By Ryan Moore
This is a guide on how to plan challenging courses. It is aimed at forest events, but there are some takings-away for sprint events as well. You can take this guide as literally as you want, either following along exactly or just using it as inspiration.
My philosophy for planning challenging red courses can be summarised into a few points.
Planning major route choice legs that could be used on the course
Don’t start planning from the start triangle. Instead, try to identify as many interesting route choice legs as you can. Print out the map or open it in an application that you can draw on. Draw 2-5 potential route choice legs that you could use in your course(s).
Route choice legs are usually one of two different categories.
In this type of route choice, the runner can either pick a straight route, which is usually worse running (such as a hill or rougher terrain), and a longer but faster running route (such as a track or flat/open ground). An example of this type of route choice could be legs A or E in the figure above.
In this type of route choice, there are two legs of a similar distance, and the runner has to evaluate which route is better. Often the difference can be negligible for these route choices, but if planned well, one option can look deceptive and be slower, catching some runners out. An example of this type of route choice could be legs C or D in the figure above.
Connecting the route choice legs to create an idea for a complete course
Once you have identified a few key route choice legs on the course, start sketching out ways to link them together between the chosen start and the finish point to create a rough course of the desired length (usually 6-9km for Long Red, see Recommended Course Lengths ). You don’t have to identify other legs or control points at this stage, just link some of the route choice legs together in an organic way. Even if you don’t use all the route choice legs you identified for your most difficult course, remember that you can still use some the legs you left out for other courses (like a shorter red course).
It’s easy to think as a course as a series of control points. However, all the navigation occurs in the legs of the course, so we should think in terms of legs, not controls. If you know a interesting place to put a control, by all means do so, but for the majority of the course, legs should determine where the controls are placed.