Milford Winter Guard

I would like to thank everyone that worked the Winter Guard competition at the Milford High School on Saturday, March 18.

Hopefully Jim WB8RRR, Jack WB8RKY, Glenn KB8STU, Lyle AB8AH, Rob N8JMV, Kim N8OXG, Chuck N8CJB, Trey KD8BVI, Pete N8OGW, Judy N8PGY and Frank K8VTW have recovered from the temporary hearing loss that may result from working the event.

Every year presents a new challenge, last year it was the number and size of the props that many guard unit had that tested our ability to keep a path clear for units entering and exiting the gym. This year only a few guard units had props, however those that did still pushed the limits on what would fit through the exit doors.

The new challenge this year was the size of the percussion groups, which have been getting larger every year. The ready line is a hallway that runs the length of the gym and we had some units that had a problem getting all their equipment into that area. Moving them in the halls between the warm up rooms and the ready line was like running a railroad with only a single track and not enough sidings.

Pete suggested we establish at least two additional control points in the main hallway to give us better control of the percussion units, so plan on us looking for additional volunteers next year for the morning shift.

As in the past, MARC time was on time. The schedule slipped a little toward the end of the day when one unit did not clear the gym on time. It slipped another minute when the sound man played the wrong music for a group.

In addition, this year they did not run out of BBQ.