Life Is An Adventure Race

by Jim Farmer (farmerjp@bellsouth.net)

Winter racing sucks. There, I said it. I know that we don’t have a lot to complain about here in the southeast, with very little snow and temps typically dropping into the teens at the lowest, but it still stinks. Every year, my teammate Patricia Williams Smith and I swear up and down that we’ll never do another winter race. Like lemmings, there we were at the starting line in January, February and March, ready to suffer once again. We kept telling ourselves that one of these puppies had to have some decent weather. The gods of statistics deemed it so. Unfortunately, the adventure racing gods are bullies and kick the crap out of the nerdy stats gods every year. Why do they have to pick on us nerds like that?

Having raced under several different monikers over the years, it was time to settle down with a consistent team name. Local outdoors shop, Rock Creek Outfitters, decided to give us a big helping hand in starting the 2006 season. Team Rock Creek would have a core group that included Patricia and me along with Dan Miller, who would serve as team mule and backup navigator. Dan is one of the best all around endurance athletes in the region and was part of the 2002 Adventure Racing National Championship team. Needless to say, he made a great addition to the roster. All I had to do was keep these two monsters pointed in the right direction and then hold on for dear life.

To make our new sponsor proud, we signed up for two winter races, both in north Georgia. The first, the Goldrush 24-hour Adventure Race would take place in the Woodstock area in early March, and the second race, the North Georgia 30-hour AR (NGAR) would be held in the Blue Ridge vicinity later on that month. Both races offered fat cash prizes but, most of all, big time bragging rights as each one would attract the top teams from both the southeast and other parts of the country. Especially the NGAR since it had achieved a mythical status over its four-year run and would attract almost 80 teams of 3 from all over the eastern half of the nation. Year after year this race had humbled the best racers around with its incredibly tough terrain and brutal weather conditions. In its inaugural year, NGAR was held on the coldest day in 50 years in the north Georgia mountains with six inches of snow on the ground and ice everywhere else. The following years didn’t get much better.

Both Patricia and Dan had raced already this season on other teams, but the Goldrush would be my first chance to stretch out my legs since last fall. Although I had kept my overall fitness level up over the winter, my abilities in a 24-hour race were in question. Throw this into the stomach acid stew with a dash of anxiety and a good helping of pressure and a couple of teaspoons of freezing temperature predictions and I was starting to feel like the poster child for Maalox. Why do I do this again? As usual though, the stressful part is getting to the starting line. Once the gun went off at noon on a cold, but sunny, Friday afternoon, it was simply time to race. Unfortunately, it was a staggered start and we were in the third wave meaning that we had to twiddle our thumbs for another half hour. Oh well. My biggest concern was not starting late, since the finish times would be adjusted accordingly, but the loss of daylight for the tough navigation that lied ahead.

After a quick run from the Cherokee Outdoor YMCA to Lake Allatoona we headed north, through some of the worst chop and wind I’ve ever been confronted with in a canoe, to the Lake Allatoona Wildlife Management Area (WMA). Throwing on the portage wheels and lashing our tow straps to the front, we made quick time of the 2.5-mile portage. Prior to the race, we had only received the first seven checkpoints. We were given the next set of UTMs at the start of the race, but decided to plot them at the TA rather than wait at the start since we were chomping at the bit to get going. Plotting quickly, we headed out for the trek section of the race in the WMA. To our surprise, despite starting a half hour behind two-thirds of the teams in the race, we were in third place out of the TA with only Team Litespeed and Enduraventure in front of us.

One evil option thrown in by race director Toby Bramblett was the decision whether or not to swim a couple of the many inlets that separated checkpoints. Water temps in the fifties and air temps in the low 40s made it an undesirable option except for the fact that it could save a bunch of time in the short term. We decided to play it safe and work our way around the inlets rather than swim. We ended up giving up about 45 minutes of time to both Litespeed and Enduraventure who chose to take a dip, but we hoped that the ability to stay dry and warm would pay dividends later on. Finishing the next foot section after several more checkpoints, we had passed Litespeed after a navigation bobble on their part and were sitting in second. Unfortunately, the later start bit us hard as the darkness rolled in and slowed us down considerably on the difficult bushwhacking through the multitude of peaks, valleys and drainages leading us towards the Pine Log WMA to the north. Spending thirty minutes searching for a CP flag that was not easy to find in the woods severely hampered our chances at catching Enduraventure.

By the time we reached the transition area before the bike section we were two hours behind them. After plotting the points for the bike leg and getting some much needed food and a change of clothes from our support crew goddess, Rebecca Shearer, we were off. After several tricky checkpoints in the Pine Log area, that were no walk in the park, we headed back south to the boat put-in just north of Allatoona Dam. By that time we had found out that there were no teams within two and a half hours behind us, so our transition wasn’t rushed. That was a good thing as it was 4:00AM and the thermometer was reading well below freezing. This fact was reinforced by the sheet of ice on our packs, paddles and the front of the canoe as we pushed off from the relative comfort of the TA.

Paddling at night, especially in the cold, is difficult at best. Dan had to holler at Patsy a couple of times to keep her awake as she started lilting to one side or the other in her stupor. My depleted state, combined with taking the brunt of the wind and water at the front of the boat, started to bring on the first signs of hypothermia. I was beginning to have trouble thinking and could only describe it as a sort of malaise. Luckily, the checkpoints along the last paddle section were away from the water, forcing us to get out of the boat and trek inland to punch them. This was a much-needed break although walking on feet that you couldn’t feel was a little disconcerting. The sun rising, despite the increase in winds that came with it, provided a big mental boost, as we made our way east towards Woodstock. The low water levels in the Little River heading to the boat take-out made the last few miles painful, but we knew that only a short run to the finish lay ahead. Enduraventure had beaten us soundly, but a second place finish in a strong field was nothing to sneeze at for our maiden voyage as Team Rock Creek. A fat check for $500 made it a little more palatable.

There wasn’t much time to enjoy our podium spot, as the NGAR was just a couple of weeks away. Traditionally held in January, Tony Berwald, the race director, had moved it to March hoping that the weather gods would be kinder to him, his staff, the racers and their support crews. Although the temps started picking up in the weeks leading up to it, sure enough, the bottom dropped out as the day of reckoning approached. Freezing temps greeted us at the race check-in on Friday night in Blue Ridge, Georgia, and a fresh layer of snow blanketed the peaks surrounding the area. I truly believe that if Tony put on a race in July that it would still snow.

Almost 80 teams of three, along with support crews, families, volunteers, photographers and race staff crammed into the Skeenah Mill Campground southeast of Blue Ridge early Saturday morning. At 8:00AM the gun went off and another epic race was underway. Being a running team we quickly took the lead on Doublehead Gap Road heading south to the first CP at Sapling Gap just off of the Benton Mackaye Trail. Unfortunately, our decision to stay on the jeep roads the long way around proved less than optimal as teams took an unmarked trail directly to the flag. Double-timing it back down the mountain towards the boat put-in at the Deep Hole Recreation Area, we passed several teams and ended up getting in the water in third place, just a few minutes behind the leaders.

In our rush to get in the water, we didn’t put on a lot of clothes, although we had all of our mandatory gear (fleece, long underwear, waterproof top and bottom, etc.) in our packs. We figured that as long as we paddled hard that we’d keep relatively warm. The cold Toccoa River water flying off our paddles, plus the chilled air, combined with sweat-soaked base layers, started to take their toll after an hour or so and we began to plan a pit stop. We weren’t far from the rapids below the Benton Mackaye Trail footbridge and decided to stop after getting through the Class II run. Our planned stop became an emergency stop after Enduraventure had a yard sale at the big drop just west of the bridge. Although we had given them plenty of room ahead of us, once we committed to the same line they had taken the current pulled us right over top of them and our boat filled up quickly. The bathtub we were now paddling was unmanageable and we quickly swamped up against the next set of rocks and took a swim in the frigid waters of the Toccoa.

We were shaking uncontrollably as we hastily purged the water from the boat the best we could and ferried over to the shoreline in order to don our dry clothes and stave off the hypothermia that was quickly setting in. Many teams passed us, some taking swims of their own, before we got back into the canoe for the rest of the paddle leg. Despite many more rapids and an endless array of shoals that drained us both physically and mentally, we made it to the take-out, just west of Shallowford Bridge, relatively unscathed. This is where the van provided by River City Bikes and our super stud support crew guy, Jeramie Hoff, paid dividends. Getting out of the cold into a warm, spacious van to put on some dry clothes is worth a million dollars to an adventure racer in that situation. No time to dawdle though as we had to make up time on the upcoming bike leg.

Deciding that we had to take some chances, we bike-whacked our way up to the Brawley Mountain fire tower instead of taking the long way around on roads. Passing one of the teams in front of us made it well worth it and after another checkpoint to the east we made another bike-whack down an old roadbed saving us even more time. We then pace-lined it back to the Skeenah Mill Campground to start the trekking leg that would be the crux of the race for most teams. After a quick transition and some hot food we took off on foot in sixth place, but only a little over a half an hour behind the leaders. Our concern was that we only had a few more hours of daylight left and the incredibly tough cross country navigation in front of us would be that much more difficult at night.

We caught the two Checkpoint Zero teams at the next CP just northwest of Licklog Mountain with some good route choices and then put time on them on the way to CP9 in Long Cove to the east. Running all of the flats and downhills and speed-hiking the ups allowed us to catch Team Mighty Dog as they punched their passport at the unmanned checkpoint. Then it was off to the races as the sun dropped rapidly behind us. We wanted to get as close to CP10 as possible before losing daylight. Keeping track of your position while bushwhacking through the thick vegetation is difficult without the visual cues afforded you by daylight. Given the fact that this area is feature-rich with drainages literally every hundred meters, the fear of going down the wrong one is very real indeed. To our satisfaction, we hit the main draw heading east into Dixon Creek just as the last remnants of sunlight faded away. Even better, we passed Team Mighty Dog and put time on them on the road towards Mulky Gap. After punching CP11 we bushwhacked east to the trail leading between Spencer Knob and West Wildcat Knob on the way to CP12 at the back of White Cemetery and its headstones dating back to the 1800s.

We were now sitting comfortably in third place but, unfortunately, our legs were not feeling the love anymore and we had to walk quite a bit of the long road heading east towards the last checkpoint of the trek at Sea Creek Falls. This CP was manned and we were told that Litespeed and Enduraventure had hooked up and were pushing each other at breakneck speeds on the long trudge back to the Skeenah Mill Campground. Unfortunately, they were an hour ahead of us at this point. We decided to go with a gamble we had discussed the night before and headed west along Mulky Gap road to a jeep road heading towards Ride-A-Horse Creek. Most teams would head up and over Licklog Mountain, requiring less bushwhacking but a lot more elevation gain, but we were ready to roll the dice. Picking up some of the multitude of old logging road beds in the area, we made good time, despite one navigation bobble, and hit the jeep road that headed west above Skeenah Creek and back to the Benton Mackaye Trail just east of the campground.

All that remained was a bike leg that would take about four hours. Litespeed and Enduraventure were well ahead of us still, but we had hopes of them running each other into the ground and letting us slip by for a victory. Unfortunately, only Litespeed granted us this pleasure by missing a very tricky checkpoint 16. We still had to worry about teams chasing from behind and, after a couple of mechanicals and some more bikewhacking near the fish hatchery, we didn’t relax until we failed to see any other teams on the out and back to CP20 at the mouth of Rock Creek. Hey, the last checkpoint for Team Rock Creek was on Rock Creek. Too bad I don’t believe in all that fate, destiny and serendipity stuff.

Several easy miles on both gravel road and pavement was all that remained between the finish line and us. Of course, we didn’t know about Litespeeds troubles with CP16 until we crossed the finish line and were told that we had another second place finish behind Enduraventure. A podium spot is nothing to take lightly in a race of this magnitude, but not being able to keep pace with Enduraventure for the second straight time was frustrating. I guess that never being satisfied is what gets us adventure racers to the point were we do this insane stuff in the first place. It’s what drives us to keep improving as well. As always, lessons were learned and hindsight becomes 20/20 looking back on route choices, transition times and missed opportunities. I came out of this race knowing one thing for sure though. I’m never doing another winter race again…yeah, right.

P.S. More of the “Life Is An Adventure Race” series can be found at www.TrailBlazerAR.com under the Chattanooga Chapter section.