Discussion: Not just elite

Please come and chip in with your thoughts to SOA conversation next Monday. Junior scene where it all starts is def high priority, there’s a mixed gender panel and even an old git :-) Might not be able to cover everything in an hour though, so very much just a starting point!

Are there some actual gender equality proposals to discuss?

We introduced "anyone can run any course" years ago, so I guess its just a question of reallocating Scottish Champs, SOL prizes to different colour courses? There's currently only one course difference at the senior age-groups and two in the juniors because?

Also: extra points for being a woman in the relay handicap?

I quite like the SOL structure as you can run whichever course you like and thus pick who you want to compete against (generally my husband). I do think that if we get to the stage where we decide men and women run the same course - or course specifications are altered across the ages bandings to become more equal - the elite women are one of the least likely groups to kick off about it so the consultation will have to be widened eventually.

From the (elite/junior-focussed) discussions I've heard, I think the idea is more to equalise the winning times than to run the actual same course.

Equalising winning times is one aspect of it, but there's potentially more to it than that. This conversation won't be about proposals but more about exploring what issues may (or may not) exist within the sport. I think in many ways O does much better than many other sports, but let's hear from people what their thoughts are!

Not that I wish to crash your party, but the key question to me would be ‘what can we do to attract and retain more women in O’.

If equal winning times or course lengths is one way of answering that question, then great. But I don’t think it’s an objective in itself?

Guideline winning times are already identical for sprint/middle and vets long course*.

* Under the original rules. They used an algorithm to convert winning time to distance so its not obviously written down.

But there are unintended consequences, Course guidelines now are scaled to M21 - if the M21 get shorter so will everything else. This already happened once when they changed the reference course from "M21E" to black - winning times went down by the same ratio 69/90 - hence the 46min winning time on my "Long" course at the last BOC.