Arctic Orienteering Club celebrated the grand opening of the newly installed Permanent Orienteering Training Course at Ruth Arcand Park on Wednesday night with a gathering of fifty or more orienteers and Boy Scouts. After attending the short ceremony honoring Owen Nordstrom who chose to spend the past year creating this course as a part of his Eagle Scout project, participants were sent out on a 45 minute Score-O to see how many of the new control markers they could locate. Upon returning, racers were asked to draw the route they’d run between control points and count up how many markers they had visited.
Completing a circuit of the entire park in twenty minutes and fifty seconds, Ian Moore went to every control point on the map and handily won the race. Making what appeared to be similar, though not identical route choices to Moore, Brian Kirchner took second place in 22:11. Although the third fastest running time for those finding all 18 control points was achieved by Allan Spangler, who’s route took him under 25 minutes, he was so late to the event that he actually started after the finish deadline and ended up with an official score of negative twenty-seven points leaving Cory Smith to take the bronze.
Hatcher Smith and Springer Moore took first for teams and, finding all of the controls in 30:25, they also ranked fourth overall. Ellyn Brown was first for women and fifth overall, completing the course in 32:54.
Be sure to check out the page on the club website where you can download several different course maps designed for the permanent course and enjoy the lovely fall foliage at Ruth Arcand Park. See you next Wednesday at Russian Jack Springs Park for a fun race and our annual meeting!
| Rank | Name(s) | Score | Elapsed Time |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Ian Moore | 18 | 00:20:50 |
| 2 | Brian Kirchner | 18 | 00:22:11 |
| 3 | Cory Smith | 18 | 00:25:20 |
| 4 | Springer Moore & Hatcher Smith | 18 | 00:30:25 |
| 5 | Ellyn Brown | 18 | 00:32:54 |
| 6 | Steve Gruhn | 18 | 00:36:01 |
| 7 | Todd & Rowan Shearer | 18 | 00:37:00 |
| 8 | Jill Follett | 18 | 00:39:00 |
| 9 | Max Romey | 18 | 00:39:11 |
| 10 | Frank Witmer | 18 | 00:43:00 |
| 11 | Mark Findlay | 16 | 00:36:40 |
| 12 | Dela Gray | 15 | 00:43:00 |
| 13 | Peter Johnson | 15 | 00:44:30 |
| 14 | Dorn & Diane VanDommelen | 15 | 00:45:00 |
| 15 | Linda & Talia Smith | 14 | 00:38:35 |
| 16 | George Prielipo | 14 | 00:45:00 |
| 17 | Anne Billman | 13 | 00:38:22 |
| 18 | Charese Gearhart-Dekrean & Drew Dekrean | 13 | 00:44:11 |
| 19 | Eve VanDommelen & Ruth Lewinski | 11 | 00:45:00 |
| 20 | Ben, Anna & Evan Nordstrom | 8 | 00:23:00 |
| 21 | Cory Detty & David Montgomery | 8 | 00:45:00 |
| 22 | Brooke, Aly, Laura & Jackson Long | 6 | 00:43:00 |
| 23 | Becky Germa | 5 | 00:35:39 |
| 24 | Allan Spangler | -27 | 01:30:00 |
| Kim, Mike, Roman & Ivis Bakic | |||
| Teresa & Eric Hamon | |||