Got back late sunday night. Work monday and tuesday was far more challenging than the race, so haven't had a moment to write much.
The Cp0 race is a Yak and Tony Berwald combined effort. It seems like the 2nd running of their venture was even better than their first, from those that had seen both.
In the minds of many people, Tony puts on one of the few remaining pure AR races around. I personally have so many fond memories of 4 previous races under Tony. The saying used to be, "if you had done NGAR or SMAR, you could do anything." The jury is out whether or not this cp0 race was among the most challenging and brutal ever. Some people think it's a no contest. We really can't vote, since we barely got past GO.
Our adventure started back in january when Tamela had surgery. After Swomp Stomp, we felt it was best for her to heal and recover more and not risk hating me or longer races.
It wasn't easy finding a replacement this time. Yak was actually so helpful and flexible about the registration fee, so we ended up having time and options.
Joe happened across Maria who was pumped, fit, and willing. The only caveat was she hadn't done an AR beyond 2-3 hrs. She had run a 50K recently and was a strong road biker. So, we had a lot to work with in one week till race time.
I honestly spent quiet a long time on the phone with her and sent her some long emails to make sure she knew what she was getting into. Actually half conducted a 20 some min interview asking her what pace and about her goals. I kept reminding her, it was simply about so we could be prepared for a pace comfortable for all of us so she could have fun on her first longer race. A Tony Berwald race isn't probably a great starter race, but I know a handfull of people that were turned onto AR by Tony. In many ways, cp0 was the ultimate testing ground for her, since she was considering PQ with her own team. For us, it was a proving ground if we could succeed with an absolute newbie. Of lately, I have been racing with high expectations, but I know better with a newbie. So, I was just happy to be going. In reality, it's rare we have a complete and experienced team, and in some ways, going with Maria was probably good for Joe, since we could of done the race alone, but then it would of not been as challenging. Little did we know, we were off to one epic challenge.
We had our excollege roomie Kurt as support. One hell of a guy and also a newbie, but we knew Kurt well. He could handle anything. Grabbing Maria last minute, Kurt was sort of left on his own, with some help from Joe, but he seemingly figured it all out.
We all met up early prerace and had time to sort thru extra gear we were providing for Maria. We double checked everything. Everything looked good. Had lunch, got the maps, plotted and routed. We were all set to go before the 8pm meeting. I got to say, I am loving what the race directors have been doing of recently. No more staying up all night with maps. No plotting on the clock. Time to ask plenty of questions to hammer out the grey areas and avoid potential problems. And the maps were a custom mytopo waterproof map with many extra trails thrown in by a joint USFS/GS combo. They were a strange custom size, but it was a wonderful way to plot, and the tick marks across the entire page made grid lines simple. And they were waterproof, so map prerace care was rather simple.
At the race meeting, Yak and Tony gave everything we all wanted to hear. Very little talk about sponsors and safety, except for a blurb about hypothermia and a serious warning about the weather. Tony and Yak launched into the course and there theories about the "grey area" of AR and with some comments about prohibited routes. I was loving it. And having fun sitting next to the cp0 team also.
I had to go grab Tony afterwards, since I missed a few bits about cp9 to cp10 and the exact ruling about the river paddle. It was then I decided, we simply wouldn't try and lead the first paddle, since I was gonna let someone else see how paddling upstream against 5 knots of current felt, and conserve our effort for later. Obviously, they had to shorten that paddle upsteam. The recent rain was the culprit.
We all got to bed relatively early, except me. I asked Maria how she was doing with everything, and it was the one and only time she hinted at being nervous and unsure. Otherwise, she always said "I'm ok.". Stoic, she was.
I of course stayed up for another hour satellite searching the whole course and planning bushwack routes, since there were a ton of em. I had the final bike and trek so dialed in, more than any race ever. Of course, we never got there, so never found out of how my obsessive piddling would pay off. I went to bed dreaming about the amazing trek Tony had in store for us.
Race started with the predicted mid30 temps and progressing into a light snow with moderate wind from the West quadrant. Perfect conditions for me, since I was training in those conditions at home, but I was cautious, knowing that I was only one person on the team.
We had a short run prologue, probably too short, and we led to the boat with a nice jump into the lead. My map was backwards and stuck under the seat, so was going by feel. Also, I didn't want to lead the way into the uphill river, so we took it easier on that first paddle, not all amped at 100%, although it was a brisk tempo for the 4 lead teams. The lead four teams had a surprising gap, and it's sort of too bad we didn't work in formation more. But, we had 20+ more hrs to go. We drafted off others when possible, and occassionally Black Dome drafted off us. I tried to alert EMS to take a break on our side wake, but they were having too much fun in their Mohawk boat.
The last turn off Lake Chatuge brought us into the downflow of the Hiawassee River. The 1-2' higher river from recent rains could of been disastrous. It was pretty much unpaddeable the last stretch, so everyone exited and walked in the water. The water temps were warm enough, but the wind and air temp made the next TA challenging. We exited the water first, with all of our friends two feet behind us as we portages to the TA thru some nice briars. EMS, enduraventure, and blackdome were seemingly intent on showing each other who was boss. Enduraventure and EMS crushed the TA, as we fumbled some getting Maria out of gear. At that time, the snow was starting to become noticeable.
Off to cp2, which was a 2.9 mile gradual uphill road bike then a fireroad up to addis gap to cp2. All straightforward. Maria showed she had excellent bike power, but was having trouble early on the road with shifting to the small ring and her seat kept slipping. We got to the first turn off with Blackdome, and it was funny how Jay questioned Chris Brown on the turnoff, when he didn't have the maps. I guess that's how they just race together. It left me wondering how they move forward when the nav got difficult.
Up to cp2 was straightforward. We bumped into our friends on EMS at the first fork in the road, and Enduraventure looked close ahead. At one point, I saw them ahead on a switchback. Maria started having more shifting and seat issues, but eventually, the ice/slush embedded in our pedals and drivetrain was making it interesting for all of us. The weather god's we definitely remembering Tony was in town. We had ice on our bikes, map, and gear. At some point, I remembered thinking maybe I should of put on my winter cycling pants. It wasn't that cold, but the conditions were telling us to beware. The bikes gained a few pounds by the extra ice and slush hanging off them.
All the teams met up again about 100m from cp2. Maria headed downhill with the other teams and had another bad endo. Ouch! We faultered for a minute and realized cp2 was behind us. Maria looked away, but had cut her face. Blackdome played that "I don't know where the cp is" game which I have seen too many times. It took the generosity of Jen S on EMS to help me with that and to temporarily forget about how Maria was doing after her crash and grab cp2. Jen is simply an outstanding person. It seemed everyone else would of just trampled over Maria, then and there. Later on the bike, Scott Pleban also caught us on the bike, and he actually was nice enough to make sure Maria and us were ok after her final big crash. By the way, EMS went on to dominate the course, with Scott's team just a few hrs behind, but they had lost their passport, so were dsq. Scott's team's effort deserves more than honorable mention. They were heroic. Of course, I was jealous, since they go to experience all of Tony's course.
After, cp2, we were about 2 min behind, I guess attempting to chase back the front teams. We at least got a chance to do one nice rhodo bikewack on the way to cp3, but our progress was halted several times coming down to cp3.
In a matter of 30-45 min, Maria's bike and body were battered repeatedly with falls. We ended up coasting slowly on our brakes, but she was still having trouble.
I was amazing how uphill she could hang person for person with all of the top teams, but downhill, she was faltering. She was so strong uphill, that they was able to hang with everyone even with shifting problems and no small cog to spin up the steeper inclines. I imagine a lot of it her downhill trouble was her still learning her MTB, but also, when ya add on iced up cleats, cogs, brakes, derraileurs, and cold conditions, things become more difficult. Most of her endo's were slow moving ones, and she just continued on, again and again. It was quiet amazing her perservance. I suppose someone could fault her having a bike unprepared for the course, but she was new at this. Her bike might of made it thru a flat 45 min bike section, but the stuff we faced, was way beyond that. Her dire determination trumped everything she lacked. We went from racing comfortably near the front to full on survival in those 30+ minutes. She just starting walking every stream crossing. Ouch, that was cold.
Joe and I were undoubtedly getting a tad cold with the stopping and coasting downhill, while we watched Maria suffer yet another endo. Somewhere around endo 2-3, we sat down and went thru the rules. Rule 1, let go of that front brake, which she apparently loved. Rule 2, keep your weight back. It was all fun, until about endo 3 or so.
About 200m above cp3, we had the mother of all endos and she came down the hill behind us screaming, not coasting and going at a nice clip, and she road right off into the woods off the trail. I ran back to her, about to joke that hitting banks and trees wasn't a good way to slowdown, but she was banged up good. Apparently, she suffered a complete brake failure (cable came loose) and her front break pads actually slipped off the rim. She sheered off the two lights I lent her, tacoed her rear wheel, trashed what was left of both brakes, and banged up her knee, lip, and face. That was only the start, and we had several miles downhill to the TA.
At that point, we walked and coasted down to cp3. They had a gear check, and one look at Maria's bloody face, and they just let us go. Kinda funny after the fact. It was about then that Maria stopped saying "I'm ok." It was fruitless asking anyhow. She wasn't ok, anymore.
She looked pretty hurt. I took her bike for the few km trip down to the next intersection. I had to dissamble the rear brake since the wheel was tacoed, and had no brakes. Did the Fred Flinstone brake method. It was then I also noticed, that despite stopping and cleaning off the bike at a stream crossing, her front derraileur was also toast. Maria felt bad enough about me having to take her bike, that she kept begging for her bike back. We finally hit the road and coasted down to TA 2. Wow, that was epic. Her bike was completely trashed.
I knew then that we were unofficial or dnf, since her bike was so far beyond repair, it was silly. I bumped into ever positive Juno, Hairy Scary at the TA. He was support for blackdome/sport factor who was fairly far behind us (they ended up with 3rd overall) In true macho form, he said, "I can fix it, get out there.". Now, if ya know Juno, he makes anything seem possible. I don't think he believed when I said we were toast and so was Maria's body and bike. Her whole leg was covered in blood. Now, I will say this, I did ask her if she wanted to paddle, and she said "yes." I think Juno temporarily talked me out of any negative thoughts, but Maria was one tough cookie. Sure, unprepared, but pretty amazing. I certainly thought hard about that decision coming down to TA2. Even if we had managed fixing her bike and I road it for her. (We happened to fit well enough on each other's bike), she was probably a danger to herself on the upcoming bike leg.
So, I hit the 2nd paddle with those thoughts. I never got to really discuss it in much detail with Joe, but we all surely realized we had encountered an unfixable situation. My head was stuck thinking about Maria, feeding her, and the time segments for the rest of the course. I know Joe was surely cold starting that paddle, but not sure how cold. It was a long TA getting Maria and ourselves together. I am not sure Joe ever warmed up till 4 days after the race.
Maria was a tad stunned and cold, but she rallied after Kurt and I fed her warm food. She put on my dry pants and two shell tops, one fully waterproof. I reached for my winter paddle gear, but downsized since it knew I would be too warm. I did bring my insulated sealskinz gloves and dry pants, which was way too much clothing. I also remember eating a solid 1000 calories in that TA. I had one chocolate ensure, some coffee, and handfulls of cookies. A stuffed belly is a warm body. For me, it was a benign paddle, but I have been outside in that stuff, was sort of prepared I guess. Post race, some teams either thought the paddle was among the more epic, while others thought it was benign. Obviously, the epic thoughts only get on the msg boards.
The following paddle was actually beautiful in many respects. Lake Burton is apparently the weekend home for the rich of Atlanta, or so I was told after the race. The water was crystal clear. The wind was typical of mtn lakes, often shifting thru 180 degrees and blowing up or down the coves. I would say, even though we traveled more distance downwind, in comparison to the wind alot, but the nearby mtns often had the wind on our nose. Quiet interesting. After hammering out the last section from cp6 to cp7, I noted our finish time, and we had at least clipped off the fastest paddle split. Something nice to think about given what we went thru.
On the downwind turn to cp5, we got some nice puffs of wind from behind and had attempted a makeshift sail with a garbage bag, to keep the bow pointed downwind. We tried it for a few minutes and it worked somewhat well, but the confused chop bouncing off some walls on the shores and the shifting winds made it more of a pain. cp5 was straightforward. We saw the lead teams who were now 30 min ahead, and surely, I was intent on making up some time downwind.
The upwind portion to cp6 was tough. Joe and Maria were now apparently turning to frozen popsicles and seemingly having trouble paddling. I tried to get them to rotate more, to keep themselves warm.
At some point, the paddle for them became quiet the sufferfest. Obviously, the preceding hypothermia with the bike mechanicals were taking there toll on us. The wind on the lake was certainly making it challenging. The puffs were easily 25+ mph at times. At times, I was pulling so hard in a sweep stroke to counter the wind, that I could feel the strain on every tendon. I think some of that was keeping me warm.
At cp6, Joe removed his frozen popsicle legs from the boat to get the cp, and it was then I noticed the shaking in the boat, which was Maria shaking so bad that the royalex was shuttering from front to back.
Wow, it was time to get home quick.
I tried to encourage us on at that point, knowing we only had 40 min back to the TA. The wind was blowing hard enough on and off, that I am not sure anyone could hear.
On the final stretch back into the long cove to the TA, we were more sheltered from icy wind and puffs, and got to enjoy the sun starting to come out and the beautiful homes on the lake front. Joe turned around once and I got to get a glimpse of the shield of icicles on his cap. Wow, that was cool. We got to the TA and I wanted to grab a picture but was too worried about Maria's condition to have time. A handfull of volunteers and support folks were there at the boat ramp. As soon as we stepped out of the boat, apparently Maria's bloody face, swollen lip, and shaking, were enough to convince them to take her away in a blanket. Our race was over. At the same time, Juno pulled me aside, and we had discussion. It was funny in retrospect. Went like "bill, dude, how's maria." "Oh, she is a frozen popsicle and pretty banged up." He said, "dude, her bike is toast, you guys can't go on. " I guess he hadn't believe me when I said the downhill from cp2 to cp3 was so epic. He also hadn't found a replacement bike, allthough he and Kurt looked. I already knew were were out of the race, but in his own flambouyant want, he made it sound so spectacular. Got to love that guy. All that macho and special forces training mixed in with a killer attitude. I can only imagine the words of wisdown that his own team was getting from him.
After shoring up the boat some, I went to look at Maria's bike myself, just out of curiosity. I noticed how Kurt had cleaned our bikes so well. Smokes, he was awesome. I actually jumped on my bike and everything was shifting well and working perfectly I hadn't even asked him. Unfortunately, those 10 minutes was all Joe's body needed to become dangerously hypothermic. I couldn't convince him to finish unofficial.
I then stripped clothes and grabbed some warm ramen noodles Kurt made. Jogged over to the checkin and let then know that we were out. Someone said they already heard Maria was out. I then begged Tony to let me go out solo on the trek if Joe wouldn't, but Tony stuck to his guns. I think he knew I was gonna anyhow, but when I got back, Joe was frozen and Maria was tucked away in someone's vehicle. Took awhile to find her. He did offer to let us go hike a few cp's with our support crew. Kurt is exmilitary, so was thinking he might actually enjoy.
Eventually, the game was over. I wasn't able to convince either Kurt or Joe to go knab a few points. Although Kurt paused a second with the idea. I think Joe thought we were nuts with the idea. He was now a cherry flavored popsicle. We started cleaning up gear and I tried to feed my remaining cookies to Jeff and Joe on EMS Masters who were next to us. Joe on our team got to enjoy some of those Ramen noodles, and we had memories of eating them in a previous race.
At some point, Team Wedali came off the water. Funny as can be. They are from Minnesota, afterall. There female looked pale and on the edge of hypothermia, but as a group, they were hilarious. One of the guys was stripped down to trishorts and parading around half naked. I guess they noticed I had barefeet standing around, so we had a good joke about the conditions were actually warmer than back home.
I headed back to the TA checkin several times, and realized that many teams had already been short coursed on their own accord and then heard of the 911 call on the Lake. It was then I decided to put on shoes and take things serious. I debated paddling out to them, but they were getting reports that another team was at their side and were ok. Wow, I was wondering what carnage was happening next. It was an interesting TA. Yak was already off to go rescue the team with some EMT's. The forecast for the night was about 20 degrees, but the conditions had dried up. Still, there were alot of stream crossings and a long night ahead, so I heard the cp0 engine being cranked up into full on support mode. They started sending extra volunteers out into the field, just in case. It was all well done. They had tons of experienced volunteers.
The only concerning thing I saw was the teams who were about 3 hrs behind, heading out onto the paddle. I would say 25% of then had males who who had on no gloves or hats. A few of them only had on paddle shells and no gloves or hat. Crazy. For me, it was a relatively docile paddle, but I guess a winter of cold paddling had me prepared. Watching some of those teams heading out, knowing it was gonna be dark by the time they were back, was a little scary. Why people would go out in that with no gloves or hat is beyond me. I don't think a single team had on reasonable gloves either. Yak and staff did close the paddle section shortly later. The race had 80 teams, but there were tons of teams who were doing this as their first longer AR.
We finally got the canoe and gear all strapped down and headed back to the hotel. Got to see all the teams on the slow uphill bike to cp8. The teams on the bottom looked cold, but by halfway up, most of them had already stripped down jackets and looked warm. I was envious of them, but happy we were safe.
We had the luxury of hot showers then some mexican food and margaritas made with wine, since it was a liquor dry county. We bumped into several teams at the hotel who were retelling their own stories.
At around 12amish, we got a phone call saying the hotel was on fire. I had just fallen asleep, so only half believed it, wondering if it was Kurt and Joe playing a joke. They stepped into our room and apparently it wasn't a joke. So, we spent the next few hours outside in Joe's car. Maria had been downstairs in shorts and on her cellphone, so she was thrown outside in the cold with only shorts on, of course with bandages on her leg. We had know idea where she was at and apparently her cell phone died. I guess one couple at the hotel noticed her leg starting to bleed again, and they offered to put her in their car. We luckily found her again. What was with constantly losing her?
At about 2am, I was sitting in the car and seriously debating just grabbing my backpack (which was all packed for 6-8 hrs of racing) and going out for a few trek cp's. We were stuck outside the hotel with nothing to do but wait. The hotel was really on fire, apparently from a chimney fire that progressed into the 3rd floor attic somewhat near our room. Cool! Eventually, I fell asleep in Joe's truck thinking about my intended routes to cp18, dreamed about Mocassin Falls, and a number of those ridge lines that I had planned on traveling.
After a nice breakfast and saying goodbye to everyone, I started driving home and couldn't resist the allure of that trek. cp19 was only a short run in, and I was curious to see how it all played out. I guess, part of it was wondering and knowing, that Maria and Joe would of been at their absolute strongest point on that trek, for Joe is a runner, and Maria had just done and 50k and had plenty of miles in her legs. So, that allure of the "if only" was constantly playing at my strings. If I didn't have to meet someone in North Carolina to drop off the canoe, I might of just done all those trek cp's. Those thoughts kept me occupied for the whole ride home. I barely played the radio, since my head was full of thoughts about how come I couldn't field a consistent team and about those bike bushwacks and trek cp's that we never got to a chance to tackle. I guess that's AR.
William Vickers, MD
-Capital Bicycle http://capitalbicycle.com -Annapolis Canoe and Kayak www.annapoliscanoeandkayak.com -Specialized Bicycle www.specialized.com -Team Wicked Fast 2007 www.recover-ease.com -Bonk Breaker Nutrition www.bonkbreaker.com
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