Endorphin Fix Race Report

Mount Porte Crayon is named after a fellow (David Hunter Strother) famous for landscape paintings. If they looked anything like the landscape we encountered on "his" mountain they may also qualify as early attempts at the horror picture genre.

In almost a decade of racing I can only remember one or two bushwhacking sections that presented unapproachable (or nearly so) targets. You know where you are. You know where you are going. It's less than a kilometer away. But you can't find a way through the thick growth of _____ (Spruce in this case). After a couple hours of futility you turn tail and head to the next point. Because in the case of the CP atop Mount Port Crayon the little beast happened to be part of a special orienteering section where we only needed 5 out of 7 points to stay on the pro course. Of course we ended up finding our way to the top of the Mountain later and secured all 7 points but more on that later.

Endorphin Fix 2007 was the first chance for the GOALS ARA team from Primal Quest 2006 to get back together and race as a complete foursome. The last time Kristen, Bruce, Jeremy and your favorite Adventure Race story-teller got together we learned to hate nature (specifically horses) and that you really can never have enough spare tubes (seriously, like 20 sometimes isn't enough).

Anyhow, I'll spare the full details of the race as there are already several good race reviews available. One at Trailblazers (and yes that's us with the 7 orienteering points that Karin mentions in her story) and the other courtesy of the Coed foursome winners CheckpointZero/Golite .

In short: We ran a prologue. Started the ensuing short bike section after (of course) pausing to reinflate a flat tire on Bruce's bike. Along the way we passed CP0's Tim as he was having his brief bike mechanical and sent his teammmates back the 99.9999 meters that they were separated by so as not to violate any 100 meter rules). After that we hiked the occasionally poorly marked trails to Spruce Knob, didn't miss any turns though and saw CP5 in it's curious off-trail position. We made a route decision later that we thought would payoff. We hiked a little further to avoid 500 feet of climbing but the trails meandered a bit more than on the map and we seemed to lose a bit of time. We reached CP7 in 10th place but almost an hour down to the leaders after having been split by only a few minutes in the middle of the night. Our arrival at the Spruce Knob bike saw the return of our ability to face down the absurd. Bruce and Kristen's bikes had arrived. Jeremy's and mine had not. It took some time for race management (Joy and Ronny) to sort things out but ultimately Bruce and Kristen were sent on their merry way down the mountain to the Via Ferrata at Nelson Rocks while Jeremy and I were treated to a car ride down the mountain. It seemed relatively fair from a racing fairness perspective (it was just a downhill ride on the bikes to the via) but Jeremy and I suffered mightly from all the heat in Doc Wortley's truck. It was particularly tough as we passsed by Bruce and Kristen enjoying the comfortable breeezes during their 30mph downhill ride in near freezing temperatures. It was harsh but somehow Jeremy and I made it through. The via was fun but the ensuing river section was even better. The constant I's and II's driving us downstream and good water depth from the recent rains and snows keeping most of the obstructions out of our way. There were some classic West Virginia obstructions in the water (washing machines, old car parts and a cow or two) but with the sun out and air temps hitting near 70 it was a great ride in the cool water as long as you packed your wetsuit.

After that it was on to one of the more brutal bike climbs I've had the distinct pleasure of doing three different times now. Up from the Potomac to the high pllain area of Dolly Sods. 2800 feet of climb (give or take) no breaks. This time was a little more interesting. The route used some old logging roads to take out most of the task before finishing the last 500 feet or so of elevation on the mind numbing haul road that most motor vehicles use to complete the climb. We slogged up that road with members of Team ARFE in the middle of the night at E-Fix 2006 taking turns riding ahead and taking brief naps on the road while therest of the sleep deprived troop marched up the endless grade. The logging trails, bright sunshine and a 12 hour difference (3pm vs 3am) on the clock made the climb substantially more enjoyable this go around. The climb ended and we reached an orienteering section with 7 points (missing a point was a 3 hour time penalty at the end of the race and you needed a minimum of 5 to stay pro).

In pre-race strategizing we decided that we would clear these 7 (pretty much no matter what) and adapt later if necessary (on a second orienteering course that was a short bike ride away and led to the finish). There were no time cutoffs between the middle of the paddle and the finish (4pm at the finish line on Sunday) so this seemed right to us. We had a few hours of daylight at the start and decided to take out two points (CPA and CPB) that we could definitely get to in the light. In retrospect it would have been vastly better to pick up CPB on the road out to Mount Porte Crayon, skipping the descent to and climb out of CPA and maybe get to that climb with some light remaining. But we had no idea the spruce would be so thick and impenetrable when we reached that point later in the evening and getting to the highest object in an area is generally an easy navigational task. Yeah, not so much this time.

Later that night when we had finished beating our heads against the wall at Mount Port Crayon we reversed my proposed loop on that end of the course (we were going to go CPC -> CPE -> CPG -> CPF -> CPD) and everything went fairly smoothly. We did (somewhat embarrassingly) stop short of CPD for a bit when we thought we had reached the correct elevation just below a big waterfall. It was 50 meters away and Bruce had almost stood on top of it before we stopped to scratch our heads. CPG was a bit challenging with a host of additional logging roads carved into the hillside. A little sweep back and forth at the correct elevation and the target was found. At this point we could have bailed on Haystack Mountain CPE and Mount Porte Crayon CPC and stayed pro. But again, there was no time cutoff in the passport to worry about other than the finish. So we elected to finish out the loop and adapt (or run) later to make the finish by 4pm. Haystack was a haul but getting on top in the early morning produced stunning views. From there we used some logging roads and thinly forested areas to stay high and begin orur journey back to the start of teh section. Along the way we found the back door to Mount Port Crayon hanging wide open. If you read the wikipedia description of the monutain it mentions the windswept nature that leaves the backside thinly vegetated and the front side loaded with Spruce. It was disgustingly easy to reach the target on the way back through. It was tough getting out but, with daylight, significantly easier than at night. Our mini-loop complete and all CPs in hand we started to run because we knew time was going to be close. The funny part of this was that we ran right through the puddles and mud and slush that we had picked around on the way out the prior night. Maybe a little more reckless abandon the nightbefore would have given us a bit more clock.

We reached the end of the orienteering section and discovered to our shock that Ronny had placed a NEW time cutoff on the end of the first orienteering course. 11am. It was 11:40am and we were officially on a short course. There had been no way to communicate the new time cutoff during the orienteering section as all the flags were unmanned. And although we knew we were pressed for time to complete the Pro Course we were deeply disappointed that we would not be permitted to try to push the remaining 11-miles of orienteering at a running pace in order to try to make it in under the 4pm deadline. Ugh! So, off we went to the finish line for our 1st place finish in the Sport-2 whatever category.

Next race report: The Savage. It will be substantially more upbeat (I promise).