The Ski Orienteering Commission in Cooperation with the Map Commission was working hard over the summer to update the ISSkiOM. The main goal was to create the possibility to organise ski orienteering events on areas and venues that have so far been unattainable for ski orienteering for environmental and landowner reasons. The new symbols also make it easier to organize ski orienteering events in smaller ski stadiums or with just artificial snow tracks.
They are not intended to replace the established practises on course setting or the inherit characteristics of our sports, but merely complement them to increase adaptability of ski orienteering into new arenas, terrains and snow conditions. The symbols will be tested during the coming season in IOF Events, feedback collected and analyzed, and if necessary amendments made and further instructions issued.
The main changes are:
– Introduction of Tracks compulsory to stay on and where no shortcuts are allowed. The athletes are thus obliged to stay on the tracks. The tracks are depicted in Orange colour.
– Introduction of One-way compulsory tracks, where skiing is only allowed in one direction. This symbol is already in use in MTBO. The main use is for athlete safety or requirement from the land owners.
– Introduction of symbol 515 Impassable wall/fence into ski orienteering in a similar way as in Foot-O Sprint orienteering. Ski orienteering events are increasingly organized on ski or biathlon stadiums and this symbol can be used for safety as well as course setting reasons.
– Improved map readability by reducing the density of Yellow from 100 % to 75 % and by introducing a white mask/contour (0.15 mm on each side of the track) for a better readability.
These new symbols and features (Tracks compulsory to stay on; one way compulsory tracks; and impassable wall/fence) should be used very carefully and only in areas where they can be and are controlled by referees or video monitoring. The use in IOF Events must be approved by the Event Adviser and the athletes must be informed about their use in Event Bulletins and at the Team Officials Meeting.
The IOF Ski Orienteering Commission invites all interested persons to a short presentation meeting via Teams on Sunday 24th of November at 18:30 CET (UTC +1)
Find the presentation from the meeting here
Please follow this link to attend the meeting in MS Teams.