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Diablo Valley College

Event #4 of 6 in the BAOC 2022 Summer Series

Date: (Sat.) Jul. 23, 2022
Location: Pleasant Hill, CA
Event Director: - 610.715.8234
Course Setter: François Léonard
Type: C; This is the fourth event of the 2022 Summer Series. Beginners are welcome!

Course Setter’s Notes

By François Léonard

Diablo Valley College is a small campus with many different features that make it an excellent Sprint venue. As such, the courses and the map will follow Sprint rules as described further below. The climb is minimal and consists of stairs and small inclines.

Safety Note: When driving into or out of the parking lot near the assembly area, please drive slowly and be aware that runners might be crossing your path. Runners should pay attention to vehicular traffic.

Map

The map has been created and updated by several people through the years to keep pace with the morphing campus and evolution in Sprint mapping. The map was just updated by the course setter to the new ISSPrOM 2019-2 standard. Please read Matej Šebo’s excellent description of the new standard, with examples from the recent UC Berkeley event, here.

More specific details for this event are:

• There are areas under construction on the perimeter of the campus. These areas have been indicated as out of bounds with the pink Xed-out area symbol (see symbol 709 in the figure below). Please also note that anything marked olive-green is out of bounds and must not be run through. Linear dark-green features are hedges and must not be crossed. Also, as Dennis W. recently pointed out, on a Sprint map, “certain objects (fences, walls, streams, ponds, hedge rows, flower beds) can be designated as uncrossable or impassable. In such instances, it means that you are forbidden to cross it, go through it, climb it, jump over it, crawl under it, reach over or through it, etc.” Some of the map symbols for uncrossable features are shown here. Complete details of the Sprint-orienteering mapping standards can be found in this file (PDF/1.2MB).

• There are sections of the map with multi-level buildings; the new mapping standard allows us to capture this complexity more clearly. In addition to the link above, it is recommended that you review and understand this chart:

The middle column indicates how an upper lever (i.e., where you can go under) is represented on the map: diagonal lines with the color indicating the characteristic of that level. For example, if the second level is covered, you would see an area mapped with the middle column of symbol 214. If the second level is paved and open to the sky, it would be symbol 501. If the second level is out of bounds, it would be symbol 709.

In the control description, the “top” and “beneath” symbols are used to indicate if the control is on the upper or lower level, respectively.

Note that participants might need to deal with the multi-level structures more frequently than just at controls. Also, you may encounter doors and gates throughout the course. Don’t try to open a door or gate​—​this is not allowed and will not help you even if you succeed. If you come to an open door or gate, and are tempted to go through, read the map very carefully to make sure that it is permitted. Remember that you cannot go through a building unless a passage is indicated on the map, or through a gate if it is indicated as impassable on the map (i.e., even if the gate happens to be open).

Despite the power of the new mapping standard, there are situations at DVC that cannot be appropriately captured:

• The most important is that the IOF standard does not recommend mapping and using structures with more than two levels. DVC has buildings with up to four levels! To use as much of the campus as possible, only the first two levels are represented on the map in such situations.

• In some cases, the new symbols for multi-levels cannot be added without making the map unreadable. Here is an example (which is greatly enlarged):

The diagonal white and beige area (i.e., symbol 501) indicates that there is a second level. That level ends on the upper part of the building on the right side. It is possible to run under that upper part of the building as indicated with the red arrow, but you cannot be on top of this area, so there is no diagonal stripping. In principle, this light-grey area should be mapped as part of the building, with dashed lines “underneath” to indicate that it is possible to run under. Also, it is possible to run (blue arrow) under the second level between the impassable wall on the left and the grey area on the right. In principle, this should be indicated with triangles on both sides of the passage. Adding all of these symbols would make the map too cluttered, and it was decided to map the area as indicated in the figure. There are not many situations like these.

Courses

Three courses are being offered: Beginner, Short, and Long courses. The Short and Long courses count for the 2022 Summer Series. The course statistics are as follows:

    Course      Length      Climb    Controls
    Beginner    1.7 km     Minimal      14  
    Short       2.4 km     Minimal      19  
    Long        4.8 km     Minimal      29

The Start and Finish are near the assembly area, with no climb.

Road-running shoes are best, since almost all the running is on pavement or hard surfaces. Metal studs are not allowed.

The map will be printed at 1:3000 to take advantage of the richness of details. (The standard scale for Sprint maps is 1:4000, so distances might not be what you expect from the map.)

There will not be any water placed on the courses. So, if you think you will need it, please carry it with you.

Map Exchange on the Long Course

Because of the small campus size, the Long course will be divided in two sections, printed on two separate maps. The first map will show the Start Triangle up to control 18 (inclusive). At control 18, the competitors will switch to the second map. That map will show controls 18 to the Finish (inclusive). Competitors need to punch control 18 only once.

The second map will be available at control 18, but will not be in a map case to reduce waste. Competitors can either discard the first-loop map and re-use their map case, or add the second map on top of the first one in their map case. The map-exchange point is very close to the assembly area, so it will be easy to retrieve the map for the first loop if it was discarded.