Life Is An Adventure Race

by Jim Farmer

I usually try to combine several races into a single article in order to reduce the number of articles I have to write and to keep from rambling on and on about every little detail. However, when a race lasts three and a half days it warrants its own article. The Beast of the East was such a race. The “Beast”, as it’s affectionately known, is perennially considered one of the toughest expedition adventure races in the world. Although it’s a few days shorter than some of its brethren, the ferocity of the course, tight cutoff times and sadistic nature of the race officials make it a brutal test of mind and body. This race is the flagship event of the Odyssey Adventure Racing Company and their motto of “Your Pain Is Our Pleasure” was evident from start to finish. As cruel as their races are, Odyssey always puts on a top-notch event that is both well organized and fair. This was no exception.

My three teammates and I had never done an expedition race before but we were ready to take a leap of faith into this wonderful world of pain and sleep deprivation. When Odyssey announced that the Beast would be held in the Brevard area of western North Carolina this year it was like a siren calling our ship to the reefs and sure doom. But we’re suckers so we answered the siren’s call and signed up as Team Chattanooga TrailBlazers for the 275-mile, 3.5 day Beast of the East - Transylvania. They asked me what number we would like and I wanted 666 but they only had two-digit numbers available so lucky number 13 was the next logical choice. I always like staring superstition right in the face.

On Thursday night at 7:00, fifty teams biked out of the Davidson River Campground just outside of Brevard to start the 2003 Beast of the East Adventure Race. After several miles of uphill grinding we dropped our bikes at the Pink Beds parking lot to start a long trek up to and along the Blue Ridge Parkway, crossing it several times in the process, until we hit Checkpoint (CP) 1. That’s where the fun began as we started the orienteering leg that consisted of three measly Orienteering Points (OPs). Unlike checkpoints, that were required elements of the race, the orienteering points were optional. Teams received a five hour penalty for each missed OP but they had to make sure that they didn’t spend too much time on the OPs or else they would miss the cutoff time for the next transition area. It was a “pay now or pay later” decision. Navigation was our strong suit so we decided to pursue all three. Although successful in our endeavor it took us over seven hours to achieve, never mind the energy used up and the layers of skin left in the rhododendron thickets that we bushwhacked through. At one point we were on our hands and knees for an hour straight trying to get back up to a ridgeline that was no more than a couple of hundred yards from us.

By now we were pushing the first cutoff time and one of my teammates was feeling the effects of a night of bushwhacking. With a 1,500-foot climb up to the top of Looking Glass Rock ahead of us I decided to pop a trusty, rusty Vivarin tablet and rig up the towing system between us. With the caffeine coursing through my veins I felt like the Grinch going up Mount Crumpet. “My heart grew three sizes that day.” We made it to the top in forty minutes flat taking some of the pressure off and allowing us to enjoy the five hundred foot rappel off of Looking Glass into the valley below. The view was spectacular and we felt invigorated as we double-timed it for the last eight or nine miles to the transition area making the cutoff with time to spare. After a short bike leg and a refueling stop we jumped into our canoes for a seven-hour paddle down the French Broad River.

As most of you know, it’s been a strange summer in terms of the weather. The Brevard area has had rain every day since the start of July. This made for a very swollen river with tons of debris and strainers ready to grab unwary adventure racers at every turn. Saying that it was not a leisurely trip downstream was an understatement, especially when nightfall hit. Sure enough, I had a momentary lapse of concentration and my teammate and I ended up taking a swim. The swift current and our tired legs, combined with the shock of being dumped into the chilly torrent, made it very difficult to get our water-filled canoe to the bank. Luckily we had everything lashed down and didn’t lose any gear. Disaster was averted but time and energy were lost.

We were well over a day into the race at that point and felt strong enough to tackle the next bike leg before catching some sleep. I was a little worried about sleeping in the transition areas because of all the hustle and bustle going on but I found out that after thirty hours of racing all you need to do is shut your eyes and you’re out like a light no matter what’s going on around you. Exactly one hour later the alarm went off. There’s no snooze alarm on my watch so it was time to hit the trails again. We did some map work for the next trekking leg and got our gear together in anticipation of a long day on our feet. A long and hard day at that. The trek took us over twenty-two hours and was easily the toughest part of the race up to that point. The route, which ran us through Jones Gap and Caesars Head State Parks in South Carolina, was both beautiful and treacherous. The one thing it was not was easy on our feet. Because of all of the rain it was impossible to keep them dry resulting in a bad case of trench foot making it difficult to deal with the ever-increasing number of blisters and sores. Duct tape and moleskin can only go so far. According to the race officials, the medical crew had to resupply four times during the race to keep up with the foot problems they were encountering. They apparently ran Brevard dry of super glue trying to patch racers’ feet back together. The transition area looked more like a M.A.S.H. episode than an adventure race.

Unfortunately, we missed the cutoff time for this transition area, but because of the extensive rains and the fact that few teams made the prescribed cutoff, Odyssey decided to create a second Pro Class. The way it works is that teams that miss cutoffs are relegated to the Adventure Class rather than the Pro Class and they are put on alternate routes or skip entire sections of the race. This gives everyone a fighting chance to cross the finish line while making sure that the elite teams get their dues. Our goal was to finish in the Pro Class so we were excited to learn that we would now be racing in Pro Class II. It also meant that we would skip the next paddling section on Lake Jocassee. Despite the fact that my feet were torn to pieces I was glad to skip the paddle. It’s not our strong suit and I was afraid that I’d fall asleep in the boat.

We were two and a half days into the race at this point and we were going on one hour of sleep so we decided to bed down for another hour to replenish our batteries. Now, being good old Tennesseans, we just loaded up a pickup truck full of our gear for the race unlike other teams that had RVs, campers, trailers and the like. So while other racers bedded down in the middle of their creature comforts we rolled out our sleeping bags on the ground for our short-lived visits with Mr. Sandman. That was just fine until the rain clouds rolled in. Our support crew had purchased a small canopy tent in the early stages of the race so we all huddled under it to avoid the downpour and dozed off. Unfortunately, we were parked on the steep grade of a gravel road that soon become a torrent of water practically carrying us with it down the hill. I felt like Bugs Bunny in the episode where the flood carries him out of his rabbit hole and to the Evil Scientist’s castle where he meets the red-haired monster with no arms and ends up styling his hair using sticks of dynamite as rollers and … Sorry, did I mention the hallucinations. More on that later. A half hour of sleep was all we could muster and the thought of putting on our rain-soaked clothes and gear for the next bike leg was hard to swallow. Nobody said a word as we all stared into space while putting our gear together. It was the lowest of lows but we knew that the end was in sight so we trudged on.

Our packs felt unbelievably heavy, partly due to being on for almost three days straight, but mostly because we had to have all of our bike, climbing and trekking gear as well as food and supplies for the last segment of the race. We wouldn’t see our support crew again until the finish line. After a few hours on the bike we hit the base of Cedar Rock Mountain where we put on our trail shoes for the hike up to Cedar Rock. After a small navigation error we found the right trail and made our way to the first ascent along an angled pitch of slickrock. The Dirty Dozen is the affectionate name given to the Odyssey ropes crew and they always do a great job of keeping things organized and safe for the racers and have a lot of fun in the process. After the first ascent we hiked up to the Cedar Rock cliff where the real work began. The ascent was about one hundred feet up a sheer rock face, which is a daunting task for an inexperienced ascender like myself but made even more difficult by a wet rock face from the morning storms along with an exhausted body. After another long hike off of the back of the mountain we refilled our water bladders and got back on our bikes for the long haul to Black Mountain, the only major obstacle between us and the finish line.

The sun began to set as we hit some gnarly single track near the Mills River campgrounds, but we enjoyed it nonetheless as it was our first time off of the paved and gravel roads that dominated the biking legs of the race. Once we hit the Black Mountain trail junction we knew that we had only seven or eight miles to the finish line. However, in our blissful ignorance, we failed to look at the topography lying between the checkered flag and us. You’ve probably guessed by now that it was not pretty. The seemingly endless uphills were a series of water bars and boulders too high to walk over in many cases. My love for my mountain bike went out the window as I hurled it on top of boulders before crawling over them. The downhills were no picnic either. We had run out of water with no creeks in sight and our lights had started to go out. If we weren’t so close to the finish I’m not sure if we would have continued.

On one uphill stretch I got ahead of my teammates and decided to sit down and turn my headlamp off to conserve my batteries. In the pitch black, deprived of sleep and entering the first stages of dehydration, the forest started to come alive. We experienced hallucinations in other segments of the race, mostly seeing bridges, houses, parking lots and people when the only thing there were trees and rocks. Having spent so much time in the woods our brains were desperate for any sign of civilization. In our sleep-deprived state we were easily convinced that these things were real. One of my teammates went into a screaming fit and starting jumping up and down thinking that a stick in the trail was a snake. Now I know why sleep deprivation is a major part of brain washing techniques. You’re easily swayed to say the least. As I sat in the dark, the trees and plants formed people and critters, all of them talking to me. I quickly turned my light back on thinking that draining my batteries was a much better option than insanity, especially on a razorback ridge with sheer drop-offs on either side.

The finish line was a sweet sight indeed. Finishing at two in the morning, combined with the fact that adventure racing is not much of a spectator sport, meant that we were greeted by a smattering of applause from the race officials and the few support crews waiting for their teams to arrive. If roaring crowds and rabid fans are what turn you on then adventure racing is definitely not for you. These races are about you and your team accomplishing daunting tasks together for days on end without killing each other in the process. The sense of accomplishment and camaraderie is beyond words. We ended up finishing in first place in our division and somewhere around tenth overall. I’m definitely ready for my next expedition race; at least after my feet get back down to their normal size and the blisters subside.