Pohick

Course results can be seen below. Splits are available on Attackpoint or Winsplits.
To enter your routes and see how others went, head to RouteGadget.

Flickr photo album for event is here.

The weather started cold but as the day progressed, turned out to be a beautiful day to return to one of our favorite venues. Tavia Sullens hit it out of the park her first time as the course setter. Tavia designed a full range of courses that that combined with the Pohick Bay terrain challenged those new to the sport and experienced runners. She designed two advanced courses that combined the Pohick Bay map with the Gunston Hall map. Craig Shelden worked through the complex challenge of linking the two maps, which have different scales and different contour intervals! If that sounds complicated - it is. A hearty thanks to both of them for putting together such a rich palate of courses.

Harry Jones was the indispensable stalwart setting up registration and running it for most of the day. I am not sure what I would have done without his expertise and diligence. Bill Vienna, Paul Collinson and Don Fish rounded out the registration team, when Harry would allow it. Bill, Paul and Lydia Andrews provided beginner instruction to a refreshing number of first time orienteers that came out to Pohick. The time and attention they spent on our future club mates ensured they had a great experience and will be back. Lydia deftly provided instruction to several people who initially declined but she recognized they would some assistance – they all made it back in time with smiles on their faces.

Valerie Meyer and Amy Louden were both able to get out and enjoy course while keeping the epunching system going with three large groups Great Mills and Patriot NJROTC Teams (66 total cadets) and in their second event Baltimore Polytechnic Institute that made the drive from Baltimore and had a great time. The statistics for the Pohick events were 221 starts including several runners who ran second and one runner ran three courses.

Tavia’s courses and terrain made control pick up a bit more challenging than usual. The control pick up crew included Matt Smith, Bill Wright, John Organek, Greg and Kathleen Lennon, Charles Carrick, Howie and Stephen Pepe. A couple of notes about control pick up, all had run an advanced course. John Organek picked up more controls than he found running the Green course and Stephen Pepe ran Blue, then sprinted Yellow and Orange and then picked up 13 controls.

I owe a special thanks to Francielo who was everywhere capturing the event in photographs – so much better than I could have done. (Photos will be on the QOC Flickr album as usual by Wednesday morning).

I hope to see everyone at Oak Ridge next weekend. Vido Aleksiev has laid out a full collection of courses that I am looking forward to running (okay walking). If you can make time next weekend, volunteer to help Matt Knight put on another great QOC event.
- Scott Sharp, Event Director