Did Anyone Actually See Rabbits? Rabbit Creek Annual Meet

    Our annual Rabbit Creek meet is my favorite meet of the year, and while I missed most of the meets this year, a consequence of going to a school thousands of miles away, helping to direct and set one of my favorite maps was a wonderful way to begin the summer. As CTOC has grown over the last couple years, thank you Meetup, meets that used to bring out 5-10 competitors now bring out 20-40. These new numbers make the endless hours of mapping, checking, and setting the course worth it for the wonderful volunteer meet directors. (Although, we didn’t exactly check the course this last weekend, which is why there were so many meet notes… our bad.)

    Often, meets are rather isolated experiences for competitors: racers come, run, and leave. But the annual pot-luck brings a chance to connect with fellow orienteers, and we all learn just how crazy we really are. A special thanks to Bill Pilcher for hosting this annual meet and letting us run all over his beautiful property, while simultaneously warning us about the bull snakes that often slither underfoot (the reason gators are highly suggested). For years Bill has been hosting this meet every May and even before Bill owned the property, his friends, retired professors, hosted May Day parties. For as long as the house can remember there have been excited visitors trampling through the property every May. It’s exciting to continue a tradition in such a beautiful place.

    Extra kudos to the real star of the show, my mother, Melanie Wright. Who did a majority of the course setting on Saturday (and around five a.m. Sunday morning). She consistently shows me up with her endurance and bravery around dead rattlesnakes. While she was insistent that people arrive on time for mass starts throughout the day, she is much more empathetic in person than on meetup and we only had one real mass start at 9:32 for racers deciding to do the self-punishing 3 hour category. People will be people so most racers (including my father, with some excuse about cows) trickled in late. But Melanie dutifully repeated the course notes with the patience of a kindergarten teacher. 

[I am grateful for Katrina's and Innes' help with control pickup as well as a bunch of other help Katrina provided, including this writeup and her cheerful company, and the company of Bill L, Terry, and Bill Saturday evening.]

    Overall, I would call the meet a success, and would hope all competitors feel the same. There were strong performances from everyone, whether it was one of the first CTOC meets they have attended or Sergey who ran the full course in under two hours (a course purposefully made so he shouldn’t have been able to do that [route shown below]). Thanks to everyone who came out, and I (hopefully we [yes, we]) hope to all see you out at our next meet in June… especially the group who brought us donuts (you’re my favorites [mine too!]).

        Name(s)                                                                # of Controls                     Final Time

3 Hour Category

1	Ted Smith	28	2:37
2	Jason and Reese Russell	28	2:43*
3	Bill and Terry Leahy	28	2:50
4	Sean Howerty	21	2:11
5	Kevin McDowell and Jon Davey	16	2:59
6	The Wanderers	12	2:13
7	Cynthia and Jimmy B.	11	2:10
8	Micah and Friends	11	2:56

2 Hour Category

1	Sergey Valichko	32	1:56
2	Innes Wright	18	2:02**
3	Dustin Thomas	15	1:46
4	Bruce and Jerry	9	2:02**
5	Scott and Christy	7	1:50
6	Cat Stauffer	6	1:52

1 Hour Category

1

John Murray

6

1:04**

*Winner in our hearts for finding Melanie’s glasses (Thank you!)

**5 minute grace period

– Katrina Wright, Co(ish)-Meet Director

[and Melanie]

Sergey's Route: Approximately 12KM distance and 500M of climb