Bimbache Extrem - Castilla y Leon
The Discipline of Navigation
Rob Howard / 03.10.2010
Adventure racing is often described as a combination of trekking, kayaking and mountain biking, but navigation should not be overlooked. In fact it could be considered the primary skill of any adventure race as teams navigate from start to finish off a race, whichever discipline they are competing in at the time. And of course paddling, running or riding fast, won’t do you any good if it’s in the wrong direction!The first day of ARWC 2010 has been very intensive for the team navigators, with two of the first three stages being orienteering. The morning city orienteering was not too demanding, and was more about local public relations and putting on a show in the host town of Avila. Even so, it did still put teams under the pressure as they all set off together, and the adrenalin of the race start did lead to some mistakes.
The afternoon foot orienteering in the Sierra de Guadarama was a very different proposition and was carefully designed to push teams to navigate precisely in difficult terrain. It featured 3 orienteering maps, the first of which the teams did all together, but when they finished this they were split up in two pairs, each taking one of the remaining maps.
On arrival they were given the first map, which was an abrupt change of scale for the team navigators. After reading 1:50,000 maps to find the checkpoints on the cycling stage they now had a 1:15,000 orienteering map with far more detail, though all will be familiar with these. The first map was a score orienteering challenge with 22 checkpoints scattered around an area of steep, rocky hills covered in scrub forest. Teams could visit them in any order, and part of the skill is choosing the best order, to find a route with easier navigation into the checkpoints, the least climb and the easiest terrain to cross. The shortest way may not be the best.
The leading teams visited all the checkpoints, but the furthest away (and highest) was missing. This happens from time to time and navigators who are less sure of themselves might spend time searching or doubting they are in the right place. The experienced navigators deal with this situation much better. They know exactly where they are and quickly decide the CP is not in the correct place and move on.
While the leaders took all the CP’s the slower teams did have a choice, as they could miss out the more difficult checkpoints and be given a 15 minute penalty for each one not visited. Given that the run took the leaders 2 hours some teams might prefer to take the penalty and keep moving around the course, rather than risk falling too far behind and getting short coursed if they end up 24 hours behind the leaders.See All Event Posts
