As the gear mule, I came early but not the first to arrive. There were many JROTC meandering at the respective pavilion gearing up for their day of competitions. I made my way to the lower pavilion to find Bob, Janet and Russ discussing table arrangement strategy for the overly large and vacant pavilion. We were paid a visit by Tapio Halme and wife (who holiday in Ft. Lauderdale) that hosted the Finnish party that came to Orlando last month in search of Orienteering.
The weather forecasted for cloudy with chances of showers, with temps in the 70's PERFECT for running. I escorted Russ over to the fenceline START/FINISH area, then had to wait as Toby finished placing the controls with electroinc punch markers out. I finally got the 'GO' word after having 30 groups waiting to go out on G,R,B courses, so they were all stacked up and ready to go and in good moods, as always. I assisted Russ until the rush was over.
Out on RED, I saw minutes of sunshine that made me choose a sweatband over a hat. The RED course with some long legs took me into familiar terrain but the tall weed growth made my treking very uneasy, I was expecting an ankle sprain, at one point, I fell into gopher hole and went down to kiss the ground - UMF!! I was headed for a control in an open area but well concealed in a pair of palm trees(can you say distinct?). This had several parties meandering in spirals & re-taking bearings, so the tall weed growth hindered easy spotting . I can safely attest that competing in O' does not allow you to sightsee, better come back later - like during control pickup if you want to look at the terrain.
Upon returning, I found that an individual was reported well over-time and considered lost. The chief was making preps for a search party and we heard reports from those returning of her location - return she did with a smile of relief.
I relieved Russ allowing him a course but he opted to head home and tend to his duties. I thank Russ for tending the START/FINISH table for the better part of the event and tallying results while idle. Every party returning was in good & happy spirits, many kudos to the Course Designer and weather for the delightful day. We did get a report of a control(G9) that was set outside of the circle and caused some time lost but that's what O' is about, "finding your way in unfamiliar terrain, checking all possibilities".
Kris Mante and I managed to pack up the Finish area while we waited for Jerry and pickup crew -- Joshua and Jack Cash with his 7 mos. grandson, Joshua Jr, Kris Mante and Joe Maliszewski to coordinate their task. I had some help from Eric Hertiage, Paul/Terry Czigans who held registration down to carry gear back to the mule.
The task of coordinating results and awards were my next endevour.
See ya next month... Ray
Course-Designer Notes
What a beautiful day for orienteering! It felt like about 75F, the sun was shining and the forecasted rain never materialized. A milestone day in the history of FLO, with the introduction of electronic punching on the Green course. The e-punch was designed for the JROTC cadets only, but several FLO civilians tried it out too.
As Course Designer, I wanted to open up a few new areas for the advanced runners and take the White-Yellow-Orange folks to the further reaches of their ranges. My barometer as to how successful I was will always be the finishing times of the winners. Looking at the Yellow and Orange JROTC winning times of about 75 minutes each, I probably could have been a little easier on them. Sorry, kids.
I thought the Blue course was a huge trail run interspersed with at least a couple of challenges. In general the blue course was heavy on backstops and short on Attack Points. I did that deliberately. A decent strategy would have been to run "hard and stupid", then backtrack if necessary, from your catching features behind the controls. There are, of course, consequences here in Florida to running H&S, apart from potential lost time, as both Ron Eaglin and I were reminded after picking large prickly pear thorns from our shins. I saw a few folks go out on Blue without any shin protection and I shuddered. Red was more or less a shortened Blue, while this day the Green was mostly distinct, with its own controls. If you noticed, the Green course was being used at this event for the Test Trial of the Electronic punching system to be used by NJROTC at their Nationals in February being help on FLO's Croom map. That event is only open to NJROTC, but the following month, March, FLO will re-visit Croom and you may get to see what they saw.
At Kelly Park we are being asked to pay rent on two separate pavilions due to the large number (200) of people we attract to our events. I always plead with the park rangers to come down and see how the events are run to appreciate we don't really need two pavilions. Then last Saturday morning, all of the volunteers decided it would better if we actually used both pavilions; one for JROTC and one for FLO. It worked out I suppose, but we'd like to hear feedback on this issue. Do we really need two pavilions, or would one be always workable? Put another way: Were the JROTC units happy to have us out of their hair for the day?
The remote start location for Kelly is always an issue and although I really want to make use of the pavilions themselves as start/finish stations, that always cheats the Orange course folks, and also the Green course, unavoidably. Some creative course setting in the future will involve the Kelly property itself, since we now have not only the "new" 120 acre area west of Kelly Park Rd, but a larger 'bridge' between the two sections that will soon be mapped. This should allow all but Red and Blue to stay inside Kelly.
A super Thank You goes out to all the great helpers: Jonathan Linforth, Ray Bruneau, Russ Steinke, Paul and Terry Czigan, Jerry Sirmans, Joe Maliszewski, Kris Mante and a few others no doubt that Ray knows about.
Bob Putnam
Related Links:
| Name | Time | |
| Rupert,N | 48:52 | (F - Gold) |
| Misuraca,M | 72:15 | |
| Knoebel,M | 117:20 | |
| Sharkey,K | DNF |
| Name | Time | |
| Stager,T | 33:11 | (M - Gold) ** |
| Candelaria,N | 35:03 | (M - Silver) ** |
| Stewart,J | 37:47 | (M - Bronze) ** |
| Cottrell,C | 42:49 | (F - Gold) |
| Morales,J | 53:10 | |
| Findley | 54:00 | |
| Vaughn,M | 54:17 | (F - Silver) |
| Vanguard | 75:05 | |
| Misuraca,M | 80:00 | |
| CCHS,Van | 82:36 | |
| CCHS,Castro | 87:45 | |
| Cummings,C | 89:15 | |
| Tr27,Boys | 90:24 | |
| Rodriguiz,L | 95:15 | |
| SSHS,Adamo | 105:35 | |
| Walker,A | 105:53 | (F - Bronze) ** |
| Czigan,T | 106:54 | |
| McNamara,C | 114:50 | |
| Lewis,J | 108:10 | |
| TR72,Clardy | 114:30 | |
| Awesome | DNF | |
| CCHS #3 | DNF | |
| Jennings,A | DNF | |
| SSHS,D | DNF |
| Name | Time | |
| Bystry,W | 75:48 (M - Gold) ** | |
| Dragonchuck,M | 80:29 (M - Silver) ** | |
| Fitzgerald,B | 84:17 (M - Bronze) ** | |
| Crane,D | 87:40 | |
| Land,P | 105:30 | |
| CHS,Keen | 108:29 | |
| Corcoran,F | 114:30 | |
| Clardy/Bentuzzi | 125:40 | |
| Moon | 127:20 | |
| Rupprecht | 128:16 | |
| Gonzale,A | 130:19 (F - Gold) ** | |
| AHS #7 | 132:48 | |
| Summerfield,M | 133:10 | |
| Harris,T | 137:26 (F - Silver) ** | |
| Tr309A | 156:25 | |
| Tr309B | 156:30 | |
| MsAdventures | 164:32 | |
| Watts,A | 169:18 (F - Bronze) ** | |
| AHS #1 | 171:35 | |
| AHS #6 | DNF | |
| Camden,E | DNF | |
| CCHS #2 | DNF | |
| Lewis,Hopkins | DNF | |
| Lewis,Arturo | DNF | |
| Tatom/Moon | DNF | |
| AHS #4 | DNF | |
| AHS #3 | OT | |
| AHS #5 | OT | |
| AHS #2 | OT |
| Name | Time | |
| Halme,T | 52:55 (M - Gold) | |
| Simmons, C | 75:02 (M - Silver) ** | |
| Johnson,B/B | 86:15 | |
| Heritage,E | 86:50 (M - Bronze) ** | |
| Sheriff,Posse | 95:24 | |
| Waltons | 96:52 | |
| Pernash,W | 106:34 | |
| Dennis/Carolyn | 110:19 | |
| Maliszewski, J | 107:36 | |
| Spezio,E | 110:22 | |
| Bednarz,S | 118:22 | |
| Deb/Paul | 133:00 | |
| DHHS #3 | 168:25 | |
| Martin,P | DNF | |
| DHHS #1 | DNF | |
| W Mustangs | DNF | |
| CCHS #1 | DNF | |
| DHHS #2 | DNF | |
| Brooks,M | OT |
| Name | Time | |
| Bruneau,R | 69:30 | (M - Gold) |
| Bohn,D | 88:19 | (M - Silver) |
| Sirmans,J | 91:12 | (M - Bronze) |
| Mante,K | 116:06 | (F - Gold) |
| Burchfield,B | 121:45 | |
| Walser | 128:25 | |
| Humberg | OT | |
| Tr27,OldGuys | OT | |
| Yak Attack | DQ |
| Name | Time | |
| Johnson,C | 108:36 | (M - Gold) |
| Hearn,G | 113:30 | (M - Silver) |
| Eaglin,R | 123:02 | (M - Bronze) |
| Cuypers,M | 124:05 | (F - Gold) |
| Go Blue | 129:40 | |
| Schultz,C | 131:48 | (F - Silver) |
| JAX | 143:14 | |
| Carr, J | 145:55 | |
| GoodNuff | 147:06 | |
| Lobel,M | 152:40 | |
| Beavers/Ducks | 153:15 | |
| Meow/Meow | 156:00 | |
| Boris/Lammi | 158:15 | |
| ** | JROTC Competitor |
| DNF | Did Not Finish |
| DQ | Disqualified (Missed Controls) |
| OT | Over 3 Hour Time Limit |