Western States Orienteering Championships, June 5-6, 2004

 

 

Welcome to the 2004 Western States Orienteering Championships. Both days will be on maps used for previous U.S. orienteering championships! Day 1 is on the west portion of the Fallen Leaf map, first used for the 2003 U.S. championships, and Day 2 is on the east portion of the Spooner Lake map. Standard A meet courses and classes are available, and the Western States Orienteering Championship will be awarded to the eligible person with the fastest cumulative time over the two days in each A class. In addition, recreational courses (white, yellow, orange, and adventure racer - long orange) are available each day.

 

You are eligible to vie for the Western States Orienteering Championship if you are a member of USOF, and either your primary residence is in a Western state (any state touching or west of the continental divide), or your primary club is located in a Western state. You are eligible for fun as soon as you get out on a course!

 

 

Course statistics            Day 1 length  Day 1 climb               Day 2 length  Day 2 climb

        

White                           3.2 km             45 m                            2.8 km             20 m               

Yellow                         3.5 km             70 m                            3.0 km             70 m

Orange                         4.3 km             120 m                          4.5 km             120 m

Brown                          3.8 km             85 m                            3.8 km             150 m

Green                           5.3 km             125 m                          4.6 km             170 m

Red                              7.1 km             170 m                          6.1 km             240 m

Blue                             9.6 km             240 m                          7.7 km             370 m

 

Recreational courses

White (beginning level – easy, along trails)

            3.2 km             45 m                            3.0 km             35 m

Yellow (advanced beginner – mostly on trail)

3.5 km                        70 m                                    3.0 km                        90 m

Orange (intermediate – mostly off trail)

                                    4.3 km             120 m                          4.4 km             130 m

Adventure Race (intermediate – long Orange)

             5.8 km             160 m                          5.9 km             210 m

 

 

 

All controls will be set up for both electronic and manual punching.  Championship participants will use the electronic punching system, while recreational participants will use the manual punching system.

 

 

 

 

Day 1 directions

 

Registration will be open from 9AM to noon. Parking is at the Sno Park just west of the Fallen Leaf Campground on Route 89. From South Lake Tahoe, go west on US 50 to the "Y" intersection with Route 89 and turn right (north) Go approximately 4 miles to the Snow Park on your left. If you see Tallac Trailhead Road, you have gone 1/2 mile too far.

 

There is a 300 meter relatively level streamered trail walk to the start from the parking area. All participants, competitive and recreational, start at the same location. There are portable toilets available at the parking area close to registration.

 

The path to the start and the terrain in view of it are the only available warmup areas to the south or west of the parking lot; all other areas in those directions are out of bounds.  Those desiring additional warmup space must proceed from the parking lot back north 200 meters to Highway 89 and then east 100 meters to cross the main creek.  All terrain east of the main creek can be used for warming up.

 

Safety bearing is north to Highway 89.

 

 

Day 2 directions

 

Registration will be open from 8AM to noon. Parking is at the Nevada Highway Department lot just north of the intersection of US 50 and Route 28. From South Lake Tahoe, go north on US 50. After about 14 miles, turn left onto Route 28. Make the first left into the parking lot.

 

IMPORTANT – We are sharing the parking area with a bicycling event that will have 3500 riders stopping by throughout the day. Please park in the southern portion of the lot, and park as close to other cars as reasonable. There will be a parking assistant to help you. Please respect all bicyclists as you enter and leave the parking area.

 

There is a 800 meter relatively level streamered walk to registration from the parking area. The majority of this walk is along Route 28, so be careful. From registration, it’s a short downhill walk to the start areas. Competitive and recreational participants start in separate locations. There are portable toilets available at the parking area, and there are bathrooms in Spooner Lake Campground.

 

All areas southwest of Route 28 (the side of Route 28 that the parking area is on) are available for warmup. Spooner Lake Campground is also available for warmup if you stay within 100 meters of the main campground road.

 

Safety bearing is south to Highway 50 or Route 28.

 


Course Setters Notes – Day 1 – Fallen Leaf

Dan Stoll-Hadayia

 

My preference is for a faster, more "sporty" style of orienteering, and that is what I have attempted to give you today.  As such, the courses make heavy use of the most open, runnable areas of this map.  In fact, after an initial encounter with some areas of moderate deadfall and brush near the start, participants on all courses will find themselves spending most of their time in pleasant forest.  Controls in particular are nearly always in areas of minimal ground clutter.  Climb is quite low.

 

This event will employ a slightly different start procedure from that used at other recent BAOC A events.  As at previous events, timing will begin at the start line, from which a mandatory streamered path leads to the start triangle, where navigation begins.  What is different is that participants will receive their maps at the start line rather than at the start triangle.  All participants must follow the mandatory path to reach the start triangle.

 

Special considerations for this event:

 

1.  Several paved one-lane roads cross the competition area.  Every course will cross them, and the White course will travel along them.  While traffic on these roads is rather light, it does exist.  Be extremely careful of cars whenever crossing or traveling along a paved road!  The roads are winding in many areas, meaning that you and the drivers may not see each other until you are quite close.

 

2.  The meadows may still be quite wet.  Please do not cross them except on trails.  The courses are set such that a meadow crossing should not be an attractive route choice, except on the White course which follows the trails.

 

3.  For the White course only--First, the trails that you follow may be flooded with standing water in places.  We will place streamers through any area in which the water makes the trail indistinct.  In the wet areas, you will likely wish to travel on the grass on the side of the trail rather than in the trail itself (which may more closely resemble a shallow, slow-moving stream!).  You'll almost certainly get your feet wet anyways.  Second, a large tree has fallen across the trail between controls 5 and 6.  We will streamer a good route around this obstacle.

 

4.  Only a few vegetation point features have been used for controls, and in each case that feature is quite distinct.  However, a review of these features may still prove helpful.  A brown X on the map represents a rootstock (roots in the air, from a tree that fell in one piece), and appears in the control descriptions as a rootstock.  A green X on the map represents either a tall stump or a standing dead tree--either way, the roots are still in the ground.  These appear in the control descriptions as a single tree, modified by the "ruined" symbol if the feature is a stump, unmodified if the feature is a standing dead tree.

 

Good luck here at Fallen Leaf Lake and tomorrow at Spooner Lake!


Course Setters Notes – Day 2 – Spooner Lake

Thorsten Graeve

 

Sunday’s courses have been set in the meadows and lower hillsides surrounding Spooner Lake. You will encounter open meadows, clearings and runnable forest, as well as some areas with various levels of undergrowth. Several trails, “ancient” flumes and railroad grades provide handrails for the beginner’s courses and route choices on the intermediate and advanced courses.

 

Clearings are accurately mapped but can be hard to distinguish on the run. Younger pine trees encroaching on some clearings may not be mapped. Some areas have been logged in the past couple of years, although most of the logging debris has been cleaned up. Small patches of wind-blown downfall may be encountered. Logging debris and slash are especially prevalent in the far western portion of the map, where the red, blue and adventure race courses may encounter areas that appear significantly more open than mapped. When in doubt, rely on contour and rock detail for navigation.

 

Light green denotes dense stands of young pine or aspen. This means reduced visibility but not necessarily an obstacle to running. The dark green areas are dense areas of brush or aspen, and are best avoided. The green "x" symbol is used to denote distinct single, mature trees in clearings. The green "o" symbol is used for a distinct group of trees (i.e. a copse). The brown "x" denotes a root stock (the upturned roots of a fallen tree) or a stump (the upright remainder of a broken or logged tree). The root stock symbol ("Ä") used in the control descriptions denotes a stump, with the height indicated in meters. There are many more root stocks and stumps in the terrain than are shown on the map. The few that are used as control features are distinct and unique within the surrounding terrain.

 

There are a number of indistinct trails on the map that may be helpful in navigation or simply in getting from point A to point B. Some of these are old logging roads. Others are remnants of flumes that were used to carry water to the mining areas of the Comstock in the mid- to late-eighteen hundreds. There even existed a narrow-gauge railroad that was used to haul timber from the forests surrounding Spooner Lake. The more obvious of these trails are mapped, although you may encounter additional ones that aren’t. Expect the occasional fallen tree or dense new growth to impede your progress on these trails.

 

The terrain features areas of intricate rock detail. Boulders smaller than 1m are generally not shown on the map, unless there are no other rock features nearby. The rocky ground and boulder field symbols are used to denote rocky areas with too many rocks or boulders to map individually.

 

Please note that, due to the dry winter, the water level in Spooner Lake is several feet lower than normal. This means that the actual shoreline may be significantly different from the lake outline shown on the map.

 

Yellow course only: The yellow course follows the edge of a clearing up a hillside between controls #5 and #6. This portion of the course is flagged. Look for orange streamers running up the hill from control #5.

 

White course only: The “special item” (man-made feature) at control #6 is a bench.