postscript I should add that I have always been a slower runner (increasingly) who really has no idea. Never an athlete, and with a terrible bent over running style that my Queensland Junior Squad granddaughter dubbed ‘the question mark’! As such, and despite some Sprint success, I’ve always been happiest in the many controls camp (but loving a ‘quality 3’ long leg) – fearing the speed of my thesis above would be my undoing - as I’m sure it would trying-on one of the WOC elite races. Nevertheless, if a focus on best practice, and matching it with the world’s best is a goal, we need to consider the course planning points that reduce the tricks and increase the speed. Our young guns will appreciate it – and maybe even my own age rivals finishing on the wrong side of a twenty plus minute flog.

Sprint O as a race. Now that’s an idea!

COURSE OF THE YEAR

Course of the Year 2022 Pomeranian Sprint Cup Stage 4 Grudziądz Citadel in Poland.

COURTESY OF WORLD OF O:

or the second time in the history of the “Orienteering Course of the Year”, a very special urban sprint course takes the honours! Back in 2013 the Monsanto evening sprint in Portugal won the “Course of the Year” title – this time the 4th stage of the Pomeranian Sprint Cup in Poland was the people’s favourite!

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Although this year’s winner was not a World Championships course, the course was definitely a true masterpiece, giving the competitors very demanding challenges and a lot of fun orienteering. And although not all old-school orienteers may be the biggest fans of this type of orienteering courses, it definitely resonates with many orienteers out there. Have you ever been running through 1-metre wide and 1.8-metre high underground dark tunnels and corridors with lots of branches going in completely crazy directions?

Long and Middle course of the year The “Long distance Course of the Year 2022” was also a high level course – the JWOC long distance in Portugal in highly technical terrain with many interesting route choices (overall 3rd). “Middle distance Course of the Year 2022” (overall 4th) was the stage 4 of O-Ringen this summer.

Pomeranian Sprint Cup 2022 Stage 4 Interview with the course setter: Rafał Podziński.

Q: I have good news for you: The 4th stage of the Pomeranian Sprint Cup is the winner in the “Course of Year 2022” – actually a clear winner. Big congratulations!

Great news! Thanks a lot!

Q: This is a very special area and race – can you tell more about the background of the race?

Grudziądz Citadel is a military area, so it was really difficult to get permission for the competition there. However, Tomasz Muller – event director of Pomeranian Sprint Cup – did a great job and after weeks of talks it was made possible. We were

not allowed to use the area of the military unit, only the part around it presented on the map. During our works in the terrain, the staff was really friendly and helpful and opened a lot of normally closed tunnels for us. If you are a visitor, you can only book a guided tour through one tunnel – the one under the finish area on the map. So we can say that the competitors got a really unique chance to explore all of them.

Q: Can you tell more about the area where this course is set? Will there be more races here?

For those interested in history I can add that Grudziądz Citadel is a system of forts from XVIII and XIX centuries, which got destroyed in 1945 and rebuilt in the three following years. As for the second part of the question, I think that this race was such a blast for the competitors that in some years we will simply have to make a sequel!

Q: What was your overall plan behind how you wanted to challenge the athletes on this course?

When I plan courses, I usually try to make them in a way that I personally – as a runner – would like to run. Firstly, I decided that a normal sprint winning time of 12-15 was not enough for such a terrain. That’s why I decided to prolong the courses up to 20-25 minutes. However, I still got ‘complaints’ just after the race from some of the people asking why their course was so short: ‘We want more’! I wanted to make the most of the multilevel structures and as well give people enough time simply inside the tunnels to make them live that unique moment. On the other hand, I was very careful regarding the youngest competitors. I didn’t want them to spend too much time in the tunnels without any ‘open air interruption’, because I thought they might get a bit too scared. All in all, setting the courses for this stage was simply outstanding and I loved every moment of it!

Q: Did you have any special worries about the courses on the race day?

Oh yes, I did. I was sure everything was buttoned up the last button, but I couldn’t be in control of two things. The 1st one – bats. In some of the tunnels there were little families of sleeping bats. However, when they got awakened, they started to fly like crazy. I was really anxious that some of the younger competitors might get too scared to punch a control at the end of the tunnel in such a situation. To be honest, MARCH 2023 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 39

COURSE OF THE YEAR

Michał Olejnik – who usually doesn’t like too strange (the socalled fun) courses, told me straight after his race that he almost felt like during a normal sprint race and he wasn’t overwhelmed but happy with the challenge. Finally, I would like to add that that day I saw something for the very first time in my life. I had never seen so many grateful, happy and smiling from ear to ear faces after any race in my life before.

This was surely the best gift I could have got for all the work involved!

Q: You were both map maker and course planner – how much time did you spend on this project overall?

Usually, when I prepare maps and courses for a competition, I do three visits into the terrain. The first one is of course about cartography works in the terrain. This one went surprisingly well and smoothly and took only about 6 hours. I had had no templates of the tunnels before, so this was quite a challenge, but fortunately the angles of the curves were quite obvious.

The second one is about checking the map and looking for good places for controls. This one took about 4 hours. I got to know that I somehow ‘got lost’ during the 1st visit and missed one of the tunnels at all! One very interesting thing is that I drew all of the tunnels by hand and all of them appeared to be twice as long on the map than in reality. That’s why I decided to count my steps in each of the tunnels and make the lengths of them appropriate. These tunnels are completely dark, so you have to use your headlamp all the time and it’s really funny how different you feel the distance when in dark compared to when in open space!

Course of the Year 2022 map - leg 7.

The third one is the last check about 1-2 weeks before the competition. It’s usually quite short, if there are any major changes to the map. Let’s say – 2 hours.

during my cartography work I also got scared once and ran away in a hurry. My 2nd worry was about the size of the tunnels – 1m wide and only about 1.8m high. I was really afraid that some people might get hurt – that’s why I recommended running in a helmet in an event bulletin and some of the tallest runners followed this advice! I was also a little bit anxious about the capacity of the tunnels. But none of these cases ever happened, phew!

Sprint cartography and course setting is mainly about computer works. Summing it up, I think I spent about 25 hours in front of the screen making the map (my biggest issue was to make the map as readable as possible) and about the same amount of time preparing the courses. I had known it was going to be a unique competition, so I triplechecked all of the line and circle cuttings, not to make any mistake. In total, if my Maths is correct, it makes around 62 hours.

Q: What is your favourite leg in the course – and why?

I chose one myself for “Route to Christmas”, but that might not have been your favourite.

My favourite leg in the nominated course is surely 6-7. I put the 7th control deliberately as much to the west as possible to make the left route choice look more tempting. However, it makes you run through the tunnel almost 75% of the whole leg, which is very adventurous for sure, but not too fast. The right is not only much faster in running speed, but also… shorter by 30 metres! However, to find it, it is compulsory for the runners to perfectly understand the area east of the 7th control and that’s what I really like in a properly set sprint race: if you are not prepared beforehand, you lose time. I think I can even call it one of my own main principles when setting a sprint course.

At the end I would also like to invite all of the readers for Pomeranian Sprint Cup 2023 which is going to take place on 26-28 May. I am also the main cartographer and course setter for this event and I can reassure you we’ll do our best to make this event a long-lived memory for the competitors. I think I can also add that we are preparing a special surprise race for the elite classes. Thanks a lot for all the votes and see you in May, then!

Q: Did you get any surprises with respect to which route choices were fastest, which routes were taken, or were the athletes made mistakes?

The one thing that surprised me a bit was the fact that people told me that it was not as incredibly difficult as they had thought before. Don’t get it wrong – it was a very positive surprise, because before the race a lot of people had been talking that it was going to be an “orienteering walk” competition, but it turned out that they were able to move quite smoothly in this terrain. Even the race winner in M21 – 40 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2023

One of the tunnel entrances.

Course of the Year 2022 map.

A headlamp is recommended

Some wildlife in the tunnels.

MARCH 2023 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 41

O-SPY

Honorary Life Membership to Terry Bluett

O-SPY NSW local champion navigates her way to World Championships (from ONSW web news)

he World Orienteering Championships (WOC) have been on Nea Shingler’s map from the moment she began orienteering.

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While juggling school commitments and a rigorous training schedule, Nea took out the 2022 Junior Women’s National Orienteering League for the second year in a row and achieved her dream of qualifying for the WOC. “There aren’t any Olympics or Commonwealth Games for Orienteering, so the World Championships is the highest level that you can get to. I never thought that I would get there so quickly,” Nea said.

Nea received a grant through the Australian Government’s Local Sporting Champions (LSC) program, which supports many young athletes to participate in championships.

“The grant helped pay for my entry fees and travel costs to get to the Championships,” Nea said.

At 17 years of age, Nea travelled to Denmark to compete in the WOC, where she became the youngest Australian to ever compete in the Championships.

“It was so cool to see the best and fittest orienteers in the world performing at the highest level.”

“I wasn't really nervous because I knew that I was there for the experience and to get a taste for the future,” Nea added.

The LSC program provides financial assistance for coaches, officials and competitors aged 12 to 18 years to participate in State, National or International championships. Successful applicants receive between $500 and $750 toward the cost of attending their championships.

Nea at WOC 42 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2023

ennelong Northside Orienteers has awarded long serving President, Terry Bluett, with an Honorary Life Membership. At a General Meeting on 11 December the club first had to amend the constitution to create the category and then members voted unanimously in favour.

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In accepting the award Terry said that he had always been active in sports and when he discovered orienteering Terry Bluett. he liked everything about it – the fitness required, strategy, the outdoor environment and especially the people and friendships. For him volunteering and taking a leadership role had always been a pleasure.

We note that he also mentored both his children, Grant and Tracy, to become elite orienteers representing Australia.

The meeting was combined with a Xmas pool party and a fun pairs event with 25 controls around Killara and nearby national park. The pairs were based on handicaps (fastest runner with slowest, etc) and at the mass start each pair of runners had to divvy up the controls based on their ability. The controls were set using the MapRun app. Finish times were all remarkably close. Thanks went to course setter, Richard Pattison, who as club statistician also calculated the handicaps.

Bennelong Northside AGM

ONSW President's Junior Award (from ONSW e-news)

rika Enderby (Newcastle Orienteers) at 15 was the youngest member of the Australian 2022 Junior World Orienteering Championships Team competing in Portugal.

Erika has competed in every Australian Championships and Easter 3-Day competition since her W10 debut in 2014 and was selected in the 2022 Australian Schools Honour Team in her first year as a senior girl. Erika helps juniors of her club on the novice course, was vetter for 2022 Newcastle’s Orienteer of the Year event and helps at events.

The President’s Junior Award is presented to a young orienteer (age 20 or less) for outstanding service to the sport beyond competition.

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Erika Enderby.

Erika in the EYOC Sprint.

Spot the Difference Solution DID YOU FIND ALL 25 ???

MARCH 2023 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 43

OA NEWS

2022 National Rankings – non-Elite DARRYL ERBACHER – OA STATISTICIAN

he following are rankings in nonElite classes for the first 10 orienteers in each class. The 2022 rankings have been determined based on results in the Australian 3-Days Championships (31, 32, 33), Australian Championships (AS, AM, AL) and the Victorian Middle Distance Championships (VM). The tables include the ranking, name, club, points, event codes and average winning margin.

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1 2

W80 Dale Ann Gordon Helen Alexander

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

W75 Jenny Hawkins NT N Libby Meeking YV V Ann Baylis YV V Robin Spriggs UG Q Janet Bush AL T Rosemary Kullmann LO W Janet Fletcher LO W Penny Dufty BO W Helena Griggs AL T

W70 1 Alison Radford 2 Lynda Rapkins 3 Carol Brownlie 4 Valerie Barker 5 Val Hodsdon 6 Jacquie Rand 7 Kerryne Jones 8 Carol Jacobson 9 Judy Allison 10 Pamela King

EU V BK V

BG V EN Q WO W BS A SH N UG Q RR A GO N RR A DR V

W65 1 Jenny Bourne AO A 2 Debbie Davey WR N 3 Sue Key MF V 4 Hilary Wood CC N 5 Julia Prudhoe CC N 6 Robin Uppill OH S 7 Helen Edmonds NE V 8 Kathy Petrie SO Q 9 Mary McDonald AO A 10 Robyn Pallas CC N

100 ALVMAM 59.27 ASBVMAM

100 94.1 89.7 82.62 73.24 72.83 65.68 63.81 53.68

100 99.56 96.53 93.81 84.43 83.54 80.1 79.89 70.27 63.47

ALAMAS ALASVM AL33AM VM33AM AMVMAS VMAMAS VMAMAS VMAMAL ALVMAM

AMALAS 333132 VM3231 VM32AS ALVMAM VMAS32 VM3231 ASVMAL VM32AS VMASAL

100 ALAMAS 0.12 100 333132 0.08 84.85 3231VM 82.82 31AS32 77.71 AS32AL 71.02 32ASAL 67.75 AMVMAL 66.87 32ALVM 65.77 ALVMAS 61.78 323133

44 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2023

W60 1 Toni Brown 2 Gayle Quantock 3 Chris Brown 4 Carolyn Jackson 5 Carolyn Matthews 6 Ana Herceg 7 Jo Parr 8 Vanessa Smith 9 Felicity Crosato 10 Sally Wayte

BS A NC N EV T BK V NC N PO A BF N KO W RR Q AL T

100 99.21 98.76 92.87 92.77 88.84 87.38 84.78 83.27 67.09

33VMAM 3132AM 32AMAL ALVMAS ASVM31 ASAL31 AMVM32 ASALAM 323133 ASAL31

W55 1 Nicola Dalheim MF V 2 Paula Shingler BF N 3 Sue Hancock AL T 4 Alison Inglis BS A 5 Wendy Read UG Q 6 Su Yan Tay UG Q 7 Kristine Cairns-TraceyUG Q 8 Liz Canning AL T 9 Christine Marshall AL T 10 Sue Garr PO A

98.81 98.23 97.87 97.59 95.15 80.03 75.69 67.88 64.82 60.32

3331AL ASAM32 32ALAM AL3132 VMALAS 323133 323331 VMASAL 31AL32 3132AL

1 2 3 4 5 6 7

W50 Jennifer Enderby Cathy McComb Clare Hawthorne Sheralee Bailey Alison Stubbs Jo Mitchell Georgina Macken

NC N AL T AL T BN N AL T AL T YV V

100 3233VM 0.13 100 AM31AL 0.11 90.26 ALASVM 71.79 33AM32 70.36 33VMAS 56.57 3332AL 55.96 ALVMAM

W45 1 Allison Jones 2 Tracy Marsh 3 Rachel West 4 Meredith Gray 5 Jenny Casanova 6 Ceri Pass 7 Sussan Best 8 Susanne Casanova 9 Michelle Schulz 10 Ruth Shedden

RR A BF N BO W UG Q WA S KO W EV T TE S UG Q SH N

100 97.11 95.72 94.02 91.02 88.17 76.75 76.08 74.36 69.55

AM3332 313233 ASVM31 VM3132 VMAS32 ASVM32 AS31VM 323133 32ASAL VMASAL

1 2 3 4 5 6 7

W40 Marina Iskhakova Kathie Dent Samantha Howe Phoebe Dent Vickie Saye Fern Hillyard Liisa Hirvonen

RR A RR A NC N RR A AO A WA S LO W

100 96.48 70.82 66.61 62.71 60.71 52.3

33AMVM ASAL31 ALASAM AMAS33 VMALAM ASALVM ALASAM

1

W35 Moira Kuffer

YV V

85.24

AMVMAL

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

W18 Eszter Kocsik Zali McComb Tara Powell Zoe Carter Sophie Best Jemima Lloyd Eve Tague Julia Barbour Sara Garbellini

GO N AL T AL T TJ S EV T TT S RR Q BF N EN Q

100 89.03 78.98 73.42 69.32 66.44 61.94 60.11 57.99

3133AL 32ASAM AMASAL ASALAM 32AS33 ASAMAL ASAMAL ASAMAL ASAMAL

Eszter Kocsik (NSW). PhotoByTom.com.au

W16 1 Lilja Lehtonen GO N 2 Liana Stubbs AL T 3 Kate Braid KO W 4 Gemma Burley YA S 5 Katherine Maundrell BS A 6 Ruby Phillips BO W 7 Aoife Rothery RR A 8 Maggie Mackay UR N 9 Ingrid Shelton Agar AO A 10 Maya Bennette YV V

100 97.11 96.37 93.46 91.23 88.56 87.57 87.11 77.35 76.23

323133 ALVM33 AMASAL ASAMAL ASAMVM ALASAM ASVMAM AMASVM ASALVM ASALAM

W14 1 Alice Radajewski 2 Katie Clauson 3 Ariadna Iskhakova 4 Amy Dufty 5 Savanna Sweeney 6 Xanthe Schubert 7 Margot Marcant 8 Sanda Halpin 9 Ella Maja Lang 10 Alexandra Edwards

PO A AL T RR A BO W WH N RR Q AL T PO A YV V RR Q

100 97.5 97.36 95.13 91.71 90.85 87.77 83.86 68.03 67.63

3331AS VMAMAL 32AS31 ALAS31 AS3331 ASALVM AMVMAS ASALAM VMASAM ASAMVM

1 2 3 4 5 6 7

W12 Veronika Iskhakova Lisa Richards Angelina Kozma Alara Williams Alma Walter Maya Lhote Gretel Young

RR A RR Q BK V RR Q RR A UG Q RR Q

96.12 92.13 91.02 88.19 84.84 80.11 79.75

VMALAS 323331 ALVMAS 333132 AL3233 313233 ALVMAS

1 2 3 4

W10 Layla Dent Lucinda Barnes Tessa Radajewski Beatrix Louis

RR A RR Q PO A AL T

96.91 90.44 88.58 81.36

VMAMAS ALAMVM ASVMAL ALASAM

M80 Trevor Sauer Alex Tarr John Hodsdon

SO Q YV V SH N

100 100 82.23

AMVM31 33AL32 AS3133

M75 1 Steve Flick 2 Ross Barr 3 Tony Simpkins 4 Terry Bluett 5 Ken Brownlie 6 Greg Chatfield 7 Reid Moran 8 Ian Fletcher 9 Dennis Trewin 10 Leigh Privett

BN N GO N LO W BN N WO W UG Q TF Q LO W YV V AW V

100 92.47 88.37 86.47 84.43 84.03 78.8 76.01 75.57 74

33AL32 AMASVM VMASAL AMASVM 3231AS VMASAL VMAM32 ALVM32 VMALAM 323331

M70 1 David Marshall 2 Gordon Wilson 3 Adrian Uppill 4 Paul Hoopmann 5 Nick Dent 6 Robert Rapkins 7 Bill Jones 8 Bruce Bowen 9 Tony Radford 10 Robert Preston

AL T BN N OH S TJ S CC N EN Q RR A PO A BG V NC N

100 99.37 98.08 95.06 90.32 88.32 86.83 83.36 80.78 78.34

313332 AMVM32 AL32VM AS32AL ASAL32 VM3233 VMASAL VMALAS AL33VM 32AMAS

M65 1 Eoin Rothery RR A 2 Ted van GeldermalsenYV V 3 Jeff Dunn AL T 4 James Lithgow GO N 5 Chris Norwood EU V 6 Warwick Davis TK V 7 Alex Davey WR N 8 Paul Prudhoe CC N 9 Tim Ashman LI S 10 Tony Garr PO A

98.77 97.73 97.58 90.4 79.04 73.61 71.81 71.33 70.73 70

VMASAM 3231AM AL33AM 33ASVM ALVMAS 313332 AM32AL ASAM31 ASAMAL 31AS32

M60 1 Robert Vincent 2 Greg Barbour 3 Warren Key 4 Tim Hatley 5 Bjorn Mella 6 Tony Woolford 7 Sebastian Burgess 8 Glenn Burgess 9 Arnold Simson 10 Jon Glanville

NC N BF N MF V BK V NC N BB N AL T NC N AO A PO A

99.42 98.43 96.38 91.94 86.34 84.04 82.57 72.91 67.65 63.41

32AMVM ALVMAM 333132 AS32VM ASAMVM ASALAM ASAMAL 323331 333231 AS32AL

M55 1 Geoff Lawford 2 Steve Cooper 3 Mark Freeman 4 Ruhi Afnan 5 Tim McIntyre 6 Andy Simpson 7 Cormac McCarthy 8 Michael Warlters 9 Andrew Brennan 10 Neil Simson

AO A YA S BF N YA S UG Q BF N YV V UR N RR Q TF Q

100 96.63 93.62 87.42 84.43 81.83 81.49 78.7 67.4 66.19

32AMVM 3331AS ALASVM ASVMAM ASALVM 31AL33 3133AS ALVMAS 32AS31 333132

1 2 3

M50 1 Grant Bluett 2 Craig Dufty 3 Jonathan McComb 4 Scott Simson 5 Anthony Stoner 6 Blair Trewin 7 Greg Morcom 8 Matthew Stocks 9 Graham Braid 10 Shane Doyle

AO A BO W AL T NC N AL T YV V TJ S BS A KO W UR N

100 94.99 91.8 82.74 81.68 75.29 74.92 74.28 66.23 64.49

323133 ASAMVM VMAL33 ASAMVM ASVMAM ASVMAM AMASAL ASAMAL ASVMAL ASAL31

M45 1 Rob Walter 2 Bruce Arthur 3 Ricky Thackray 4 Simon Rouse 5 Andy Hogg 6 Richard Goonan 7 Reuben Smith 8 Angus Shedden 9 Damien Enderby 10 Tate Needham

RR A MF V BK V DR V PO A CH V TT S SH N NC N RR A

100 99.76 93.94 90.84 87.43 78.02 72.59 69.58 64.28 60.67

VMAM31 33ASAL ASAMAL AL3133 AMASAL AMALVM 323331 AMASVM AM32AL ASALVM

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

M40 Matthew Crane Dion McKenzie Matthew Cohen Simon Louis Tyson Hillyard Fedor Iskhakov Klaas Hartmann Gavin Bennette Mark Lommers

AO A AL T AL T AL T WA S RR A AL T YV V LO W

100 96.51 93.53 90.14 76.72 71.47 59.45 54.69 53.21

323331 VMALAS AMVMAS ALASAM VMAMAS ASVMAL VMALAS ASVMAM ASALAM

1 2 3 4

M35 Andrew Slattery Daniel Stott Eric Smyth Istvan Kertesz

RR A YV V SO Q GO N

99.68 99.67 97.78 73.47

AMVMAL ALASVM ASAMAL ALVMAS

M18 Torren Arthur Jamie Woolford Lochlann Hogan Joshua Newnes Aldo Bosman Oliver Freeman Charlie Young

MF V ST N BB Q EN Q SW W BF N RR Q

100 97.09 92.46 75.04 73.29 64.99 63.7

AM3331 AL32AS ASAL31 AS3132 313233 ASAL33 AS3233

M16 1 Cooper Horley 2 Owen Radajewski 3 Euan Best 4 Dylan Bryant 5 Henry Smyth 6 Nick Stanley 7 Marcus Degenaar 8 William Barnes 9 Liam Dufty 10 Eckart Bosman

GO N PO A EV T EN Q SO Q GO N AL T RR Q BO W SW W

100 99.78 99.01 89.86 88.08 81.73 81.07 78.98 76.36 75.49

AMVMAS AL3132 33ASAL ASAMAL 31ALAS 33AS32 AMASVM ALVMAS ASVM33 AMAS31

M14 1 Elye Dent 2 Miles Bryant 3 Lachlan Braid 4 Ben Marschall 5 Alton Freeman 6 Duncan Still 7 Marcus Cazzolato 8 Matthew Layton 9 Alejandro Fisher 10 Adrian Garbellini

RR A EN Q KO W TT S BF N TJ S TJ S NE V AL T EN Q

100 96.53 93.1 83.01 82.36 77.15 72.52 67.05 65.7 64.88

AL32AM 31VMAS 33VM31 VMAMAL 33VMAS AMVMAS 33VM31 VMAMAS AMASAL VMASAL

1 2 3 4 5 6 7

Hayden Dent (ACT). PhotoByTom.com.au

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

M12 Hayden Dent Connor Dent Rohan Braid Shay Sweeney Achilles Barnett Baxter Peel Thomas Caristo Patrick Maundrell

RR A RR A KO W WH N TJ S NC N EN Q BS A

100 92.17 88.21 73.96 69.16 68.08 57.6 52.59

313332 VMAM32 VMASAM ASVMAM ASALAM ALAS32 333231 ASAMAL

1 2 3 4 5 6

M10 Euan Shedden Luca Schulz Joshua Layton Sean Carroll Ryder Seaman Neo Kozma

SH N UG Q NE V AL T WR N BK V

100 89.95 83.29 59.52 53.97 53.73

ALVMAM ASAMVM VMA MAL AMVMAL ASAMAL VMAMAS

Torren Arthur (VIC). PhotoByTom.com.au MARCH 2023 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 45

OA NEWS

National Squads

Ron Frederick OAM

From High Performance Management Group Report January 2023

ongratulations to Ron Frederick for receiving the Order of Australia Medal.

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he High Performance (HP) Squad’s coaches - Julian Dent, Grant Bluett and Natasha Key.

The National Development (ND) Squad’s coaches - Paula Shingler, Tracy Bluett and Jock Davis.

The citation from the Australia Day Honours website https://www.gg.gov.au

HP Squad - Angus Haines, Alistair George, Aston Key, Brodie Nankervis, Ewan Shingler, Matt Doyle, Pat Jaffe, Henry McNulty, Grace Crane, Caitlin Young, Emily Sorensen, Nea Shingler, Asha Steer, Olivia Sprod and Aislinn Prendergast.

MEDAL (OAM) OF THE ORDER OF AUSTRALIA IN THE GENERAL DIVISION Mr Ronald James FREDERICK, Mont Albert VIC 3127 For service to orienteering and rogaining.

ND squad - Erika Enderby, Mikaela Gray, Julia Gannon, Joanna George, Zoe Carter, Natalie Miller, Sophie Taverna, Milla Key, Ryan Gray, Sam Woolford, Oskar Mella, Leith Sodden, Toby Lang, David Stocks, Ethan Penck and Alvin Craig.

Orienteering and Rogaining • President, Nillumbik Emus Orienteering Club, since 1998.

• Member and former Treasurer, Orienteering Victoria and Orienteering Australia, since 1969.

• Former Committee Member and former Vice-President, Victorian Rogaining Association, and Member, current.

• Orienteering Competitor, event organiser and course setter, since 1969.

Sport - Other • Led and supervised participants, Victorian Bushcraft and Mountaincraft Leadership Courses.

• President, Langrenn Ski Club, 20 years.

• Former Member, Bush Search and Rescue Victoria.

• Former Trips Secretary, Melbourne University Mountaineering Club.

Rotary Club of Mitcham • President, twice.

• Secretary, current.

• Secretary, Rotary District 9810, 1990.

• Regular Volunteer, including Mitcham Op Shop, since 1990.

• Member, over 40 years.

Other • School Council President, Southwood Primary School, 1980s.

• Former Accredited Wills and Estates Specialist, Law Institute of Victoria

HANDYMAN For stockist call 1800 808 971 MAKERS OF THE ORIGINAL SWISS ARMY KNIFE | ESTABLISHED 1884

Crossword and Quiz Solutions VICTORINOX AWARD Quiz Answer: 1. B DOWN: 1. Western Australia. 4. Boulder. 5. Contours. 8. One hundred.

9. Bike ACROSS: 2. Vampire O. 3. MapRun. 6. Ugly Gully. 7. Corroboree Frog.

10. You and me. 11. Launceston 46 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER MARCH 2023

This issue’s Victorinox Award goes to Peter Yeates for providing The Australian Orienteer with his photographs.

Peter will receive a Victorinox Handyman which includes 24 tools and features – retail value $139.

Top Events July 21-27

2023 March 11-12

2023 Sydney Sprint Weekend NSW

April 7-10

AUS 3 Days Carnival, ACT Snowy Monaro

May 13-16

World Masters MTBO Champs Slovenj Gradec, Slovenia

May 26-28

Pomorze Sprint Cup 2023 (3 days) Tczew, Pelplin, Gniew, Poland bno@umkskwidzyn.pl 2023 Jukola Relays Porvoo, SE Finland.

O-Ringen 2024 Smålandskusten, Sweden

World Masters Orienteering Championships Turku, Finland August 15-20 European Orienteering Championships, Mór, Hungary WMTBOC & JWMTBOC Sept 9-16 Bulgaria Sep 28 - Oct 6 AUS Champs Carnival Armidale, NSW August 3-9

June 17-18

2025 May 17-30

July 2-7

Kainuu Orienteering Week Jämäsvaara, Kuhmo, Finland

July 2-9

JWOC 2023, Baia Mare, Romania

July 11-16

Forest WOC 2023 Flims Laax, Switzerland

July 15-22

Swiss O Week 2023 Flims Laax Falera, Switzerland

July 23-29

O-Ringen 2023, Åre, Sweden

July 30 Aug 4

Scottish 6 Days (actually 5 days) Moray, Scotland

August 11-18

World Masters Orienteering Championships, Kosice, Slovakia WMTBOC & JWMTBOC Jicin, Czechia

June 30 - July 6 July 23-29 Aug 8-15 Aug 20-24

August 18-27

Sept 9-10

AUS MTBO Championships Brisbane, Queensland

September

AUS Championships, Western Australia

Dec 27-31

Xmas 5 Days Central Coast, NSW (venue tba) www.onsw.asn.au/xmas-5-days

Mar 29-Apr 1 Easter June 15-16

AUS 3 Days Carnival South Australia Jukola Relays Lakia, Finland

June 27-30

2024 European Youth Orienteering Championships, Poland World Masters MTBO Champs Viborg, Denmark 2024 Sprint WOC Edinburgh, Scotland

2025 World Masters Games Taipei, Taiwan 2025 JWOC Bormio, Italy Forest WOC 2025 Kuopio, Finland 2025 WMOC Spain 2025 EOC Antwerp, Belgium

2024

June 28-30 July 12-16

July 15-21

2024 JWOC Czechia MARCH 2023 THE AUSTRALIAN ORIENTEER 47

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