Photos Vladimir Bukalo
Well, this was my first race of the season, the 12 hour Adrenaline Rush out at Shenandoah River State Park near Front Royal Virginia. We brought two teams, 5 members in all; Dima, Val, myself (Calleva1) and Tamir and Alexandra (Calleva2). My trepidation was high since I was running with Dima and Val, two very experienced racers. Tamir and Alex ran as a duo and stayed with us for the start of the race and then joined up again at the end to great effect. There was 73 racers split into 34 teams. The race was laid out as Prologue(short run), O-course, mountain biking, paddling, road biking, and O-course. We had maps to everything but the last orrienteering section which we would get after the 2nd biking section.
The Prologue was a simple kilometer road run up and down a steep-ish hill. The first O-course was about 10km if you cleared all 13 ckeckpoints. Lots of steep ridges and plenty of bushwacking. We lost Tamir and Alex after a few checkpoints. We got on bikes after clearing the O-course and right off the mark encountered one of numerous large hills . I thought my biking was strong with commuting to work once or twice a week but Montgomery county has nothing on these hills. The mountain biking was great. Steep inclines, some of which I had to walk, and descents on wide hardpack through the forest, twisty and real fast. Dima had told me of tales bushwacking through the forest with mountain bikes and indeed we did. It was only about 500 meters but it was well placed and probably saved us 20 minutes. Nice one! This is how it is done.
The paddling section was next and fairly uneventful. We loaded up 3 in a canoe. It was about 12 km flatwater with one short 10 meter portage around a low bridge. We brought kayaking paddles and knocked it out in about an hour and 15 minutes passing one boat. The field of racers had spread out significantly by this point. The potable water resources were not that well placed. We were completely out of water by the end of the paddling. If it had been hotter, we would have been in trouble. Val was drinking out of the Shenandoah river. He didn't seem to suffer for it. There was a bathroom with water not too far from the paddling take-out so we were alright and I filled up another 2.5 liters. We ran back to the bikes about 3km.
At his point we had to make a strategic decision. We had about a 2.5 hr bike ride ahead of us, all on the road, and my hill legs were not that strong. There were only 3 checkpoints to get in this section. The last O-course had 22 ckeckpoints. It was about 3:15pm. We had been running, trekking, biking and paddling for 7 hours. Too tell the truth, I was getting a bit worn out. We decided to skip the 3 road biking checkpoints to give us more time on the final trek. Tamir and Alex were coming along the trail on foot as we were heading back to get the last map. We told them our plan and they caught up with us to do the last O-course together. Dima picked up the final map and noted there were no trails marked on it, unlike the first O-course map in the same area. I give credit for the race organizers for coming up with this little trick. We headed for the obvious first pick of checkpoints. Dima suggested we mark the new checkpoints on the first map. We did. It took about 10-15min but really paid off.
Tamir and Alex showed up at this point and after discussion we all headed out. The next hour and a couple of CPs were a little blurry for me as I was pretty tired and the ridges didn't get out of our way. I ran the flats and downhill and walked the hills keeping my eyes mostly on the trail and whoever's feet were in front of me. We made a direct attack on a non-visible checkpoint down a reentrant and up a steep ridge. When we crested the ridge the flag was sitting on our direct line. It doesn't get better navigating, Dima. We took a brief break to reassess our plan. After some discussion among our team, we came up with what I think was the most efficient laid out course for the next 17 CPs. A brilliant group effort. I got my second wind and was able to act as Val's second as rabbit in taking a few flags. Dima and Tamir both had maps and we made good work of knocking out all the high ground CPs. We descended a steep incline with fortunately no cliffs. A regular WV sleigh ride though I did not give in to such reckless abandon or at least mostly not. With a steady trudge of a jog through the last checkpoints we all arrive at the finish at 10hrs, 50min. Tamir and Alex scored with 41 CPs. Dima, Val and I, 44 CPs.
Michelle Faucher and Andy Bacon, the race directors, put on a pretty good first race. Dima provided some nice constructive criticism to make it better next year. Team Odyssey placed first overall beating us by about 2.5 hrs(if you include the cycling) and clearing all the checkpoints. How the heck! I need some serious training. Still, Calleva1 placed 1st in our division, 8th overall and Calleva2 placed 2nd by division and 12th overall. I consider it a win for both teams, 1st and 2nd is not too bad! Tamir no doubt is wishing he would have taken the time to get one more checkpoint to get 1st in their division. Very close and he was redeemed by Alexandra who won the pushup contest against Vanessa, the gal from the Double Trouble coed 2 person team, who got first. Val's rejoinder to Alex, "just one more", no doubt got her that tube of Zanfel as a consolation prize.
Congratulations to all! Let's do some hill work!
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