Charles River Canoe-Orienteering Event, Auburndale, MA
Saturday, July 9, 2011
Event Director: Ian Smith
Canoe orienteering races happen infrequently in New England, and they tend to be less accessible to a casual participant because most sites are remote and do not have on-site canoe rentals. It had been some time since we last used the Newton facility - which has Charles River Canoe and Kayak on the map, so I elected to set the second Canoe-O race of the season at that location.
The Score-O format is more interesting for canoe orienteering than for foot orienteering because there are many more possible paths of similar difficulty. I had never set a canoe course before, and score-O has the benefit of forcing people to think about what order to take the controls and of allowing individuals to choose a course of a length suited to their interests without fear of DNFing. I decided to have two classes - anyone who chose to visit ten or fewer controls would be in the "short" class, and up to 20 would be the "long." This partition set a shorter, attainable objective, and the short course was a popular option. I set a long (14-15 km) challenging course. One of the major challenges was finding an optimal way through thick water chestnuts and lilypads; I think this would have been more appropriate if they map had included all the vegetation in detail. As it was, several competitors battled through a few gratuitously difficult legs. The map is likely better suited to an earlier race - in late May or early June, when the vegetation isn't so mature.
A total of 24 people made it out for the competition. I think with some effort advertising the event at Charles River Canoe and Kayak (which I did not invest), the turnout could be much higher. Many thanks to Pete Lane who showed up unsolicited to help out with the event and picked up 14 controls; it would have been challenging to have managed the event efficiently without his assistance.
Long Course - 20 controls | ||||
Place | Name | Class | Controls | Time |
1 | Aims Coney and JJ Cote | C2 | 20 | 2:02:34 |
2 | Bill Warren | K1 | 19 | 2:22:52 |
4 | Gabe, Alec, Arthur | C2 | 14 | 2:32:55 |
Short Course - 10 controls | ||||
1 | Lori Huberman | K1 | 10 | 1:16:53 |
2 | Scott Drumm | K1 | 10 | 1:34:04 |
3 | Martin Kessell | C1 | 10 | 1:34:42 |
4 | Stephen and Jocelyn Matthews | C2 | 10 | 1:47:46 |
5 | Otto Ritter | K1 | 10 | 2:06:31 |
6 | Lea Ritter | K1 | 10 | 2:06:31 |
7 | Dave and Josh Trahan | K2 | 9 | 1:22:37 |
8 | Paul Schiralli | K1 | 9 | 2:27:00 |
9 | Zachary Schiralli | K1 | 9 | 2:27:40 |
10 | EK and SK Khalsa | C2 | 8 | 1:36:21 |
11 | Lilia and Stefanie Evans | C2 | 7 | 1:52:00 |
12 | Ann Harrer | C1 | 6 | 2:05:40 |
13 | Scott and Kathy Turner | C2 | 4 | 1:13:30 |