2019 is officially launched...Topo trail series#3 at MFF and 361 Adventures Frigid 4hr Rogaine

Holidays time is over and was well spent recovering with family, friends and lot (maybe too much) food. The motivation is finally back to restart pushing while racing and getting back on a more structured training despite some leftover pain from El Cruce. 

The past weekend was perfect to test the legs with 2 races on the schedule, Topo 10miles Trail running at MMF park on Saturday and 361 Adventures Frigid 4hr Orienteering rogaine on Sunday.

The Saturday trail run was a perfect warm up race for the Sunday event that I was planning to race strongly. Perfect weather at 10am when all the trail runners were set free for the 5 or 10 miles course. The MTB trails at MFF being still wet, Brian designed an alternative course with minimal usage of road and still with some good short climbs. 

I decided to stay with regular runners in the leading 10 miles pack, well we will be quickly just 2 with the first runner way faster than us and another pack getting distanced little by little. We stayed together for 3 laps and then I backed up a bit at the beginning of the 4th and last lap as my right leg was a bit painful and to save as much as possible for the next day. Finally finishing 3rd at 20-30secondes from the 2nd and far behind (probably 4min) after the winner. Really happy with the feeling for the first 3/4 of the race, then the pain in right leg woke up again but it hold more than anticipated so it is a good sign.

Early wake up on Sunday, to arrive quite early at registration after the one hour drive to General Butler park to get the map and having a good amount of time to plan the first part of the race. The main race had 19CPs that would need to be all punched before returning to the start to get 5 additional CPs. Lot of strong racers and navigators made the travel but it was also nice to see lot of new faces as the day before 361 Adventures organized an Adventure Race/Orienteering clinic which motivated new person to try to race the next day.

At 10am the racers were launched in a spring like weather to collect the 19 first CPs. My strategy was to get the far out CPs first as probably most of the new racers and person/team thinking to not clear the course would go on the other side of the park where lot of CPs were packed in a smaller area. As planned, CP18 was found really fast down in a re-entrant 300m from the start. Then it was time to find CP17 that was right in a re-entrant down the road at the bottom of CP18. Well, that was looking so easy on the map that I didn't read the clue and spent 5minutes wondering in the right re-entrant not finding the flag...and I could have spent all the time looking for it as the clue said pipeline.....PUNCH ONLY...so no flag, just a punch on the pipeline that I passed multiple time looking for a flag :P. 

Well that totally put me in race mood pushing the pace on the road/path along the lack to catch couple of racers before CP16. More push collecting CP15 on the way to CP14 that required to jump over a fence as I took the road to approach my attack point. As expected I found the trail attacking just before the small hill from the road and got CP14 right in the next re-entrant. I finally caught up with the lead racer on this side of the course in the big climb going to CP12 near a pound. CP13, 11 and 9 were all found pretty easily going up and down some steep hills. Another big climb to CP10 and then I decided to go to CP8 first, then CP10 on the way to CP7 down a re-entrant and backtrack up to collect CP3. From there I took a way downhill to CP4 collecting CP6 on the way down a re-entrant

. Then back up the road to get CP5. From here, I was on my way back to the start by CP2 on a bushy spur where I cut my face and hands but with the strong runners on the course no time to be to concern about avoiding all the bushes. After collecting CP19 on the way up-hill to the start, I found Minto father and son "A Large Orange hedge" Team, just in front of me on the road and we arrived at the same time (1hr23min) to copy the 5 extra CPs on our race map. I copied the CPs as fast as I can and went back on race first pushing on the road to CPA while the 3 person arrived to get the new CPs. Definitely no comfortable lead at this point so I would kept pushing, running strong down CPA to CPE....which I missed by 5meters not seeing it on my left while going into the re-entrant near the road. The 2nd and 3 racers caught me back and we all finally found it at the same time. Well one only thing to do, being smart keeping up the pace. CPD was close to CP14 so I applied the same strategy running on the road attacking this time after the hill on the side of the road, and reach directly the right re-entrant first. As after CP14, I made the choice to climb up to reach the trail stay on the top to move in direction of CPB and went down a steep downhill before taking the trail that was going right to the re-entrant were I found CPB. Back down on the trail to run to CPC which I decided to attack from the top of the spur. Once punched, the finish was at less than 1.5km from the finish and as planned it was all on the road...so sprint time as I crossed just after CPB Minto Father and son and knew they were really closed to finish too taking another route. Last push on the stairs to the finish and even before I had time to give my punch card, the second team arrived...after 2h18min and 24CPs we finished at 10 secondes from each other after finishing exactly at the same time the first 19CPs!!! Incredible tight finish!!!

As always. post race analysis and strategy discussion with the finisher before the awards ceremony and heading back home with a first overall win in 2019, finger crossed it will continue on a good note the all season.

Definitely a fun weekend, and big thank to Topo and 361 and all the volunteers to allow us to enjoy those winter days.
Results : http://361adventures.com/Results/Frigid_2019.pdf
Details of the route on Strava : https://www.strava.com/activities/2060957114

  

361 Adventures Unbridled Series Finale The FIG 12hr – A perfect finish for the 2018 AR season

It is finally the end of the AR season for Marc and I with the last race of the 361 Adventures Unbridled Series, the classic The FIG. Around 125 racers registered among the 54 teams that will adventure in the Red River Gorge Area.

For once we were right on time with no misadventure to arrive at the bike drop off but as always the pre-race unexpected happened. While tightening my seatpost to drop the bike at the TA before check-in, the screw of the clamp broke off right in middle and all the shop around were about to close. One hour later we found a solution using a CP screw that Dallas gave us at the check-in. After some struggle to remove the broken screw from the tread with Doug’s plier, we were finally able to drop the bikes and gears for tomorrow and just missed 10minutes of the pre-race meeting.

After getting the race instruction and the 3 maps (1:24000), we plotted and strategized our route for next day 12hr fun. While plotting we realized that the race will be not too hard for navigation so being fast will be key.

Quick breakfast and canoe set-up before the last meeting and start. At 7am the herd of racers was set free, and we all rush on foot downhill from the start towards the paddling section. We gave up on the idea to cross the camping area to cut a bit of distance, and went up on the dam just on the other side of the camping and then down the same dam to reach TA1 where our canoe was waiting for the fun paddle ahead.

The lake is pretty small, but as always the 361 crew found an interesting and fun way to keep us a bit more on the water. Basically they set up a moving boat CP that we had to visit after punching each boat leg CPs. That was a lot of fun and required a bit of thinking to avoid traffic jam at the CPs and near the moving flag boat.

After 45min we were down, avoiding all the boat traffic and reached the TA2 first before taking off for the first trek of the day.
We got into a nice easy pace, found CP5 near an arch and crossed No Complaints and Deviate on our way down from the CP at 5-7min behind us.

Then the stupid mistake of every race happened. I lost focus being too confident on the easy navigation and stayed on a road 3km more than what we should missing a trailhead. That costed us 17min and we were no more at the lead of the race.

We arrived to the TA in 4^th, after No Complaints and just right after Deviate and Topo. It was time to be smart and to push to try to catch up.

Instead of going up by powder mill single track as the other teams in front of us did, we went up by an ATV road and that will turn to be a game changer. Even if half the way to the far out northern CP9 was really muddy we managed to stay on our bike for most of the time and avoid too much pushing. Teams that decided to go reverse way would have to struggle with all the mud on the way down and that always cost time. We collected CP10 on our way to CP9. We were then on a really nice double track and were able to collect CP8 quite fast.

We started the last 20k long trek of the day being back at the lead of the race. The call was to collect CP13, 14, 16, 17 and 18 before deciding on the way back to go or not to CP15 that was far off the other CPs. We crossed Deviate on our way back from CP18 and 2 min behind them we crossed No Complaints. We estimated that we had 30min gap on them.

After thinking 2min about playing safe as we didn’t think other teams would have time to go to CP15, we decided anyway to go and tried to clear the course are we were only at 8hr30 in the course. The way to CP15 was a big push with Marc putting the watts in the climb to give a fast pace. This went faster than expected. We then headed back to TA5 in way less time than anticipated as Marc was still pushing hard to keep us in a fast pace.

We were actually able to jump on the bike for the last 18km leg to the finish still in front of Deviate and No Complaints realizing that the CP15 detour didn’t cost us much time (around 20min more than avoiding it).

In 50min we were done after collecting the 2 last CPs with Marc in beast mode (after an energy gel) pulling us till the finish line, almost sprinting in the last climb to the Nature center. We learned later that we were the only team to clear the course.

That was the best end of the season possible for TJ79 Team Moziatex as we won for the first time the FIG and for the 2^nd time in a row the Unbridled AR series. The first long bike leg definitely played in our favor after the dumb mistake I made on the first trek leg. As always Marc as the best teammate possible kept us on a good pace to make up for my mistake and did a fantastic work pushing us all the way from CP15 to the finish despite a bad lower back pain.

Another year full of new and old friends, learnings out of mistakes and great times in the wild. Thanks to Moziatex Bikewear for their support and perfect outfits that kept us moving in the best conditions through all the conditions we encountered. Thanks to all the AR community for creating such a friendly and great environment and making this sport so fun.

The 2018 AR season is over for TJ79 Team Moziatex, next stop will be in Chilie for El Cruce trail running stage Race and then a good Christmas break.

See you all next year with big smiles and for tons of adventure.

USARA NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP 2018....2 derailler hangers close to our 2018 season goal

Team Moziatex and Team Silent Chasers first met online, when team members were unable to make the championship race held at Four Winds Resort and Marina.  We agreed to unify and do our best.



After arriving, on Thursday afternoon, meeting each other, checking in, getting our cool swag that we promptly split up, we headed to the pre-race brief meeting that would hopefully answer last minute questions and give us a better idea of the still secret course layout.



We would not get our maps until 6:30 am Friday; we also learned there would be plotting on the course and race strategy would be important.  After finishing the meeting, we headed back to room to finish last minute packing and catch as much sleep as we could, 5:45 am would come too quickly.

We were up, and feeling good about the day.  We gathered our gear, readied ourselves, and went to get our maps.   We had less than thirty minutes before the 7 am start, to quickly review things, and execute a hastily formulated plan drawing from our cumulative team experience. We would start with a foggy paddle.

The ‘gun’ went off and the field sprinted towards the canoes 400 meters away.  The eerie foggy morning calm of the lake reservoir, was shattered by the clanging of fierce paddlers, shouting directions, trying not to ram each other, and find their way.  We had found our canoe that we would need to be-friend, and we hopped into her, got started paddling, and finally settled into her.  I should mention that when we started, visibility across the strangely calm water was less than 50 meters; we were guided by Matt’s ‘more left, ok…straight, more right’.  It was nerve-racking not being able to readily see landmarks, and distances.   Although it seemed as though we were alone much of the time, if one was to imaginatively lift the fog, we would see that we were with a pack of boats; they just were not visible…yet. 

 

Our first stop would be a checkpoint where we would receive coordinates for the next 7 checkpoints on the course.  Throughout this course, a team could chose to strategically skip and do any checkpoints in any order; cool- my kind of race, the kind that allows for creative solutions and strategy.  Matt masterfully guided our HMS canoe to her first stop.  Generally, paddling navigation is simpler and straight forward navigation; today Matt’s skills were severely tested immediately.  We were the ninth boat ashore, in a fast lead pack.  We went to checkpoint (CP) 1, and proceeded to get to work plotting; we did it quickly, and a brand new AR team was bonding, making me smile inside; someone observing would not have known this was our first race as a team.  We made quick work and were off with Matt on the maps.  

The next few points were not to far away in the foggy terrain, and Matt guided us flawlessly to each one and back to the boats with only six boats that had left before us.  The fog was beginning to thin, but still ever present, and we hopped back into HMS canoe, and headed to a second set of trekking CPs  further up the reservoir. 

 

By the time we arrived, the fog was barely noticeable.  Again, we communicated and executed our canoe dismount and matt guided us flawlessly to the next CP.  Then, what had to be a funny (or maybe humorously annoying??) conversation from Marc’s point of view occurred where Matt was unselfishly wanting to not do all the navigation, and wanting to share.  My philosophy was if you are on a heater (a roll), keep it going; no reason to risk stopping a good thing.  Matt insisted I do the next one, and I wanted him to keep it going.  I took over the navigation for the next two points, with full intention of being relieved soon at some point.  After initially making a three minute ‘oops’ while getting my mind focused on navigation, we knocked out the next two points, smoothly.  Back to the boats, and we were headed to the transition area where we would switch to bikes. 

We had spied and decided on a portage that shortened our paddle by 3.5-4 km.   We had arrived in 7th position to the course area affectionally named Triple Triple.  This are had a total of nine CPs that could be done in any order, by any means of transport (bike, foot), and in this section the teams were allowed to split up as they saw fit to acquire the points.  We were issued three separate maps, and we quickly split the work load with Matt taking the furthest four CPs since he was the fastest on bike.  Our team had elected to use bikes as much as possible to get each point, which seemed to be the best strategy for us.  Matt took off, whilst Marc and I did our final briefs and went about our CP tasks.   Marc was back to the meeting point first, and I showed up next. 

 

 We had fun chatting a few min with race personnel and talking about how we met and formed our team.   We took advantage of our time waiting for Matt, looking at the rest of the course, eating and situating bikes, and gear.  Matt arrived 15 to 20 minutes later, and he was ready to go. We submitted our completed CP punches to race course personnel, and were informed only 5 teams were ahead of us…great news, we had moved up one more spot! I situated the bike map on the map board one final time and we were off.



I continued to navigate and we had agreed, that strategically we should initially skip the large majority of the initial bike points, in favor of getting to a key orienteering section called the Dog bone orienteering section, in order to maximize our time orienteering during the daylight.   We peddled and collected two CPs on the way to the Dog bone orienteering section.  We arrived as the first team but we understood that other teams had elected to collect bike section CPs and were simply completing a different order of CPs.

We moved out and began to get to work, I handed Matt the maps for this section and said that he was the right person for this section;  he cleverly played hot potato with it, for which he won, and I was still on the maps; again I wondered if Marc was thinking ‘would someone just navigate!’.   This section was large and a pivotal point of the race, I try to reason that rested eyes would do better; I still lost.  Our team was fantastic.  We had built an estimated one to one and a half hour of lead on the closest all-male division team racing.  We had about two and a half hours of daylight, and this area at night, would punish even minor mistakes.  We (I) made one of these procedural mistakes, punching one of the ‘dog bones’ in the wrong order, forcing us to redo that particular leg in order to stay official.  Although this cost us an estimated 30-40 minutes by our estimations, and some sunset light, it was far from a disastrous error.  Our team was one; no one ever complained, we only moved on, although I did apologize incessantly for a bit. Our physical navigation was virtually flawless, with one exception of not finding a trail and having to back track 150 meters to locate it. We pushed fairly hard, had some great laughs, and worked together spying and calling out landmarks and CPs.   We humorously called the CPs Jean-Claude, saying ‘oohh lala, Jean-Claude is looking nice tonight!’  whenever we spotted them, making me chuckle every time.  We completed it in roughly 5 hours and 50 minutes, only 15 minutes behind the next team that elected to do a similar strategy, as they were still in the transition area when we arrived.  This marked approximately the two thirds completed portion of the course.

We transitioned and reset for the final third of the course; food, filled water bottles, map folding, and extra clothing layer since it was now the cool late night, early morning temperatures.  Left was a bike, paddle back to the transition at the finish line, and a final trek to complete the course. At that point, we had just over 12 and a half hours to complete this course. We were in great spirits, in great position, and theoretically, had plenty of time if all goes well.  Collectively, our agreed upon route choice was selected, and we moved out.   Then it happened.

About forty minutes later, whilst on the ‘lolipop’ stick portion of a single track loop, Marc had an unlucky event.  I heard some loud commenting and Matt, saying in his awesome french accent…’oyyhh’; that could not be good.  Marc’s derailleur had taken blow from a stick, that broke the derailleur hanger clean off.   Marc and Matt were prepared and fortunately packed a spare derailleur hanger.  Our team assessed the damage and we started to look at how to repair it.  Marc and Matt got to work and handled it.  I decided to look at maps, and eventually take a seat, shining my head lamp on their work space; those two were on it, and I would only be in the way.  One coed team did pass us about 35 min later, however we were on our way to collect more CPs with-in 40 minutes.  We ran across great adventure racer ‘OG’ Carrie Sona, had a quick chat and continued around the loop portion of the trail, collecting two more CPs on the way. Marc stated that he would hear a creaking but his bike was working relatively fine, and he was doing his best to be gentle on it. Once we were heading towards more CPs further on the course, about 40 minutes after the first incident, this time I heard a clear ‘thwack!’ followed by I think some choice words by Marc.  Matt who went to him first, was saying ‘oh my, that’s it’, and I quickly saw why.  Another stick had gone into Marc’s rear tire spokes, gone around striking his carbon frame, cracking the frame, smashing his derailleur into several pieces, and braking the derailleur hanger off, all in a lickety split-second.  Unlucky, was not the word to describe this;  the odds of a completely separate incident causing similar and even further damage again, on the same bike have to be insanely high.   We did not have a second derailleur hanger for that bike and the derailleur was completely inoperable.   We looked at the damage, and we came up with ideas, and elected that we should try to make the bike a single speed bike by removing the derailleur from it.   Marc and Matt went to work, and Matt’s chain breaker broke while working on the chain…what?!  The earlier team soon went past us again, no sure how that happened, along with two more teams. We were able to borrow a team’s chain breaker, and complete the process of converting Marc’s bike into a single speed bike.   We were still in the fight, and likely dropped one possibly two overall race positions.  Then the discovery happened.

After getting rolling for the second time, Marc’s chain would not stay on the bike.  We had discovered that Marc’s front crank ring, was a special Oval-shaped ring.  This caused the non-stretchable chain to be to tight, then to loosen as Marc pedaled his two wheeled steed.   This caused the chain to either drop off, or go up and be too tight on the other rear gears causing the tire to ‘seize up’ and stop turning.  This required brief removal of the rear tire to allow it to turn again, and re-positioning of the chain.   In 30 minutes, we had barely made it 2 km, with 30 plus km minimum, including skipping CPs to shorten the bike leg in order to complete the course.  In this competitive field, this would cause our overall ranking to plummet to bottom of the field….if we even were able to make it back to the canoes, and final trek.   Our team was completed gutted.  Our goal of a top five overall finish, and first place in the all-male division, was over.  Each of us understood this was not sustainable, and after a post-race inspection, unsafe.  The carbon frame was compromised and would have likely completely failed at some point, along with we would likely not make the time cut-off (getting the rest of the CPs), even under full bike tow.   We agreed to return to the previous transition and with a heart-breaking decision to drop out of the race; it was quiet for the first time whilst we travelled.

After returning to the hotel, none of us regretted this decision, nor the effort we had placed into this race.  We had given 100% and there was not another decision to make for our team.  Marc, Matt, and I were a team.  

Thank you to all our families, Moziatex, the friendly brotherhood of adventure racers and volunteers, is not enough, for the allowing the possibility of us racers to do what we do. 

By Phil Nicholas...