The new "Official" Baker to Vegas web site is
http://bakervegas.com

Rules for 2001.

Fremont PD, took 10th place out of 200!

Well Done, Fremont Runners! Once again, Team Fremont took first place in their division. This year, the margin between first and second place was close to an hour. (In past years, only minutes have separated the first three or four teams.)

This page is presented by the San Francisco Bay Area B2V Ham Radio Team. We work with Team Fremont (Fremont P.D.), and other teams from the San Francisco Bay Area, to provide tactical and support communications for the teams which we support during the Challenge Cup Relay.

Our Picture Gallery is finally online!
[Wiring Overview] [APRS Trackers] [Staffing info]

Death Valley is one of the hottest places on Earth. The highest temperature on record for July 15 was in 1970, when the ground temperature was 201 degrees, and the air was only 128 degrees!(Fortunaly, the race is in early April!)

Great Sponsors during B2V 2000! Garmin donate three Garmin-12XL handheld GPS units (with built-in active antenna) for our group. These were used for the race, and then donated to our organization. We, in turn, held a drawing to award them to some of the volunteers who went to Las Vegas and helped with the race. Beside the great experience that all our volunteers got during the race, these units were a great donation, and we plan to borrow those units for 2001 from our lucky volunteers! (Thanks Garmin! Garmin logo copyright (c) 1999 Garmin International Corporation.)

Kenwood USA's Ham Radio Group donated 80 embroidered hats for the APRS crew, and five $50 gift certificates good toward the purchase of Kenwood Radios. Thanks Kenwood! Kenwood logo copyright (c) 2000 Kenwood Communications Corporation, Inc.)

This page is meant to be a roadmap, providing links to related information on this site, as well as other sites. Please browse the whole page before jumping to the other links. If you have a URL that you'd like me to add, please email N6UOW at baker2vegas.org and tell me about it.

What is 'Baker to Vegas'?

For the uninitiated, the phrase 'Baker to Vegas' (B2V) refers to the Challenge Cup Relay; A 120-mile, 20-stage, foot, relay race, which starts in Baker, California (gateway to Death Valley), through the California desert, over the mountains, to Las Vegas, Nevada. The teams are restricted to Law Enforcement teams (Police and Sheriff departments, judges, bailiffs, and other agencies and service teams). All of the teams are responsible for providing their own logistics and support efforts, including communications.

In 1999, our group of Ham Radio Operators, and other volunteers from the San Francisco Bay Area supported Fremont P.D., Roseville P.D., the Alameda County Sheriffs Office, and the Los Angeles Sheriff's Department Temple Station.

Fremont P.D. finished first place, in the 300 division
Roseville P.D. finished third in their division
(I'm still looking for info about Alameda County S.O. finish.)

If you are interested in having our support for your team in 2000, please email N6UOW at baker2vegas.org with your information or request, and I'll forward it to our group for discussion at our next meeting.

We have created a wiring standard for packet radio and APRS trackers, which we are encouraging ARES and RACES groups to adopt. We have also developed an idea for APRS Tracker packaging, which allows the unit to be used as a packet station, and then quickly turned into an APRS tracker.

You can read the original Ham Support for the 1995 Baker-to-Vegas Challenge Cup, a chronicle that was submitted to QST magazine. The article that appeared in print (April 1996) was a slightly shorter version.

Our Picture Gallery has some pictures of some of the technical work, as well as some cleaner images of the new technology we are using this year for vehicle tracking. (Look for the pictures without any descriptions. I added the links now, so folks can view them, even though I didn't have time to add descriptions.