2007 Tombstone Trail

The Tombstone Trail returned to Fillmore County, the home of the first several Tombstone Trails, for the 30th annual event. Earlier in the week it was predicted to be very cold with a strong possibility of rain, but the cold held off and the skies cleared to reveal a nearly-full moon, increasing the visibility in the cemeteries as well as the overall wierdness of the competitors. So, it was a reasonably cold, clear night for the 46 teams who drove to Rochester, MN for the event.

This year used a format similar to the previous two years, where contestants had to find clues to a mystery tombstone which was worth 10 points, with 1 point for each correct answer at all the rest of the cemeteries. It was probably the most difficult event of the last decade, with the clues to the mystery tombstone spread far and wide. Only a third of the field found the mystery tombstone in time.

The event started off with a very difficult clue. As per the rules, there was a large but not obvious tombstone right near the main gate. However, in the excitement of the chase, many people forgot the rules, and wasted a lot of time searching all through a fairly large cemetery. Some even found the right family marker, yet did not search in the proximity for the correct family member. So, lots of teams wasted a huge chunk of time with or without finding the necessary clue.

The rallymaster blew one cemetery which exists in the middle of a corn field. When the event was set up and checked, the corn was too high to see the tombstones. However, the corn was harvested prior to the event, making the tombstones visible, and creating a problem that had to be corrected by a scoring review.

The most difficult question of the year was finding a man with two markers - a family marker and a headstone, with different information on each. The correct answer was found on the headstone, where it revealed that the man died just before his 75th birthday, making him 74 years old, not 75 like the family marker indicated. That one tripped up the majority of teams who answered it.

The rallymaster's favorite trick question was observing that Carroll was not the same as Carol. That one was visible from the car window, and was answered wrong by at least one team who read the name out loud and didn't notice the spelling.

The event was won by Dave Fuss and Rachel Fuss, who found the mystery tombstone plus 13 more! They had a good strategy of going for the questions that looked the easiest to answer, even driving right by one cemetery without stopping because the question (the person with the longest name) would obviously take a long time to answer. The Fuss's spanked Erik and Cindy Dahl in 2nd place overall and in class A, 3 points back, and Doug Atwill/John Wiersma also 3 points back, but losing the tiebreaker to the Dahls.

In class AA, Brad Odegard and Nina Noe took the win, 3 points back, and in the middle of the tiebreaker for 3rd overall. It was only Brad's 2nd Tombstone Trail and Nina's first, and they found the mystery tombstone with time to spare, but didn't realize that the 4 clues that Brad found and the 2 clues that Nina found were on two different sides of the same tombstone! The minute late that caused them prevented them from taking 2nd overall outright. Lance Stevens and Dana Stevens were 2nd in AA and 9th overall, while Therese Helberg and Jon Helberg took 3rd in AA, 14th overall.

Class C had Jeff Munson and Sherri Munson take the closest battle of the night, but only one point over Natalie Melhouse and Gail Molohon. Munsons were an incredible 6th place overall, with Melhouse/Molohon in 8th. Andrea Lang and Stephanie Jax took 3rd in C, 23rd overall.

Nancy Huseby and John Huseby took class D with an amazing 10th overall on their first ever Tombstone Trail. John Bjerke and Melissa Norgord were 2nd, and Jeremiah Davis and Allie Micka in 3rd.

In class B, another close battle had Joel Luth and Mindy Luth in first and 11th overall, only one point over Jim Anderson and Clark Pansch in 2nd and 13th overall. Jason Egan and David Biggs took 3rd, 17th overall.

The best costomb award went to Alana Rae and Stu Tanquist, with their excellent Trailer Trash costumes. The best story award was given by the contestants to rallymaster Mark Larson for his story about fending off a killer raccoon atack. The coveted dead last award went to Shaun Sapala and Dana Sapala, whose 11 correct answers would have put them in the top 15, had they remembered that their 20 wrong guesses would be deducted from their score. Bet they won't make that mistake again.

Thanks to Kevin Beck, Amanda Ingle and Mark Utecht for an excellent precheck, and to Dave Cameron for registration and scoring. Your hard work made the 30th annual Tombstone Trail the best it could be.

Mark Larson
Rallymaster

You can see the event results here.

2006 report