Lake Herman Recreation Area
Date: (Sun.) Feb. 21, 2016
Location: Benicia, CA
Event Director: - 925.934.6567
Course Setter: Gavin Wyatt-Mair
Type: C; Regional event with seven point-to-point courses; COOL event #3
Meet Director's and Course Setter's Notes
By
Lake Herman Recreation Area is an open, runnable, mainly grassy park with rolling hills dotted with thickets and bushes. The grass has been nicely mowed by goats, and is at a perfect length for running with good footing. The courses all have minimal "difficult to get through" areas, so the pace will be quite fast. Advanced runners (Brown through Blue courses) should wear studded shoes to accommodate the hill slopes. The rain this week made some areas a bit sloppy, but the weather forecast for the weekend is nice—sunny and dry, 68 degrees—so much of the wetness should be gone by Sunday. In fact, the conditions for orienteering will be just about perfect!
Notes from the Park Management
There are seedlings that have been planted—they have enclosures around them. Take care not to hurt the seedlings in any way. The lake is higher than last year. Be careful not to kick up loose dirt that could enter the lake, as this increases turbidity and takes a long time to settle. One way to help is to not run in elephant tracks. There was a fire in some areas—typically where the new trees have been planted. As a result of the fire, the ground vegetation has been reduced, so the footing could be slippery in those areas.
Courses
Navigational Physical Course Length Climb Controls Difficulty Difficulty White 2.3 km 105 m 12 Easy Easy Yellow 2.9 km 140 m 14 Easy Easy Orange 4.8 km 225 m 13 Moderate Moderate Brown 3.3 km 160 m 13 Advanced Moderate Long Brown 5.0 km 290 m 16 Advanced Moderate Green 5.9 km 330 m 21 Advanced Hardish Red 6.8 km 360 m 26 Advanced Hard Blue 8.0 km 390 m 28 Advanced Hard
Beginners' and Intermediate Courses
For the White, Yellow, and Orange courses, the control descriptions on the map have been split. Check the whole map to find the descriptions for your entire course.
The White course has one leg with streamers to be followed.
Advanced Courses
On the Brown through Blue courses, check your control numbers! There are areas of each course that use controls that are placed on similar features, with identical descriptions, fairly close to each other.
COOL Courses
This event is part of the 2016 COOL (California Outdoor Orienteering League) season. The COOL competition classes are assigned to the courses as follows:
COOL Class Course Elementary White Middle School Yellow School JV Orange Varsity Girls Brown Varsity Boys Green College JV Orange College Varsity Women Green College Varsity Men Red
Map
The map was drawn by Emile Radtke for her Girl Scout Silver Award project in 2014. The 2.3-square-kilometer map has some wooded areas, mostly in stream beds, and the rest is rolling grassland with hundreds of meticulously mapped bushes and small trees.
- The map scale is 1:7,500; the contour interval is 5 meters.
- The green-dot ● symbol has been used extensively to map thickets and bushes. These features are not all of similar size. In some cases, a dot can be a single bush (perhaps 5 feet high and 3-foot radius), whereas in other cases the dot can be a single thicket (perhaps 10 feet high and 15-foot radius).
- Details in the northern half of the map were added by Jay Hann this year. In this area, vegetation is mapped as shapes, and not dots.
- Contours are smoothed, so some topographical features do not show up. The big hills and valleys are certainly easy to distinguish.
Goats
There are goats grazing on the land, and they are controlled by fences. The fences are electrified—do not cross a goat fence. Go around.
Miscellaneous
All the courses use E-punch.
Poison oak on the courses is minimal to zero.
The Start and Finish are very close to Registration.
Registration will be open from about 9:00. The earliest start is at 10:00; the latest start is at 12:30.
The weather forecast calls for 68-degree temperature, mostly sunny, and no chance of rain.
Wildlife we have seen include deer, eagles, buzzards, orienteers, lots of goats, and frogs.
We do need a few more volunteers for starts, clinics, and control pickup. Please help if you can.