• Many non-orienteers will be using the Canmore Nordic Center this weekend. Please be aware of hikers, mountain bikers, and disc-golf players. Be courteous to other users of the park so that we are welcome guests again in the future.
• It's a hilly sprint which is why the courses are a bit on the shorter side. Be cautious with all the tricky trail junctions. Enjoy the downhill finish.

From down-town Canmore, follow signs to the Canmore Nordic Center. Park at the Day Lodge. The Assembly area is in the stadium area behind the Day Lodge.

• If your elapsed time in the Sprint was less than 30 minutes, your start time is 1:00pm plus your elapsed time in the sprint.
• If your elapsed time in the Sprint was more than 30 minutes, your start time is 12:45pm
• If you did not run in the Sprint your start time is 12:45pm

Course closing: 2:30pm (max time is 120 minutes)

• It�s ABSOLUTELY essential that you watch for roller skiers on the paved trails whenever you cross them. Please avoid running on the asphalt roller ski paths - and cross them at right angles when necessary.
• The trail builders have been hard at work and they are extending the "Orange Loop". We have mapped some small sections of it, but runners on the longer courses will encounter some unmapped sections of this single track.

Same parking / directions as for the morning's sprint race

• Some trails can be very faint on the ground, and in general smaller trails should not be relied on for navigation.
• There has been some blow-down in areas of the map. Some areas of blow-down are marked with vertical green lines, but unfortunately we have not been able to update the map to show all the new blow-down areas.
• Outhouses across Highway 1A, approx 550m from Start/Finish.
• water levels (as of August 22nd)are much higher than shown on the map, often up to a form line around the water feature. In particular, courses 2 and 3 should note that two lakes shown in the middle of the courses have combined into one, with an island where the causeway separating them used to be.
• Courses 1 and 2 have two flagged routes on their courses. These are to guide runners between controls where there is no obvious path or other handrail. They are shown on the control description as a dashed line between two circles and shown on the map as a dashed purple line. On the ground, there will be orange streamers hanging from the trees. Follow them and they will take you from one control to the next.
• Safety bearing for all courses is East to the road.

Bus Shuttle from YMCA

There is no parking at this event. Everyone must take the bus shuttle from the Event Centre (even if you aren't staying there!).

To the race:
The first bus will leave the YMCA in front of Bowfort Lodge at 9:10am. One bus will leave every 20 minutes.

Return from the race:
Busses will leave from the event site every 20 minutes. The last bus will leave at 12:40pm.

• Sunset is about 8:30pm
• Super junior course stays on major trails in sight of the camp area
• Junior & Youth course may go just out of sight of the camp area
• All other courses travel into the forest and fields surrounding the camps.
• Control sites are marked as usual with a flag on a stand as well as by one or two pin flags with light-reflecting tape.
• Don't forget your headlamp!
• WARNING. The two long courses (Youth Plus, Venerable, Expert, Elite categories) cross the camp access road. As you drive in to the camp in the daytime you will notice a yellow rope on the east side of the access road. Please be VERY CAREFUL when crossing the road in the night-O so you do not get injured by this rope.

• There has been some significant blow down on some patches of this map. The C and D runners will be most affected by this on their long legs. We have not attempted to map this deadfall, so please be aware that you will find some unexpected zones of difficult running, despite what the map shows. We believe (and hope) that all teams will be affected equally by this blow down.
• Because of the forking it will not be possible to provide separate control descriptions.
• On the map the controls will be numbered with both the sequence code (1,2,3, etc) and the control code (eg: 49). For example, the first control on Leg A1 will be marked as: "1 (66)". This means the first control has the code number 66 on it. This is so you can quickly check that you are at the right control.

• we are trying out some new relay concepts that are not well supported in the timing software. Therefore we are expecting some serious problems with giving people their proper splits and printing results. Our main focus is to use the timing software to verify that runners went to the correct controls - if we also manage to get the proper times we'll be astonished! But of course we'll be able to tell who won the race just by keeping track of who crosses the finish line in which order.
• Immediately before the race we will give the instructions about how the change-over area is to work. Please be present for this and listen closely.
• Each team will carry a special Barebones Baton in the race

Team Composition

•  You should make teams if possible from your club (or your region, or your country).
• We will help you fill teams. In particular we will assign �A� runners to all teams following Saturday dinner. If you have a strong desire for a particular �A� runner you can put him/her on your team � but we reserve the right to over-ride.
•  You must submit your team lists to Richard before Saturday evening. Richard will assign you a team number � it is critical you know this number because that is how you will find your maps during the race. Perhaps write the number on your arm before the race!

Each team will have four runners, named A, B, C, D. Each runner will run two legs. Leg difficulty is as follows:

• Runner A - suitable for super juniors - all controls on obvious handrails. No forking.
• Runner B - intermediate, shortish - suitable for juniors, recreational, sport, or super-venerable
• Runner C - technical, shortish - suitable for "Expert" and "Youth Plus" category runners
• Runner D - technical, long - suitable for "Elite" category runner

Each runner will have a certain handicap point value. Points values are based on your age as of 31st December this year as in the table below. Add up all runner's point value to get the teams category. There will be three categories: 4-7 point teams, 8-11 point teams, and 12+ point teams.

Leg Descriptions & map scales

Each team member will run twice - one sprint and one middle distance leg.

Your team's maps will all be in one bag (8 maps in all). Maps will be identified by the leg number and the runner number. For example 1A is the first leg map for runner A, and 4B is the forth leg map for runner B.

As you can tell, the mass start will include almost everyone. To prepare for this you must do lots of mental preparation so that you are able to focus on your own navigation and not be distracted by others. To help with this mental preparation, here are two video clips from the last relay that our club had a team in... Video One and Video Two (warning: these take a while to download, but they are worth it).

Following: While following is generally frowned upon in orienteering (actually it is quite against the rules), an exception is made for relays. In fact a lot of the fun of running in a relay is being in a "train" - moving together with other runners much faster than you would if you were alone. But beware - the course planner has some tools to break up trains - most importantly beware of "forking"...

Forking: There will be forking on all legs for runners B,C,D - this means that you will not necessarily have the same course as other runners on your same leg. However, by the end of the race all the teams have done exactly the same course, just in different orders. So, some of the time following is helpful, and other times it is not. To master the relay is to know when to follow and when to go it alone.

Second Mass Start

A second mass start, for all runners not yet started, will be held at the organizer's discretion. It will likely be just after the winning team finishes. We expect the following fastest times:

Leg 1: 10 minutes
Leg 2: 35 minutes
Leg 3: 12 minutes
Leg 4: 25 minutes
Leg 5: 12 minutes

This event takes place at the Event Center - the Rocky Mountain YMCA. The start/finish are at Hector Lodge, about a 1.5 km (approx) walk from the event center parking.

If you are coming for the day, please drive past Bowfort Lodge and park at the 'outfitting parking lot' - easily identified by the large number of canoes. If you are staying at the camp, then a limited number of cars can be driven from the main parking to the 'outfitting parking lot'.