Discussion: Billygoat 2017 - Thank you

Today's Billygoat was great fun, with a smart course using the open woods with interesting choices and yes, some healthy climb, too.

Many thanks to Rick and the whole team who designed and produced the great 39th edition of the BG!

Agreed! It was a lot of fun. Even the weather cooperated.

Touche. Kudos. Well done.

Here, here! Outstanding Billygoat!

Thanks to Rick for the excellent course. It was great having both of the sometime-traditions of the Billygoat, skip and fork, and both were especially well implemented. The course posed multiple varied and tempting skip opportunities from start to finish. And the fork offered a pair of interesting and quite different choices, maybe the best Billygoat fork ever. In general, there was a wonderful variety of orienteering problems to be solved throughout the whole course--even an interesting route choice on the leg to the last control.

And a well organized event all around--thanks to Craig, Geoff, and all the rest of the HVO and WCOC crew who produced the (and my) 39th Billygoat.

Are there maps for those of us spectating from abroad?

Or even just from Colorado? Much appreciated if someone can post.

Pretty terrible map quality, and the track doesn't line up since the photo is pretty warped, but here it is on my doma:

Here is another version:
http://traktore.se/maps/show_map.php?user=TraktorE...

Thanks, Rick, for a wonderful BG. Can you put the splits on AP (or send them to me to upload)? It does a skip analysis of time gained.

A wonderful event - great company in the woods to share bad route choices with!
Thanks to the whole crew involved in setting this up - getting me thinking about offering to set another BG myself.

A splits upload would be great, along with RouteGadget - so I can really see my errors.

Splits should be up on AP shortly (thanks George!) and RouteGadget (thanks Valerie!).

Splits are up on AP now--Thanks George and Ken.

https://www.attackpoint.org/racesplits.jsp/race_24...

I think the gain estimates are a bit too high for 14. This can happen if none of the top runners visit a control. I'd guess it's more like 9-ish minutes from a quick eyeballing.

Most times at 21 were missing due to malfunctioning box, so I can't tell if anybody skipped that one.

skips: BG | PG

I surmise that Coach skipped 21 and Richard N didn't skip any.

14 was my skip based on Alex's photo of the map.

Apparently Rich N had one of those moments - somewhere in the middle he decided he couldn't remember if he had punched 3 or not, so decided maybe he needed to go to all the rest. Of course, as it turned out he had punched 3.

Looks like a great course. Wish I could have been there. Skipping the last control can also be fun. :-)

I'm wondering how #1 would have been for a skip? It looks like it'd save a lot of climb (plus make what climb remains more gradual), and give a trail run to 60m from control 2. People often don't like skipping early, though, nor putting a target on their back. Sorry that I couldn't make it this year.

Craig Weber, meet director, did an outstanding job organizing the event. Thanks Craig!

Update...RouteGadget is not available quite yet...need to figure out why the first place person is being dropped...

I just noticed the cute goat head on the map. Nice touch. Something that per-event printing allows.

OK, I got the RG sorted for both races.
http://vmeyer.net/gadget/cgi-bin/reitti.cgi

For those missing the split at #21, you were given a split of zero, or the same time as the previous control. You will need to adjust your split manually to #21 (the one before the fork).

The Goat's Report is available now: http://www.faculty.fairfield.edu/rdewitt/wcoc/Goat...

Niel's O did a nice analysis of the fork, comparing times for the top 10, top quartile, all runners, etc. We'll try to get a link to that up soon.

Very nice, entertaining summary, Rick!

This begs for live tracking!

The fork analysis is now available. Thanks Niels!
http://www.faculty.fairfield.edu/rdewitt/wcoc/2017...

A very interesting analysis. (On reflection, it makes intuitive sense. If I slow, then distance is everything.)

I went straight, which seemed really preferable since I was walking anyway.

Thanks very much to the organizers for a fantastic event! The Billygoat is always great fun, and the Ward Pound Ridge terrain was excellent.

I seem to have misplaced my e-punch somewhere between the download and refreshments. It is a grey SI-6 with a yellow tip, SI 504703. Please let me know if anyone found it.