Graeme Ackland, Competitions convenor said:

In view of comments above, I should clarify…

This is NOT a proposal for a new Scottish Championship.  The SOA Fixtures and Competitions people will not be asking clubs to put on extra events.  We’re simply making a coherent series out of those events which we observe that clubs want to do.

Steve makes a good point about juniors.  Some urban events have excellent junior courses, others don’t.  Andy has proposed an U16 class and I assume that the likely quality of courses for this group will be a consideration.

Roger Scrutton said:

Yes, I do agree with Steve’s sentiments.  I would not like to see urban displace the more conventional types of orienteering, especially those that we use to attract newcomers into the sport.  Newcomers might become urbanistas in due course, but it is through CATI’s and easily accessible Colour-Coded events that the majority of newcomers are recruited in the first place.

Stephen Wilson said:

Of course, I welcome this exciting new initiative. However, there are two issues we need to be mindful of.

1. While an enjoyable complement to conventional orienteering that opens up the opportunity for orienteering in new places, urban orienteering can never offer the pure technical challenge of forest orienteering and so inevitably favours “runners” over “navigators”.

2. More seriously, there are two major issues with juniors. On one hand, the best M/W16s and M/W14s will be running technical challenging courses in forest orienteering but are restricted to much less challenging “urban lite” courses by the BOF insurance rules, and so may well decide not to bother with urban events. On the others hand, parents might well have safety concerns about younger juniors taking part in urban events (BOF rules notwithstanding) and again choose to stay away. In both cases, I have a real concern that too much emphasis on urban orienteering may put juniors off our sport.

In summary, I support this initiative provided it is in addition to, rather than instead of, forest orienteering.

Clive Masson said:

I’ll chip in a planning observation.  St Andrews is quite a big map (3.5km x 2km) but with a limited set of start / finishes (parking and toilets) and some sterile areas I’d be struggling to lay on new and interesting courses every year.  In fact I think an event every 2nd year would be the maximum.  Also, as Graeme know, snow and ice on pavements means a cancellation so you couldn’t plan an urban event in Dec, Jan or Feb with confidence.  Perhaps slightly fewer events, visiting areas other than the cities every second year might be more appealing?

Andy Paterson said:

Thanks Roger. I know Paul Caban has circulated some thoughts for feedback regarding rejuvenating the SOSOLs series which have been struggling a bit the past couple of years. I’m not sure how urban would fit into SOSOLs though with the issue regarding junior courses being a concern. Certainly holding an Urban/Sosol double header may be a positive option for the future.

Roger Scrutton said:

If we are close to a full set of 7 urban events already, then I’m more comfortable with this plan.  I was concerned that other events would get squeezed, for example, CATIs on a Saturday, where newcomers can be introduced to orienteering, and I am aware that the SoSOL series is struggling to be quorate this Autumn-Spring, perhaps as a result of a switch of the odd one or two events to urban. 
If 7 urban events are needed, and part of the rationale for the league is easier access for Scottish orienteers to urban events, then perhaps another northern club should grab a slot.

Andy Paterson said:

Roger - FVO also have an event in the fixture list for later on in the year to add to Graeme’s list of “possibles”. Hopefully its clear from the proposal that its not the intention to try and compete against forest O - merely to add a bit of interest to the urban events going on in Scotland.

Bill - to be honest I think the main barrier would be whether it could be reconciled with the automatic scoring system. Not sure about that. Another possible fly in the ointment might be that in some of the urban races the older categories are actually the more competitive in terms of numbers so running “up” might actually be more productive in terms of points which doesnt seem fair if these were to count in both categories.

Bill Melville said:

I can’t understand why points gained running up a class don’t count towards your age-group total. It would help to make things more competitive both for the individual and the age-group.

Graeme Ackland said:

Not easily Roger…
There’s no filter on the events website for Urban.  Looking through level C and above for 2011

Edinburgh
North Muirton (sprint)
Erskine
Strathhaven
Lossiemouth
Deans

Plus a huge slew of level-D’s

What Andy is proposing is *not* an SOA competition where
clubs will be allocated events they may not wish to do, its simply using what we think is already there. 

Without prejudicing Andy’s selection, I’m already aware of plans for 2012 races from EUOC, ESOC, STAG, INT and MAROC
I doubt we’ll be twisting arms too hard to get to seven.

Roger Scrutton said:

Would it be possible for Graeme or Andy to provide, for info., a list of the relevant urban events we have had in Scotland recently with the years they were held.  I recall Edinburgh, St Andrews, Glasgow, Erskine, Strathaven, Lossie, Perth, Deans & Dechmont (50%).  I think it would be helpful to have this info so that we can judge the likely impact of extra events on the current fixture list.  My guess is that we are already more than half way to having 7 events, but even three more could simply have the effect of diverting runners away from existing events in return for the considerable effort it takes to stage an urban event (permissions, securing controls, police etc).

Graeme Ackland said:

I don’t think any England-based, English club runners have completed the SOL series for many years.  Of course we’re delighted to have them at our events, but I doubt if any will complete the series.  If they do, we should rethink, but it’s better to act on what people actually do than what they decide to moan about.

Andy Paterson said:

Thanks Clive and Gordon
I’ve sent out an email to all (Scottish) clubs to see who is interested in having an event included. Hope to have some more info within a couple of weeks.

The BOF number is a requirement for the scoring system only - nothing to do with the SOA. I understand that without this you get signficant complications with duplicate results etc. Not having a BOF number isnt an issue for entering the individual events, but you wont get a score for the league. No-one so far has come up with a better solution.

The requirment to be a member of a Scottish club was suggested to reduce the possible impact on the league scoring of having events which are also Nopesport Urban League events. For example if two of the seven events in the Scottish League were also Nopeposrt events, the impact of the additional English runners on the average points scored might reduce the relevance of these events. Of course it might also have the effect of encouraging Scottish runners to go to the less popular events. It would be interesting to get some feedback from Scottish orienteers who would be likely to compete in this league as to whether they see this as an issue or not? At present most of the feedback on Nopesport is from disgruntled non-Scottish runners and it certainly wasnt our intention to offend them.

Gross said:

The proposal on Nopesport indicates that it is a requirement to be a member of BOF to participate in this competition. I do not support this requirement.

The above proposal paints a different picture indicating that membership of a Scottish club is the requirement. It later staes that a local or national BOF number is required.

Some explanation is required.

However, this is obviously a good move for fans of Urban O… good luck! Having founded the Scottish Short Race Series years ago I know how hard it is to get these things off the ground!

Clive Masson said:

We’d be delighted to add the St Andrews Urban event on Sun 4 Mar to such a league.  This is already a double header with the Scottish Sprints on Sat 3 Mar.  Courses match those proposed and this event will also be a Nopesport urban event.