An under promoted challenging and fun competition utilizing amateur radio. A great time of year to see the colors of Michigan too. Hope you enjoy reading and viewing about it. 73, John, WØPV Official web site of the 12th IARU Region 2 / 23rd ARRL USA Radio Orienteering Championship. Announcement from a host club web page, Organizer: Joseph Burkhead (Event Director) aka KE8MKR The Southern Michigan Orienteering Club (SMOC) and Amateur Radio Clubs across southeastern Michigan invite you to attend the 2024 USA Radio Orienteering Championships held in the Chelsea, Michigan area this October. USA Radio-O Champs and IARU Region 2 Champs! Whether you're brand new to radio-O or an elite competitor, we welcome all orienteers to the great state of Michigan for supreme fall color racing in some of the finest SMOC venues known to mankind! No excuses for not coming because there will be a training camp 5-6 Oct and practice days 8-9 Oct to help anyone who is either new or wants to improve skills! We will also have some equipment to rent for those that need it as long as you pre-arrange, so that's not an excuse either! Competition days will be 10-13 Oct 2024 to include the following race formats: - Radio Sprint - Foxoring (Fox-O) - 144 MHz Classic - 3.5 MHz Classic - Search & Rescue (SAR) Team Exhibition We also have some exciting tourism/cultural outings, a Sat evening awards banquet, and other activities planned. Cider and donuts will definitely be part of the plan! This event will serve as both the ARRL's USA Radio-O Champs, as well as the International Amateur Radio Union (IARU) Region 2 (North/Central/South America) Championship! We welcome international competitors to compete! Event website: https://www.radioorienteeringchamps.us Stay tuned at our social media channel for news here: https://www.facebook.com/2024USRadioO/ As reported in the local press, USA Radio Orienteering Championship Coming in October Parks surrounding Chelsea, Dexter, Pinckney, and Brighton, Michigan will be venues of competition for the 23rd USA Radio Orienteering Championship to be held October 5th through the 13th, 2024. Radio Orienteering, also known as Amateur Radio Direction Finding (ARDF), is a multi-skill sport that involves running and navigating using only a map and compass (orienteering) while using a hand-held radio receiver and antenna to locate multiple transmitters hidden in a forest. The sport has direct application to important activities such as search and rescue, wildlife tracking, airborne and seaborne navigation, and communications. Competition will involve hilly terrain, intricate navigation challenges, and elite-level orienteering racing, but anyone who is a beginner will be happy to know that coaching, practices, race events, a training camp, and equipment rentals will also be offered during the competition week for those who would like to get started. Race formats include Sprint, Foxoring, 144 MHz Classic, and 3.5 MHz Classic events. Competition venues include Waterloo State Recreation Area, Hudson Mills MetroPark, and Brighton State Recreation Area. A training camp at Pinckney State Recreation Area and two local practice events with mentors will also be offered in the days leading up to the races for anyone who is a beginner or wants to improve their skills. The training camp will be held October 5th & 6th, practice events will be held on October 8th and 9th, and the championship races will be held October 10th through the 13th. The American Radio Relay League (ARRL), Southern Michigan Orienteering Club (SMOC), and local amateur radio clubs are organizing the event. Lyndon Township’s Joseph Burkhead who serves on the ARRL’s Radio Orienteering Committee is the Event Director for the championship. Joe is a 2018 World ARDF Championship bronze medalist, USA M40 national champion in the 144 MHz Classic, and also competed for Armed Forces Orienteering Team USA at the 2013 World Military Orienteering Championship. The International Amateur Radio Union (IARU) also sanctioned the championship to dually-function as the IARU’s Region 2 (Americas) Championship. This means that in addition to attracting competitors to the local area from multiple states across the country, organizers are also expecting international competitors hailing from Canada, Australia, China, and Europe. To highlight the important civic and humanitarian applications of radio transmitter hunting the organizers are also planning a search and rescue team exhibition contest. Search and rescue teams from across the area will be invited to compete in a distress beacon hunt while conducting land navigation and other search and rescue tasks. National championship medals will be awarded to the top three finishers in each class of competition including junior, elite, and masters age classes. Multiple social gatherings, outings, an amateur radio guest speaker, and an awards ceremony are also planned for the championship week. Whether new or experienced, young or senior, all are welcome to compete. Regular registration is open until August 15th. For additional information and the registration link, visit www.radioorienteeringchamps.us. You can also follow the event’s social media page at www.facebook.com/2024USradioO, or contact the organizers at radioO2024@gmail.com. Also,
I have been among the few who kept organizing fox-hunting contests. Then we were struggling to find a name for good old fox-hunting. Then, a jolly good Norwegian proposed ARDF at an IARU region 1. Conference. We studied compass orienteering contests, learned their organizing skills, used maps, and searched for mapped places. At that time someone invented Radio Orienteering.
I love it! As a hiker SOTA activator, this is another radio-related activity I can train for, and strive to achieve.
What a great concept! I did ROTC orienteering when going to college at Michigan Technological University and it was a blast. Adding radios to that would be fun.
How would someone get started in ARDF? I live in central North Carolina and I'm not aware of any ARDF groups close by. John, WB4OFT
John, A quick Google search turned up this org that is holding quite a few ARDF events in your area, Backwoods Orienteering Klub - Have Fun in the Woods Orienteering… with the best maps in the world Quite a deep web site, have fun browsing. Note the schedule page that lists several upcoming events nearby. Also way down in lower right corner of the Home page is a box of web links to "Other SE United States Clubs". Seems like NC is a hotbed of ARDF and a very beautiful place to do it especially in autumn. If you check them out, take some pics, come back here and share the experience with us. Good luck and have fun! 73, John, WØPV
