Jorgen Martensson's quote - "If the orienteering seems too easy, you're not running fast enough" - may be trite, but Pt. Pinole certainly supports it. While Pt. Pinole's unique terrain is fairly open and flat, no one found the orienteering too easy at the Sprint Champs and White/Yellow/Orange courses held there on Saturday, May 15.
On the contrary, there were a lot of tired folks at the end of the three-loop, 4.2 km Sprint Champs course. All who completed the Sprint Champs course had already completed the 3.3 km seeding course, so flat or open, 7.5 km of short, mostly head-to-head courses gets everyone in touch with their "physical" side. Those on the regular courses also seemed to feel that they were running faster or harder than usual. Don't you wish you could keep that tempo up on all courses?
The Sprint Champs were set up to loosely follow the successful Motala ("one-person relay") course format Joe Scarborough used at last fall's "Bay Area Backroads" event. The results of the orangish-brown Seeding Course were used to place "sprinters" into groups of six who started the Sprint together, but completed the three loops in orders designed to put the top two seeds head-to-head on the final loop. In most cases, however, the main head-to-head running occurred on the first loop. Once a handful of the six groups were out on the course, folks were going every which way, giving those of us at the start/finish almost as much of a challenge as the runners.
The Seeding Course results list received constant scrutiny as the groups unfolded. Small mistakes moved you quickly down the list, and usually into a lower-seeded group. Wyatt Riley headed the list at 17:52 for 3.3 km, but Doug Stein and Neal Barlow showed their speed and were less than 15 seconds behind. Wyatt continued the tempo and became the BAOC Sprint Champ for 1999 with an impressive 25:38 for the 4.2 km Sprint. Doug and Neal couldn't quite hold on to Wyatt during the Sprint, but Panu Haaramo and James Scarborough nearly did, running head-to-head on the last loop to finish a close second and third to Wyatt. Syd Reader's time in winning the second group was fourth fastest overall, and Gary Carpenter won the fourth group by nearly 11 minutes. George Minarik won the third group and Eric Anderson the fifth, as the only one to do the Sprint faster than the Seeding Course.
Dwight Freund was quite pleased with his Orange course run - he felt it one of the most enjoyable Oranges he'd ever done. Funny how a good result frames your outlook! It might have soured a bit when Jim McMahon came in nearly an hour-and-a-half later with a time three minutes faster.
Barbara Robben may not have realized it, but she battled Ruth Keller and Nick Palaio for top times on both the White and Yellow courses, winning the White, with Ruth and Nick taking the Yellow as a second course over Barbara. Aimee Grimes had the top Yellow for those starting it fresh.
Lots of folks to thank, starting with Steve Gregg for updated field-checking and recommendations on course-setting, and Bob Cooley for squeezing in time to make updates to the map's OCAD file and print out a load of fresh maps. Evan Custer not only supplied a lot of his own equipment and organized and ran both finish areas, but even was able to record all split times on the Sprint Champs course.
Aimee Grimes, EvnJean, and Dwight Freund worked registration; Meg Gerstner, Jan Wolfe, Shirley Parlan, Kelly Wells and Ian Ramsey helped at the start/fininshes; Judy Koehler helped the beginners; Leslie Minarik and Dan Stoll-Hadayia helped nab controls; lots of Sprint Champers helped carry stuff back from the remote start; and the East Bay Parks crew provided invaluable assistance ranging from hauling equipment and water to the starts to even picking up a control (wow, how many rangers have done that!). Scarborough Orienteering supplied Gookinaid as prizes to the Sprint Champs.
I'm sure I've left other helpers out, but thanks to all for helping make this a fun event. The area is quite different from most others in BAOC-land, and may even be a candidate for a full-blown mountain-bike orienteering in the future.
SEEDING COURSE 1) Wyatt Riley 17:52 2) Doug Stein 18:04 3) Neal Barlow 18:06 4) Dan Stoll-Hadayia 18:21 5) Panu Haaramo 18:38 6) James Scarborough 18:52 7) Magnus Wallenborg 19:05 8) Van Boughner 19:50 9) Syd Reader 20:22 10) Kent Ohlund 21:37 11) Tapio Karras 21:42 12) Ian Ramsey 22:18 13) Angelica Riley 22:24 14) Dan Greene 22:27 15) Joe Scarborough 23:01 16) Sanna Wallenborg 23:58 17) Alan Glendinning 24:13 18) George Minarik 24:51 Dennis Wildfogel 24:51 20) Gary Carpenter 26:16 21) Sarah Minarik 26:30 22) Shawn Larsen 28:42 23) Eric Rosenzweig 30:20 24) Kelly Wells 30:29 25) Mark Rice 31:58 26) Mark Blair 32:28 27) Jeff Lanam 36:12 28) Robert Lewis 40:55 29) Steve Beuerman 41:08 30) Eric Anderson 46:19 Leslie Minarik MSP (#3) THE SPRINT Group 1 1) Wyatt Riley 25:38 2) Panu Haaramo 26:10 3) James Scarborough 26:25 4) Neal Barlow 27:57 5) Dan Stoll-Hadayia 28:24 Doug Stein MSP (A4) Group 2 1) Syd Reader 26:53 2) Kent Ohlund 29:35 3) Tapio Karras 30:13 4 Ian Ramsey 30:57 5 Van Boughner 36:01 6 Angelica Riley 37:50 Group 3 1) George Minarik 32:35 2) Dan Greene 35:27 3) Sanna Wallenborg 36:00 4) Alan Glendinning 38:31 5) Joe Scarborough 43:44 6) Dennis Wildfogel 53:51 Group 4 1) Gary Carpenter 30:18 2) Sarah Minarik 41:17 3) Eric Rosenzweig 42:23 4) Shawn Larsen 42:24 5) Kelly Wells 47:56 6) Mark Rice 60:34 Group 5 1) Eric Anderson 39:10 2) Mark Blair 43:48 3) Leslie Minarik 49:40 4) Robert Lewis 58:28 5) Jeff Lanam 58:54 6) Steve Beuerman 63:04 Magnus Wallenborg DNS
WHITE 1) Barbara Robben 21:06 2) Ruth Keller/Nick Palaio 23:09 3) Michael and Rachel Owens 41:49 4) Lou and Elisabeth Saylor 56:36 5) Joe, Jen and Kaala Rego 63:55 6) Shantika and Peter Emker 66:13 YELLOW 1) Ruth Keller/Nick Palaio 38:18 (second course) 2) Aimee Grimes 42:48 3) Barbara Robben 46:18 (second course) 4) George and Pat Aster 66:13 5) Jack Myers 76:04 6) Shirley Parlan 76:21 (second course) 7) Chris Lowry 77:17 8) Kris M. 115:47 ORANGE 1) Jim McMahon 44:36 2) Dwight Freund 47:55 3) Marsha Jacobs 58:06 4) Madonna Bentz 65:20 5) Stew Hintz 77:35 6) Cecile Jimenez 78:00 7) Dave Watt and Laura Downs 79:15 8) Rosemary Johnson 82:00 9) Shirley Parlan 86:30 10) Judy Koehler 92:52 11) Ev and Jean Beuerman 98:30 Orlando San Martin DNF