Upstate Aftermath

Another one bites the dust! Well, at least I don't have to make the decision about going to Dubai...unfortunately its too early to tell if I'll be on the starting line at Nationals...

Most of the race was not very navigation intensive...not really my kind of course...no bushwhacks allowed on the trek sections, lots of paved road riding, and of course the real mountain biking wasn't until AFTER I hurt myself so it was just completely miserable and tenuous.

We had a prologue run that one person had to do...apparently a volunteer directed some folks the wrong way - fantastic, off to a great start! We had Jay do the prologue while we stood around. Once he returned, we portaged our canoe down to the lake.



We were on the water in second, right behind Dart-Nuun and trailed them for much of the paddle until near CP1, when we arrived there first as Dart appeared to be confused and didn't see the channel between the islands. By the end of the two hour paddle, we were again tailing Dart and came off the water right behind them, transitioned, and then hopped on bikes about a minute behind them as we had to return to the TA for some running shoes...D'oh!





The bike was a 14 mile road ride to Table Rock, and it was pretty intense. Jay took us from 0 to 27 mph in about 4 seconds so I was hurting. We caught Dart-Nuun and rode into Table Rock with them. We took off on the first trek just in front of them.

Again, the pace was high up Pinnacle Mountain and I overdid it, as my stomach felt pretty bad for the next 6 hours until I finally...uh...dropped some weight. My legs were so worked on the uphill so I felt wobbly on the descent. We lost a couple of minutes here running right past the CP. I was too far in oxygen debt to notice it.

The next bike was another road ride, and I was completely wasted. I had no power and still hadn't recovered from the previous two legs, so we were moving pretty slow. (ok, I guess that's relative) We dropped our bikes and took off on the second trek with one of the CPZ teams.

We did the first part of the trek with CPZ until we realized we had overshot the trail intersection we were looking for. We all missed the trail because there were about 15 boy scouts all standing in front of the trail intersection signs...we thought it was a campsite, but when we crossed a creek, the warning light went off in my brain and we backtracked. We continued on the trek, picking up the next CP easily, and as we're jogging down the mostly downhill Coldspring Branch Trail, my footing gave way, and CRACK!!! I went down as my right ankle gave way beneath me. Oh, it hurt, but the pain subsided and I was able to walk on it and eventually was able to start jogging again.

When we reached the rocky Jones Gap Trail, I kept tweaking it on the uneven footing and was pretty much reduced to gimping along by CP11. When we arrived there, we found that we were the first full-course team there..WTF??? How does this happen? Physically I was having one of my worst races, and then you add in the hobbling...where did the other teams disappear to? This gave me some adrenaline and encouraged me keep gimping along. We climbed up to CP 12 and didn't see the CP at the falls. Our elevation there was lower than the plot, so we continued up the trail, losing it at times, but didn't see the CP as we reached the road. We debated whether we should go back to the falls, and started heading down, but after seeing so many other teams come back up empty handed, we took our chances and moved onto the TA.

The Camp Greenville TA was happy and sunny during the day...





But when we arrived, there was a 30 mph sustained wind and it was cold and miserable. Our gear was blowing around and it just wasn't the sanctuary I was hoping for. Chris taped my ankle, we downed some food, and took off for DuPont. I was hoping the biking was easier on my ankle, but it actually was worse. The stiff bike shoes were killing me and pedaling was actually more unpleasant that walking. Every bump made me cringe.

We picked up the first two CPs, spending considerable time scratching our heads near CP16, but unfortunately led Dart-Nunn to CP16, which they may not have found as their navigator did not agree with where we were looking.

After realizing that I wasn't going to be able to ride fast, and knowing that the last trek along the Jones Bridge Trail would likely cripple me, I had to make the call to bail, and hope that I could get myself healed for Nationals in less than two weeks. I have no idea what the doc will say tomorrow, but right now its looking pretty bad...