April 8, 2019 by Will Enger
Junior Nationals, of course! Having honed their skills at the Winter League Championships at Camp River Ranch (site of this photo), some 45 Cascaders, most of them juniors, will make their way toward the nation’s capital this weekend to compete in the most important event of the year geared toward the younger age groups.
Junior Nationals will be hosted by the Washington D.C.-based Quantico Orienteering Club and will be held on Marine Corps Base Quantico in Northern Virginia. The event will also double as the team trials for American juniors vying for the privilege of representing the USA at the Junior World Orienteering Championships (JWOC) this summer. Best of luck to everyone!
You can read more about the event here, or check out the orienteering map that will be used on Route Gadget here.
Oh, by the way – next year, Junior Nationals will be hosted by Cascade OC!
April 1, 2019 by Debbie Newell
Next up in the Ultimate Orienteer Series is a score-o at Bridle Trails State Park in Kirkland. It’s you against the clock as you collect as many points as possible within your chosen time limit. You choose the controls you visit based on their point value.
Speed through the park in 60 minutes or set a more leisurely pace and take 90 minutes. This is a head-to-head competition: everyone starts at the same time!
Online pre-registration is open until 9pm on Thursday, April 4. We’ll also have registration on the day (cash or check only) but would appreciate pre-registration in order to get an accurate map count. Get more details on the event page.
March 17, 2019 by Ing Uhlin
Come join us March 23 and 24 for a two-day event on Peteris Ledins’s brand-new map of Frenchman Spring near Vantage in eastern Washington. Saturday includes the Pig War Challenge, a low-key competition between the USA and our Canadian friends. Citizenship in either country is not a requirement. So come out and run this Middle distance event with courses designed by Ott Toomett. The Sunday event features Long distance courses designed by Peteris.
Saturday Night in Quincy
On Saturday night, please join us at Tijuana Mexican Restaurant in Quincy, where you can order your own food and compare routes with your fellow orienteers. We’ll also be awarding the Pig War trophies. Details are on the event page.
Both days include five courses of different lengths and difficulty levels (Beginner, Intermediate, Short Advanced, Medium Advanced, and Long Advanced). The Ultimate Orienteer classes for competing in the Ultimate Orienteer Series are assigned to the three Advanced courses. You are welcome to sign up for any course but please consider the course closing times and give yourself enough time. All Advanced courses have pre-assigned start times. Please pre-register for these events since that helps us order enough maps and helps to assign the start times. We rely on your help to organize the events so please consider volunteering. For more information on the events, registration, volunteering, travel information, weather, lodging, etc, see the event pages for Saturday and Sunday.
March 6, 2019 by Ing Uhlin
The Ultimate Orienteer Series is quickly approaching and the first event of the season is already this Saturday. As freezing rain and snow is falling again, it is hard to believe that the forecast actually is promising for this weekend. Join us for the first Ultimate event on Saturday evening at Lynndale Park, with exciting courses set by Will Enger. More info and to register, go here.
February 26, 2019 by Michelle Kastner
QOC invites everyone to come out and experience the excitement of orienteering at a National Championship event held in some the finest orienteering terrain in the Mid-Atlantic region. Come see US junior orienteers compete for both interscholastic and intercollegiate team and individual titles and for the right to represent the United States in the 2019 Junior World Orienteering Championships, while testing yourself in the same terrain. COC would like to encourage everyone who can make the trip to participate in this exciting event. It’s a great learning experience for any orienteer. Juniors- remember any student can participate, regardless of how you finished in WIOL! COC had 40 kids in MA last year. Let’s represent well again!! To learn more click here.
February 19, 2019 by Michelle Kastner
Bragging Rights, Trophies, Podiums, National Ranking Points and Amazing Courses! Don’t miss this season’s championships at Camp River Ranch this Saturday, February 23rd! To learn more, register or volunteer click here.
February 11, 2019 by Michelle Kastner
Register Now! Don’t miss the fun! The 3rd annual 3-person relay, an exciting ending to the winter season, is being held Feb. 24th at Seattle Pacific University. There are two classes: Open and Junior. The only restriction to forming a team is that all members of a Junior team have to be 20 years or younger. This year, all three legs will be about equal in distance and difficulty, all about 2 km in distance (point to point), have about 20 controls on each leg, and all legs have forking. And to make it even better, it’s only $2 when you pre-register! Learn more and register here.
February 7, 2019 by Michelle Kastner
For safety reasons we are cancelling Saturday’s Winter League #7 meet at Pt. Defiance.
SEASON SCORING:
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We will be counting the Championship race at Camp River Ranch as the 7th meet of the season. So those close races for season trophies will be decided on the course and not by snow.
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The Camp River Ranch meet will still be a championship race with trophies for this meet, but it will also count as meet 7 in the overall season standings.
A huge thank you to Ing Uhlin and Dave Tallent for the incredible amount of work they put in to design amazing courses for Pt. Defiance. We will use these courses in the near future, so they will not go to waste!
February 5, 2019 by Michelle Kastner
Join the fun at Pt. Defiance Park this Saturday, February 9th for the final “regular season” meet of the Winter League (WIOL + Winter O’) Series. This race will play a major role in determining who wins the overall season trophy in many categories, so excitement will abound! Terrific news is the map has had major updates thanks to course designers Ing Uhlin and Dave Tallent. Find more info or register here. Please note: Due to winter storm forecasts, the Winter League Series Directors will announce the status of the race at 8pm Friday evening.
January 28, 2019 by Michelle Kastner
The JTESC and the coaches of the OUSA Junior National Program, Erin Schirm and Greg Ahlswede, announced the 14 member (7 male and 7 female) Junior National Team earlier this month and four Cascade OC members have made the team! Congratulations to Siri Christopherson, Caroline Sandbo, Kai Mihata and Jessica Colleran. These four have put in countless hours of physical training, participating in training calls, logging performance metrics, traveling all over the globe to compete, and running in many COC events. Cascade OC is excited and proud to have this amazing level of representation on the junior national team. A special shout out to COC Member, Mike Schuh, who helped to train all of these competitors.
Cascade OC also had three competitors named to the Junior Development Team (JDT): Great job by Annika Mihata, Jolie Barga and Anna Campbell. The JDT is designed to help young orienteers who are capable of orienteering on orange-level courses to transition to the advanced level and become nationally competitive. To learn more about OUSA’s Junior National Program click here.
