On early April, the Cincinnati Orienteering Club organizes an "A meet" called Flying Pig. It is an annual event and I heard great things about it. About a month ago signed up for it, but somehow forgot to tell the wife. Through the grapevine of the Cleveland orienteerers, Bob Boltz got the word that I was looking to share/ride the trip, and called in to see if I was interested in traveling with him. I wasn't home when he called, but my wife was. She took notes and when she relayed them to me about some "Flying Pig" thing, she was laughing. Apparently, I forgot to tell her that I signed up for this event, and that such is the event name.
It is well organized and managed. This year it was a three-day event, with middle distance on friday, two springs on saturday, and an ultra-long event on sunday. Drove to Cleveland where I met Bob Boltz of the North East Ohio Orienteering Club, and together we drove across the state of Ohio in time for the start of the friday event. It was a drizzle-rainy day. It had rained all night, and the terrain was soaked like a sponge.
After picking up our packet at the parking lot of a church, we drove two miles to a forest parking lot to view the model area. The model area is a part of the park where participants can have a view of what the terrain will be like.
For the middle distance event, on the 2 km walk from the parking lot to the start, we were instructed in not touching a fence since the owners of the land are upset with the park, and "are armed with dogs, guns and lawyers". The terrain of the middle distance event was very very muddy and soggy. The last controls had a nice matrix of controls criss-crossing each other all in an open grassland area. For this event, wore a cap, long sleeve shirt, and Salomon XA Pro XCR shoes. Made a mistake on locating control 13. Overshot it and went south until I saw the clearing around the pond, and then returned to my steps going north and found it. The vegetation underbrush, just as in the model area, showed how difficult it could be to locate the controls from a distance.
After the event, many of the Cleveland orienteerers drove to the EconoLodge motel to wash and dry themselves and their clothes. It had been a wet and muddy day, and many where happy to be in a dry world. With Bob we drove to a Ihop restaurant, where they serve breakfast menus for dinner. First time I saw scrambled eggs seasoned with ketchup being eaten, apparently a mid-west favorite by many. I shared the room with a hasher from the Rubber City Hash House Harriers, and with another hasher camouflaged as orienteerer, Shorthairs, we shared tales of memorable hashes of the past. Btw, this correlation between orienteering and hashing is more common than I expected, as I would later find out that a veteran russian orienteer also participating in this event, has hashed in the San Francisco hash and got named "The Impaler".
The morning sprint event was on the campus of Miami University in the town of Oxford. The day was a beautiful spring day, with temperature at around 8 C in the morning, and 15 C in mid-day. Made a serious error on control 8, didn't read the clue (bottom of steps) and not seeing the control on the southern side of the building, felt lost for about 1m 20s, when the competitor behind me caught up with me, and saw him going down the steps. For both the morning and afternoon sprints, wore a short sleeve shirt, and Adidas Cardrona shoes.
After the morning spring, Bob and I had some lunch at the car parked nearby, and then scouted the campus with the map to discuss mapping features.
The afternoon sprint was in a natural area just south of the Miami University campus. There was alot of areas with underbrush, specially where the controls 6-12 were, and that made it interesting.
The last sprint event was over at 3 PM, and they started assigning awards to the top three in each category. At around 4 PM, Bob and I stopped by the Art Museum where we saw an interesting retrospective on a local painter. Then, strolled on the college town of Oxford, that was full of parents and their children students. We found Rick Armstrong sitting outside a Starbucks, and invited him to walk to a campus dinning hall were, apparently, they were going to serve free korean food. We found the dining hall, got photographed (and kissed) by a group of students that were on a scavenger quest, and then, waited and waited for this korean food festival to begin. Unfortunately we had to be elsewhere at 6 PM, and by 5:50 they weren't ready to offer their prepared foods, so we left. At 6 PM, we found the St Mary's Church banquet dining facilites, and there we had whole grain pasta with balsamic tomato sause (more like a ratatouille), meat balls made from the best Angus meat, and lemon mousse. ... and a bottle of red Australian wine.
The sunday event was in a large state park, with steep ravines and drainages on the sides of a lake, separated by flat hilltops with very few distinct features. It was going to be a beautiful spring day. Because of the heavy rain two days before, the trails were going to be wet and muddy, and with the steep hillsides, the reccomendation was to wear shoes with big cleats and lots of grip. I chose to wear Adidas Cardrona, and a short sleeve shirt. On the route choice from 2 to 3, should have stayed on the paved road on the north. My first big mistake was on locating control 4. Apparently I headed slightly north. Hitting the fence I thought it was the fence North-South on the way to the control from 3, but instead it was the fence East-West. I realized the mistake when I found a small pond (in the map it looks more like a marsh). Just below the drainage of that pond, there was a control for another course. Realizing I was getting lost too easily, followed the stream down to the trail, and then from the fence line located the control. Between controls 6 and 7, got passed by Mark Voit, another M45 participant. Followed him for a while, it was nice to see how he made his route choices. Caught up with him while he was putting back his shoe that got sucked out by the mud, and there he told me that he had a broken compass. Later, after the event, he explained that early on while jumping a metal cable over a parking lot road, he tripped and landing on his hands, the thumb compass broke on its plastic sides (it was still operational, but not while running with it). My next huge huge mistake was in going from 8 to 9. Still not sure how it happened, but must have passed it quite close by and continued north and found the drainages and ravines downstreaming to northerly direction and tought I was on the right ones to look for. Not until I saw the lake from one of the ravines that I realized I had overshot and was totally off. In trying to get back to 9, located the reentrant features near 10 (even saw it from a distance), and then got to the pond, the reentrants just north from the pond, and finally to control 9. A surfer would have said: "dude, you just weren't in the zen". The good news was I still had alot of energy, apparently the whole-wheat pasta I globbed down the day before was doing its carbohydrate work. Got passed by a couple of F21+ participants that were also doing the red course. Then, towards the last four controls, an West Point Military Academy cadet and I followed each other closely for a last dash to end the long event. From reading the split times, I estimate that I lost 15 minutes in finding control 4, 2m 45s in re-finding control 8, 23 minutes in finding control 9.
On the long drive back to Cleveland, Bob and I stopped by a outlet mall, looked at all the beautifully dressed families with their latest mall fashion garb. I still had thorns and twigs sticked in my hair, some scratches on my arms, and possibly tiny spots of mud on my pants (that is, my clean pants). We looked at some sport stores, including a Nike and Adidas brand stores, but found them disappointing.
On the very last 0.5 km of the shared ride with Bob, he proudly takes a short detour, and shows me a view of rapids and waterfalls in a deep gorge. Apparently he wants to showcase the main attraction of his home town of 35 years. But, I told him, I had already been here before: it was a beer stop of a Rubber City Hash that I went to some five years past: Shorthairs was the hare then.
Just 2 km to go...
A thorn stuck on my ear was noted by a photographer... now, that is must have been some shiggy...
nice "white" open woodland, very runnable...
Nice picture of a running Will Smith (Canada) with a control in the background.
For animated results of the route I took on the long run, go to this website and select "Red" from the dropdown listbox, and pick my name. then click on View Animation and click on Start. On the same website, it is fun to watch the 2nd and 3rd competitor that finished the 18 km "Blue" course. they finished only one minute apart (2:04:22 and 2:05:20), but you can see how far apart they were in different points of their time frame. To view my mistake on the Sprint on the Miami University campus, go to this website and select the "Long" item in the dropdown listbox. You can compare me with another 45er whose finish time is 17:57, by selecting both his name and my name, click on View Animation, and then click Start.
For controls 10 to 13, I saw a competitor ahead of me and pretty much followed him. He was pretty fast in the woods and blazed trail for me. Then I made my mistake and lost him. He started two minutes before me, and note that I was able to catch up with me because he made an expensive mistake in an earlier control. Michael Norris, USMAOC, started at 14:32:00 and finished at 15:11:21. I started at 14:34:00 and finished at 15:12:47. ... and on trail we shared three controls in the middle, funny how it goes...
Pig Middle Split Times for M45
Pig Sprint 1 Split Times for M45
Pig Sprint 1 Split Times for M45
Pig Long Split Times for M45
One of the earth mounds as described by the corse setter:
earth features
The official park website
Course Setter's notes:
The Rentschler area is primarily a plateau, cut by steep drainages. If you've run at other Flying Pig "A" meets, you've probably seen similar terrain at parks such as East Fork, Fort Ancient, Mounds SRA, and Camp Friedlander.
Some 2000 years ago, the area was inhabited by the Hopewell people, and apparently was an important ceremonial center. A survey by James McBride in 1840 mapped several mounds of 3-5 feet height, including a unique earthwork consisting of two circular walls.
Four miles downriver, the City of Hamilton was founded in 1791. Along the Great Miami River, the Miami and Erie Canal was built, which destroyed some evidence of the Hopewell culture even before McBride's survey, including removal of "several human skeletons and a variety of stone implements"1. Although McBride reports that the area was still heavily wooded in 1840, settlers were soon moving in to clear and farm the land. This accelerated erosion around the steep perimeter of the site and the outer walls are now almost completely gone. One mound was excavated (that's too nice a term, lets just say "looted"), so there's now a depression in its center. Evidence of farming such as old wire fences, a couple foundations, and an old barn still remains. Besides the canal, a road and sewer line was later put in along the towpath.
If you have time after your run, though, it is well worth the short hike to view and ponder the remaining earthworks.
1 - Squier, Ephraim G. and Davis, Edwin H., Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi Valley, 1848, Smithsonian Institution.
Advanced runners may encounter a unique Indian earthworks consisting of two circular earth walls, one inside the other. Please avoid running over these mounds. These walls are now less than a meter high, and most of the other nearby earthworks which were mapped in the 1800's are now so deteriorated as to be almost unnoticeable to all but the most experienced observers. Some were also destroyed during the building of the canal which runs along the north edge of the map. You'll probably run along the towpath and possibly even cross the old canal (mostly dry) during your course.
The Flying Pig "A Meet"
Towards the end of March, got home and my wife told me someone called from Cleveland and talked about car pooling to something called a "flying pig". The wife's facial expression showed a mixture of puzzlement and laugher, and I realized then that I had forgotten to tell her I had signed up to a three-day orienteering event in Cincinnati, Ohio, in fact, called the Flying Pig.
This event is sanctioned by the USOF, and it is labeled as an "A meet". In the 2008 schedule, there are seven this year. It takes a great deal of preparation, clues are printed on the map, and registration is usually closed a week before the meet starts. Having heard great things about the Cincinnati event by fellow orienteerers in the Cleveland area, I decided it was worth a try. Haphazardly got conjugal permission to absent myself for three full days, kissed the kids, and drove to Akron where I met with Bob Boltz of North East Ohio Orienteering Club (NEOOC), and together we drove diagonally across the buckeye state to the first of the four events.
The event was a middle distance. In addition, it was sanctioned to be a World Ranking Event (WRE), allowing orienteering athletes and competitors to acquire points. Being this the only WRE event in the US this year, it attracted many competitors. It had rained all night, it was still drizzling. The ground was soaked and muddy. We pick up the packet with the last-minute information, the e-punch, and the bib number with four safety pins. There is something called the "model course": it is a demonstration course to summarize what terrain and features to expect. It can be very useful for those that come from, say, Arizona or Texas, and seeing how alluvional wooded hills look like. The course is 1.6 km long, and we simply walk it to get a feel of it. Terrain and features looks and smells like back home in the Three Rivers area, same mud, same grass, same jaggers: it gets my Western PA stamp of approval. Back to the parking lot, there is still a bit of drizzle, and while a few are warming up on the sides, others are still in their vehicles. The start is about 2 km from the parking lot. We are instructed on how to get there, and told that at a certain point we are not to touch a fence or give any bad looks over that fence, as the owners over that fence are in a legal dispute with the park administrators, and the instructions clarify that "they are armed with dogs, guns, and lawyers" [humor intentional].
At the start there is a clothing collection bag for those that want to drop a rain jacket that they used for the long walk to the start. The clothing will eventually be collected and delivered to the finish area. There is also a Port-a-John. Volunteers call out the start time and scheduled participant names three minutes ahead, at which participants "clear" the data from their e-punch and then "check" the e-punch. At two minutes from start, participants advance to the next line and collect clue sheets in case if they want them to place them on their clue holder sheeted around the fore arm. At one minute from start, the participants advance to the next line, and from a line of boxes holding maps face down, each participant picks a map of a course that the participant is registered to. The maps cannot be viewed, and at this time, the participant writes his name with a marker on the back of the map for map collection at the end of the event. At the sound of the buzz, the participants can start by placing the e-punch in the start device, turn the map, view the course, and off they go.
Having signed as a M-45+, meaning a male gender of 45 years of age or more, the course designated for that category was the red course. This one was 4.3 km with 20 controls, in a woodsy area similar to those in Western Pennsylvania. Ground was very wet and muddy. While looking for my controls, I could see other runners looking for other controls of other courses. Made a small mistake when I overshot the location of a small reentrant, and returning to my steps, realized that I had lost about a minute. The final section was a neat criss-crossing cluster of controls in an open grassland. At the finish, one final punch, and participants were asked to leave the map in a box, since there was still one hour to go until the last start, and the maps cannot be viewed by any particip ant until then. I jogged back to the parking lot, went to the parked van designated to be the "e-punch data downloading" point, downloaded the data from the e-punch and got a printout with all the split times between controls. Changed into dry clothes, and then walked back to the finish to see the arrivals. Among the participants was a group of middle and high school students from Houston, Texas. They all had the same green uniform, and were quite skilled. There was also a large contingent of cadets from West Point, the Army academy. And there were other notable athletes, some of which flew from afar to attend this event.
At the end of the friday event, my travel mate and I lodged into the motel, hot showered and changed into more dry clothes, and went looking for dinner. At the restaurant I was reading the Post-Gazette from Pittsburgh that I happened to have with me, when I saw another patron with a Polamalu Steelers jersey walking by, and I promptly got up and walked to him and gave him my newspaper saying "to all Steelers fans, here is a complimentary copy of the Pittsburgh newspaper". At the motel, an entire line of rooms were all booked to orienteerers. A lot of them knew each other, managed to stick together, talked about topics that rarely was outside the realm of this sport. In general, if you asked them a question that was not orienteering-related, the answer was very short. If you asked them a question that was related to orienteering, it could germinate into quite a discussion.
The second day was going to have two Sprint events. This time, the weather couldn't be better: a fine spring day. The first one was on the campus of Miami University in the town of Oxford, Ohio. A nice quaint campus, the course for Red and Blue was going to be Sprint Course 3, of 2.9 km with 17 controls. Most of the controls were adjacent to buildings, trees, stairways. Incredibly, I made a mistake that cost me 1m 20s. I mentally believed to find the control visible on a side of a building, when it actually it was at the bottom of a stairwell going to a basement door. Always read the clue sheets !
After the first event, we had some time for lunch, and with map on hand, we walked over the campus to discuss mapping features. My travel mate has mapped several maps and it was interesting to hear him discussing the mapping choices from a maper point-of-view. A fresh flower-bed of tulips might be colored in olive green, and crossing it may subject the participant to immediate disqualification.
The second sprint event was in a natural setting, with woods, grasslands, and semi-open areas with underbrush and low small trees. Being still early for leaves, I thought the controls could easily be seen in this short course. Yet, the small branches of the brush and small trees made visibility poor, and some controls were smartly placed in making the find more challenging. The course for Red and Blue was the same, Sprint Course 3, of 2.7 km with 14 controls.
Everyone congregated on a specific location at the end of the parking area, to view the results posted on sides of the parked van, or to nibble from the food table with cookies and bananas, or for collecting a map with your name on it. There was also a vendor of orienteering-related stuff: shoes, compasses, clue sheet holders, shirts, pants, gaiters. The vendor is also a participant in the race, so when he's running, the "shop" is closed. Here I got the opportunity of touching actual "orienteering shoes". They have metal spikes on the soles, and walking on pavement, it makes a distinctive rasping sound.
With the day still young, my travel mate and I browsed around campus and the adjacent college town for things to do before the 6 PM social dinner. We checked the university art museum, a Korean student association mini-festival, the shops and cafes, and roaming students on a scavenger quest that asked us if we were professors. The banquet was prepared by a local caterer: Angus-beef meatballs, whole wheat pasta with a ratatouille vegetable sauce, lemon mousse. ... and, a bottle of red Australian wine.
With a good meal and a night of rest, we got ready for the third and final day, the Ultra Long Pig. The event was to take place in a very large state park, and it attracted several adventure racers as well. The blue course was 18 km long and 600 m elevation, and the red course was 13.2 km with almost 400 m elevation. The course setters notes recommended shoes with big cleats, or anything that can provide a good grip. The slopes were steep and muddy. From the footwear I had with me in the car, I chose to wear Adidas Cardrona, which proved to be an excellent choice for my personal style. The map had a long leg of about 2 km in length. I chose a more direct route, but midway had some second thoughts and thought that a better choice would have been to follow the paved road on the North and then cut south using trails and a fence as handrail. Got incredibly lost twi ce, and lost 38 minutes total on these two errors (I computed the time lost based on the time of my immediate peers by reading/studying the split time results). On trail got passed by another M45er, and it was great to see him in action, and see how he made route choices on real-time. Stayed behind him for a couple of controls, but then -- he was just too fast -- faded out of sight. The good news is that towards the end I still had a lot of energy: The carbo-load of the banquet was making its effect, and I kept on running like an Energizer bunny. On the last four controls I had a dueling partner from West Point, and we alternated leading position several times, each one of us making better route choices respectively. The last control was a welcome sight, however somewhat camouflaged in the background of colors of several parked cars nearby. The legs were tired, the will waning, and with one la st dash to the finish, e-punched one last time. A photographer, the usual cluster of people around the van reading the posted results, a line of flags flapping to the wind, a table with an assortment of foods. I am greeted by a couple of familiar faces, people that I've met in the days, the usual "how did you do" starter phrase. The air temperature warm enough for people to wear a T-shirt. Spring is here. People are animatedly discussing route choices, controls that dared to be found, fences that couldn't be seen. Everyone seems happy and content. People with cramped legs slowly walked to their vehicles, and retreated to their home destinations.
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