OPENING CEREMONY
The 2006 Corporate Challenge kicked off on Friday night with the Opening Ceremony. Thanks to everyone who came out and walked, shot Terry Howard and me with a Super Soaker, sang, cheered, or just wore a t-shirt. I expected to accumulate enough points to earn a Spirit Stick (and we did). What I did not expect was that we had the highest overall point total of all teams – in EVERY DIVISION. That earned us the coveted TAILGATE AWARD, which is an actual tailgate from a truck with all the company logos painted on it. There is only ONE tailgate and we won it. Way cool. If she has room for it I think that Amy Barnes absolutely deserves to display the tailgate in her office for her awesome work setting up the party. She can loan it to Sharon Hudgens for a while too.
TI won the overall tailgate award (an actual tailgate painted with all the corporate logos). Only one is given across all divisions so it’s a big honor.
TRACK AND FIELD (1st place -16 points) - Event Results
There are only 5 sports that we have won the past four years and track is one of those. Make that 5 in a row now. We won the 4x100 by 2 seconds (Lyndsey Cecka, Tara Larzelere, Benjamin Sarpong, and Aaron Hall in 51.2 seconds), then we won the 4x400 by 18 seconds (Tara Larzelere, Juanita DeLoach, Todd Fortenberry, and Arthur Yancy in 4:18). In the jumps we used age group scoring this year. Tony Deatherage at age 70 scored a whopping 817 points (12’6.5”) with Aaron Hall jumping 20’10” for 714 points. Tara, after running two relay races, leapt 14’7” to earn 634 points. We won the jump by 256 points. Gold in all 3 sub events adds up to the team title again. Captain Paul Westbrook is undefeated in track meets this century.
BOWLING (1st place -16 points) Event Results
IN 2005 the bowling team was edged by Nortel by just 42 pins (5634-5592). Our bowlers were apparently not happy with silver – this year they bowled 5662 and won by 494 pins! BlueCross edged out Nortel for the silver. Captain Joe Scott assembled a great team.
After the opening weekend TI led Nortel by 14 points (32 to 18).
PUNT, PASS & KICK (4th place –4 points) Event Results
We finished 4th and Nortel won, which closed the overall lead quickly.
HORSESHOES (5th place—2points) Event Results
Last year we medaled in all three sub events and finished second. This year we were shut out of hardware in all three and tied for 5th. Nortel took the gold and the overall lead. Thanks to captain Bob Graham for organizing the team again this year. Next season I’m confident the ringers will go our way.
TENNIS (5th place—2 points) Event Results
Last year we won Tennis and this year we just couldn’t get it to go our way. Amazingly each of the three teams lost a tiebreaker along the way to take a 5th, 5th and 3rd. That gave us a 5th overall. Had those 3 tight matches gone our way it would have probably given us at least 3rd overall – maybe more. Thanks to captain Russ Urquhart for stepping up and taking the captain role this year.
SOFTBALL (1st place—16 points) Event Results
Our softball teams have always medaled, but never stood on the top platform – until this season. They got beat by Nortel in their 3rd game, but came back through the bracket and beat Nortel twice to take the title. Outstanding! Congrats to captain Roli Ochoa and the very active Elisa Lindeman in leading the team to victory.
5K (1st place—16 points) Event Results Individual Runner Results
Three of our top 6 finishers from last year were out but this is a deep group of talent. We’ve never lost the 5K and we weren’t about to start now. 420 runners lined up. Brian Schmidt was 2nd overall, Ken Heap was 8th overall, and Jim Drumm was 14th to give us a good men’s score. The women matched them with Christie Rambin, Lisa Wesneski, and Heidi Nagel running well to give us the overall win over Nortel by 1:12. Also thanks to the other runners who came out and joined in. This event has no entry limit so it’s fun to see all the TI shirts running in the field.
With 7 events complete Nortel led TI by 11 (83-72).
DOMINOS (3rd place—7 points) Event Results
Each company enters two teams. Our pair of teams finished 5th and 3rd out of 14 teams to add up to an overall bronze medal. Nortel tied for 4th so we picked up a few overall points on them.
FLAG FOOTBALL (4th place—4 points) Event Results
We had a first round bye but lost to Nortel in the second round. We beat Blue Cross, but then lost to RISD to take 4th overall. Nortel took second.
With 9 of the 20 events complete we were down by 13 to Nortel (96-83).
MINI GOLF (2nd place–11points) Event Results
We played very well taking a Silver in Women (Kay Carter and Mary Lou Manning) and Mixed (captain Jerry Swan and Tram Dao) and a Bronze in Men’s (Allan Manning and Jonathon Sanchez). Unfortunately Nortel swept all three sub events to take first overall. We finished second. We fell behind Nortel 112-94 for the overall title.
TEXAS HOLD ‘EM (exhibition; 2nd place) Event Results
This one doesn’t count in the overall team totals. We did great in the prelim with captain Jason Glenn and John Garrison finishing on top and Michael Sorrels in 3rd but we just didn’t get the cards in the finals. We ended up taking 2nd overall to Nortel.
SWIMMING (2nd place-11points) Event Results
We swam well as always, but couldn’t unseat RISD from the top overall slot. We took second and Nortel took third. Derek McEachern and David West earned first place in the men’s 50 meter backstroke. Kudos goes to Beth Smith, team captain as well as Derek who competed and helped hold our standing all four events. Our other winning team members include Scott Summerfelt, Maciej “MJ” Blasiak, Scott Hiemke, Tracey Panzer, Sarah Liu, Lara Wallentine and Cari Ossenfort, who recently returned to the pool with her new baby boy.
BADMINTON (1st place—16 points) Event Results
This one usually comes down to TI and Nortel. Captain Claude Cirba fielded 3 excellent teams (Men: Adrian Chan and Raj Talluri; Women: Yue Li and Vivian Zhu; Mixed: Bobby Lai and Vivian Zhu) and we swept all three sub events to take the overall title. The overall team point gap began to close.
GOLF (2nd place–11 points) Event Results
The golf team finished second to RISD by a single stroke – 117 to 118. Nortel was 3rd with 124. This narrowed the overall team point gap to just 5 points. Good job by captain Jerry Swan to put together a pair of solid teams.
SOCCER (2nd place-11 points) Event Results
The Soccer team had reached the finals the previous week and the final game was held Saturday afternoon. It was close match but Nortel prevailed 2-1. Thanks to Robin Mahmud for his excellent leadership and Rodolfo Molina for assisting. This is usually the toughest team to captain because of the large amount of interest. The overall gap was back to 10 points.
BIKE RACE (1st place—16 points) Event Results Individual Results
Postponed one week by rain the bike race finally got off and there was no stopping the TI Team. This is one of only 3 events we’ve won all five years. They didn’t just win – they dominated. The 4 TI riders took 93:22 and the next closest was 113:10 – a stunning 20 minute margin of victory. Our top two men were both Masters riders too – Ken Maclean and Dave Parks. Michelle Boyer was the first overall female and 14th out of 167 riders. Cari Ossenfort was not far behind her. Good job by team captain Les Stark. The best news is that Nortel, who always finishes second to us, finished 4th this year and that catapulted us into the overall lead for the first time since opening weekend.
With 15 of the 20 events complete we up by 2 points over Nortel (159-157).
DARTS (2nd place-11 points) Event Results
We have dominated Darts and taken gold the past four years. Nortel has not been as strong so there was a chance to widen the lead. Unfortunately it looks like my weeknight event theory is still holding strong. All 6 of our event gold medals have been won on Sat or Sun. In a stunning turn of events we only took 4th in both the Men’s and Women’s and were tied with Nortel for 5th overall going into the Mixed event. In the Mixed we finally struck Gold and beat Nortel in round one. Those rascals came all the way back through the loser’s bracket to take second. That win propelled us to 2nd overall and Nortel tied for 3rd.
VOLLEYBALL (4th place-4 points) Event Results
In the past 4 years Nortel has finished 1st or 2nd. Last year we made our best showing ever to finish 3rd. I was worried we would lose ground. When the first night’s results posted it showed we lost our first game and Nortel won theirs. Turns out there was an error in the scoring and we should have won the first game. One of our players caught it (lesson – everyone learn the rules of your sport) and we were offered the win. Captain Tim Taylor decided to let it go and hit the losers bracket to get some team confidence. Had we taken the win we would have faced Nortel. The strategy seemed to work as the TI Team defeated Siemens and BlueCross and the team that “beat” us defeated Nortel and then Nortel was knocked out by Alliance. Alliance then knocked us out, but we finished 4th and Nortel took 5th so we picked up two more valuable team points. That was one wacky and brilliant strategy.
TABLE TENNIS (2nd place-11 points) - Event Results
ABC Sports should really think about covering this event. We opened the Mixed matches against Nortel. The event was very close but Nortel prevailed. We came back and won the Men’s gold the next night. The winner would be determined by the outcome of the Women’s match last night. TI and Nortel both won their first two games and met in the semifinal. Nortel prevailed so our team beat RISD to move into the final, but the outcome was the same. Nortel edged us and took the overall Table Tennis victory. Great spirit and effort by the Table Tennis team – this event could have gone either way on just a bounce or two. Great job by captain Vivian Zhu.
BASKETBALL (1st place—16 points) - Event Results
We’ve always done well in Basketball and Nortel finally did well last year. We opened with a victory over Blue Cross and faced Nortel in round 2. We sent them to the losers bracket where Nortel beat Siemens before losing to Sprint/Nextel. Our team then defeated RISD to move to the final where the dispensed with Sprint/Nextel by about 20 points to take the title. Nortel took 4th. Good job by team captain Dan McKeon to put together another solid team.
With 19 of the 20 events complete we led by 16 points over Nortel (201-185).
BILLIARDS (2nd place-11 points) - Event Results
We only needed one point from them to secure the team title and they could have earned that by just showing up. The TI team bounced back nicely from a bad season last year and did very well. The first night Nortel won and our men took 4th. The second night the TI women ran the tables to take the gold. On the final night the mixed team took 4th and gave us 2nd place overall. Nortel finished 4th overall.
And the 2006 Overall Winner is . . .
TEXAS INSTRUMENTS
We also won the Division A spirit award for good sportsmanship.
Overall Standings
http://www.quickscores.com/cc/index.php?Year=2006
DIVISION A
TI – 212
Nortel – 189
RISD – 149
Alliance – 119
Sprint / Nextel – 74
BlueCross BlueShield - 51
Siemens – 49
Most importantly, the TI athletes donated over $3,500 to Special Olympics.
TI Team Coordinators: Paul Westbrook and Lara Wallentine
