Academy / Reading a roadbook
Lesson
How to read a rally roadbook
A roadbook looks like a strange comic strip until someone explains it. This is the explanation we give on the first morning of every Bootcamp.
1 · The idea
A roadbook is a list of decisions
A rally roadbook is the route written as a series of boxes, one box for every point where you have to decide something: turn, go straight, slow down, watch out. Between the boxes you just ride and watch your trip meter.
You never navigate with a map. You navigate with distance. That is the single most important thing to understand.
2 · One box
The three columns of every box
Each line of the roadbook (each “box”) has three parts:
- Left: distances. The big number is the total distance from the start of the stage. The small number is the partial distance from the previous box.
- Middle: the tulip. A drawing of the junction seen from above. You always arrive from the bottom of the drawing, at the dot, and leave along the arrow.
- Right: notes. The cap (compass heading), danger marks and extra information: bridge, village, gate, rocks, “stay on main track”.
Read the box from left to right: how far, what it looks like, what to watch out for.
3 · Distance
Your trip meter is your best friend
The roadbook distances only work if your trip meter agrees with the person who drew them. Every bike and tyre is slightly different, so you correct the meter regularly: at a clear junction, compare the meter to the total distance in the box and adjust it.
A rule we repeat all week: when the meter says you have passed the box by more than a few hundred metres and you have not seen the junction, stop. Go back to the last box you were sure about. Nine times out of ten the mistake is there.
4 · Caps
Cap: the heading you should ride
The cap is a compass heading in degrees. 0° is north, 90° east, 180° south, 270° west. When tracks split in the desert or across a plateau, the drawing alone is not enough, and the cap tells you which way to point the front wheel.
Read it from your GPS or rally computer, not from the sun. And remember it is the direction of the track, not the direction of the final destination.
5 · Danger
Danger marks: ! !! !!!
One exclamation mark means caution, two mean danger, three mean serious danger: a hole, a drop, a ditch across a fast track. Three marks are a promise from the organiser that something there can hurt you. Slow down before you reach the box, not when you see the hazard.
6 · Waypoints
Waypoints: proof you were there
Rallies use waypoints to check that every rider followed the route. Some are visible and announced in the roadbook, others are hidden and only open on the GPS when you are close. Missing one usually costs a time penalty, so the boxes with waypoints deserve extra attention.
The exact types and validation radii differ from rally to rally. Dinaric Rally explains its own waypoints and equipment on the page Rally navigation equipment.
7 · Beginner mistakes
The five mistakes everyone makes
- Riding faster than you can read. Navigation speed is always slower than riding speed.
- Scrolling the roadbook too early and losing the box you are on.
- Following the tracks of the rider in front. They may be lost too.
- Not correcting the trip meter for half a stage.
- Ignoring the cap in open terrain because the drawing “looked obvious”.
May and July 2027
Learn it on real stages
Reading about a roadbook is the first step. Seven days of riding real Dinaric Rally stages with an instructor is the second.