Auckland Orienteering Series (AOS) 2016
Introduction
The Auckland Orienteering Series is an annual competition of foot-orienteering events operated by the Auckland (AK), Counties-Manukau (CM) and North West (NW). This year competitors are awarded points for their result in each of the eleven events and the best eight are added together to obtain a series score. The points provide the data for course and age-class competitions.
Courses
The following table shows the courses available and a description of the difficulty of each.
| Course | Difficulty |
|---|---|
| Red 1 | Very long and difficult |
| Red 2 | Long and difficult |
| Red 3 | Medium length and difficult |
| Red 4 | Short and difficult |
| Red 5 | Very short and difficult |
| Orange Long | Intermediate in difficulty |
| Orange Short | Intermediate in difficulty |
| Yellow | Easy - for beginners |
| White | Very Easy - for children |
You may enter any course. You should choose a course that suits your navigational skill, experience and fitness and with a length consistent with the time you wish to spend on the course.
Course lengths in kilometers and the climb in meters for hilly courses will be given in the event information to help you choose a suitable course.
Course Lengths
Course lengths and climbs are set according to the expected win time in minutes (EWT) and climb guidelines in the following table for the fastest seniors in the listed age-classes for Red 1- 5; the fastest entering the orange courses irrespective of age-class and median times for the yellow and white courses.
| Course | Age classes | EWT (minutes) | Climb |
|---|---|---|---|
| Red 1 | M21 | 60 | |
| Red 2 | M18, M20, M40, M50, W21 | 55 | |
| Red 3 | M16, M60, W18, W20, W40, W50 | 50 | |
| Red 4 | M70, W16, W60 | 45 | <= 5% |
| Red 5 | M80, W70, W80 | 40 | <= 5% |
| Orange Long | M14 | 45 | |
| Orange Short | W14 | 45 | |
| Yellow | M12, W12 | 30 | |
| White | M10, W10 | 30 |
Your Age Class
Your age at 31 Dec 2016 determines your age class for the age-class competition outlined below. You enter in the age-class in which you reach the designated age during the year, for example, M50, means a man of at least fifty years and less than 60 years in age on December 31 2016.
Junior age classes are those below 21 years and the age means up to and including the age, for example, W16 means older than 14 years and up to and including 16 years on 31 Dec 2016.
| Birth year | Age class |
|---|---|
| 1927-36 | 80 |
| 1937-46 | 70 |
| 1947-56 | 60 |
| 1957-66 | 50 |
| 1967-76 | 40 |
| Open | 21 |
| 1996-1997 | 20 |
| 1998-1999 | 18 |
| 2000-2001 | 16 |
| 2002-2003 | 14 |
| 2004-2005 | 12 |
| 2006-2016 | 10 |
Competitors aged 20 years and under may elect an older age grade up to and including 21. If you are 40 years or older you may enter a younger age-class down to and including M/W21. The 21 class is open to everyone.
The competitions
(a) Age classes
The age classes are listed in the table above.
(b) Course classes
The course classes are Red1M (Red 1 Men), Red1W, Red2M, Red2W, Red3M, Red3W, Red4M, Red4W, Red5M, Red5W, Orange Long M, Orange Long W, Orange Short M, Orange Short W, Yellow M, Yellow W, White M and White W
Your name and the points you receive at events are entered into the appropriate age and course classes.
You may compete in a course at an AOS event and have your result published without being part of the series competitions. If you do not wish to take part in a competition or there is an error in the age class in published results please advise us at auckoc@hotmail.com
Eligibility
You must be a member of a New Zealand orienteering club to be awarded AOS points and you must be a member of an Auckland club to be eligible for an AOS certificate. You will not earn AOS points in a second course you do at an event. Please advise registration at an event if you are registering for a second course.
AOS points
The points you receive for a race are based on the course you enter and how well you did compared with the others in your course. Those running the average time for a course will score points equivalent to the weighting factors given in the table below.
The points above and below this are calculated using the difference between your time and the mean time. People from the same age-class may do different courses.
| Course | Weight |
|---|---|
| Red 1 | 90 (80) |
| Red 2 | 70 (70) |
| Red 3 | 50 (60) |
| Red 4 | 35 (50) |
| Red 5 | 25 (40) |
| Orange Long | 25 (35) |
| Orange Short | 20 (30) |
| Yellow | 15 (25) |
| White | 10 (20) |
Course planners and controllers are awarded points for their event following the last AOS event and is equal to the largest of the points earned in the other events.
Points Calculation
Calculation of points is done using the Standard Algorithm of the orienteering event results program SportSoftware.
Points = 1000 + (200 * (Course Mean Time - Runners Time) / Course Standard Deviation)
The points are then adjusted based on the course weighting and divided by 10 to give top scores of around 100 points per race.
Adjusted Points = Points / 10 * Course Weighting
When mean time and standard deviation are calculated for a course, only those runners' times from the list of grades in the Course Lengths table will be used. This stops the skewing of points caused when top runners run down in a shorter course and get a fast time compared to the regular runners on that course. All runners are given points based on the calculation, even those that are running down in a lower grade.