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