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The Boggs Mountain forest beckons!

Return to Boggs Mountain A-Meet

Spring Lake Regional Park and
Boggs Mountain State Demonstration Forest

Featuring the 2009 U.S. Team Trials

Date: May. 1 - 3, 2009
Location: Santa Rosa, CA & Cobb, CA
Event Directors: - 510.681.6181, - 415.456.8118
Course Setters: Mikkel Conradi, Evan Custer, George Minarik
Type: A; 3-day A-meet, featuring the 2009 U.S. Team Trials and 2 WRE days; recreational courses Saturday & Sunday for non-competitors


Course Setter's Notes – Sunday Long-Distance Courses

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The long-distance courses are designed to test all aspects of orienteering, but especially route selection and running ability. The Boggs Mountain terrain has been described by our WRE advisor as the best approximation to continental terrain we have in North America.

The Red X, Red Y, and Blue courses will have a 1.2-km walk to the start from the assembly area. (Follow the yellow & black streamers.) The White, Yellow, Orange, Brown, and Green courses will have a brief 150-m walk to the Start. (Follow the yellow & black streamers.) The Finish will be close to the assembly area.

Note for Team Trial and WRE entrants: Remember that your assigned start time cannot be changed. If you are late, you can either (a) start right away, but keep your original assigned start time, or (b) ask for a new start time, but then you will not be eligible for the Team Trials.

There will be two Red courses: Red X for F-21 and F-21-T, and Red Y for all the other Red classes. These two Red courses will be the same, except for the map scale. Red X will have a 1:15000 map scale (according to IOF rules). Red Y will have a 1:10000 map scale. Please be very careful to pick up your correct map.

Control descriptions will be handed out at the Start, after the Call-up line. There will also be control descriptions on the maps. No control descriptions will given out in the packets.

The Blue and Red courses will have more climb than the 4 percent suggested by the USOF course guidelines. The White, Yellow, and Orange courses will slightly exceed 4 percent in order to include some interesting terrain. The Brown and Green courses will be within the guideline. All the courses have been designed to be within the recent USOF winning-time guidelines for Long courses.

Some of the forest is well groomed, whereas other parts have deadfall and are slower going. The steeper parts tend to have more deadfall than the flatter areas.

There are some complex rocky areas, as well as many single boulders throughout the forest. Generally, rocks are mapped if they are at least 1 meter high. But some smaller rocks can be mapped if they are very visible and appear alone in the forest.

The trail network is moderate. These include vehicle tracks, paths and rides. A very significant mapping note is the depiction of old, abandoned, logging roads as narrow rides. These are numerous and very important to navigation. If these abandoned logging roads do not show evidence of recent use, they are mapped with the narrow rides. Their appearance may be different than the traditional narrow ride. The runnability of most of these narrow rides is good, and they should be selected for faster running. Some of them are overgrown or rocky, but still offer equal, if not better, running than the surrounding forest. These old logging roads may be hard to discern when crossing them. Runners should note the differences between paths and narrow rides at the Model Event.

You may encounter various logging streamers, including pink, blue and white, and orange.

Except for the Blue course, there are only small amounts of poison oak on the courses. There are a few scattered plants about ankle height that are easily avoidable. On one leg of the Blue course, the poison oak appears as sticks growing from ground, with green buds. It may not all be avoidable. Runners should wash with Technu after the race.

Most of the ground vegetation is either Manzanita bushes or Coffeeberry bushes. The dark green on the map is almost always wiry Manzanita, which is impassable. Areas of dispersed Manzanita bushes are usually depicted as green vertical lines. In these areas the bushes can be run around. Coffeeberry bushes are usually easy to run around or through, and are only depicted if they are very thick. Extensive deadfall is depicted with green vertical lines. There are some recently burned areas that have had a small effect on the vegetation. These burn areas will mostly affect the Orange course, but other courses may encounter them.

The Blue course comes within 500 meters of an informal, occasionally used firing range. Unless you are wildly off course, you will not encounter this range, although you may hear gunshots from this range. Firearms are allowed throughout the park, although seldom seen away from the firing range. We have posted notices warning the locals that we are using the park.

The Red X, Red Y, and Blue courses will have a Start triangle that is about 50 m from the START-punch/map-pick-up line. All competitors must go through this triangle. There will be pink streamers leading you there. The Start triangle will be indicated with a control marker (bag). Do not punch at the Start triangle.

For all other courses, the Start triangle is at the START-punch area.

There will be a clothing drop-off at the remote Red & Blue Start. There will not be a clothing drop-off at the White through Green Start, since it is so close to the parking area.

Maps will be collected at the Finish until after the final competitor has started.

The safety bearing is South to the main Park Road 200 (dirt).

Preliminary statistics (subject to change until final printing of maps):

   Course    Distance    Climb   Controls  Map Scale  Walk to Start
   White      2.4 km     110 m      13      1:10000      0.15 km
   Yellow     3.2 km     145 m      12      1:10000      0.15 km
   Orange     4.2 km     205 m      12      1:10000      0.15 km
   Brown      4.2 km     130 m       7      1:10000      0.15 km
   Green      5.6 km     200 m      10      1:10000      0.15 km
   Red X      8.4 km     370 m      16      1:15000      1.2  km
   Red Y      8.4 km     370 m      16      1:10000      1.2  km
   Blue      11.1 km     595 m      16      1:15000      1.2  km

White course note: White control 8 – Special Item – is a water tank.

Orange course note: Orange control 2 is a water tank. "X" is used as the control description.