Not stopping at controls/checkpoints is a key part of mastering faster orienteering. It’s about control-flow, or moving through the control smoothly, which is about the approach and planning the exit from the control.

For the approach, you use the symbols in your control description paper to work out the features close to the control and the control’s position relative to them. A control might be close to a boulder, but to the east side of it – and this would be shown in the control description. Of course, you will need to know the symbols denoting this information.

Planning the exit is about looking ahead of the control immediately ahead of you to the next and plotting a direction and something of the route in advance. This route planning and visualising in advance is one of the major challenges of orienteering.