Comparison of ‘Nishi no ya oku ike’ with WOC sprint terrain

Land Forms: The ridges in Nishi no ya are higher than the WOC sprint terrain and the slopes are generally steeper. There are some areas of complex contour detail in the WOC terrain that are not present at Nishi no ya.

Vegetation: Nishi no ya is covered in pine forest with mostly dense under-vegetation. Most of the terrain is very poor runnabilty except for a few small areas of 'white' forest. The WOC sprint terrain is quite different with a mixed pine and deciduous forest that is generally ‘light green’: reasonably runnable but low visibility. In much of the Nishi no ya terrain the ground is covered in ferns which range from 0.5-1.5m in height. These are mapped with ISOM symbols 407 and 409 (green stripes). There are some patches of similar vegetation in the WOC sprint terrain but it is generally not as thick as at Nishi no ya. There is no semi-open terrain at Nishi no ya similar to some parts of the WOC sprint terrain.

Roads and Paths: The network of walking paths in the WOC sprint terrain is similar to Nishi no ya.

Both areas are mapped according to ISSOM (April 2005 version). The WOC sprint area was mapped by Per Ola Olsson with checking by Rob Plowright. Nishi no ya was mapped by Rob Plowright. The Nishi no ya map is not mapped as accurately as the WOC sprint map.

These courses were set by Rob Plowright (WOC sprint course setter). However since the nature of the terrain is quite different it should not be assumed that these courses are particularly similar in style to the WOC sprint courses.