Discussion: WOC 2014 sprint spectating thread

Startlists for tomorrow morning's sprint qualification race for women and men are available from the organizers.

For Team USA we have (previous best WOC sprint result):

9:09 Tori Borish (first WOC!)
9:17 Alison Crocker (20th, WOC 2012)
9:27 Samantha Saeger (29th, WOC 2006)
10:08 Ethan Childs (first WOC!)
10:16 Ross Smith (Q21, WOC 2011)
10:36 Giacomo Barbone (Q33, WOC 2012)

(this info also on usa-orienteering.blogspot.com)

I'm getting a 404 error for the start list links :-(

Ah, they are both 404 now... wild speculation here, maybe something came up in the team leaders meeting that caused them to have to redraw the starts?

Links are up as men's and women's now - initial ones had 'secret' in their filenames...

Fixed above. I think my wild speculation was indeed wild -- I see no difference between the men's lists except the filename.

Is it 15 from every heat to the final as usual?

Yup, top 15 go through.

Canada athletes and start times on the blog

Has anyone found links to coverage of the sprint qual? It's not included in the full week pass and will not have GPS tracking. Anyone know if there will be any TV feed or at least live results?

WOC Live page "You'll know the start lists and result" - doesn't have a link for results at the present time though!

There's a link on World of O to Swedish tv coverage - I clicked on this and got a page which says coverage of the WOC sprint will commence in 8hrs 30 minutes (it's now 7am Venice time). Since this would be after the time the qualifications finish it's likely to be just a summary of the results and maybe some footage of the Swedish runners). But the fact the link works is promising for tomorrow :-)

Live results are here.

@simmo - maybe the Swedish tv coverage is of the final only?

so the live results break down who is in what heat. I hope everyone is quarantined before they went live :/

@ susan - why would it start in 6 hours time then?

Because that's when the final starts...

at the moment in heat women A the top two finishers are shown with 13:55 and 13:56, but with 0:00 difference.... hmmmm and women B women 13:38 and 13: 42 with a difference of 0:03... is there rounding in there somewhere?

When I go to the results page it flashes the choices for which hear but then goes blank

try this: http://liveresults.woc2014.info/followfull.php?com...

I'll stick my neck out and say that all the top runners will make the final. Among the antipodeans Hanny will definitely be in, Felicity Brown touch and go, Rachel Effeney and Lizzie Ingham are up with the leaders at the first radio. Imogene Scott and Greta Knarston won't make it.

If the results are right it looks like Ali Crocker is 25th so far in her heat and not through. Tori also in the 20s. Sam is 13th right now in C and looks like she will be in by a hair.

@ Cristina - yes thanks, I was thinking it must be tomorrow. Logistics of getting all the runners from Burano to Venice by boat must be difficult.

Sam 15th so in by 4secs! woot!!!

Poor Ali looks to have had a nightmare :( Sam just sneaked into the final, well done!

For GB Ruth just missed out, but Tess comfortably through from heat 3!

Felicity just missed out in 16th, but Samantha made it in 15th.

maps anywhere i wonder?

Probably only after the men run...

but they've shown us heats surely womens maps now are ok men shouldn't see them they start in 5mins

If you keep pestering Boris about it I'm sure he will be able to produce the maps. :-)

:)

it would be sooooo nice to have an idea of what the guys are running :)

Here you go: https://twitter.com/WorldofOLive/status/4853344140...

https://twitter.com/WorldofOLive/status/4853344140...

Looks straightforward enough, they got it up before anyone finished.

thank you guys!

Could you say that again?

here's a link to the ma..... oh wait, someone else already linked it!

There's now audio from the arena, too: http://mixlr.com/woc2014/

Thanks for the audio Cristina I can now walk away from my computer and actually start packing up the flat haha

holy sh... Emma and Judith destroyed heat A.

Looks like Ross had a nice run in Men-C!

Yeah, really good! Solid from Ethan in A, too!

yep, Ethan good, too, 1:44 back current leader Murray Strain.

Looks like Nick will scrape in, 15s down ;)

All three Brits in the final! nice one guys!

No English in the final :)

Bostrom Out!

Shows you can't take a Quli too easy!

Looks like no North Americans in the final, Will Critchley was closest -- 19th in Men-B and only 53s back from the winner (8s behind 15th). Tough to make it!

2/3 POR through, and the third only 8s out, 1s behind Bostrom. Well done by them.

And that's that. I want the sound back.

anyone thinking its worth it for the week pack by the way?

Good run by Julian Dent, the other Aussies and Kiwis missed out. Can't really say whether the pack is worth it until the final later today. I knew it didn't cover the sprint qualification when I bought it. Should be good if the tracking works, and Swedish tv is available.

I was thinking Yle got lucky that Sprint finishes just before ARG BEL, but then I copped on.
Also on tv today, Maalipallon MM, hurrah? And SM viesti.

The big question... watch at home with Per or on a big screen in Kallio with Jussi?

Quick US recap here.

When is an alley not an alley?

https://twitter.com/martenbostrom/status/485375238...

...

Just saw Sam start on TV

Is anyone having problems with their ticket/code for the live coverage off IOF's site? I doesn't want to accept the code that I got after purchasing the ticket.

Use the dashes

works fine..so far..

is there supposed to be sound you can hear in the livecenter tv stream?

seems way behind or something from earlier today

I found it on woc site "speaker"

From mixlr.com

thanks!

NRK TV coverage so far looks pretty nice.

We had live tracking until we shifted the screen/map, the lost it and can't get it back. Video still works and accompanying audio just kicked in.

GPS not working for us. Saw Sam through the first few controls

It's bavk

I can't get my code to work either Z-man! Should have just saved the money and watched the swedish coverage

Code doesn't work even if you copy + paste?

Watching Sam's GPS dot finish now!

and Sam finished. yay

I keep seeing Kenny at the finish when runners cross the line. Cool!

Great start for Anne Lind (NOR/Nydalen)!

It's tough not being there, but here ain't bad!

Nice running by Lizzie and Tessa!

Really good race and result by Sam: 32nd place!

+1 Sam!

Hi Neil, good to see you kitted out for the occasion. Enjoy the racing :)

FWIW, the SVT feed is working perfectly for me. I have a relatively slow DSL line, and yet the SVT feed is clear and solid.

Thanks, Boris, Sam didn't know. Better than she thought and very happy.

Go Nick!!!

+1 for Nick - in the lead at the 5th :) :) :)

Bobach looks to have a strong run going ...

Go Murray ...

Is that a fence on Hubmann's left route choice to 19?

Coverage was very good. GPS, Live TV and commentary from Forsberg. Very good for the women's final, BUT for the men's final, there was a disconnect between images and commentary - the TV editor wasn't up with the race.

Anyone else have the same problem? or have another way around it?

I did notice the audio and video out of sync for what I was watching but that may be because I was no listening to the audio that was with the video.

One problem I did have was the GPS tracking didn't work for me for much of the womens race. It was fine for the mens. Might have been my bumbling around but was disappointed in what I got for the womens sprint. The mens was fine though would have been nice if I could have blown up the map

Carl, you can zoom in and out on the map by clicking the + and - buttons on the bottom left.

For what it's worth the video and gps tracking worked fine for me. Mostly I watched the NRK TV coverage (higher quality video, mostly the same as the live center video) with arena audio because Per.

I find sprints a bit too hectic to really get into watching live with all the live results and gps and video and audio but at least it all seemed to work well for the rest of the week.

When is an alley not an alley?

I just looked at Boström's tweets and if the problem is what I think it was (the gate on the alley made it look like it was a building?) then it sounds like he is once again finding someone else to blame for his mistakes.

From the pic, it looked like building on map included a gated alley in reality. It affected understanding of the terrain, not route choice.

Edit: I was totally wrong.

I too was a little confused by the photo and map snippet in the tweet, but this GPS track makes it look like he approached the offending gate from the other side.

From that GPS track, what I can't understand is why everyone didn't take that route? Did someone close the gate during the race??

I don't think that's a GPS track... looks like someone drew a line on the photo that Boström tweeted.

I am confused, though -- here he asks "is this gate open?" which makes me think the problem was that it didn't look like an alley in the terrain, rather than it looking like an alley but not mapped like one. He mentions in another tweet that it was not a routechoice and that several people lost time because of it. Also that protest was denied. I will hold off on further skepticism of his complaint until I am less confused. :-)

Here is the Google Street View of that gate. I can only think that he was a late runner and someone closed the gate during the race.

Do the GPS tracks show that other people came that was.

Note, based on his GPS track it seems clear that he wasn't trying to get INTO the alley from the gate end (for which I would have no sympathy), but he was running down it and found the gate closed at the end (in which case I'm a little surprised there wasn't a protest)

Although now that I read Chrisina's comment that it might not be a GPS track, that puts a lot of my argument into disarray ;-) I haven't seen the course maps yet, so I'm not 100% certain which way the leg was run

That leg goes from left to right on that picture: http://www.woc2014.info/LIVE/maps/sprintq/Burano-s... (11-12)

There was a protest and it was denied. I'm still confused.

I think his GPS turns around not because he has found a closed gate, but because he realizes he has completed a whole loop around the block. The closed gate is the dead end alley immediately to the south of the passage, which I guess caused some confusion as to where along the street he was, which is why he ran past the passage and down the next one.

Have people found splits somewhere?

Yeah, the gate is on the dead-end alley, according to the photo and the link AZ posted, so it wasn't a way to go (also "no routehoice through closed street", he wrote).

If that line is actually a route that someone ran then there is more wrong than just missing that the alley was there. I understand one could get very flustered and confused in the heat of the race and the mistakes could cascade, but from the comfort of my living room chair that looks like an alley to me.

No splits found here!

The arena commentary and the TV images were out of synch (for me) during the women's final, but seemed related editorially. For the men's final, Forsberg was getting excited about a potential new leader approaching the final control and we were watching an also-ran coming over a bridge. So I'm wondering if it would be better to watch another TV broadcast.

How are they going to deal with the Sprint Relay on Monday?

Okay, I agree - that gate is on the dead end alley. So he made a map reading error in a slightly ambiguous situation and failed to use the abundant information available to him to correct. Is that about right?

Hard to understand why he kept turning right and ended up going around the block.

Disappointing that he would blame IOF

Splits are up for the qual and final.

Thanks for posting. Without the mistake at 12, Ali would have been in. Good efforts all round for the USA and well done to Sam.

Ali's write up suggests the gate was on the route she wanted to take - not sure this mystery is quite solved yet...

Yeah, I just saw that Ali's bad mistake was on the exact same leg that Marten Bostrom was complaining about

It's my understanding that Ali's mistake was on the same leg but not in the same place -- in her case she was flustered by an opening that was mapped correctly as passable but looked like a private area to her in the terrain.

The gate in the middle of this image is where Ali had trouble.

Out of curiosity, how do model events work for the Sprint? Are they set up with enough race-day realism, so that a runner practicing on the model map can get a good feel for what out-of-bounds and in-bounds areas will look like?

So it's the gate on the other side of this passage.

The model event for this year's sprint was only open for about an hour. The organizers boated all the teams to Venice and set them loose. There was plenty of atmosphere and opportunity to spend time on similar terrain by the same mapper

The model event for Sprint Relay will have both laser and offset printed versions of the map...
... because as the newest format, innovation is crucial and the race will be run on laser-printed maps.

Or maybe the original plan was offset, but someone closed a gate and they needed to reprint.

Had to wait for better internet, but here are some photos from the sprint qual and final.

but someone closed a gate and they needed to reprint.

;-)
I'm still having difficulty believing that the open/closed gate caused such problems. Is that really so confusing? Is that really what the problem was

It wasn't just the opened/closed gate per MBB, also the existence or non-existence of purple canopies in that same area (one existed where there wasn't one mapped, one vice versa).

That is maybe a little easier to understand, but still these are marking tables & chairs in front of restaurants right? These are things that will change (like gates being open or closed) and really the runners should be aware of that and able to take that information with appropriate flexibility - otherwise it will be impossible to make a sprint map in such an area. Or am I still missing something???

I don't think you are missing a thing, AZ.

Bostrom writes about his World Champs Fail. If you expect this to be, as I did, an introspective and humble reflection about personal failure and improvement then you are wrong. If you expect, as I should have, that it is about finding lots of problems by other people then, congratulations!

I do think some of the map issues in the document may be worth addressing. I also think that it is easier to be taken seriously if you limit your criticisms to things that are legitimately problematic.

Yes, the title suggested an introspective take, but somehow I wasn't surprised by the gentleman's polemic.

While the IOF Athletes' Commission is looking at the quality of the mapping, maybe they could look at the relevance of rule 23.8