Is it okay to follow somebody in MTBO?

[Bentnose]

I was doing mountain bike orienteering last weekend and the navigation wasn't going so well. The eventual winner caught up with me around half distance and I followed him for a couple of checkpoints, having no trouble keeping up with him, he just reads maps better than I do. I then felt a bit self concious about just following somebody and decided to go a different way, got lost and ended up losing 10 minutes in the last half of the event coming home fourth; it would have been an easy second if I'd just followed the leader home with just a 4 minute deficit instead of 14. I don't know if anyone else here does MTBO, but would you consider it okay to just follow somebody if it is the faster option home and you can stay with them?

[trojam]

Its up to you and what type of person you want to be.

[trailgumby]

1: It depends on whether the other guy knows where he's going
2: It depends on whether it's in the spirit of the rules

If the answer is "no" to _either_ of the above, I wouldn't do it.

Where's the achievement in cheating?

[Bentnose]

I don't think its considered 100% cheating, he's going where I'm going anyway so it could be hard to argue, it could be just you who would know, but it wouldn't be in the spirit of the rules as they send us all off at different times for a reason, the guy did know where he was going though, I had pretty much no clue what was going on, the map was just a spider web of tracks, the faster I went the more spidery it seemed. I have done score events were you all take off at the same time and then spent the entire race with another bloke though I wasn't following him maybe he was following me? Maybe the bloke who I was following on Saturday didn't realise I was following him for the couple of checkpoints that I did. Probably better off not purposely following somebody.

[Mulger bill]

Never done MTBO but I did a fair bit of it on foot as a teen. Isn't the challenge in navigation the main reason for entering these events?

Maybe it's me? I've never been a particularly competitive sort of bloke.

[alchemist]

The danger is that they don't know where they're going or could even be on a different course.

[Bentnose]

I knew who this bloke was, he was definately on the same course as me and I know he navigates amazingly well. This was a sprint race, 15 checkpoints in 5 kilometrers (took me nearly 40 minutes), so things get a bit hectic, on a longer race when I get to stretch my legs a bit more, I wouldn't want to follow anybody. The thing I find is when I know I'm on the same course as somebody else it can sometimes become a bit difficult not to follow somebody part of the way. Quite often I'll overtake someone, make a slight mistake and then be overtaking that person again and again and after a while i'll end up in a position were I'm basically following them. What can happen then is, I don't like following people so I go off down some alternate route and end up losing heaps of time. I enjoy MTBO, but I'm not particularily good at it.

[trailgumby]

it could be just you who would know, but it wouldn't be in the spirit of the rules

There's your answer.

You would know. Isn't the reason for engaging in these pursuits the challenge and the acquisition of a set of skills? If you know, then you're defeating yourself by cheating.

I doubt there's any serious money in it. If there is money or other reward in it and you cheat to get an advantage, you've just sold your integrity very cheaply.

[Bentnose]

Don't worry, I'm not in the habit of following people, just the opportunity came along, it doesn't very often and I didn't do it, apart from a few minutes, just wondering what other peoples thoughts were on it, which I'd say is a bit fat no. And there are no prizes in MTBO, its a very niche sport.