CHCCS ARDF
2019-10-05, Fall #3
Foxoring
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Carolina North Forest - East

Island Creative Time
The family website of Kelly and Patrick Sears




Wow! What a way to end the season: 22 participants. We had 7 middle school students, 3 high school students, and 12 family members. Fantastic! With the weather cooling down a bit, it was an excellent day for running. This was especially nice for a foxoring course.

This was a foxoring course, meaning that the control features were marked on the map but the true control location had to be found by radio direction finding. The format was such that you tried to get as many controls as possible in any order. In orienteering, this is known as a score-o. Unlike classic events, the control features were marked on the map and there were 10 controls instead of 5. So there was plenty of running to do. One particularly difficult fox was fox 3. It was pretty far from it's control feature in an area with dense brush and heavily broken terrain. The longest distance across the course area was 1.7 km.

We had three new groups. We all started as a large group learning about foxoring and heading for the first clearing on the east side of the main trail. There, Jack (SmMS-6), Rhodes (es), Chris (f), and Stacy (f) felt pretty confident and turned west to search for fox 1 by themselves. This was their first time trying ARDF and they found fox 1 on their own. Excellent! After that they went for fox 3. Oh no! We didn't realize it turned out to be the hardest one on the entire course! Super effort! Meanwhile, the rest of the group went east and then north on single track, searching for fox 2. Found it, no problem. Then back west to the main trail. Passing the trail, Matthew (SmMS-8), Owen R (SmMS-8), and Cooper (SmMS-6) separated from the group, and headed into the bush, searching for fox 1. That was a bit tougher to find but we got it. Super! Back to the main trail to rejoin the group. Again we split up. Matthew, Owen R, and Melissa (f) went north for more foxoring while Cooper and Aimee (f) headed for the homing beacon.

We also had a good number of experienced RDFers. Naomi (SmMS-6) and Jon (f) went as one team and did super. Malcolm (ECHHS-9), Theo (SmMS-6), Peter (f), and Mary (f) went as another team and also did great. There was a fun competition with Owen MB (SmMS-8) and Morgan (CHHS-9) on one team versus Scott (f) and Sarah (f) on another. In orienteering score-o races, the course designer tries to make the course so that only the winner will be able to get every control. Such a feat is known as clearing the course. In foxoring, it's not as difficult but our course was still quite challenging and both teams cleared the course. Outstanding! Toby (ECHHS-9) had a busy schedule so we were super happy that he could come for a short run. It was also great seeing Jason (f) and Kate (f) go as a team.

The course timing system. This took quite a bit to setup. Ten foxes instead of just five. But all appears to have worked well.

Check out how you did at the end of the web page, after the pictures. The results appear in the order that people started out. Everyone who used an RFID card gets their own results. Others that went with them get added to the group list, but of course groups are free to go together and split up.

A super thank you for all who donated to the club.

It's nice we had enough receivers for everyone and you made it possible. Also, we have enough to put in another order. With the number of participants growing, it will be especially nice to have a few more receivers when the spring season arrives. Thanks again : )

Thank you to all our helpers.

Thanks to all the middle school and high school teachers and staff who helped get the word out to the students: Rachel Hopler (Science Teacher, Culbreth Middle School), Christine Lippy (Science Teacher, McDougle Middle School), Al McArthur (Technology Facilitator, Phillips Middle School), Haley Wamble (Science Teacher, East Chapel Hill High School), SaCola Lehr (Media Specialist, Chapel Hill High School), Libby Diesel (Library Assistant, Chapel Hill High School), Femi Jayeola (Librarian, Carrboro High School), Margaret Devetski (Library Assistant, Carrboro High School). Thanks to Greg Kopsch (Park Manager at Carolina North Forest) for the use of CNF.

Pictures.

Clicking pictures will bring up original full-sized versions. All participants are listed as seen in the picture from left to right. Pictures are generally listed in chronological order trying to keep groups together. If you took any pictures during the event, we would love to post them. If you would like that, email us your pictures.

Thank you Jason Reed for taking the pictures labeled JR.



Getting equipment, getting ready.

Chris, Stacy, Rhodes. They have their maps, compasses, and receivers. Ready to go!

Chirs, Stacy, Jack, Rhodes. The whole family : )

Kelly, Owen, Melissa, Matthew, Amy, Cooper. The big gathering to get equipment at our home base.

Scott, Owen. Some friendly competition was spicing the talk : )

Sarah, Morgan, Scott.

Scott, Sarah. Talking about how they're going to run it and how Owen and Morgan will run it.

Patrick, Toby, Kate, Jason. Gathering equipment.



On course.

Matthew, Owen, Cooper, Melissa, Amy. On the main trail. I think this was heading south after finding fox 2 and heading down to search for fox 1.

Morgan, Owen. Confering over the map.

Kate. Map and receiver in hand, ready to RDF. [JR]

Kate. At one of the controls. Zoom in to the picture and you may discern the control box hidden under pine needles. With a bit of finding Waldo, you may also find the foxo pole. It's there, keep looking : ) [JR]

Kate. Jumping over one of the drainage channels for the old runway. [JR]



Arriving at the finish.

Owen. Coming down the finish shoot.

Owen. Punching the finish box.

Morgan, Owen. They just completed a super fast run having cleared the entire course. Outstanding!

Toby. Coming down the finish shoot.

Toby. Punching the finish.

Kate, Jason. Coming down the finish shoot.

Kate, Jason. Punching the finish.

Jon, Naomi. Coming down the finish shoot.

Aimee, Cooper. They just arrived back.

Chris, Jack, Rhodes, Stacy. They just got to the homing beacon.

Chris, Stacy, Rhodes, Jack. They just finished, having found fox 1 on their own during their first time RDF'ing! Excellent!

Malcolm, Theo, Pete. Approaching base camp.

Malcolm, Theo. Theo is punching the finish.

Sarah, Scott. Just finished after a good run clearing the course.



Back at base camp.

Kate, Jason, Toby, Kelly. Talking about RDF, band, and all sorts of stuff.

Naomi, Jon. Happy after a good time on course. They want more events!






CTS Evpro Results.

The cts-evpro results are listed here in order by start time. There is a separate listing for each RFID card used but participants are free to run the course individually or in groups. For this reason and because we don't have enough participants to create meaningful categories, we're not providing a ranking. Mostly, everyone is competing against themselves, seeing how they can improve : )

ToC is the time on course. HB is the homing beacon.

For each control, the information is presented as follows:


Classic 80m course.

Students are listed with their school and grade. We use the following schools abbreviations: PhMS Phillips MS, SmMS Smith MS, McDMS McDougle MS, CuMS Culbreth MS, CHHS Chapel Hill HS, ECHHS East Chapel Hill HS, CaHS Carrboro HS, es elementary school, s CHCCS student (no school info), f family or guest friend, t teachers and staff members.


All the pictures we took are free to use as you wish. The web page (text and layout) is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. Link to License. This means that you can copy anything you want, use it and alter it as you want, as long as you give credit to us for the original work, provide a link to the license, and explain any changes you made. We try to make sure all other content we display is also available to use. But check the sources we list before using them.