MTBO is big in Britain and Europe and specially France. Australia had its first national champs in November 98 and now it's here in NZ! Read on for a plain no-nonsense description. Or visit aucklandmtb.co.nz for an illustrated introduction.
In a normal MTBO event you have about 10 control points marked on a map. You have to visit them in order, using the track info to find the best route. Competitors start at intervals, and the fastest to do the course is the winner.
Control points are easy to find, they are all on or beside tracks, it's all about finding the best route. The map shows how good the riding is on all the trails, and how steep the country is. Courses are designed to be won in about an hour.
The Wairarapa Orienteering Club website has the biggest collection of MTBO maps to look at. Map files are big, be patient as they load. Click on the little maps to see the bigger versions.
For some advice on what to expect, some hints have been assembled. Some of these will apply to bikers taking up MTBO, others will apply to orienteers getting onto a bike.
There's a British variation called Trailquest. Here the map covers a bigger area and you get a fixed amount of time to visit as many controls as you can. The further ones are worth more points, and the time allowed is several hours. The map is a standard topo one, you have to guess the ridability of the tracks.
And New Zealand has a long-distance variation, called the Cyclic Saga. It's like a Trailquest but over two days. You get 7 hours on the first day and you must arrive at a given campsite where the organisers have ferried your gear. You get another 6 hours the next day to visit more controls and get back to base. It's been running on Banks Peninsula in mid-March since 1995.