A Remembrance of Carl Wisser

By Tom Knight (USATF Course Measurer)

Carl Wisser passed away on May 1, 2009 at the age of 78. He was an architect by profession. He was dedicated to measuring road race courses. In the 1970's, continuing into the beginning of the 80's, Sheldon Gersh single handedly fulfilled San Francisco Bay Area course measurement requirements until some dedicated people like Carl Wisser came along.

Without Carl and his willingness to take on a huge workload and his dedication to the course measurement cause, the improvement in course measurement in Northern California would not have happened. Flory Rodd, an exceptional runner in his 50's, was the catalyst in getting the running community to improve the state of course certification in the Bay Area. An inspirational organization meeting and on-hands tutorial by Bob Letson of San Diego was responsible for the formation of a brand new certification committee that represented both TAC (predecessor to USATF) and RRCA in the Bay Area. Carl was elected Chairman of the Greater Bay Area Certification Committee. He served in this position from 1982 through1996.

The members of the committee included Carl, Tom Benjamin, Tom Knight, Paul Oerth, Pete Shandera, Dick Hughes, and Ron Grayson. Carl did most of the actual certification work and kept the records in his architectural office.

From 1983 to 1999 Carl certified 490 courses, of which he measured 152 himself. Pete Riegel, then head of the National Road Running Technical Committee, validated two of his courses, a 10 km and a 20 km, back around 1990, and of course both passed. Carl organized the measurement of the Western States 100 Mile course which was done with mountain bikes.

I (Tom Knight) measured quite a few courses with Carl, including the Oakland Marathon and Half Marathon, the 1984 Olympic Marathon, the Big Sur Marathon, the Napa Marathon in 1995, and the San Francisco Half Marathon (now the Kaiser Permanente Half Marathon). Carl was a real professional in everything he did and was well liked and respected by all of us in the measurement community.

Carl was Smart, kind, and very modest. As Pete Riegel said, "He was a nice guy, and I enjoyed working with him."

A memorial to commemorate the life of Carl Edward Wisser will be held on Thursday June 4, (which would have been his 79th birthday) at Lake Temescal Beach House in Oakland (short 30 minute walk at 3 P.M. , Memorial 4-5 P.M., and Reception 5-7 P.M. )