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The Baker to 'Vegas Race Logo
The combined efforts of Orange County Amateur Radio Club and COAR (City
of Orange Amateur Radio) and volunteer hams from the City of Cypress provided over 24 hams
to help plan, prepare, and provide the communications for the Police Department team of
the City of Orange compete in the 120-mile-long running relay race. Over 220
different law-enforcement teams participated in this yearly event. |
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A map of the 120-mile-long B2V relay race course. It
contains 20 individual relay legs and starts outside of Baker, goes through the cities of
Shoshone (Calif) and Pahrump (NV), goes over the mountain at Mountain Springs and ends in
Las Vegas |
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Ten
members of OCARC helped the Orange PD in planning, preparations and operations of the
race. Orange PD B2V Planning Meeting participates: (Standing L-R) - Leon-KK6AB, Bob-AF6C,
Steve-KB6ROL, Mike-KF6QFY, Rich-KR6BA, Mike-KF6WRM, Lowell-KQ6JD, Rich-KE6WWK,
Steve-KI6DDE, Dieter-N6ZKD, Bruce-KC6DLA, Ken-W6HHC. Mike-WA6OUE, and Les-KM6SQ.
(Seated) - Elmer-WA6PFA, Beverly-KI6APH, Jay-KK6OZ, and Robbie-KB6CJZ. |
Photo taken by Debbie Klein of OPD |
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| One of several COAR-RACES B2V-Planning-Meetings that were held
in the EOC room located at the OPD building to work out locations, staffing, and
frequencies |
Photo by Rich - KE6WWK |
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The Pool-side Workbench of W6HHC tested out radios,
computers, and antennas before the big race. The Equipment Testing Session really
began to look like "Field Day" when COAR operators from the "Follow
Vehicle" Showed Up. L-R - Mike-WA6OUE, Ken-W6HHC, Bob-AF6C, Bruce-KC6DLA,
Elmer-WA6PFA, Nicholas-KI6AUL, and Steve-KI6DDE
Photo by W6HHC |
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The Orange PD team captain, Dave Nichols, gives final
instructions to the runners and supporters at a Baker H.S. meeting before the race
begins.Two OCARC radio operators can be seen in yellow shirts. |
Photo by Mike - KF6WRM |
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Steve-KI6DDE checks out the 144/440 voice radio gear in
the OPD "follow vehicle" before the race begins.
Photo by Mike - KF6WRM |
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The OPD "follow vehicle" traveled along side
the runnners during the entire race. This vehicle not only provided drink or food as
needed and a back-up runner, but was also equipped with a radio operator. The radio
operator could easily reach the communications centers of COAR to pass information
(including running times) to OPD officials. The Follow Vehicle had three ham
antennas. Two dual-band 144/440 magnetic mounted antennas for voice and 2M antenna for
APRS Beacon |
Photo by Mike - KF6WRM |
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The first communications center on the route was set up
out in a mobile atop Ibex Pass. The ridge blocked some communications south towards
Baker, so this helped in the initial part of the race. You can see some other
communications organization used a cherry picker as a portable tower.
Photo by Debbie Klein of OPD |
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Radio operators from Cypress manned the
communications center in Shoshone. 144 MHz simplex was used as the primary channel for
"back bone" communications. A cross-band repeater with 440 MHz that was located
in Sandy Valley linked the "OPD back bone" to Las Vegas . |
Photo by Rich-KR6BA |
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Runners from the Orange PD team watch progress of the
runner on APRS tracking while waiting for their "turn" in Shoshone.
Radio operator Rich-KR6BA can partially be seen in the reflection of the
wall mirror (yellow jersey).. |
Photo by Steve-KB6ROL |
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View of the APRS Tracking Program set-up by Steve-KB6ROL
in Shoshone, CA. Not only did the APRS tracking program display yje loacation of TEAM 045
(OPD) runner on the left side, but a second screen displayed a picure of the runner and
the difficulty of the terain on the right side. |
Photo by Steve-KB6ROL |
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