Well this race started the night before, not with gear check in as they usually do, but with the realization that my mountain bike needed work. As I was cleaning it up at the last minute from the mud of the Sherando Lake area training ride we had done a couple weeks before I realized that the back brake, of which there was not much pad left, was rubbing. I was not confident enough in my bike mechanic skills to begin doing any serious work at 9:30pm the night before the race! Yes, to me at this point changing the brakes would be a big job. So it became clear that there were 2 choices; 1) Leave the bike adjusted as it was so that I had some braking capabilities but was fighting the brake pad rubbing the wheel rim (no thanks!) or 2) Forget back brakes. I chose plan B, which is a big one for me because I had in the past been a back brake rebel. What can I say, after flying across the handle bars and landing face first on a gravel road chipping and shattering front teeth I had learned fear of the front brake versus respect! But I decided to trust those who had told me the front brake was my friend if I knew how to use it! :^)
Race morning dawned perfect -cool clear gorgeous! I had a few jitters but felt confident. I met my HRAdventure teammate Don at the central TA and we got through gear check, grabbed our Starbuck's coffee and started dividing up the required gear. The maps were handed out at 10:00am sharp and we got straight to work plotting all the check points and reading the race instructions. Our first surprise....we were gaining a third teammate! A wonderfully weighty fat orange pumpkin which was to be our constant companion! We discovered we were to kayak, mountain bike a single track loop, bike into Colonial Williamsburg for a little urban style AR, then head out of Williamsburg toward Jamestown for a little trekking before biking back to the central TA for optional rogaine style checkpoints and the finish. Throw in a pumpkin and some special tasks and there you have TASC 2005!
The first two-thirds of the race went very well!
Don had brought along his kayak caddy just in case and that was a god send as we had to get the boat down a gravel road and rather steep hill to the kayak/canoe launch. We caught two CPs on Queen's Creek and had a gorgeous paddle along some beautiful salt water marshes. Don’s two person kayak was awesome and we were able to catch and pass a number of teams on the water. Back to the launch site and up that darn hill to our first special task, which was to memorize 6 dates and facts about Halloween, run across a field and regurgitate them :^) Then it was onto the bikes!!! We had approximately 6 miles of awesome mountain biking and at each of the half mile markers we had to collect a number. Don had a great idea and we memorized about 3 numbers at a time so that we could keep moving. 74 - year I was born, 21 - legal drinking age, 78 - year my brother was born - you get the picture! And you really don't need back brakes, though in some of the tight switch backs they sure would have been nice!!! Back to the TA to...what?!?!? You want me to add 11 numbers together. Yeah so I used my fingers but come on - the brain was just slightly oxygen deprived!
Off on the second bike leg, paved roads, you could almost imagine you were on a road bike (my personal favorite...shhhh don't tell anyone!). We made it to Colonial Williamsburg quickly and weaved through the tourists with about 4 other teams in the mix, interacting with the "colonists" and getting directions to historical theaters and jewelry stores to answer trivia questions. Then we hit the Colonial Parkway towards Jamestown to find CP 8 where we would transition to trekking. Here is where the race began to get a little shaky. We knew there was a better road to follow to CP 8 but it was hard to tell what that road was on the topo so we took the sure route....the Parkway. This meant the check point was not completely visible and we passed it once and had to turn around. The bummer was 2 other teams followed. We had to drop into a steep gully and forge a small creek but we still arrived at CP 8 behind only 2 other teams and with 3 other teams in tow - still easily in 3rd or 4th place, certainly in the top 5. We showed the volunteers the required mandatory gear, dumped bike shoes, helmets, etc and we were off!
Off to the dreaded CP 10. There is always one it seems, that one ominous CP in the race that ends your good day! For us it was 10 and I learned a lesson or two. There were 2 ways to approach the CP. The first was from a gravel road then shooting into the woods to grab the checkpoint based on the contours of the land. The second was to head back up to the Parkway, hit the next tourist overlook and then shoot straight into the forest and grab the CP. We chose the first and it did not work out. Bottom line is that unless you are really good at reading topos it is easy to loose track of where you are when there are few landmarks and only contours to guide you. Even though we had an idea of the distance from CP 8 to where we needed to duck into the woods we still over shot it. There was even a small gravel road into the woods that we passed, it did not go far before it ended but the little voice in my head was screaming - take the road in it makes sense that the CP is in further off the that road - but alas instead we continued on. Then we talked to a team who was also looking and they said they had searched the woods beyond that little road and it was not there (in fact it was) - another lesson learned....search for it yourself. After wasting much precious time we bushwhacked to the parkway and decided to hit CP 9 then come back for 10 (this time shooting in from that overlook off the Parkway.)
We did some awesome bushwhacking to CP 9 - we followed Paper Mill Creek - literally walking down the creek, heading straight for the point. It worked well at first....a beautiful little hard bottomed stream. We weren't even getting dirty! Then as Don rounded one corner in front of me I saw a huge snake drop into the water! Yes everyone I do indeed scream like a girl!!! Lets just say I moved from that area very quickly. Then the stream became a marsh stream....finally now we are getting dirty. The marsh stream became a marsh....uh ok now mud up to the upper thigh....and Don casually suggests that we maybe should find higher ground. We crawl through some rather thick vegetation and come out of the woods - YES! Right in front of the park containing a plaque to honor some governor’s daughter! (That was what we were searching for!) Hallelujah! I love when you end up exactly where you mean to when you are bushwhacking! But we determined that in this case running on the road is, much faster then running through creeks, cattails, thick shrubbery, and thigh high mud!
Back to the overlook on the Parkway, into the woods, straight up to CH 10! Curses! Drat!! I cannot believe we wasted over an hour trying to get to it the other way! More curses!!!! Quickly back to the bikes, back through Colonial Williamsburg, and back to New Quarter Park for our last special task. Though we hoped it was smashing our "beloved" pumpkin it was not....instead I got blindfolded and we had to use three cinder blocks to cross and expanse of grass without touching the ground. At this point we know we are in the top 3 or so in our division, and we have roughly 20 minutes so we have to decide - optional CPs for a time bonus or just cross the finish. Since we do not want to loose our place to a team who might attempt to find optional points off we go. Turns out we pick one of the more difficult points to find but Don comes through like a champ and finds the flag out on a fallen log in the marsh beside Queens Creek. Sadly in order to get my attention and the passport we end up notifying 2 other teams of its location - DOH! Then we scramble like mad up to the finish before the time cutoff! And we are done!
