Training Log Archive: danfoster

Pre-race jitters:
We got the maps around 9PM at Sunday River, and we did a quick overview and then I set to work on the first three legs and the final leg, knowing we'd probably miss the first cutoff and have to plan the middle of the race again.

We identified three possible routes for the bushwhack from CP5 to CP6: north to Sunday River for the long way around on trails, NW on the ridge from CP5 to the drainage and then up the saddle at Locke Hill, and due west along the ridge. The Locke Hill route seemed to be the safest bet for us. Went to "sleep" around 11, although I didn't get a minute of sleep and was freaking the freak out the whole night long. Huge thanks to Brent, Eric, and the other navs who calmed me down in the morning and got me to the starting line when all I wanted to do was sneak back onto the bus and head for home.

The Kedakina
"Hot and humid is no way to go through life, son." (Animal House, sort of)
This weather is my Achilles Heel, and I had to ask the team to slow down a few times on the race up the ski hills so I could keep my heart rate and breakfast under control. Once we got up on the ridge, things got better, and I started to find a groove. We came down the first curved ski run to the north of CP3, which wasn't the fastest route. In hindsight, I would have come down via CP5 to get more beta on the woods NW of Jordan Mtn. The key insight on the way down was seeing the conifers switch to hardwoods around the 2000' elevation. At that point, we were comfortable with our decision to go through the saddle at Locke Hill, staying off the high ridge as long as possible.

Started the proper bushwhack at 10:30AM from CP5, trying to NW down the ridge from Jordan Mtn to the confluence of several drainages between Jordan Mtn and Locke Hill. Came out to the brook right as another team was heading north along it, presumably dropping all the way down to go around via the Sunday River (river) approach. We headed up the reentrant to Locke Hill, and were elated to find a washed-out bulldozer road right up to the saddle! 30 minutes later we were atop Locke Hill, and then fighting our way through raspberry-choked logging sites down into the South Branch drainage. Came across some giant, raspberry-red bear scats along the way.
Picked up the logging road that climbed toward CP6, and followed that until it ended. It started pouring on us as we made the final bushwhack up to the x2591 saddle and then fought our way north to the flag.
I don't think we could have done that section any cleaner - it was exactly what we intended to do, and everyone was in high spirits. Hit CP6 at 3:15, well ahead of our 5PM deadline to get out of the woods before dark.

Heading for 7, we retraced our route back to the x2591 saddle, and planned to contour south to the stream and then climb to x3024 at Bear Mountain. Someone was kind enough to run a trail along the contour, and we were in CP7th Heaven. The trail fizzled out once we hit the water, so we started climbing up to the saddle, and then we heard voices - loud singing and occasional swearing, coming our way down the reentrant.

Shortly thereafter, we ran into VTMA, Stark, and Threshold, all heading down the reentrant towards us, on final approach for CP6, which we had left 60 minutes earlier. From later analysis of their GPS track, it looks like they'd come over the high ridge, had gone up the summit north of Bear Mtn, backtracked toward x3024, and then dropped down into the reentrant to the west, where they met us. My understanding at the time was that they thought they were right below CP6, 1KM NW of where we actually were at the time. In any case, we all teamed up at that point and headed up to x3024, where my team's original plan was to contour around to the flag.

As we approached x3024, we changed plans and decided to go up and over the 3183' summit and then down to Campbell Mtn, for about 1.5km distance. The going stopped going once we got into the dense spruce and fir, and we next tried to contour around to the west. Try as we might, we couldn't drop elevation or gain it, and nothing we did got to easier terrain. There were 13 of us, in varying states of happiness.
Finally, after almost an hour, we passed through a boggy area with a drainage stream which we assumed was the saddle between Bear and Campbell. And a few minutes later, we climbed to a bump which had an unobstructed view (of mist) to the south. Surely this must be Campbell, despite our altimeters still reading 3100'. (A thunderstorm had just blown over us, and I wrote off the "too high" altimeter reading as a result of the massive change in pressure that had just occurred.)


So we decided we'd gone too far and were now on the southern hump of Campbell, and turned around to count bumps back to the northern one. That took us to 6:15PM, when we started encountering teams coming across the top, who had just left the Bear Mtn saddle only a few short minutes earlier. We hadn't gone far enough, and then backtracked up to the x3183 summit of Bear! I'd set a 7PM cutoff to be done with CP7 to get us out in light.


At this point we had some very wet, unhappy hikers in our party, who were going to become very unhappy overnight campers if we lingered. I asked the teams to vote whether to keep going for CP7 or to bail, and the majority wanted to go down. My teammates wanted to keep going for 7, now that we knew what we had done wrong. In the end, we decided to keep the group together and head down the SW ridge, paralleling the drainage that fed down to CP8. I'd set a cutoff of 7:30PM to reach CP8, thinking it would only take 30 minutes to drop down from CP7. It took us 100 minutes to reach the stream and trail, and half of that was on an unmarked logging road that we stumbled across.

Down by the stream we hit a large, well-maintained logging road that didn't match up with the trail on the map. We debated this for a while, eventually agreeing that it had to go in the direction we wanted to go as well. One member of the group bonked hard at this point, and was eventually picked up by a volunteer from TA1. On the walk out, we passed others coming from CP8, who directed us back up the trail that WAS marked on the map to get the flag. This would have been another backtrack, so we let it go and just continued on to the TA, arriving around 10:15PM.

For both of the last two points, I'm confident we could have gotten them on our second approaches, since in both cases we'd figured out what went wrong the first time and now had new information that would have helped us re-attack. But I think our decision to bail and keep moving forward toward a trail that would take us to the TA while we still had some light was the safe one, the conservative one, and the right one for us and the teams we were travelling with at the time. As it was, we still didn't get out before our self-imposed deadline, and we just barely got one of the other teammates to the safety of a road before he couldn't continue onward. And having missed a CP on the first leg changed our mindset for the rest of the course, which made our decision making process a bit easier on the legs to come.

Event: Untamed New England Expedition Race 2018
 

Early morning fog gave way to another gorgeous day. Plans to go paddleboarding at Walden have already been foiled, since everyone else headed there first.

As I was nodding off last night, the final piece of the Untamed puzzle fell into place. Suddenly everything made sense - the bushwhack, the paddling sections, the "Taj Mahal" reference at TA3. I went to sleep knowing I'd figured it all out.

And of course, when I woke up this morning, I didn't remember any of it.

Cool, dry, pleasant. Why can't we have this weather NEXT week?

Much less humid after two inches of moisture precipitated out of the air yesterday. Realized a little too late that a tree leaning across the trail that I'd propped up six months ago had slipped down in last night's storm, and I couldn't get low enough to avoid bashing both shoulders into branches as I rode through.

Jess freaked the freak out when we encountered an older gentleman bent forward at the waist in uttanasana in the middle of the trail, not moving at all. This was even more disturbing to her than the dog in a cone that we met on yesterday's walk, which also short-circuited her canine brain.

Early-morning ride after a late night poring over maps for Untamed. Now it's time to practice carbo-loading at our own personal "waffle wonderland" T/A.

C • Maps 5

Final big training session before Untamed. Wapack trail from 119 to Windblown, and back over Watatic. Managed to complete the hike on the 3 liters of water I was carrying, but had to scrounge for water for Jess several times along the route. I felt a little silly filtering water into her drinking bottle while she was lapping it up straight out of the water holes.


Jess slept for most of the ride home - a rare occurrance and evidence that I successfully tired her out. She then went bonkers and zoomed all around the yard as if she was ready to do it again.

A much-needed break in the heat. Tested out Jess' Garmin Astro tracker's claimed 5 mile line-of-sight range by leaving the receiver plugged in at home. Came back to a map that shows a distinct loss of signal every time we got outside a 1 kilometer radius, with perfect tracking within that circle. Jess can easily run 20 km/hr, so I guess that means I can only give her a 3 minute head start when she takes off.

Back home after a long weekend of carbo-loafing in VA. Biked past a deer next to the trail that was clearly startled by the dog that ran right past her but didn't have the courtesy to give chase. Jess was either not paying attention, or was easing back into things by chasing only squirrels. Switched our route up to avoid riding through the tall grass, and my arms and legs look much better for it.

Pre-dawn ride in what normally would be called enchanted mist or ethereal fog or something, but today was just a mocking reminder of how humid it is already.

Picked up so much crab grass seed on this morning's ride that I had to rinse the bike in the driveway so I wouldn't reseed our lawn with weeds. Does getting whacked at speed by a million grass seed heads trigger a histamine response? Because once again I'm looking like I've been attacked by no-see-ums dipped in poison ivy.

Night ride in a futile attempt to beat the heat. The humidity is too damn high!