Adventure Race Report (dhutch&birch)

“May 8 430am

I woke up after a short nights sleep (lots of rain and campers making noise). Dhutch showed up 10 min later and some wonderful coffee & pop tarts (thanks again!). Got dressed and headed out to check in.

Got our check-in done and went to drop our canoe and gear bag. The big benefit of using my boat was that we got to drive some of the course and would know what the canoe put in would look like. Dropped the boat and headed back to the start area.

Drank more coffee, visited with fellow racers (its a small community so famailar faces are common),caught up with them and shuffled gear. We talked some strategy and decided to forgo speed for accuracy and good route choices. We headed to the race briefing. Listened to the briefing and took copious notes. Got our maps and had 20 min to get ready.

800am Start time...

We began with a 1-2mile orienteer with 4 checkpoints (CP), we could get em in any order so we just followed to herd and got them in a flash. We then hit CP5 and grabbed our bikes to begin the section we knew would be our weakest. We would focus on not trying to hard and just getting to the canoe section. The area we biked was 95% dirt roads and lots hills, not huge per se but constant. They got old quick. Hit CP6 withouyt a hitch and headed to CP7 then a "bike whack" that would take us across a river and through a dense woods. We knew CP8 was near but not how near. We seperated from the group and headed more easterly (wise decision) and ended up at CP8 within 10 minutes. Along the way Dhutch found an old barbwire line fence by getting tangled in it. After getting her free (no injuries) we cruised on. As we neared the road we noticed tons on teams coming back for CP8 without bikes, they had gona ahead and were now coming back, it would cost them loads of time.

Got on the road and cruised to the boats. The paddle section would be 7 CP's around the perimeter of the lake. We headed counter clockwise and made great time. We boath are strong paddlers and were able to really make some time. We were done in an hour or so and were ranked 16th over all at this point (CP 18). Back on the bikes after eating more of the oatmeal raisin cookies Sass made for us. Most teams would back track the whole bike whack. We took roads. I hike the area often and know the roads well, it was a big help. We cruised the bikes to a mandatory walk section (horse trail) and got CP19. A short peddle put us at CP20, the orienteering course. It was 18 CP's no order in getting them.Our score would be based not on time but on how many CP's we'd hit combined with our finish time. We knew that this was our final chance to make up sometime and to focus on accuracy. We planned the first 7 points and left. We opted to walk fast as it was early (1140am) we set a 4pm time to be back at the bikes for the final peddle to the finish. We knocked the CP's off staedily and had no nav errors, the highpoint was the massive zip line through the trees. We then headed out for the final 11 CP's. While doing the course we were able to spend the time talking nd even though I've known Dhutch for a few years,I got to know her much better. I am honored to call her one of my closest friends. She is a wonderful woman and a determined competitor.

We flawlessly got the next 9 CP's. We missed the 10th by talking. That cost us 7-10 minutes. We headed back to the bikes and CP38 (our 18th Orienteering point). Somehow we missed a turn and ended up off course. The conversation we had was funny. Dhutch got her compass out and said "we are headed south southwest" I said "oh" she said" is that bad?" I said "not as bad as heading due north but the next worse thing". We were 1 mile off, it would be 15minutes to make it up. No biggy it was roads. We were passed by other teams who were on their bikes. It was hard to not get nervous as they road by. We discussed this and agreed that we cant be sure that they got every CP and if they missed one we would win since we missed none. Got one the bikes and headed back as fast as we could (not very, we were smoked!). Talked the ride back and realized we were doing really well and having a blast. Cruised that last few miles and crossed the finish at 502pm. 9hrs 2 minutes. We dont know our place yet (will be announced in a few days). But we werent top 4 as they announced top 4 rankings. The number three and four teams were near us the whole orienteering course so we couldnt be far behind. There were 34 co-ed teams who started, dont know who finished.

All in all an amazingly fun race! My partner was evrything I in one. Strong,determined,energetic, great decision maker fun companion. regardless of where we placed it was fantastic race experience. I would change nothing about the day!”

“sounds great ladies, I can only half comprehend and sit back in awe at your accomplishment. dhutch, you watch those barb wire fences and take care of yourself ya hear!”

“Sounds rad! Glad to hear you both had a blast while busting your ass.”

“AWESOME!”

“sounds great "ladies" (hehe)?

Way to go birch and dhutch!! Glad to hear the barbed wire incident turned out ok . . . that could have been nasty.”

“congrats to both of you for finishing the race. Hope you move up in the standings by getting all of your orienteering check points.
I knew you two would work well together.”

“Dhutch, backpacking with heavy loads up and down mountains must seem pretty tame after this. Did you just flex you muscle to break the barbed wire? One tough woman, eh.”

“Hey cool, glad you guys finished the race. I almost went to an orienteering meet today...but didn't go because of a bum knee...and I had to work. :o(”

“Ok, this is my side of the story....

Most of the story is identical to Birch's. Except I beg to differ on the injuries portion. My Tights! We had to tear them to get me out of the barbed wire. The left leg has a massive hole. They are liner tights now. My legs however, only were slightly scratched.

Oh, and as we were pounding out checkpoints a bee just up and stung me in the arm. Remember how everyone always says, "Don't bother them and they won't bother you?" Well.....

I also couldn't have asked for a better partner. We joked, we talked, we kept our focus (except for once) and acheived all of our race goals. Most importantly, we supported each others' decisions and birch inspired me to push my physical limits.

I had the best time! Any race, any time birch. Go TEAM F.U.B.A.R! And I'm soooo looking forward to my upcoming race with Sass in July!”

“Oh, and the weather held up! As I drove in at 3:30 am there was lightening everywhere. By race time at 8 it was clearing and ended up to be mostly sunny, most of the day. High around 72. Perfect. The adventure racing gods smiled on us all. :-)”

“that is very cool! Congrats on just doing the race. It sounds like a fun and challenging event.
:o)”

“How cool!!!”

“thats really cool yall, sounds like it was both challenging and a lot of fun.”

“Very cool!

Was this at Waterloo/Pick?”

“Yep, started at Portage Lake. Beautiful ares. Waaaay too many hills for biking. :-)”

“That's awesome!

I am so pissed at myself for getting so out of shape since last year. I'll be back to AR shape by fall though.

Again, congrats!”

“congratulations, you hard-core SOBs! i wish i wasn't too hyper to read the whole report! maybe later...”

“Way to go, lady and gentleman!”

“Great Job! COngratulations.”

“Awesome, you two!”

“Great report! Awesome race!
Congrats to both of you.”

“That's great! Congrats to both of you! Really cool report, I gotta do one of these races sometime.”

“That's great! Very inspiring! Congrats.”

“Thanks for the kind words all. I highly recommend that everyone at least try a race sometime, its blast. 6 wks till my big race, cant wait!”

“Very cool! Congrats.”

“The results are in!!!!

We got 11th out of 33 in our bracket.

We got 25th out of 94 overall, not too shabby!”

“CONGRATULATIONS again to you two.”

“This type of stuff is Trail talk at its best.

Nice job you two.”

“YAY!! Good job. :-)”

“dhutch, I would be more than willing to help you take care of you wounded leg ;)”

“Thanks Ewker ;-) the leg is fine. It was the tights that were torn to shreds from the left knee down. lol

Dagnabbit, I looked at the results and the one error we made probably cost us 5-6 places. I'm really not doing the woulda, shoulda's, coulda's. Way more than happy with the results. Just learning from the mistake is all. Got to cause I'll make a different one next time and I don't want them to pile up.

Thanks all for the congrats. We had soooo much fun.

Birch - start thinking about this fall's 24 hour rage and next year's 72 hour coast to coast. I'd be honored to be on a team with you.”

“You been reading my mind Dhutch? We'll see what my Dr say next wednesday, I may be out for some time....”