September 10, 2022

Lubrecht Foot-O and Mountain Bike-O

The fall orienteering season in Montana got underway with our season opener at Lubrecht Experimental Forest. In addition to a full set of regular foot orienteering courses, three mountain bike orienteering (MTBO) courses were offered, courtesy of Garth Flint.

Ten people tried the MTBO courses, including a close battle between Kim Mize and Garth Flint on the long course. Kim triumphed by just about two minutes, winning in a time of 1:45:26. Another close contest took place on the advanced beginner (foot) course, where Missoula Youth Orienteering Program participant Mox Anderson finished just four seconds (!) ahead of Jared Hearing.

Special shout-outs go to Leslie and Emi Berg, Katherine Ferguson, and Jan Lauenstein, each of whom went out on both foot and MTBO courses! Jan, a Swiss exchange student spending the year in Missoula, had the fastest times on both the Long Advanced foot-O and the Medium MTBO courses.

Thanks to our great team of volunteers! Garth Flint had the idea to hold the Mountain Bike Orienteering event, and did all the work to make it happen. Harvey Goldstein helped with setup. Loy Koch helped with pretty much everything, from setup, to running the download and registration, to cleaning up. Calvin Olson, Mox Anderson, and Jan Lauenstein picked up controls.

In addition to our volunteers, we'd like to thank our event sponsors Blackfoot Communications and the Loose Caboose, and our main club sponsor, Alpine Physical Therapy.

Results are below. You can see the split times here.

You can also see some of the competitors' routes, and add your own routes, here.

A handful of photos by Boris Granovskiy, as well as course maps from the event are here. If you have cool photos from today's event, please add them to the album.

Up next is our FREE Beginner-Focused event at Pattee Canyon on September 24. A full set of courses will be offered, and extra beginner instruction and tips will be available. Information about the event is here.