I was very pleased to see such a great turnout for the première Nursery-O and this of course was partly due to excellent winter weather. We had about 50 participants which resulted in a donation of $772 to the host Tecumseh YMCA.

Special thanks for in order for the sponsors: City of New Carlisle, Bethel Township Trustee Dave Pharses, Scarff’s Nursery, Studebaker Nurseries, & Lavy’s Turf Farm.

Results by Class

Split Time Results

Feedback

Brian Grafton

Larry,
Twas excellent!  I will happily attend if the show goes on next year.  The worst part is the cleanup!
Thanks Larry!

Jeff McPherson

Hi Larry, looks like it was a nice event.  Surprised nobody from Cleveland showed up... -Alexis (Pittsburgh WPOC)

Alexis Rzewski

Jeff Archer

Hi Larry!

I just wanted to tell you that I had a great time on Sunday, and am looking forward to participating again.  Thought you might want to see a novice's view.

Can you imagine a race where you don’t know the distance or route that you’ll run?  Unexpectedly, I experienced such a race this weekend.   Late Saturday afternoon, my Dirt Dawg friend, Mike Allen, called me to ask if I’d interested in teaming up with him for the "New Carlisle Nursery-O Mini-Rogaine", which was sponsored by the Miami Valley Orienteering Club.  Without hesitation, I said yes.

This orienteering event, also known as a "rogaine", took place over about the 1,800 acres of Scarff’s and Studebaker Nurseries in New Carlisle.  The terrain varied from manicured golf course green fields to shoulder high rushes, from uniform rows of cultivated shrubs and trees to dense woods with thorny undergrowth.  Scattered throughout to course were 30 orange and white control markers, each of which was to be found within a 6 hour time limit.  We were told that the course could be covered in around 30K. 

After checking in, we were each given a map of the overall course area, which had the 30 control locations noted.  After being given the briefest of explanations of the map features and color coding, we decided on the order in which we would connect the dots.  While I drew straight lines between the points, rarely, did we travel such a manner.  Several areas on the map were noted as "out of bounds", which caused some inconvenient diversions. 

Each of the controls had a brief description, such as "distinctive coniferous tree", "stream bend", and "re-entrant", which after some deciphering assisted us.  After finding each control, we would refer to our map for the next, try to figure out the quickest route, and begin our slow run again.  Several times, we had to climb fences, search for fallen trees in order to cross streams dryly, and figure out how to get around or through thick brush.  Once, as I was looking at the map, I told Mike that we should take a particular trail that led directly to our next control point only to discover once we had started running that we were following my ink line and not a real trail at all.  Another time, we came out of the woods into an open field and continued on in a huge circle only for about 20 minutes only to discover that we had been within 10 yards of the control when we originally left the woods.  We were told during our map reading lesson that the white areas on our map referred to dense forest.  Mike and I both forgot that fact very quickly, and assumed that white meant open field.  This little confusion was worth about 27 minutes.  Remember, we had to get all of our controls within the six hour limit, and we were also adding up additional mileage during these fruitless searches. 

With under an hour to go, we had three controls to find, and as the temperature was rising, the ground turned to slippery mud.  Mike’s heel was hurting, so as he kept me in sight I ran ahead to collect each of the remaining controls.  Covered with burrs, scratches, and mud covered tights, we slowly jogged back to the base camp at the New Carlisle YMCA to finish in 5 hours & 46 minutes & 53 seconds.  We traveled around 25 miles in the course of our search. Because each team or solo contestant had to determine their own order to navigate the controls, as we saw runners and walkers, we didn’t have a clue who was ahead or behind. I don’t know yet how we finished overall, but I sure had a good time on an unexpected adventure.  (Having received the results, Mike and I discovered that we came in 5th out of twelve Mixed Masters teams.)

Cheers,
Kenneth J. Seidl
Dayton, Ohio