Discussion: New courses vs. used courses

I am wanting to help out OCIN and set a few courses at England Idlewild. However, every point feature has been used in the past. I was wondering if you guys think it's okay to reuse old courses from past events or A meets?

Another question is if you say yes I can reuse the maps and courses..... Then how much time needs to elapse before you could use it again?

1. A sequence course is more about the legs than the controls, do you supposed that every leg has been used before? 2. How picky is the OCIN crowd, if they recognise the problems of finding volunteers they will be more than happy with whatever you do. 3. Disclosure - tell everyone the courses are recycled 4. The beginner courses could just about be the same every time

I would say the answer depends on what you plan to use the courses for. For A-meets and major local meets, the courses and challenges should be as novel as possible. For your typical weekend local meet, reusing old courses can be ok, especially if the courses are not recent (say 5 years or older).

However, even if almost all the point features have been used, you can design a large number of distinct courses from the same set of features. Reorder them, look for varieties in leg length and characteristic.

Addison, in general, I'm not a fan of re-using courses. Sometimes we get an event where very few people do a particular course. In that case, if you have a good course and very few people have seen it, then it would probably be okay to re-use. At E-I, we did a winter TROL event 3 or 4 years ago that had deep snow and very few people came (most Ohio and Indiana counties were under snow emergency restrictions). If you had to re-use ideas, that would be one to look at, provided that similar things were not done more recently. But, I'd encourage you to try your own designs first.

As far as advanced courses, there are parks with which we get very familiar because they are small and frequently used, so you get really familiar with them. That's the case with England-Idlewild, which we typically use twice a year - once for TROL and once for FAST-O. This year we didn't use it for TROL for just that reason - it is small, and we have been there a lot. So, it would be a possibility to use for FAST-O or a regular meet later this year.

So how to make it interesting? First, you are probably right that just about every small depression, single tree, and other point feature has been used at least once. But there are lots of other possibilities including reentrants, thickets, etc. Also, just because a feature has been used doesn't mean you can't set a different leg and approach from a different direction.

When I set a course in a small, frequently used park, I generally look at the most recent (usually the previous year) course. Did it flow clockwise? If so, this year's course will flow counter clockwise. Where did it start and finish? You can change things up by using a different start and finish. Were there areas or corners that weren't used? If there are any places the courses have not been recently, use those.

Also, as you get into the park to plan, look for anything new. Are there new trails? New rootstocks? Has a building or trail been removed? Areas that have changed are great to use (assuming you update the map). They'll offer a challenge that people have not seen before.

Try to set legs for the challenge of the leg, not just pick the hardest features you can find. Look for legs that offer route choices or tricky navigation.

Also, one of the best things you can do is bring a new perspective to the park. You've never set courses there before, so BEFORE you look at past courses, try to design 3 or 4 of the most interesting and challenging legs you can. Figure out if they work in both directions or are clearly better in one direction. Then connect them with shorter legs and turning controls. THEN look at previous courses. Can you move a control to a nearby feature that has not been used? Can you lengthen or shorten or reverse a previously used leg to make a different challenge.

I'm sure you'll come up with some ideas for interesting, fun, challenging courses.

@mikeminium said it all. Not sure there is a reason ever to use an old course unless you are sure all the attendees have not seen it before. If this is not so, use your creativity to design a new one. So much more fun for you and the competitors.

I tried to recycle an old rogaine course with a thought to making it easier for new course setters to get started by offering them a map and an armchaired course ready made. It was an interesting experiment that produced some unforseen problems.

And try something new in a familiar place.

This may not be the right opportunity, but something new like a memory-O can make a familiar park a bit harder.

We have a smallish park that we held an event on July 14th one year, and that got me thinking about stars and the 50 states.

The Sprint competitors may not have realized it until after the event, but the course was in the shape of a star.

The Random-O competition - well, that was one control for every state. Yes, 50 of them... I stuck them on every possible feature across the park.

The question wasn't can you reach all of them, it was can you look to make sure you know where they all are, remember where you've been, plot an efficient path, and get them all within the 60 minutes!-) [Completed by 2, close by a handful of others]

The excitement turned an ordinary summer random-O and sprint meet into quite the exciting event. Challenging in different ways with lots to talk about afterwords.

I reuse point features a lot, especially in areas of dense green or narrow sections of mapped area. But I try to make new legs, including approaching from different directions. It's shocking sometimes how the same feature appears to be completely different when you approach from other directions. The worst "reuse" example for me is the recent Sharon Woods Red and Green. Fully 1 km of that was nearly identical to two events I've set in the past because of the transverse of the golf course. It was hard to negotiate the path with the golf course greenskeepers, but it meant a more interesting loop rather than an out-and-back, which we've also done multiple times. The snow was kinda neat, because it gave a new appearance to those legs.

If it's for training, I frequently reuse courses though they are usually a few years old. I don't think I've ever reused a course for an actual event though I don't hesitate to use the same feature.

Ditto all said above. I've re-run courses from ppv going backwards (for practice, not for real), and I was amazed like cedarcreek said how things can be so different! So yeah, when setting courses we pretty much never use the same courses, but sometimes (very rarely in my courses) we'll use the same features. For the beginner courses and even intermediate I haven't really worried too much about repeating features from ppv courses for control locations, but for advanced I very seldom will use a feature from within the past couple years as a control location, and if I do it will definitely have a different approach angle. It always seems to me like the beginner courses are the more challenging ones because of how limited the options are for control locations and routing. Even if I absolutely have to put the control in the same area as a previous event, I'll still look around for a different location in that same area...if the old course had the control on the NW corner of a bldg, I'll put it on the SE corner the next time. But usually even with the limited options available on maps like the one you're working on I can usually avoid repeat feature visits for 80% of the control locations if I work at it-- it can be tricky, but its been doable. Another option to change things up on an overused venue is to change your overall route philosophy for the next event. If the ppv one had a bunch of equally spaced legs between controls, design a course that has a bunch of short-distance legs in a loop, then a couple really big long legs, then a couple short-distance ones again...just as an example, lots of options there. So not only can the approach angle/direction of the leg(s) change things up, but also the lengths of the legs + overall distance. You could do a sprint-style-inspired race, a middle-style-inspired race, a classic/long-inspired, etc. And if you really want to go crazy, maybe even changing the scale. If you have 1:10000 map for an overused venue, maybe zooming in to more of a sprint style scale and doing a little bit of map updating at the finer detail could be a nice changeup. I've done this before and got a lot of comments from the racers about how different it felt doing a run at a sprint-style scale. Anyway, I'm sure you'll come up with something that will work and with it being a local meet I'm sure everyone will be happy just to have another orienteering opportunity at your event even if the venue is a little stale. Hopefully I can make it and definitely look forward to it, good luck!

Gosh, you guys have been pretty tough on AddisonB. We all would love pristine woods too...and separate controls for each course...and apple pie and ice cream after we finish.

But the realities of an aggressive schedule of local meets for many small clubs means that sometimes...there's not enough volunteer time to set all-new courses for every meet. And good course setting is a lot more than mixing up the control sequence or running it backward; approach angles, attack points, catching features, etc all should be evaluated for each leg.

And I would rather run a memorable repeat Green course from a couple of years ago....than have the local meet cancelled outright, or limited to WYO courses. Wouldn't you?

There's little problem with reusing beginner courses from a few years earlier, because the people who were beginners back then are, in general, not beginners any more (they're usually either gone, or better).

you guys have been pretty tough on AddisonB

Who has? He says he wants to help and was asking for advice. He got a lot of good advice. This has actually been a nice, productive, positive thread. Pie for everyone!

Let me re-emphasize a point the others have made above, but a bit more succinctly. It's not the controls that make the course, it's the legs. The controls exist to define the legs. So the question is - have all the legs been used before? Likely not…

Very succinct. I couldn't have put it more succinctly myself.

I tried to recycle an old rogaine course with a thought to making it easier for new course setters to get started by offering them a map and an armchaired course ready made. It was an interesting experiment that produced some unforseen problems.

What were the problems, other than me winning the event and all the other top teams heading interstate to compete in the Nationals that weekend?

I reused a course once at Barebones. It was hilarious. For example, one of the unforeseen problems - there was a control deep in the middle of some complex contoured forest at the top of a big climb. Runners were very careful as they climbed up so they would have a strong attack point as they reached the complex terrain. But when they got to the top they found the forest had been logged and the control was clearly visible in the middle of a big field.

Reusing a course? - not worth the effort ;-)

We are reusing a course this year. Was a championship from years ago that I did well in, the challenge is for all those young bucks who think they are good, to go out and better the winning time. The Forest is still the same as it was, and what few new tracks that do exist, wont help in any real way. Looking forward to the results

AZ - is that a 'reusing the course' issue or just that the map should have been updated?

We regularly reuse our courses for our youth meet every year. The event rotates between venues on about a four year cycle. Because we need to set multiple beginner courses, often the options for this are limited, so we just use the same basic designs each time. There may be minor course changes if something has changed in the park. Most of the participants turn over in a four year cycle or they have moved up to a different course. It does mean that our club score-O event on the day after is pretty much the same every four years.

Re-using a course?

It has actually been done on the very top level.
At O-ringen in Hälsingland in 2006 the Elite classes ran the same courses as had been used at another Elite event in 1975 (Mästarmötet, Meet of the Champions, was televised* in full as one of the very first in that category).

Everyone knew about it before the race, but still noone managed to beat the 31 year old record time in the H21E class. Andrey Khramov was close though - while the five best women beat the winning time from 1975 with Simone on top.

*) still available in the open archives of Swedish TV, but unfortunately only for Swedish viewers.

AZ nails it.

Any reasonable course setting effort demands time in the field to check control locations, potential routes between and around controls, and general fidelity of the map. Some controls aren't suitable on a brand-new map; if it is multiple years old, more locations won't be suitable.

If you have to go into the terrain anyway, that is most of the effort. If you have to adjust some controls on an otherwise good course, it may be OK, but if you've already done all that, coming up with all new courses isn't really much more work.

One year (2008?), the first segment of the Hudson Highlander was the WOC93 Men's Classic. Worked out nicely. Reusing courses for a local meet is not an unreasonable thing to do, I've seen it happen a few times with no complaints. One thing that can drive this is if unusual weather makes attendance be very low, and there's a surplus of printed maps with courses that get used a year later.

Sounds like AZ's example is a case of complete negligence. Surely the logged forest was noticed when hanging the control...?

The first(?) unofficial US Long O champs at Silver Mine (1982?) reused an exact leg from the US Champs in 1979. I felt it was the optimal leg for that section of the map. I believe the leg was on both Blue/M21 courses, but other courses may have used it as well. As I remember, only one person noticed.

Just came back from an afterwork MTBO score event. Same control sites as last year's sequence event. It was good. Mind you we have quite small numbers, its probably different when you have course planners coming out of your ears..

On many maps, Yellow and White are the hardest courses to set. I think if you find a good beginner course on a map that has few options, you should have no qualms about re-using it a few years later. Anybody who ran a beginner course three years ago has likely either 1) moved up to intermediate, 2) quit the sport, or 3) isn't really interested in competition so they won't care.

Word is that beginners get better after a few years and are unlikely to be doing the easy courses again so you can reuse those if you like.

Negligence? Or laziness? Or what? No, everyone knew this was a rerun of an old course on an old map - the ultimate "barebones organizing". Sure, the guy hanging the control realized it was a disaster. But since he did it about 30 minutes before the first runners came there wasn't much to be done except have a laugh.

My point is, like j-man noticed, that reusing a course "properly" requires maybe more work than it sounds like.

(Note: I must retract that this was a Barebones race. It was not - I can't find a record of it, but it must have been a training weekend)

Used courses from regional/national events are often some of the best overall training courses. I religiously use them to train when I am not specifically choosing a skill. The courses are well thought out and quite good.

Jlaughlin, good point. And re-running courses is great training. You can compare different routes and also get a better feel for how much time you're losing.

I also re use courses when I do school programs, and kids can compare results with previous classes.

But I remain generally opposed to reusing a course got a competition unless it is specifically stated in advance.

And of course, over time, map changes may make it impossible or impractical to use exactly the same course.