## 4 Discussion
### Analysis by Age Groups and Gender Differences
As a result of these selection and maturation processes, RAE contributes to the premature elimination of athletic potential, preventing younger athletes from having the necessary time to develop their sports experience [1; 81]. In fact, it has been proposed that athletes with lower relative age are more likely to experience negative sports experiences and quit the sport at an earlier age [12]. This is especially the case when sports development systems introduce selection processes and representative competition levels [83]. While the magnitude of RAE remains relatively constant with age in the younger categories, in the male elite category, the effect intensifies. This finding contradicts reports in other team and individual sports, where RAE tends to attenuate at higher performance levels [1]. This suggests that, in male orienteering, access to the elite category may depend more on the accumulation of advantages gained during early formative stages--such as experience, maturation, and quality training--rather than on current performance evaluations. In the elite category, when analyzing RAE independently in each subgroup, it is observed that in the male group, statistically significant differences are identified between birth quartiles, while in the female group, no significant differences are detected when analyzing either quartiles or semesters. Specifically, in the male elite category, the data indicate that the probability of an athlete born in Q1 being part of this group is almost double that of one born in Q3 (OR = 2.054). This finding suggests that, within the male group, RAE is more pronounced, while in the female group, the birth date distribution is more homogeneous. Several studies [1; 18; 75] have shown that RAE depends on the competitive level. In particular, they have observed a greater RAE in the early stages of sports development and a more pronounced impact on pre-elite athletes than on elite athletes, which does not align with the findings of this study. According to [PERSON] et al. [2], if there is already a skewed distribution throughout the licensed athlete population in a given sport, it would be expected that this asymmetry would also be reflected at the elite level. However, this pattern is not evident in this study. Despite the distribution of the TF population being significantly different from that of those born in Spain, its effect is notably smaller than that observed in the male elite subgroup or category. This suggests that the asymmetric birth date distribution among elite athletes is not merely a reflection of the distribution of licensed athletes (TF), but could be attributed to RAE. In contrast, in the female elite category, no statistically significant differences have been identified. This could be because athletes born in the later months of the year return to sports practice at later stages, after having had fewer development opportunities than their peers born in the earlier months of their cohort during childhood and adolescence [18]. Other explanations suggest that athletes born in the later months of the year have developed adaptive strategies that favor their continued participation in sports [75] or that, conversely, older athletes quit the sport at earlier ages [75; 84]. Finally, in the elite category of our study, female participation (\(n\) = 520) is approximately 40% lower than male participation (\(n\) = 883). This lower internal competition means that selection processes are less strict [75], which reduces the presence of RAE [39]. Among these explanations, the most plausible in the context of orienteering could be the late return hypothesis, given that female participation in the elite category is significantly lower than in the male category. This suggests that many women who reach this level may have followed less linear trajectories, in contrast to men, whose progression seems more aligned with the relative age advantage accumulated in earlier stages.