The final meet of the year was held Saturday, December 9 at Stewart Gulch East.

Although weather forecasts had predicted either rain or snow for Saturday morning, the precipitation pretty much stayed away from the meet site (except for a few intermittent sprinkles). The higher elevations on the map (especially the north faces) were quite slick with hoarfrost, but the majority of the area was runnable (if somewhat frozen) until later in the day, when melting made the paths very slick. All things considered, conditions were pretty good for December.

The Intermediate and Advanced courses were set as a score course (12 controls, any order, various point values), with the only difference being the time limit -- the Intermediate course had a 90 minute time limit, while the Advanced course had a 60 minute time limit. I didn't think that it was possible to get all the controls in an hour -- Sergey proved me wrong. Jeff Black came close until the end, when a persistent mental error (and a somewhat flakey map) combined to have him waste a huge amount of time on his final control. Ole and David Bergset came back shaking their heads, with Ole's map hanging in tatters. However, they did manage to explore most of the map in the process :-) . Frank Kruesi gave it the ol' college try, but the treacherous footing proved to be too much, resulting in his giving up quite a bit earlier than usual.

The Beginner course was a somewhat difficult 2.3km loop (with an icky 85m of climb). Masha Velichko did an admirable job of leading her father through the course.

Meet Results:

Advanced Course
Score
105pts max, 60min limit, 1pt/min penalty
                   Time    Raw pts     Adjusted pts
Sergey Velichko    51:50    105            105
Jeff Black         73:17     85             72

Intermediate Course
Score
105pts max, 90min limit, 1pt/min penalty
                      Time    Raw pts     Adjusted pts
Ole & David Bergset   77:45     80           80
Frank Kruesi          64:30     25           25

Beginner Course
2.3km 85m climb

                            Time
Masha & Sergey Velichko     48:30



As winter wears on, the next few meets will be down in the valley parks. Our next meet will be Saturday, January 20th 11-1 at Veteran's Park.

Andy Hill