Discussion: News Coverage on the U.S. Champs
in: US Individual Championships (Sprint/Middle/Long/Trail) (Apr 13–15, 2012 - Carrollton, GA, US)
Apr 10, 2012 8:42 AM
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We received some newspaper coverage for our U.S. Champs from the Newnan Times-Herald.
http://www.times-herald.com/local/20120408orientee...
Orienteering national championships planned at Chattahoochee Bend
By SARAH FAY CAMPBELL
sarah@newnan.com
What’s likely the first national championship event to ever be held in Coweta County is coming next weekend to Chattahoochee Bend State Park.
The park in western Coweta will be the site of the U.S. Individual Orienteering Championships, which is also a world-ranking event. A portion of the competition will be held on the campus of the University of West Georgia in Carrollton.
Orienteering is a “map and compass sport,” said Meet Director Laurie Searle of Chattahoochee Hills.
Competitors use a very detailed map and a compass to find a series of control points. They must get to each point, in the right order, and then get to the finish. The person who completes the course in the shortest time wins.
Orienteering originated in Scandanavia, and came to Georgia in the late 1970s, Searle said. The Georgia Orienteering Club was formed in 1980. “We’ve been steadily progressing for at least 30 years,” Searle said.
The championship event begins April 13 at West Georgia, where the “sprint” and “trail orienteering” events will be held.
Then it’s on to Chattahoochee Bend, where the “long champs” events will be Saturday and the “middle champs” on Sunday. There are different age classes.
Planning for the championship has been going on for several years.
Searle and her husband, Sam Smith, first approached the regional park manager when construction began at Chattahoochee Bend.
“The biggest part of hosting these meets is you have to develop a specialized map,” Searle said. “That is a very time-consuming and expensive project to do.”
“The first step is to get permission to map the park,” she said. “That was a challenge. There was no park staffâ ¦ they didn’t know when it would be built.”
Once they got permission, Smith started the process of creating an orienteering map of the park. An orienteering map not only shows topography, but also has different colors to indicate terrain.
Doing well in an orienteering competition is about more than speed and map reading skills. It is also about route choices, Searle said.
“You don’t necessarily run in a straight line from one point to the other,” she said. “The straight option may be up a hill or through thick woods.”
“It’s being able to read the map, knowing which vegetation and topographical features are the easiestâ ¦ making those choices and running the fastest you can run,” she said.
Orienteering competitions have gotten high-tech in the past few years.
In the past, when competitors reached a control point, they would use a hole punch to indicate they were there. Each competitor had a different punch.
These days, everything is computerized. Each competitor wears a device on his or her finger, and it is scanned at each control point. The information is instantly transmitted to the finish area — meaning results can be instantly updated.
One control point is a “spectator control,” where spectators can watch, she said.
Watching an orienteering event is “sort of like watching a marathon,” Searle said. You can’t see the whole competition but “you can watch people from a stationary spot.”
Because of the nature of the competition, starts are staggered. Competitors leave at two-minute intervals so that they can’t follow each other.
“You line up seven people who are all on different course, and they start every two minutes,” Searle said.
The Georgia Orienteering Club hosts “at least two or three local meets a month,” Searle said, and usually one national event a year, but this is the first time it has hosted the U.S. Individual Championships.
The fact some of the events are for world ranking is “kind of a bigger deal than even the national event,” Searle said.
Getting to host the U.S. championships is “based on the national events you’ve hosted in the past, and your capacity for volunteers to host the meet,” Searle said. “Each club can request sanctioning for a national meet through our national organization.”
“We have a solid base of volunteers,” Searle said. Members of the Friends of Chattahoochee Bend State Park will also be on hand, helping with parking, she said.
In the world of GPS, using a map and compass might seem almost quaint.
Searle was asked what she thinks about the future of the sport.
“A lot of us are getting really old,” she said. “There are not as many young people coming into it.
“Hopefully these kinds of competitions will get elite athletes interested in it.”
The Georgia Orienteering Club can help those who are interested learn more about the sport.
At the local meets, “we always give an ‘introduction to orienteering’ beginner session,” Searle said.
For more information, visit www.gaorienteering.org or www.us.orienteering.org .
http://www.times-herald.com/local/20120408orientee...
Orienteering national championships planned at Chattahoochee Bend
By SARAH FAY CAMPBELL
sarah@newnan.com
What’s likely the first national championship event to ever be held in Coweta County is coming next weekend to Chattahoochee Bend State Park.
The park in western Coweta will be the site of the U.S. Individual Orienteering Championships, which is also a world-ranking event. A portion of the competition will be held on the campus of the University of West Georgia in Carrollton.
Orienteering is a “map and compass sport,” said Meet Director Laurie Searle of Chattahoochee Hills.
Competitors use a very detailed map and a compass to find a series of control points. They must get to each point, in the right order, and then get to the finish. The person who completes the course in the shortest time wins.
Orienteering originated in Scandanavia, and came to Georgia in the late 1970s, Searle said. The Georgia Orienteering Club was formed in 1980. “We’ve been steadily progressing for at least 30 years,” Searle said.
The championship event begins April 13 at West Georgia, where the “sprint” and “trail orienteering” events will be held.
Then it’s on to Chattahoochee Bend, where the “long champs” events will be Saturday and the “middle champs” on Sunday. There are different age classes.
Planning for the championship has been going on for several years.
Searle and her husband, Sam Smith, first approached the regional park manager when construction began at Chattahoochee Bend.
“The biggest part of hosting these meets is you have to develop a specialized map,” Searle said. “That is a very time-consuming and expensive project to do.”
“The first step is to get permission to map the park,” she said. “That was a challenge. There was no park staffâ ¦ they didn’t know when it would be built.”
Once they got permission, Smith started the process of creating an orienteering map of the park. An orienteering map not only shows topography, but also has different colors to indicate terrain.
Doing well in an orienteering competition is about more than speed and map reading skills. It is also about route choices, Searle said.
“You don’t necessarily run in a straight line from one point to the other,” she said. “The straight option may be up a hill or through thick woods.”
“It’s being able to read the map, knowing which vegetation and topographical features are the easiestâ ¦ making those choices and running the fastest you can run,” she said.
Orienteering competitions have gotten high-tech in the past few years.
In the past, when competitors reached a control point, they would use a hole punch to indicate they were there. Each competitor had a different punch.
These days, everything is computerized. Each competitor wears a device on his or her finger, and it is scanned at each control point. The information is instantly transmitted to the finish area — meaning results can be instantly updated.
One control point is a “spectator control,” where spectators can watch, she said.
Watching an orienteering event is “sort of like watching a marathon,” Searle said. You can’t see the whole competition but “you can watch people from a stationary spot.”
Because of the nature of the competition, starts are staggered. Competitors leave at two-minute intervals so that they can’t follow each other.
“You line up seven people who are all on different course, and they start every two minutes,” Searle said.
The Georgia Orienteering Club hosts “at least two or three local meets a month,” Searle said, and usually one national event a year, but this is the first time it has hosted the U.S. Individual Championships.
The fact some of the events are for world ranking is “kind of a bigger deal than even the national event,” Searle said.
Getting to host the U.S. championships is “based on the national events you’ve hosted in the past, and your capacity for volunteers to host the meet,” Searle said. “Each club can request sanctioning for a national meet through our national organization.”
“We have a solid base of volunteers,” Searle said. Members of the Friends of Chattahoochee Bend State Park will also be on hand, helping with parking, she said.
In the world of GPS, using a map and compass might seem almost quaint.
Searle was asked what she thinks about the future of the sport.
“A lot of us are getting really old,” she said. “There are not as many young people coming into it.
“Hopefully these kinds of competitions will get elite athletes interested in it.”
The Georgia Orienteering Club can help those who are interested learn more about the sport.
At the local meets, “we always give an ‘introduction to orienteering’ beginner session,” Searle said.
For more information, visit www.gaorienteering.org or www.us.orienteering.org .
This discussion thread is closed.