Griesacker Race--the descent that made the climb worth it

Anytime a race makes me feel younger than what my license says . . . well that's a good day of racing. At the end of the Wilmington marathon I felt 75 and I swear buzzards were circling. But not today. Today was 30 years the other way.

I was a last minute sub for Steve who I partnered with in the Cradle of Liberty. This time 50+ miles in Hamburg PA for the Krista Griesacker race. Beautiful 80 degree, sunny weather. Nice.

I rolled in late Friday night and was too jacked to get a good night sleep, but who needs sleep before a race. Fortunately, we were able to get a good 5-10 minutes of route work before the race. Pre-planning is so over-rated.

Nice jog for the prologue to get the blood flowing. Then off to the obstacle course. Long jump over the pit, cross the balance beams, up the rope, climb the giant A-frame, then over the wall and through the concrete pipe crawl. Rope swing over the water, then off to the monkey bars over the water (with a gator this year instead of piranhas). A final cable cross over a creek, and we're off to the climbing tower.

OK, so I had been practicing a prussik climb, and felt pretty good about that. Now I get to use an ascender for the first time and that's supposed to be easier. Key words, “supposed to be.” Waited and watched, waited and watched. Shouldn't be that hard, but it looks more complicated than a prussik. Finally, I'm on the ropes, feeling good, ready to go. Started out easily enough—just keep a steady pace. Sounds good in theory, but this is definitely a learning experience, and I'm learning that (a) I'm not doing this quite right and (b) I still need more upper body work..

Before my arms and (one leg) exploded, I mercifully made it to the top. Greeted Bill and hooked in for the rappel. Opted for the speed rappel (a.k.a. plummet like a stone). As they say in skiing jumping off a cliff doesn't take any skill, it's the landing that takes skill.  Fortunately, my belayer had skill. You know you're rappelling fast when you hear “Coming in hot”. Surprisingly, it wasn't the fastest I'd descend during the race.

So now we're off on foot. Bushwack or trails? Survey says . . bushwack. Straight uphill about 1000' climb. Yeah, it was a good idea to get the obstacle course over before the trek.

Found checkpoints 1 and 2 with little trouble. Then off to Pulpit Rock for CP4. What a great view of the valley. Ran into a few hikers who took our photo, then we were back in the game.

Downhill all the way to CP3, which regrettably means more climbing to get back to the TA.

At CP3 we had Adventure Racing Lesson 1:

     trust your instincts even when another team has been looking
     for ½ hour and says they've checked where you think the CP
     is located.

CP3 Just Out of Sight

We stopped our initial search 15 feet too short and wound up beating the weeds for 20-30 minutes with two other teams until we returned to our initial spot and looked further. Lesson one learned the hard way. Unfortunately that wouldn't be the only lesson today.

After finding CP3, we climbed back up the ridge before ditching the trail and following an interesting bushwack that had been blazed by at least one team. Fortunately, the earlier team was in too much of a hurry to eat all the blackberries along the way. I fell into a routine of stopping to satisfy my addiction to wild berries and then sprinting to catch Steve. At this point it feels like a summer day a lotta years ago and we're just running through the woods.

We pop out on the road just up from the Civil Air Patrol, and we run into one of the other teams who abandoned the search at CP3.

“Don't tell 'em we found it—it can be demoralizing” Steve says

Naturally, what's the first thing they ask? “Did you find it?”

Can't lie-- “Yeah. It was near where we first looked” (And yeah, Steve was right. They were hacked.)

Lunchtime at the TA

Quick lunch and then onto the bike. A nice rolling ride through a beautiful part of Pennsylvania. Everywhere is a photo opp. I feel like coming back sometime when I'm not so rushed.

Everything was going well until I ran out of map, and had trouble getting reoriented after I flipped the map. Finally we re-oriented ourselves, and only needed to make one last turn before buckling down for some climbing to the first bike checkpoint.  Should be easy.

OK here's the turn. Hmm . . . gravel road. Crud this is just a driveway to a farm. Turn around. Back on the road, and there's another gravel road 20 yards up.  But that looks like another driveway leading to a bunch of barns too. Why do these folks put street signs in front of driveways?

Next intersection—things don't look right. Not matching what I'm expecting. I make the mistake of looking for what I want to find instead of trying to figure out where I am. I guess that's Lesson 2 for today.

But then comes the most painful lesson of the day: winding up off the grid. When you're off the map, get the heck back on the map as soon as possible. (That would be Lesson 3 for today) In other words, just turn around. It was only like 5-10 minutes back to where we knew we were.

Hating Bike CP1

But no. We flew off with reckless abandon convinced that we could cut a corner coming back. Regrettably, when you're off the grid, roads don't have to go how you'd expect. A north/south road can become a northeast and even easterly road, especially if, oh, let's say for instance, there's a huge lake right where you need to “cut the corner”. (I'll loathe Leaser Lake for years to come.)

Quickly our nice ride through a lovely countryside devolved into a demoralizing hunt to get back to where we needed to be. Five extra miles and an hour plus later we finally got back on the grid and mercifully find Bike CP1. Now we still have a climb over the ridge to get to CP2.

At the top of the ridge, the AT crosses, and at the top I run into a through hiker.  Interestingly, he's from Maine, but he started in Georgia. We chatted a bit about his adventures and our current one. Passed on some food, and he headed east as Steve and I descended north.

CP2 was uneventful. So was the ride to the put in for the canoe—except for my heart attack as we neared the canoe put in. I suddenly thought I mistakenly led us to the take out. Fortunately I was wrong about being wrong. When we unfolded the map, my heart started beating again. (I guess this would be Lesson 4—label the route points well.) I mean really, first a 5 miles detour and then if I had guided us to the canoe take-out. That would be all world navigational bungling.

The bad news: we're the last team to check-in for the canoe leg. The good news: they have water for us to refill. Unfortunately, we later discover the water tastes so bad it's almost undrinkable.

We also learn that the paddling section quickly becomes the canoe dragging section—maybe, just maybe, that mandatory throw bag wasn't necessary today. And as bad as it was for us, dragging a canoe is even worse for the team of three that we find and eventually pass—sweet not in last anymore.

Wipe off the lens next time

We ran into a bit of a snafu at the take-out. We must have offended Jeff or one of the other race volunteers because they forced us to carry our canoe up an absurdly steep hill and then hoof it ¼ mile or so to a truck. I asked what the standard tip was for volunteers who put away the boats, but they seemed determined to make us do it ourselves.  Need to talk with Bill about getting that included in the race fee.

I need to work on the canoe carrying technique. Having my head face first in the end of a canoe is like having a bucket over your head. Talk about trusting your partner. I'm sure there's a better way.

With only a little over an hour left before the time cut-off and a huge climb up Hawk Mountain to get to the finish, we bail on bike CPs 3, 4 and 5.

After 11 hours of racing, the climb up Hawk Mountain made us wonder why we paid for this torture. Our lungs burned almost as much as our thighs.

But we soon forgot the pain of the climb as we bombed down the backside of the mountain at 40 mph. What a rush!!  I might be willing to do that climb again just for the descent.

As we crossed the finish line, there was satisfaction for finishing, remorse over the mistakes we made, and unexpectedly a wish that it wasn't over. I really didn't want it to end.

Really does it get any better than this?

Even though we didn't finish how we'd hoped, it was a great day. The adrenaline kept flowing for the long ride home, further fueled by a sugar rush from Dunkin Donuts. And right on cue, the radio hit a block of Hall & Oats, Billy Ocean, Van Halen and Police. Good to feel young.