The Cross Country Rally is a branch of motorcycling where the conductive abilities of the pilots, resistance and navigation are mixed. It is in the navigation where I will deepen in this edition.
For navigation in the Cross Country Rally we use several instruments that will help us find the correct route, through the interpretation of road books that the organizers deliver one day before each stage for the pilots to study.
The main instruments used are:
Roadbook --> is a box where the road book is installed and advanced and reversed manually and remotely from a controller located on the pilot's handlebar. Here the road book is installed in the form of a parchment where the most relevant information ordered according to the kms of competition is delivered.
Odometer --> kilometer counter that is used to balance the information provided by the road book. It advances automatically as the front wheel turns, but it also allows remote intervention through a button on the handlebar. This adjustment is mainly to square when we make navigation errors or there is a lag.
CAP --> This instrument is a digital compass, where 0º is north, 90º is east, etc. This is used to navigate in sectors where we do not have references such as trees, poles, etc.
GPS --> unlike what most people think, the use of GPS is limited only to check the passage through different points and for later analysis by the organization that we have followed the correct route.
The navigation is carried out by advancing the Roadbook in order to see km by km what is coming on the route, whether it is a danger, change of course, etc. Which is described by a standard symbology. We are interpreting this according to the kilometers that the odometer gives us.
There are sectors, such as in the dunes, where there is not much reference and the use of the cap is necessary to follow a correct course, so that we are tracing courses in the desert.
The correct way to know that we are on the correct route is when the GPS is activated automatically when being in a certain radius of a waypoint (radius that goes from 300 meters to 3 km), information that must coincide with what we deliver the roadbook. The GPS goes with the arrow that indicates the next point deactivated, until we enter this radius.
This is a discipline of a lot of practice and interpretation, since practically everything is done manually, the instruments do not adjust automatically to the place where you are, so you are forced to read each reference that they give you to go through the right place and be aware of the dangers that exist.
