Where do we start the SORCAR re-cap?
Pre-race excitement. It might have been a 27 (wink, wink) on a scale of 1-10. Everything was going great: we were right on time leaving Cleveland, we had all the necessary gear, some clouds and no rain, GGB Kristen’s bday, the “It’s Good to be a GGB” CD in the boom box (in the car), pre-race snacks, great directions, screaming “how can we be lovers if we can’t be friends” at the top of our lungs, small knife was packed in a safe spot… See! How could things NOT go right????
Set Up. We get to the transition area (TA) feeling better then we’ve felt since we started adventure racing. It was so good to see Bethann (BA), Frank and a lot of familiar faces… we almost didn’t feel like “newbies” anymore. The pre-race puzzle was a fun twist! The small knife was used to open the puzzle box, which I tried to open with my bare hands with no luck and was very happy to have the small knife. BA and Frank are so tricky ;) But it was in the back of our minds that we may have to use the knife again. You just never know. Kristen rocked the puzzle – and we agreed that we would definitely win a puzzle race, maybe we need to look into something that plays to our strengths more? Anyhow, we had to finish the pre-race puzzle to get a poker chip. Once we had the poker chip, we got our bikes and gear set up outside in the TA. The sun may have been peaking around the clouds at this point – things were still looking really good!
Run. Our run start time was 8:05 and we handed over the poker chip while waiting in line to depart. We had a good idea of what direction we were going to run for all of the colors (for the red, yellow or green course). We had the red course first. "We just have to get two check points (CP’s) and we’re on to the next." Well, we had great intentions when we started. We knew the general vicinity to run, but we’re overshooting all the CP’s… every race we re-learn that the points on the map are A LOT closer together than they look. After completing the red course, we started on yellow. Awesome – we found CP5 so quickly and we’re thinking “we’ve got this, we feel good, let’s keep this momentum”, but that’s when it got bad… we ran allllll over looking for CP3 and 4. Why??? We must have passed both CP’s numerous times…at one point we got so mixed up that we came across CP5 again! UGH!!! OK, deep breath, let’s look at the map again, here’s the compass, it should be right here, let’s keep running, wait, let’s look at the map again, hi other team, yes, we did just see you 30 minutes ago in this same spot, oh you’re heading back?…yeah, we’re still on yellow, wait, did you just say that we look lost and we shouldn’t be helped? we weren’t going to ask for your help anyway and yes, we know we look lost!!!! deep breath. We finally found CP3, then CP4 and were head back to TA. BA gave us the biggest smile, yelled “Go GGB”!!!!!, and said “we were wondering where you ladies were”. Time for the green course. At this point, we’re running downhill and bikes are zipping past us, we know that we’re alone on the run course for the most part. We cross the bridge to the other side of the “river” and decide that since we can’t find CP6, we’ll get 7 and 8, then come back to 6. While on the north side of the river, we spot CP6 on the other side. Instead of wasting precious energy to run around to the other side (at this point the time doesn’t even matter), Kristen volunteers to cross the “river” by maneuvering along a narrow, dried out, dead tree to reach the other side. She was a champ and it was a minor victory for the GGB’s. Post yellow-course-fiasco, we would take any small victory! After getting 6, CP7 and 8 were easy to find. I do need to mention that the climb to CP8 was intense!!!! Very steep, so we had to walk a majority of the trail leading to it. To get back to TA, we had to cross the “river” again. This time we decided to take off our shoes and socks and very carefully cross. Although the fisherman watching us may have thought we were a little crazy, their facial expressions didn’t give anything away.
TA. Back at TA, of course we only see our bikes and another teams’ bikes. We were expecting this. The run portion took us over 2 hours to complete. What we weren’t expecting was seeing the Batty Boys there. They’re that good. They lapped us. Like, MAJOR lapped us. Are we that bad? We won’t answer that question. Moving on. We run in and give BA our green punch card and we’re smiling because we’re optimistic. We really love mountain biking and usually it’s our strong leg. At least on the bikes, there’s very few instances that bushwhacking is needed. As you can tell, we’re not great at veering off trails. The Batty Boys shared some encouraging, compassionate words, along with a double check of our food and water supply, then wished us luck on the bike portion. Here we go!!
Bike. CP9 was easy to find, CP10 was more of a challenge. There was a lot of pushing bikes up hills and there was mud. Also, this may have been where the negative comments started. We pushed on and found CP11. Along the way we came across two other teams, much to our surprise. We thought we wouldn’t see anyone for the remainder of the race. CP12, CP13 all were found. It was between CP13 and CP14 that the negativity reached an all time high. Of course we were pushing the bikes up a hill, Kristen’s back was hurting, like really really hurting. My leg, I’m sure it was just a rogue muscles shouting it’s protest, was not feeling great. Did I mention we were walking the bikes up a hill? The following comments may have been uttered during the trek from CP13 to CP14: I’m not having fun. Why are we so bad at navigating? Why do we keep doing these races? I’m not having fun. If I could quit right now, I would, but no one would be able to come get us. Remember, no quitting. Why do we keep participating in something that we’re not good at? Why did we think we were going to do good today? I don’t have the energy to cry right now. My bike and I are not going to be friends for a long time after this. Whyyyyyy????? I may have to use crutches when this is over. I’m already thinking about what I’m going to write in the blog. Let’s do some yoga stretches to help your back. Maybe a downward dog? We need to take some pictures to remember this ultra low point, maybe a video too. This is a bad birthday. Take that back. OK, this is a great birthday. It’s hailing on us...again. CP14!!!!! It was nestled in with the giant pine trees and was more difficult to find. We knew exactly where CP15 and 16 were because we passed them on the way to CP10, so we lifted our heads a little higher, put on a smile and headed for home. On the main road heading back to TA, we got to see a few of the racers driving away and we got a lot of encouraging waves, “great job girls” and smiles. A lot of smiles. Once at TA, we threw the bikes down and ran in to see BA, amid clapping and cheering. It was a great moment.
We finished the race. We didn’t quit after the run, we hit every single CP, there wasn’t a flat tire or even a mean word exchanged between us (whewwww!) and 6 hours 23 minutes is better then a DNF, right??
To race another day? As you can probably tell, we don’t compete to win the race. Obviously we’re competitive and would love to place, but if we competed just to win or even just to place, then we wouldn’t keep signing up for the races. We wore the notorious “pink leader jersey’s” because we have been doing this for a couple years and not because we’re the competition. Besides, all the other teams quickly learned not to follow the (pink) leaders.
As much as we told ourselves that we would never forget the pain we felt during the bike, we were able to laugh about it during the car ride home, and the next day, the pain was just a distant memory. On Sunday, we were already looking forward to HVAC. On a very positive note, we know we’ll get better. We’re going to work on our navigation and endurance training. Lastly, we’re optimistic because we know the trails of HVAC (we’ve been lost on them for probably over 12 hours during races in 08 and 09 combined) – it’s not much but it makes us feel better!
Thanks again to all our fans, supporters and fellow Grass Roots racers for the encouragement and competition!! You inspire us to become better racers!
Big smiles in Cleveland
