After responses from the оrganisers and the IOF regarding the apparent Fair Play violation in the World Cup, I also received a response from the Foot Orienteering Athletes’ Advisory Group. Please find it below with their permission to publish it.
The Senior Event Adviser and the Chair of the FootO Commission declined to provide a public response. That is fully respected. However, it raises the unavoidable question of what could stop somebody from stating their opinion if they believe that everything was done according to the IOF Fair Play Principles.
This is a very interesting case with lots of learnings for future events. The IOF Fair Play Principles appear to be clear at face value: Organisers shall not allocate persons with a potential conflict of interest to key positions with access to secret/confidential event information.
None of the respondents claimed that the IOF Fair Play Principles were not violated, but there was a wide range of excuses why the violation of the Fair Play Principles did not matter.
In addition, there are also important learnings that may revolutionise our understanding of orienteering preparation at the elite level. For example, there appears to be a consensus that preparation for a given competition happens only during an event. So, as long as the course setters are not involved during competition with their teams, they are perfectly fine preparing their teams for the competition.
There are many rich and far-fetched learnings that we shall review in a separate post. What is clear, though, is that all these learnings shall provide a liberating feeling for future organisers of IOF events who might feel constrained by the IOF Fair Play Principles. No need to worry. There appears to be ample flexibility in getting around the letter and the idealistic interpretations of the rules and principles.
Well, this might not apply to China or other less reputable nations, but that is another story.
IOF Reflections 