After David W. handed me a wonderful BK cheeseburger, I was set to go for round 2. The second event of the day had the same finish location, so that made things easier.

Went with the same as the morning – radio control at the Start, two at the Go control (200), and the USB wired controls for the Finish. Used no additional repeaters in the afternoon.

The White/Yellow Sprint course map

Map with tracks

To be low maintenance for the Start crew, for this course I started on my assigned start time, so I was 1/4 for the weekend. I did wear my bib number 2/4 times, which is a new record.

Anyway, I got a bit too cocky from 5-6, and eventually found 7, but then inexplicably I headed back to 5 and punched there again and was on my way to 7 again when I realized something wasn’t right. Back to 5 for another check, and a foul word or two, and then to 6 and the rest of the course. What made this such a painful error was that the entire area was just a slick muddy mess. Hey, but then it wouldn’t be the Pig, would it?

Another error when I decided to go through the tall stuff from 9-10 and then missed seeing the control. After that, there was a bit of head to head with a FU cadet who out kicked me by 10 seconds in the finish chute. Is it just me, or do we have the same expressions on our faces? Photo courtesy of OCIN.

Another enjoyable course. I could get used to doing Yellow on a regular basis.

Distance was 2.4 km with 60 m of climb, finish time = 36:19. Placed 9/16 on the course, my worst showing of the weekend.

While yesterday was hot and sunny, and I got a touch of sunburn, today was cool and overcast with a threat of rain most of the day. I, for one, was really appreciative of the cooler conditions.

The first event of the day was the Sprint.

Sandy and I drove to the Start and put out a radio control there and the repeater at R1. Again, we may have been able to skip the repeater at R1, but it wasn’t being used elsewhere, so we put it out there.

Sandy then set out the two GO controls at 136, and I set up the two USB wired controls at the Finish. Today, I used a little different computer configuration to deal with the wireless connection and the connection of the O-Lynx computer to the second computer being used for displaying information for Vladimir. That combination worked out well enough.

Though, it turns out that the USB wired controls at the Finish were a bit flaky because one had older firmware, and I was also using extenders to extend the cords further then is advised.

Anyway, here is Vladimir manning the mike. Photo courtesy of OCIN.

And, with the QOC flag on prominent display. Photo courtesy of OCIN.

The White/Yellow Sprint course map

Map with tracks

The Sprint course was a lot of fun with people going in different directions. I was surprised that I placed 4/22 on the course, but I think the youngsters were having issues keeping track of the 19 controls.

Distance was 1.6 km with 39 m of climb, finish time = 15:22.

Due to issues with my right Achilles and hip, I had to accept that I was going to the Flying Pig on the injured list, at least in terms of overdoing it on the Green course. Instead of feeling too sorry for myself, I decided to embrace my status and run the Yellow course (generally reserved for M/F-14), and I would also offer my assistance to the OCIN crew.

Part of the plan was to set up the O-Lynx radio controls so that there would be live data sent back for the announcer.

Since I was traveling light, and there was minimal time to plan and set up before each race, the idea was to keep things as simple as possible while still getting useful information for the announcer.

Here is where the radio controls and repeaters were placed at Middle Creek.

There was a radio control at the Start with two repeaters sending the signal back to the Finish. It may have been possible to go from the Start to the Finish without the repeaters in between, but I didn’t want to walk up the hill to the Start more then once, so I erred on the conservative side and put the repeaters out the first time.

Repeater 1 by the cemetery.

Two radio controls were put out at the location of the last control (100) and one was put out at the road crossing control (39). Photo courtesy of OCIN.

I also set up two USB wired controls at the Finish and connected everything to the O-Lynx software on two laptops and a netbook. Since I was hooking into OCIN’s wireless network for the OE2003 event data, and this process hadn’t been checked beforehand, there was a bit of an issue getting everything to work flawlessly, but I cobbled together enough data that Vladimir was good to go.

So, I got ready to go back to the Start for my own course. I didn’t make my assigned start time, and I was very amused by the time I got back up the hill to the Start by the number of people I passed who told me that I had missed my start time.

For me, it was pretty hot with temps in the mid 70s by the time I did start, and I was also feeling the lack of fitness on the hills. But, I took it slow and easy, and I enjoyed the course.

The Yellow course map from today. No tracks, because for the first time since I have owned a gps watch, I arrived at the start line with a dead battery. So, I wore it around with a blank screen mocking me for my carelessness.

Distance was 3.1 km with 100 m of climb, finish time = 49:03. Placed 5/17 on the Yellow course.