Left, Right, or Straight: Leg Analysis #20 Part 2.

 

Left, Right, or Straight: Leg Analysis #20

Part 2.

We're back today with more analysis of Leg 9–10 
from the M18 long course at the Baltic Junior Cup, held on October 25, 2025, in Estonia.

Running Perpendicular to the Leg Line = Standing Still

When planning a route, segments that involve running perpendicular (or nearly so) to the leg line — instead of toward the next control point — should generally be avoided, unless absolutely required by the terrain or by navigational necessity to establish an exact position.

But if there are no such obstacles, we should always aim to move in the direction of the next control.

Let’s look at a real-world example. Below is a comparison of GPS tracks from three participants of similar running speed (Pärtel Külvik, Joel Börjesson Eriksson and Villem Piirimäe). 

One of them chose a left-hand route that looped around to reach a road. It took this runner 2 minutes and 10 seconds just to reach the road.

On the image bellow, you can see how far the other participants had already progressed along the leg during the same time.

The result? After 2 minutes and 10 seconds of running, the athlete who took the left-hand route still had almost the entire original leg distance left to cover. His only gain was a short stretch of road running — around 250–300 meters — as a form of compensation.

The time saved by running on the road instead of through the forest on that short segment was about 30 to 40 seconds.
It means the total time cost was 2:10 minus the 30–40 seconds saved on the road — resulting in a net loss of about 1 minute and 30 seconds, simply due to the route choice.

Source: https://www.livelox.com/Viewer/Baltic-Junior-Cup-2025-long-M/M18?classId=1074541&live=false&tab=player

Aleksandr Alekseyonok, November 20, 2025.