Spills, Chills and Canadian Thrills- Quest for a Cure 2007

It started out like any adventure race, show up the day before a little frazzled from a long drive, meet up with team mates, pack enough carbohydrates into your stomach to feed a small under developed country and get a little sleep before the start. But, this would be no walk in the park, after 32 hours of nail biting, leg pounding, gut wrenching action packed racing Team LBF had declared war on their bodies, minds and Canada’s #2 Pro Team Salmon River Sports only to come up 50 minutes shy of their ultimate goal; winning an entry to Primal Quest 2008.

The mass inline skate start was down a gentle grade and turned into a mass decline shred to get out in front. Apparently Canadian races, regardless of duration, all start with a hammer fest to get in the lead. So we bolted off the line with two relatively new skaters and their stone cold faces eager to get the first of three skates over without a crash. Third place into the Rafts and we were paddling down the Ottawa River to the first of half a dozen rapids. We had had a 5 minute lesson what to do in case you swim and I don’t know about my partners in crime but I was going to stay in that raft regardless of whatever unforeseen circumstances arise while paddling through 3+ foot walls of water. We moved through the rafting section with ease and arrived at the pull out first with 5 other teams. Our nimble feet and sharp Nav put up out front again on the 7 KM run to the nearest paved road where we donned our skates for round two of “Wilson vs. Gravity”.

Team SRS with their carbon clad race skates were quickly out of site as we stumbled our way to the water and TA2. 800 meters before arriving at the waters edge we started descending down a steep hill, I was oblivious to the fact that my team mates were not super comfortable on skates when the angle of the dangle increased and took off down the hill with three backpacks and a big old smile on my face. I get to the bottom and peel of the road into a parking lot to bleed off some speed and take a deep breath after a nice little rush. Meanwhile back at the ranch, Jason was squaring off his wheels while slowing Laura down and Jamie was squaring off with his arch rival, Gravity. I didn’t witness the impacts but I hear they rivaled his best diggers to date. One was a quick edge catch and smash onto the pavement leaving a little (4 inch diameter) souvenir on his right thigh. He lost that battle but was determined to fight another day, so he picked himself up and before he was able to dust himself off the fight was on again as he build up speed and was “above my comfort zone” he said. He flew by Jason and Laura waiving the white flag of defeat he veered to the right and hit the grass screaming
”legs don’t fail me now!”, three big strides later they did and legs Magee was airborne. I was sitting at the bottom of the hill thinking ‘maybe I should have stayed with them.’ when I saw everyone jogging down the hill with all their limbs attached, a good sign.

We arrived at a dock where we got in a boat and were transported across a 300 meter wide river and told to get out 60 meters from shore. We all jumped in with a scream and swam our way to the bank. It was 60 degree water and 55 degree air so getting out was a shock to say the least we dragged our dripping bodies to the TA and got ready for a 50 KM bike and our first lead of the race. Five minutes into the bike we were warm and pacing down the PBJ rail trail at a brisk 26 KMH. We passed the fist on three teams ahead of us then. The rate of closure was about 16 KMH and the team out front got a little confused with our instructions of “on your right”. A quick swerve of the group and we went by in a cloud of dust. Like people say “you are sponsored by a bike shop”.

We arrived at TA 3 in first place only to find out that a road we took was off course even though…how about we just leave it at that. After a long discussion with the race director on the radio we were giving the option of riding that section of the course over or taking a time penalty that a jury would decide on. We promptly grabbed our canoes and maintained our lead going into a long paddle. We jumped into our boats and stated up the river with our new Mitchell Leader Paddles, now these paddles are the BMW of canoe paddles, smooth fast and light. We kept our lead despite being caught and waging a battle on the river with Team SRS for almost 90 minutes. We would draft, they would shake us, they would draft, and we would shake them. We finally solidified our lead on the last of three portages through the woods when they took off up the wrong trail as we found the put in and started hammering away as the dawn approached. But after a CP was plotted in the wrong spot we were caught once again and passed just before coming into TA 4.

There wasn’t a huge concern at the Team LBF camp as the next 50 KM were on two wheels and mostly fast roads. We were pretty the next battle would hurt like hell but we would at the very least tire them out while riding and at best drop them like a sprinter on Alp De Huez. As we were packing the RD came up to us and assessed our penalty for the previous bike leg. “2 hours! Are you insane? That’s a little harsh don’t you think?” Our hopes of going to Primal Quest were slipping away with every minute of the conversation. Upon hearing that a race official was at the intersection we were supposed to turn on and said nothing to us they agreed to cut the penalty down to 1.5 hours. Better than 2 hours was the way I looked at it. The kicker of it was we had to serve it right then and there. We were stuck in TA for 90minute from the time we checked in, which actually was really nice, we were at the Race HQ were our cars were along with a camp stove, sleeping bags, showers and bathrooms. So it was a mandatory rest for us and the 3 place team was still an hour away. We watched Team SRS leave the TA as mashed potatoes were being cooked and showers were being taken. A quick nap, splinting of Jamie’s then thought to be broken wrist and drying of some clothes filled the remainder of our penalty and we were in the starting blocks at 8:04 am rested and ready to take off.

We cut their 90 minute lead to 40 coming into the next TA where we jumped in our canoes and hammered down the river. It was about 11 am when the sleep monsters started catching us and the four portages and Laura barking orders to eat and dumb water on us were the only things keeping us awake. It was five hours later that we pulled turned the corner and saw the zip line across the river and our carrots sliding across it. We were now only 20 minutes behind but really tired after pushing so hard for so long.

We got to the dock were we would ascend the cliff to the TA and were about to step out of the canoes when a race official said “Not here. Park your canoes over there and swim with all your gear to the dock” Jamie’s response was the typical “HUH?” while I was thinking ‘what the heck is up with these guys and making us swim?’ Laura the grittiest of us all was half way to the dock at this point was telling us to hurry up and get in the water. The ascent was about 100 feet and as Jamie’s wrist was really messed up I offered to take his pack along with my soaking wet carcass, pack and dry bag. I was now hauling 60 lbs of extra gear hanging below me and really feeling it. It was five minute after getting to the top that I realized, in my delirium; I had detached the map from the canoe then reattached the map to the canoe instead of my pack. So I scrambled down the wall, got it and scrambled back up just in time to nearly puke up the Ensure I had drank and plot the orienteering section of the course.

We were at the zip line shivering for ten minutes waiting as each of us took turns flying across the river and skipping across the water like stones before dragging our selves the rest of the way across. This was by far the hardest sections of the race. Pulling yourself the last ten feet up to the embankment caused the most severe pain and fatigue in your forearms that I have ever felt. So hard it was Laura had come to Jason’s rescue when he reached what I would classify as “total muscle failure” 5 feet from shore.

We shivered on our clothes and headed up the 80 meter rock scramble and through the woods to find a series of roads that would take us to our 4 Orienteering CP’s. A slight error in Navigation put us at the wrong end of our trek and caused us to double back once before returning to the river and the rappel. We past Team SRS on their way out after they got the last CP and really gave them a scare. Unknown to them we were getting the CP’s in the opposite order and after seeing us they took off at full race pace.

We got to the rappel 70 meters above the river and in the thickest cloud of mosquito’s I have ever been seen in my life. It was so bad that Jamie threatened to jump off the cliff before he got hooked up to the rope. Luckily the RD was again being tricky and had us rappelling straight into the water and swimming across the river and to our boats. There were a number of teams coming in to the ropes in their canoes looking at us with astonishment and saying things like “what” “huh” “why” “are you”. It was getting to be dusk at this point, the temps were dropping and the realization of a midnight swim was a little much for some of the teams.

We shivered clothes from my dry bag back on and took off down the river with no chance of catching SRS as they were far better skaters and an hour ahead of us again. We paddled hard and pushed our way to the final stage and one more inline skate to the finish back and Race HQ 7 KM away. We took our time and made it there in one piece at 10 past midnight to finish 2^nd in 32 hours and 40 minutes. We were all pretty spent after a long hard race that more resembled a battle. Team SRS was at the finish with cocoa, a few extra slices of pizza and a firm handshake for a team that gave them a good run for their money.

We changed and hit an all night pizza place to refuel and clean them out of the best recovery drink of earth (chocolate milk) before crawling under a table in a hanger and passing out till morning. All I could think of while falling into bed was there are some poor souls bobbing across that freaking river right now, man oh man am I happy to be warm and dry.

Quest for a Cure Live GPS Tracking!

Hello to all,

Just to let you know come Friday at 4pm while Jamie, Laura, Jason and I make our way throught the Canadian wilderness you can sit at your desk or couch and watch us wander around and hopefully go the right way in the 2007 Landrover Quest For a Cure. Just go to www.questforacure.ca, click on the GPS Tracking link and keep an eye on Team Littleton Bike.

Enjoy the show!

And to all who donated to the Ottawa Cancer Research Fund thank you for your support!

Dave

NEARS VT 12 hour AR: "HUH?"

June 9th 2007 Team LBF packed up the rig and headed to West Dover for a nice short race. We arrived at the Lodge at Mt Snow around 9pm just after they packed up registration. So with a little begging and pleading we got signed up and ready to go. Jamie arrived with our support crew, the incredibly patient Carol Myers and son Craig, around 11:30pm just as Mel and I were packing up the last of the gear for our 6 am start. That night I met up with a few friends from the AR community and got a low down on what normally takes place with this race director. We were awakened at 4am by 15 alarms that were set in case we slept in. Starting the day with 3 cups of coffee, two pancakes and one big pile of eggs was the best way to welcome the sun and a day of slogging up hills. We received our maps and UTMs 15 minutes prior to start and after plotting our paddle CPs. We trotted down to the launch and picked out a boat. We, being not so fast paddlers pulled the boat up on shore in 6th or 7th place. After looking around we realized that the support cars would not be at this TA like we thought. Not a huge deal other than the fact that, because of the rain our gear was in a dry bag and we had no backpacks! So after a moment of slight discontent we packed the dry bag with only the mandatory gear we needed, plotted the CPs on the nine mile trek, grabbed a water bladder and set out of the TA as the 12th or 13th team carrying everything in our arms. Now if you haven't tried running with a 6 lbs dry bag and/or a 70 oz water bladder in your hand take Jamie's word for it, "Wilson, this is not too much fun". However, we blew through the trek like the big bad wolf and the first little pigs straw house. It was beautiful, I'm talking rhapsodic! We hit ever nav point dead on and made huge gains with a few cunning bush whacks. The only issue we had was Jamie at full speed rolled his ankle and nearly ate dirt in a ditch. That was followed with a labored and Jamie specific high pitched voice "oh Mr. navigator...I think I broke my ankle" If you haven't heard this voice ask him to demonstrate it is one on the most hilarious things on the planet. So, in true team spirit Jamie bit his lip and pushed through the run without even a whimper. We got into TA 2 back in 6th place only to watch the teams in the distance stay in the distance. 4 miles later with a few sore arms and hungry belly's we pulled up on shore and carried the boat over head to the TA where all our gear was laid out ready for the ransacking. When adventure racers come into a TA they support crew has everything out and opened up so we can just grab whatever we want, it often is a little crazy and things get tossed a bit but after a nine mile trek with little to no food and two paddles that were an all out effort to stay with our competition TEAM LBF resembled Tasmanian devils, we rummaged through gear and food bins eating and drinking everything in sight dug out new sock, backpacks and towels for wet feet. We had received our new maps and 15 minutes later the course was plotted. As we checked out the volunteers at the TA said the next team was only 3 minutes ahead of us and with "Mt Goat" Mel Brown, Dave "Nummer" Stiles and Jamie "The Mule" Myers rearing to go on our Cannondale and Specialized hard tails we were fairly confident in our response to them being "Not for long!" We headed out on our favorite discipline at a blistering pace hammering up the Vermont dirt hills. There was only 23 miles to bike a a huge deficient to make up so we planned on ridding as hard as we could for the fun on if and to see how many teams we could catch. The course was mostly paved and birt road with a few double track trail sections. The thing I remember the most was the climbs there are these three distinct 3-5km climbs that were just brutal especially because I have the worst power to weight ratio of the three and chasing Mel and Jamie up hill is like being a dog on linoleum, lots of action but no movement, they are always just out of reach I just can't get a claw in the rug and catch them. One thing is fur sure we hauled through the bike in record time. so we picked up a couple spots and finished in 4th place. Sat down in the finish area and took off our packs. Jamie and Mel started Hoovering Oreo cookies and oranges while I was writing down the TA questions on our passport. For those of you who don't know when an adventure race happens in a rural area checkpoints that are or roads or somewhere in the open people have a tendency to steal the pretty flags we use for Check Points so the race directors in this race wrote numbers on the back of street signs and asked us to answers a few question at the CP instead of punching the passport. So back to the finish...I'm transferring the answers over when I get to CP 18 and I realize...there is no CP 18 on my answer sheet but...OH NO! The next conversation went something like this: Dave "hey guys. can you hand me my map?" Jamie "why?" Mel (blank stare) Dave "we're going back out to get CP 18" Jame "HUH?" Mel (blank stare) Dave "we're leaving now!" Jamie "HUH?" Mel (blank stare) Dave "lets go its only 3 Miles. Come on guys" that 6 miles was a blur. We time trialed out and back at 90% thinking another team was right behind us and going to zip across the finish while we were playing dumbo the adventure racers. We got back to the finish without seeing anyone on course but the road biker were passed. So I apologised to the gang a couple times and we all decided that "Check Point 18" was now a new verb and could be used so if necessary. ie "are we going to CP 18 this one?"

Over all the race was a lot of fun, we raced hard and did very well. Mel had a great first AR and we are looking forward to competing again with these race organisers at the NEARS final at Gunstock in September.

Thanks again to our sponsors for helping us compete at the level we do.

Team LBF

New Addition to Team LBF

June 5th 2007 Melanie Brown, one of the regions fastest Mt. Bikers, has been added to the Team LBF roster. Mel is well know in the Littleton area as a super biker who in last season, her first at Mt. Bike Racing, won the womens solo division of 24 hours of Great Glen and shattered the female record at the Top Notch Triathlon. Mel is an astounding athlete and a welcome addition to Team Littlton Bike and Fitness.

Roller Blades, Potholes, Cabs and Cramps

So I did my first Inline Stake workouts today. In the Quest for a Cure we will be on skates for some undisclosed amout on time and with a previous coaches ingrained rule "train like a pro race like a pro" I decided to grab some blades and hit the pavement for a little 14 mile glide. Well at the moment I'm living in NYC and skating to class is a great 7 mile run and bike so, why not skate it also? 10 minutes into it my legs, back and ankles were so cramped I could barley move and my freshly shaved legs were being rubbed raw from the low sock high boot combination. I made if over the 59th st bridge and into Manhattan where the cabs own the road. I only grabbed ahold once and it was to make a soon to be red light where a pothole the size of a small car nearly ate me for breakfast. I nearly hit 4 people that pulled the typical NYC walk into the street 10 feet to hail a cab and had a few close calls with quick moves by busses and cabs that happend to have me in a "New York Blind Spot" which is the area around a car, behind the front bumper that drivers don't care what's in it before making some amazingly stupid swerve, weeve or sudden stop. By the time I got to class I was pretty pumped on a adrenalin rush and very sweaty for an intense workout. My form got better on the ride home and I started really going to town and riding like I was racing. However, after getting to work this evening I found out that I was really tired. My Calfs were smoked and knees felt like they had been hit with a ballpeen hammer repeatedly for 3 hours. But I'm feeling stronger on the skates and after tomorrows recovery bike ride to class, work and around the park, Thursday will be filled with skating in Central Park.

-Crack on
Yacky

Florida Coast to Coast

Sun, Sand, and Swamps
Team Littleton Bike Shop
2007 Florida Coast to Coast Adventure Race

On May 24th a truck set out of Littleton NH bound for Jacksonville Florida and the starting line of a 280 mile adventure race that would end four days later in a small town south of Tallahassee. The truck was loaded to the brim with bikes, packs, food, tents, a kayak, two support crew members and a couple athletes that were rearing to go. The week prior to their departure was full of packing of, organizing and re-organizing gear, eating loads of pasta and strangely enough winning the first event of their season, the Kancamagus Team Time Trial. After twenty four hours of driving south Team Littleton Bike Shop arrived at race HQ, checked in and began race preparation. At an adventure race teams of two to four racers receive instructions and correlating maps of an area. The athletes are given UTM coordinates and have to plot on the map their Check Points or “CPs” and Transition Areas or “TAs”, they are told what discipline will be use on each leg and given a start time. That night I was handed the smaller of two map packages containing nine 9x17 inch topo maps and six pages of instructions. With the help of one support crew, two pizzas and three hours, I had the first half of the course all planned out. The final packing was done and my teammate Jamie was fast asleep. I got to bed just before midnight to catch a quick four and a half hours of sleep before heading out on the first big race for this newly founded team.
“Thirty seconds everyone” the race director shouts. I look at Jamie and give him the “Let play ball” look and the whistle blows, 200 spandex clad warriors take of out of the parking lot and head down the road. We start off on foot for an easy 25km (roughly a half marathon) before jumping on our new Specialized bikes. We quickly build a lead after CP 3 and hold it through TA 1, TA 2 and half the paddle when we scared a couple Manatees in shallow water who, in trying to get away from our Kayak, nearly gave Jamie a heart attack and filled our boat with 100 gallons of water. TA 4 we had been passed by two teams who had the unfortunate luck of being the “carrot” for two fast bikers that had 50 miles to reel in a measly 30 min lead. A bit to eat and a clean pair of shorts after our sea cow encounter was it before heading out to tear the legs off a few well trained paddlers that had gotten the best of us.
Back in the lead we are now working with Team Tools from Canada to find some well hidden CPs in the middle of nowhere. Because four riders are faster than two we made a packed to stay with each other till CP 6 and we would go our separate ways but at TA 5 (CP 11) we rolled in again in first place and all still together. Having lost ground after a mis-marked road through us off course we decided to prolong our parting and take a few short long cuts on the road to regain our lead. Most of the mountain biking was to be done on dirt roads but here in Fl there is no dirt, it is all sand, 4 inch deep bloody sand that makes training ride up the Mt. Washington auto road seem like an easy spin.
Twenty hours into a race is not a time to dilly dally and do something silly like sleep but after the days of traveling and hours in the hot sun and sand we all fell asleep for a little over an hour. I was in the bed of the truck eating mashed potatoes and sifting through 23 new maps and 6 more pages of instructions when the sleep monsters caught me and pulled me into a deep state of unconsciousness. Meg, our lead support crew, attempted to wake me a few times verbally before resorting to violate shaking and yelling. It was light now and we needed to get a move on. After plotting the next four sections we headed out on a swamp trek with our new found friends right beside us. Jason and Laura worked well with us and going into a bushwhacking section two eyes are better than one and eight are better than four so we stuck together. Also, we were four of the fastest athletes there and knew we could benefit from racing together.
The swamp section was good until we spent 7 hours in the thick bush looking for SP3 (Swamp Point). After a few hours we were on the phone with the race director and asking for more water on the course and going in for our last attempt. At this point most teams were skipping SP3 and heading to TA 6 without it. We, however, were dead set on getting this point which if obtained would automatically make us overall winners because the other teams passed it. But at 8:45 pm we cashed in our chips and left the bush like broken gamblers that just lost their fortune at the craps tables. We were still the leading Duo teams and high up in the standings but the lead team was far off in front and we had little to no chance of getting the overall victory that we were hoping for.
The next few sections were completed with another addition to our group, Team XS, and the six of us began to be known as a combination of our official team names “Wilson’s XS Tools”. From that point on we extended our lead on all the other duo teams and caught a bunch of other racers that had moved passed us while trying to find Swamp Thing 3 the day before. We ran, biked and paddled another 110 miles before pulling into the finish at Sea Hags marina on the gulf coast all three boats tied together. Over the past 48 hours non of us had slept and we all came really close as people do in Adventure Racing, we crossed the line together with mixed emotions of how we managed the race and how the race was managed but the one thing we all knew is we were all fast tough racers that united in the true spirit of Adventure Racing.
We ended in a three way tie for first and took home first in our division with a time bonus from early in the race and left the race site with new friends to race with next month and few prizes and a %50 off entry for next years race. Be sure the watch the leader board at next years C2C because Team Littleton Bike Shop will be there and gunning for an overall victory.
Many thanks are extended to our title sponsor Littleton Bike Shop for our clothing and equipment and our support crew Meg Skidmore and the young James Myers, you kept us moving fast, clean and well fed.