PETER Mitchell spends a lot of time chasing cartoon characters, especially Big Bird from the popular TV series, Sesame Street. He may also be found tracking Bart Simpson, Kermit the Frog, and Snoopy as well as bicycles, running shoes and even circumnavigating New Zealand.
Mitchell’s journeys may sound a bit esoteric, but they are all carefully traced, digitally, on a map. The Safety Beach runner follows what he calls a “creative pastime – GPS Art”. Before setting out on a run Mitchell draws his course on a map of the area which is then able to be called up on his sports watch. The art, outlines of cartoon characters or objects, developed from maps is then followed by the Mornington Misfits social running group.
“In the early days roughly formed images that we could see in previous runs were altered to form more precise outlines of objects such as animals,” Mitchell said. “It all started when the Mornington Misfits were running and one lady went missing in action and others went back to find her. On viewing the map after the run, it kind of looked like the outline of Big Bird from Sesame Street. “A couple of us subsequently tweaked the course to look more like Big Bird and it soon became a thing in the local running community. The Big Bird Trail was born.”
The nine kilometre Mount Martha-based trail is now followed by hundreds of runners, with an open monthly group run to “run the Bird”, which includes undulating hills, dirt roads, a boardwalk and The Briars community forest. “There are organised Big Bird events too, like our annual winter Solstice fundraiser and the Big Bird World Championships, where Big Bird himself comes along.” Runners can record their efforts on the exercise app Strava.
Mitchell says he uses two approaches to his GPS exercise art, street routed and freestyle. The street routed art has a basic line image superimposed over a map. “I try to best route a course that follows the image on my exercise app [and] sync the route to my sports watch and go and run it, as it helps navigate me.” “On the ground there’s often an access issue or two,” Mitchell said. “Sometimes an unexpected fence to climb or road closure. “When I ran my world map my friend and I literally went straight through the State Library and a couple of shopping arcades. It was very memorable to say the least.”
The generally shorter freestyle art (two to five kilometres) is usually more intricate in design and run on sports grounds or in parks. “I superimpose a basic line image over a satellite map of the area and use landmarks such as cricket pitches, paths, small buildings, trees, playgrounds and car parks to help me best follow the image once on the ground,” Mitchell said. “This technique is much slower as you need to keep stopping to see where you are going next and get your bearings. It’s very detailed and often slow going.
“A group of us ran my 55km map of Australia over Australia Day weekend, then a Kiwi friend asked me when we were running New Zealand so I designed that too and we ran it at Matariki weekend, the NZ Indigenous New Year.” Other courses drawn and followed by Mitchell and his friends have included a bicycle inside a map of France during the Tour de France as well as the cartoon characters.
“It’s evolved over time and my world map piece surprised me with just what’s possible. It’s been overwhelming as hundreds of thousands of people from all over the world have seen it and hundreds have felt the need to comment, which has been quite amazing.”
Mitchell believes there is a niche market for his GPS art “mainly in the sporting industry to promote such things as events, clubs, logos and equipment”. “I just want people to enjoy it and hopefully get active too. Whether that’s to get inspired and try making their own new art, or running the Big Bird Trail or seeing my larger pieces and just enjoying them for what they are, whatever that is.”
The next Big Bird Trail running event on Sunday 8 September includes a 42.2km marathon option.
Details: Strava Big Bird GPS Art; Instagram: bigbirdgpsart; Facebook: Big Bird Trail
First published in the Mornington News – 3 September 2024
