By Gavin Wyatt-Mair
We had perfect weather, a great turnout, and plenty of fun at this year's 13th Bay Area Scout Orienteering Championships and BAOC Briones event.
There were 425 pre-registered scouts and 117 BAOC participants, for a total of 542 runners.
This year we were again fortunate to have e-punching on all courses — a really great improvement to our efficiency and accuracy. The e-punching went very smoothly, thanks to a dedicated effort by our e-punch crew. We also were fortunate to have electronically computed results — within 15 minutes after the Score-O finished!!! Thanks Jay!
I've been waiting 14 years for this, and it's finally happened! Congratulations to our 2005 Bay Area Scout Orienteering Champions: Girl Scout Troop 793 (Polish Scouting) from San Francisco, with a very convincing win.
Second place, and first Boy Scout troop, went to Troop 465 from Concord. Third place, and second place Boy Scouts, went to Troop 905 from Dublin. Troop 237 from Orinda came in fourth, and collared the third place Boy Scout Troop award.
The top Junior Scout troop award goes to Pack 403 from Pleasant Hill, who beat out Pack 464 from Walnut Creek by a mere 1 point.
The competition was organized in two parts:
In the morning, there was individual competition according to skill level. Four courses were offered: Course 1 (White), Course 2 (Yellow), Course 3 (Yellow-Orange), and Course 4 (Orange). Scouts were required to compete in groups. The top three groups on each course were individual champions, receiving medals and certificates for their efforts.
In the afternoon, there was a one-hour Score-O. Each control's value was its number. The goal was to plan a good route, and get as many as you can.
The totals for each troop were computed from a combination of individual morning results and Score-O. Morning results were weighted based on time, and afternoon results were weighted based on number of correct controls found, with a lateness penalty.
Once again, we had an impressive improvement in orienteering skills amongst the Scouts. More and more scouts are doing the harder courses, and doing them well.
The undisputed Bay Area Scout Orienteering Champion for 2005 is Malcolm Wyatt-Mair from Troop 241 in Lafayette, who won Course 4, the orange course, in 56:51. In second place on course 4 was Mike Sobczyk of Troop 905 from Dublin, and third place goes to Garrett Pitsenbarger of Troop 227.
On Course 1 (the White course), first place was won by Ian Brown, James Parfitt, Karen Garman, and Kevin McGrew of Troop 66 in Davis. Second place goes to Zahir Kareshi and Max Friday of Troop 501 in Los Gatos, and third place to Adrian and Kevin of GS troop 793 in San Francisco.
David Katz, Ian Lundgren, and Travis Strong of Troop 241 in Lafayette won on an interesting Course 2 (Yellow). Second place went to Zac March and Michael Trebino of Troop 277 in Pleasant Hill, and third place to Sylvia, Magda, and Julia of GS troop 793 in San Francisco.
Course 3 (Yellow-Orange) was won by Charles Mighetto and DaMarlynn Wright of Troop 24 in Berkeley. Conrad of GS troop 793 in San Francisco placed 2nd, while Maxime and David also of GS troop 793 in San Francisco were third.
Erin and Tom of Troop 237 in Orinda collared top honors on the Adult course. George March and Mike Shubat of Troop 277 from Pleasant Hill placed second, while Mark Paulson and Bob Matthews, also of Troop 277 in Pleasant Hill, ran third. Since this was for bragging rights only, Erin and Tom get to be the biggest braggers — well done!
Troop scores are shown below. You can check out the comprehensive results and splits here.
Scout patches were distributed at the meet. If anyone did not receive a patch, as well as a course patch, please contact me. Anyone who has not yet received a patch for last year's meet, please also contact me: 925-934-6567 or e-mail GavinWM@comcast.net
Thank you!
We would like to thank the East Bay Regional Park District and the Briones Park rangers for their support. The Park Rangers were particularly helpful with parking, access and advice, and we are very grateful to them. The scouts would like to thank BAOC for sponsoring the Scout-O event and helping scouting out. Thanks also to all the parents and scout leaders who took the time to bring their scouts to a day of orienteering.
To all our helpers: Thank you very much. With such a large attendance, help was the most essential element of the meet, and you all did a wonderful job! To those whom I have left out (and I'm sure I have, since there were so many ad-hoc volunteers), please accept my thanks, too. And of course, thanks to my family (Nina, Arwen, Malcolm, Kelsey, Wendy) for all their help and patience — typing, stuffing packets, telephone calls, mailings, recruiting, results, and putting up with the disruption.
Once again, BAOC members excelled and showed the club's true colors with all their help and encouragement. Here is this year's list of helpers with this caveat: I simply couldn't record all the helpers and help that was given, so please, if your name is omitted, we are still very very grateful and I apologize for the omission.
Nina Tyksinski Pre-registration, phone calls, e-mail
Bob Cooley Maps, and more maps
Alan Houser Course design (WYO), vetting, safety, start, bag set, bag pickup
Jay Hann Results, bag set, water, photos, bag pickup
Chris Hann Bag set
Judy Koehler Photos, awards ceremony, instruction, scout packets
Jean Beuerman Registration
Ev Beuerman Registration
Mark Blair Bag pickup
Nancy Lindeman Bag pickup, instruction, packets
Terry Gleason Instruction, registration, parking
Bill Straka Instruction, scout packets, start
Barbara Straka Scout packets, start
Penny DeMoss Start
Harold DeMoss Start
Roberta Pitsenbarger Score-O signups
Joan Roos Finish, instruction
Grace Tang Finish
Trinka Gillis E-punch
Evan Custer E-punch
Steve Gregg E-punch
Rosemary Johnson E-punch, permits
Bjorn Widerstrom E-punch
Jeff Lanam E-punch
Evan Custer E-punch, equipment
Joe Scarborough Early run
Mikkel Conradi Early run