Gear, Gear and more Gear – 4 a.m. Wednesday morning - the day is finally here.  Almost a year of training, planning and visualizing what was to come was finally here.  As I rolled up to the plane counter, the nice attendant struggled to put my bag on a weight scale.  She looked at me and asked if I knew my bag was overweight.  She then politely asked if I wanted to shift anything to my other bag.  I laughed….looking at a body bag-sized duffle that was stuffed to the gunnels.  I had too much crap…a gear box (70 lbs), a duffle (64 lbs), a bike box, a backpack filled, plus a boogie board.  She asked if I was moving to Utah.  Scratching my head, I laughed because it sure felt like it.

How we met – John and I brought the team Racing with Giants together.  We met on the Internet bidding on an Eco-Challenge video.  John, our resident lawyer, successfully outbid me, however, he emailed me asking if I would like a copy.  Over the next month, we emailed each other and spoke a couple of times on the phone.  For those AR racers out there, you can appreciate the fact when you talk to someone else as interested in racing as you are, the conversations can go on for hours.  I finally brought up the topic of Primal Quest to John.  After some further discussion about why we should not do this…such as not being able to train together, being on opposite sides of the country and being rookies, it seemed logical that we were perfect for each other.  Now we needed two more teammates.  John suggested his wife Gina, who was a very strong biker and a well rounded racer.  I suggested a person I had raced with before, Brian, who was a great navigator.  After a couple of calls, the team was complete.  We knew we faced challenges, being spread across the country, but through weekly conference calls, and hundreds of emails, we bonded as a team.  Two months prior to the race start, Gina tore her ACL during training, requiring a last minute teammate swap.  Our two alternates had already been snatched up by other teams.  Fortunately, however, I was able to reach into my bag of tricks and produced Shari, an experienced expedition-length racer, who had completed Primal Quest in 2004.  The final lineup was now in place.

It is a dry heat in Utah – I was the last to arrive in Utah on Wednesday.  John had arrived on Sunday and Brian had arrived on Monday night with Shari in the “Rockstar” RV of power.  Tuesday turned out to be a scouting day.  Thanks to a BLM posting on the Internet, we had found an environmental impact report, which allowed us to do some preliminary scouting.  Not that it mattered for a team like ours.  They could have walked us through the whole course, and pointed out every short cut.  Scouting gave us a warning of the magnitude of what we were about to endure…….. EPIC PAIN.  Lucky for us, Grand Junction had a REI store.  One would think that in the period of one year, we would buy enough gear for a lifetime, but every racer knows…you can never have enough gear.  After a trip to the REI and the bike store, we arrived in Moab in time for dinner.  Team Racing with Giants was finally all together.  We made our headquarters MOAB brewery for the night. 

Last minute planning and training – We spent Thursday and Friday morning doing some last minute training and packing.  We wanted to fine tune our ascending technique, so we went to spot we knew from a previous training session.  John used his ropes skills to set up a ropes course for us.  We were looking good and feeling confident.  After lunch, we unpacking and repacking all our gear.  This seems to be a re-occurring event for many racers.  I think it’s the fear of forgetting something.  The race allowed each team only four gear boxes.  One for food, one for mountaineering equipment, one gear box and one personal box which will be locked up.  We packed our mandatory gear and read through the list for the 50th time.  We were ready to race.

Red Cliffs Lodge was the staging place and HQ for Primal Quest 2006.  Red Cliffs is an upscale horse lodge approx 15 miles outside of Moab.  As we drove in, we knew we were in the right place.  Primal Quest banners were waiving down the entrance to the hotel.  Most of the racers had arrived the day before, however our check in was on Saturday, the last day before the race began.  The cottage they put us up in was located right next to the Colorado river.  It had two rooms, which we quickly spread out into.  As we started to spread our gear out, there was a knock, it was team Radioactive Beagles.  The race organizers had failed to indicate to us that we were sharing a room with another team.  This will be tight.  Even though the check in for us started on the next day, we heard they were allowing teams to check in early.  John had to pick up his wife Gina from the airport, so we thought we were done for the day.  However, we were able to high tail it to a couple of stations to see if we could check in to a couple of stations.  We had heard it took some teams 12 hours to get checked out and we wanted to accomplish as much as possible on the first day.  We ran into our friends from Team Sole at the kayaking station, who confirmed, check-in was taking a long time, so we were happy to be able to knock down several stations before we called it a night.  It was a long night and no one slept well.   In the morning, we got through the remaining check in fairly quickly and were done by noon.  Not bad.  Keith’s dad, Bob, had volunteered for PQ.  Not really knowing too much about adventure racing, he was in for an experience.  It was great to see him at check in, a smiling face and several cute girls around him.  Race chicks always love the old guy.

Too much food - It was time to finalize the food box.  We had to pack ten days of food for four people.  We all decided to pack food in 12 hour bags of around 3000 calories each.  It seemed like a logical idea.  After seeing all of the food, Shari joked that Joy Marr, an Odyssey AR Academy teacher, experienced racer and expert support person, could see all this food, she would make us throw out at least half of it.  The race organizers said we needed to start the race with enough food for 72 hours in our packs.  That was six large ziplock bags of food.  Shari continued trying to convince us to downsize our food, but we wanted to start out with more than less.  (Rookie error #1)  We now had insanely heavy packs with all this food and 200 ounces of water.  It was getting closer and closer to race time.  The pre-race dinner was at 6 p.m..  Pre-race briefing was at 7:30 p.m. and midnight was the time to report to the front of the lodge to be transported to the starting location.  So much for that second night of lodging.

Pre-race briefing – 91 teams gathered into a central tent to learn what was about to come.  You could feel the excitement and electricity of over 370 like minded individuals from all over the world run through your veins.  Race management flashed pictures of what was about to come and ran a small video that made everyone cheer.  (See the video here)  The video introduced us to the scale of the course . . . epic in every way.  It spoke of the pain we were going to endure … everyone cheered again; racers are a crazy bunch.  It talked of the heat…that would cause nausea, vomiting and Don Mann even mentioned we might see “bile”.  The place went wild on the word bile.  In the land of the insane, when you look around, everyone seems as normal as you.  We received our maps . . . and headed back to the room to plot our course.  The maps confirmed that our scouting trip was close to hitting the mark (click here to see the course we had predicted).

Sunday Midnight – 91 team, 350+ people, each with a 20+ lb pack, pile into the rows of yellow school buses that were waiting for us at the entrance to the lodge.  We were told it would be a four hour bus ride with one break (where over 300 people would have a five minutes pit stop to do their business and get back on the bus).  I guess sleep was out of the question.  I sat with Shari and Brian sat with John.  We were off to a place outside of Price, Utah.  We arrived around 4 a.m.  The organizers boarded the bus and instructed two people to get the horse and two people to get our GPS.  You could tell the horses were not having a good time.  You could hear them all around stomping and making all sorts of noises that did not sound like they were happy.  Shari and John went to get our horse.  There was one horse in the pen that was kicking, running, around like a maniac, totally freaked out.  One by one the well behaved horses went to other teams.  Finally, it was down to two teams and two horses.  A fine Bay and the crazy bucking horse. We thought, oh please not that one. . . .  He grabbed that horse and we met our new, crazy teammate.  We called him ”Bucky” which seemed appropriate; (we later learned his name was Dick…also appropriate).  “Gook luck,” the handler said with a smile.  Bucky was an uneasy horse that probably needed some prosaic.  He was skittish with everyone that walked by.  We had agreed that Shari would start on the horse, and Brian, our own horse whisperer, to the horse’s lead.  Between the two, we got Bucky to the flats where we would start our race. 

Sunday 6:36 -- The start of Primal Quest

Our first section was a 22 mile desert trek with Bucky.  They started us in a large flat area and lined up all the horses.  A gun shot signaled the race’s start and the ESPN helicopter did a low level buzz over the field.  That combination caused many horse to throw their riders and even try to make a break for it back to their pens.  Lucky for us, we had some cowboys to help the city slickers reclaim their horses.  So off we were to Humbug Flats.  Our strategy was to start slow and let the field spread out so Bucky would stay calm.  We had the option of either having one rider on the horse, or loading all four pack (but no rider) – we decided that we would walk and let Bucky take our packs.  Our horse liked that strategy because there was nothing fast about Bucky at all.  From the start of the race and across all 22 miles, we had to take turns towing Bucky almost the whole way. 

The one thing that Bucky hated more than the desert was the red umbrella we carried.  Every time the umbrella came near him, he became uneasy and sped up a bit to get far away from it.  Then it hit us; the person carrying the umbrella would walk behind Bucky, to keep his pace up.  When he would slow down, we would open and close the umbrella behind him which picked up his pace for a minute.  Brian, our horse whisper, had a good rapport with Bucky, while I whispered sweet nothings about the glue factory.  Overall, it was amazing these horses did as well as they did.  22 miles with four packs strapped to them with only two water breaks. 

Sunday 6:37PM  Transition to Trekking without the horse - Humbug Flats 24 Mile desert trek

This was a bitter/sweet transition.  Loosing Bucky made our travel remarkably faster, however, we now had to carry our insanely heavy packs.  This included 200 oz of water (100 oz  = 7 lbs), five bags of food (which was way too much) some mandatory gear and I had the luxury of carrying the GPS (another 6-8 lbs).  When you do not have special skills, then you become the pack mule by default. 

We were now 12 hours into this race.  By this time, we had come to some stark conclusions. 

1. It may have been a dry heat, but it was damn hot.  Think of how hot your car gets when in the mall parking lot.  Now hike, bike and kayak in that heat with only the shade of a few trees to cool you down.  It was like that until sundown.

2. Sand – That is it….our beach trip is cancelled.  Sand was everywhere and got everywhere.  We wore gaiters on top of our shoes to keep the sand and rocks from entering our shoes from the top.  What we did not realize was the sand was so fine that it would come though the mesh on the shoes and fill up both your shoes and your socks.  Luckily for me, I wore my Injinji toed socks, which ensured I had an even distribution of sand on every toe.  I did not one to get ignored.  Blisters would play havoc on many racers.  So bad, that one person literally wore the sole right off his foot.  (The photo is of my feet, which did remarkably well.)

3. Water – We were going through a lot of water nearly 400 ounces a day.  This does not include the bottles and bottles of orange Gatorade we drank at transition areas.  And luckily, since we were closer to the back of the pack, we did not need to worry about getting hot water for our dehydrated food, because the water we had to drink was already 90 degrees.  The race organizers did not realize how hot the water would get so fast and how fast the ice would melt.

 

The race director said this would be a race of attrition…the heat, the sand and the magnitude of the race would take no prisoners.

I was the first to get blisters.  They started four hours into the race.  I was worried I would get blisters in the race, however, I did not think it would happen so soon.  I was in for a long, painful race.  I doctored my feet every chance I had, covering them with Leuko tape…a surgical tape that sticks to skin for days.  This was a suggestion from my Rochester racing buddy Jim.  This became a life saver for the team.  I could tell the team was getting concerned with me, since every chance we sat, I wanted to tend to me feet.  (This strategy, while slower in the beginning, actually saved my feet and my race).

The night hike was relatively uneventful, we hiked for hours in a wash, which is for you East Coast racers, a dry river bed comprised of rock and …to our astonishment sand.  (A theme that would hold true for most of the race).   My foot pain at this point is getting better…thanks to 800 mg of Ibuprofen, which I will take three times a day for the rest of the race.  This seemed to put my body pain in a stasis.  You could tell that Brian’s foot pain was starting to kick up.  This is also where sleep deprivation started to kick in.  This is now Sunday night.  Before the race had started, we had slept about two hours on Friday night and about two hours on Saturday night, so we have been up around 60+ hours on four hours of sleep. 

 

 

 

 

 

We came up to our first major navigational decision of the race.  We came up to a valley that had many racers, close to ten teams, who were sleeping or surprisingly unable to find the checkpoint.  They were comparing maps and watching teams walk around aimlessly.  Brian, our navigator, chuckled as he called us over for a huddle.  He knew exactly where we were.  He asked us to turn our headlamps off and walk across the valley to ridgeline.  We all worked our way across the valley, up a ridge and down a path to the next checkpoint.  We had just jumped some nationally recognized teams, and had jumped from 78th six hours earlier to 61st in the ranking.  For our sleepy team, this energized us and we were off to the next checkpoint.

On our way to the next check point, we had run across some racers that were coming back saying they could not find the path and were getting cliffed out.  (Cliffed out means if you try to move forward past a certain point, you fall off a cliff).  Brian kept the team steady and focused and we decided to pace count to make sure we made all the right moves.  Talking and counting your paces is not an easy thing to do.  Shari took the task on and off we were.  The team was gelling, finding all the right switches and moving in the right direction.  We came across several teams again consulting each other on the next directional move.  We saw NEMO and Adventure Pocono.  This is where I got to meet Pete from Adventure Pocono.  He is a native Sag Harbor resident, just like Shari.  He is in his mid-40’s with not a once of body fat.  He is chatty and going strong.  You can tell, Shari and Pete are buddies…Shari cheers us on and says, if we are keeping up with this team, we are doing really well.  So far the navigation has been flawless.

We were all following each other down this bolder field and on down some endless trails.  The trails of littered with groups of racers sleeping.  The sleep monsters are reaching out to everyone now.  We see this mysterious light in the far distance that we keep talking about.  Brian is convinced it is the all seeing eye of Don Mann – the race director, watching us from middle earth, scheming to put all sorts of terrible things in our path, just to help make it a more painful experience.  Our 10 hour hike draws to an end with the site of Ryder trucks, many bike boxes and a trip to the medical tent for Brian and me.  The dogs are barking.

Monday 4:42am arrive at Summerville Flats – Biking 55 mile bike – Hell bike through Green river

Both Brian and I tend to our feet, as John and Shari start building our bikes.  We see the same medical guys in the tent, so we start to chat with them as they help drain blisters and retape our feet. Usually, Brian does not get blisters, but his feet are starting to look worse than mine.  Brian just laughs it off in his usual cheery disposition.  Surprisingly, I still have the adrenaline going through my body, so I don’t sleep.  We fill our water bladders, drag the bike boxes to the truck, which will take them to our next destination.  Shari is super quick during transitions, unlike us rookies, so she has time to knock off and get a quick catnap. 

 

6:52.  We are off for a short 55 mile bike leg.  We are glad to be off our feet and on bikes.  The good thoughts last about an hour…During this leg, we realized one thing, there is not one thing that will be easy about this race.  The next section has roller coaster up and down climbs, but Nostros Donmannus, aka Don Mann, decided to sprinkle large areas of sand throughout this course.  As we cruise down some slopes, we would nearly wipe out in the sandy pits, which were quite frequent during this section.  (For those of you who haven’t tried to mountain bike in sand while carrying 25 lbs of gear, bikes do not work well in those conditions.  You nearly wipe out, work four times harder to peddle through it or have to push your bike.) By mid-day, it is now hot and I am starting to drag like a dog’s butt.  We are going through a relatively large, flat, sandy area, with a large climb 1000 ft up a redrock ridge.  I am in need of help.  Not having slept yet, I am in a very bad space.  I am dehydrated, extremely tired and overheating.  Shari’s and John’s experience here helps me out through this section.  Shari gets me under some shade and John helps push my bike for some sections.  We make it up the ridge and have to go through a gate.

The gate has a siren to greet us….a doll with a chopped off-head that has no hair and is burned on the side of her face.  She looks as good as I feel.   Brian cheers me on saying the next section is down hill to the next water station. 

As we rode up to the water station, you had to laugh.  You could see a blue tarp duct taped to two rocks, which was the only shade in sight.  My dad was manning this station and I saw him get out of the car.  Air conditioned I am sure.  I sat in the shade and rehydrated.  The volunteer with my dad offered our team a cold candy bar.  They had treats for most of the racers.  I could tell he was worried about me, I was looking pretty rough.  After about 30 minutes, we were back on our bikes and started our death ride across the desert to Green River.  Think of riding a bike through desert roads, with no shade for hours.  What kept us going was the thought of Green River, the local town with real food and cold drinks.  I was hitting the sleep monsters again, but Shari helped me with a No Dose, which picked me back up.  Shari told me later, that once I woke up, I talked her ear off.  I think she said, “That boy can talk a leg off a horse.”  Shari is a strong racer that you never hear complaints from.   You could tell during this ride, the heat was kicking her ass.  We were all happy to see the town of Green River. 

Green River was an oasis in the middle of no where.   It was 100+ during the heat of the day when we hit Green River.  We rode to a grocery store much to the chagrin of the owner.  Not only did these dirty, smelly people come into his store, they walked the isles opening cokes and eating ice cream, as they filled the basket with other food.  In a grunting like gesture, we indicated we would pay for all this on the way out.  We decided that all the food we carried was not enough, so we bought more “real” food.  This is where I learned canned soup, stew and fruit cups were good race food.  Heavy to carry, but it beat the health bars and gel.  Next, we rode next store to a Dairy Queen like place.  We ordered about $30 worth of food including milk shakes for everyone.  The next thing I remember is waking up surrounded by cold food.  As I was in the men’s room, I overheard the staff in back asking if they could kick us out because we smelled.  We got the hint, it was time to move on to the next stop, Swassey Boat ramp.  We were in no hurry because the “dark zone” was at 6 p.m.  We did not think we would make the dark zone because we thought we had to run 8 miles from the next transition area up to the river put in for the swim. 

Monday 5:00pm Swassey’s Boat Ramp 3 hour River Swim

This was famed to be one of the highlights of the race.  This would be an 8 mile river swim through class III rapids.  The race organizers warned us that we needed swim protection including shin and elbow guards as well as a wet suit.  In addition, we would have to swim with our backpack, as well as mandatory gear.  Luckily, we have done this before, so we knew what to expect…a nice float down the river.  Other teams overcompensated with expensive riverboards and equipment.  For us, it was a $50 boogie board and string for swim fin tethers.  

Back to the story, when we rode up to the TA at 5 p.m., it was pandemonium.  To our delight, the race organizers were actually ferrying people up to the swim section by car, however, there was at least a 30 minute back up and we had to be in the water by 6 p.m.  We hurried to get into the queue and left around 5:35.  Our adrenaline was pumping.  The ride would be 15 minutes barring no major issues.  We chanced it and quickly got all our gear.  We were in the back of a Suburban.  If you were a bystander looking into our car, all you would see hands and legs everywhere as we tried to get into our wet suits and other swim gear.  We arrived at the water section with 5 minutes to spare and we were the last team in the water at 5:55.

Nefertitti rock 5:57-9:45 Float

The water was around 70 degrees Fahrenheit and felt fantastic.  During this section, John’s tendon was killing him from a pre-PQ injury, making the three hours of kicking painful.  At times, I grabbed his tether and towed him as I swam backwards…this is my kind of towing.  As the sun came down over the mountain range, the ESPN helicopter followed us for about 15 minutes.  This was our 15 minutes of fame.  We did our water acrobatics for the camera, then back to business.  Well, back to floating….. Shari and John got inflatable riverboards from NRS.  Great in concept……Shari’s had a slow leak in it and was feeling deflated the whole trip.

Monday 8:55 pm Swassey’s Boat Ramp

Coming off the swim, we were refreshed and in great spirits.  Our feet hurt a bit, we were physically wiped and ready for a sleep.  Our goal was to get our gear together ready for our paddle and hike into the canyons.  We knew this was going to be the most brutal part of the trip.  As always, Shari, our most efficient transition queen, got her gear together, helped her boys out and still beat us to sleep.  Amazing…..We all cuddled up on a blue plastic tarp on the sand.  The goal was to sleep to 4:30 and be on the water by 5. 

Volunteers kick ass – Through out the race, the volunteers were outstanding.  Their smiling faces and help were second to none.  It was also pretty awesome that we knew many of the volunteers including my dad, Susanna, Lori Faulk, Jerry Simpson, Chris Rumohr, Chris Caul, Don…the list goes on.  To give up their personal time to help us was amazing.  We did have a special group of volunteers aka cheer leaders that were particularly awesome, Cynthia and Carl from Team Cyclopath.  They were good friends of John and Cynthia was our alternate for Primal Quest.  You would think that from the time we first met to when we left, we had been great friend for years.  They were there to cheer us on at many check points.  Their encouragement and hugs helped keep us going.  There is no other way other to say how awesome they were! 

Tuesday Leave at 5:30 am First leg of the paddle - (35 mile paddle)

We push off the beach at dawn in our bright orange Necky Amaruk Kayak.  This is a two person, hard shell kayak the has the size of a Edsel and the weight of an SUV  Our first goal was to paddle  to a portage 3 miles down the river, where we have to portage our kayaks for about 1.5 miles.  We thought we needed to carry the boats, so Brain and Shari decide to haul their gear first, then come back for the boat.  John and I, a little more stubborn, decided to try to slower tactic of carrying everything together.  This made the boats around 100 to 150 pounds with no real good way to carry the boat.  Half way into our sweatfest, we saw other teams dragging their boats.  This is where we learn this tactic is approved.  Our whole strategy changed.  Our organization in this event was all over the place, so each of us did what we thought needed to be done to get from A to B.  My job ended up dragging an entire boat by myself for a distance.  I tied a rope to the front and made a loop I could step into.  I then did my best pack mule imitation and started dragging the boat.  I did run into one problem.  I had lost so much weight, my pants kept falling down.  I was a home boy racer with low rider pants.  Shari would just take a look at me and start laughing.  She said I needed to fix that.  I was scaring the other racers.  I put my water bottle between my pants and my body to take up the 2 inches I had lost.  Waaaa…laaa.  Quick fix.  The only problem was when I need to drink from my bottle. 

Tuesday Afternoon – Our Big Decision - Short Course– Ruby Ranch (44 Mile Paddle)

This was the half way point on the kayak.  A big conversation piece on the paddle was whether or not to skip Canyon #3.  At the pre-race briefing, the course director announced that there would be two official courses.  The full “expedition course”, and a reduced “adventure course” that gave the teams the option to eliminate two section, which, combined were expected to shave 24 hours from a slow team’s race.  Shari, having raced expedition-level races before, was leaning on her boys to consider the short course.  She knew our feet were bad and getting worse.  She also wanted to see us get to the end of the race and see the finish line.  She did not believe that at the pace we were going that we would be able to finish the entire course.  By going on the short course, we would skip a canyon that was wreaking havoc on other teams and by short coursing this early in the race,  we would be in the lead for short coursers.  This was a strategic decision that we all agreed was the right move, but also would come to bite us in the end. 

After a quick lunch at Ruby Ranch, we launched back into the water for a ten hour paddle.  During the first paddle, the river’s current was around three miles per hour, so with our not so expert paddling, we were doing pretty good.  The second half of the paddle was more of a flat water paddle, so it was slower with more effort.  John demonstrated an expert skill I have only seen in a rare few people….paddling while sleeping.  His head would dip, but his arms kept paddling. 

Shari and I passed the time by practicing for our next American Idol audition.  The tunes were numerous, but often not complete.  The one we did know… we sang loud and proud…Paradise by the Dashboard Lights.  We also ran into tribes of local inhabitants, mosquito’s so thick you could not break without ingesting a few.  Lucky for us rookies, we packed bug spray!!!

Speaking of lights, it got dark for the last leg of the paddle, which made it interesting.  Intelligence would tell us to take out our lights; however stubbornness said we could do it with only one.  Luckily, we ran into a team Nomad during this leg, who had several lights.  We strategically followed them tightly into the TA, 

 

Tuesday night in 11:35 44 mile paddle 

When we got into this TA, we realized the decision of taking the short course, now put us with all the elite teams.  Merrill had just come in from Hells Roaring canyon.  Port Nelson was there.   Robin Benicasa of Merrill, one of the best female AR racers in the world, was right next to me.  I lent Robin my bug spray.  I looked to John and told him, Robin and I had a thing.  I could see it in her eyes, if she did not have to run, we could have had a thing.  I would be forever immortalized as the geek who brought a full bottle of bug spray to Primal and carried it.    J  We were racing neck and neck with Merrill…yeah right…she was only 1 day ahead of us and it was only the 3rd day.  We now had the luxury of things like ice cold Gatorade and this miracle Gatorade shake.  Lack of sleep had really put us in a fog.  I was moving slow and my feet needed tending.  While the team was getting some rest, I got my feet tended to.  I learned that no longer would the medical staff helping racers with their feet, they were now teaching us how to take care of our own feet.  That was nice and dandy, but I was damn tired, cranky and wanted someone to take care of my feet.  I was on my own.  Lucky for me, I had my own stash of stuff.

A woman sat down beside me - quiet, stern, she looked grumpy too.  The only words that came out of her mouth was “I need some tape.”  So, I gave this stranger a piece of tape.  I cut myself another piece.  She said, “I need another piece of tape.”  This went on for 5 minutes.  I was getting a little pissed now.  So I informed this stranger that I was not the medical staff.  She said …”yeah, I know.  Give me another piece.”  I thought I was talking to Rebecca Rusch and I could not believe how rude she was.  After some small chat that made no sense, I looked over to see Shari sitting next to me.  It was her all along….. I started to laugh.  This was the start of my hallucinations.  By the time I was done with my feet, it was time for the team to go.  Oh well for the sleep.  I was now 96 hours into this race with only 7 hours of sleep. 

 

Wednesday – Hell’s roaring canyon Mineral bottom – leave at 3:14 33 miles

They say to travel light and travel at night.  Well, at least we started to travel at night.  As always, each section is epic and extreme.  This was no different.  We were starting to travel slower because of everyone’s feet.  There was a couple of interesting mistakes on this section.  We accidentally took a wrong trail and end up to high on a mountain.  After climbing 500 feet, one does not usually want to travel down only to have to travel back up.  We decide to try to find a short cut, which was a boulder and scree (loose rock) field.  This is extremely dangerous so we travel slowly.  If only they were watching our GPS, they would be freaking out, considering a racer got killed last year doing roughly the same thing.  We hear helicopters in the distance.  Maybe they were after us?  Little did we know, they were saving people from the section that was ahead of us.  When everyone was down safely, we found the right ascending site, which is 300 ft straight up.  Uggg.  Everyone goes up easily, however I am messing with my gear and make a huge mistake, I change my gear set up based on a suggestion from the climb guide.  His adjustment makes my 300 ft climb agony.  It takes me twice as long as my team and I go through almost 60 oz of water.  For the first time in the race, I am scared to death.  Can I make it up?  I am exhausted.  I do six reaches and rest.  six reaches and rest. six reaches and rest.    I got religion on the ropes and prayed it would be over soon.  I get to the top and have to take a 15 minute break to recover.  It is hot and we have to go.  It is getting to the heat of the day and we want this section to be over.  Little did we know, this was the hottest day of the race and we were heading into hell. 

The hallucinations begin – As we traversed the top of the mesa, I felt like I was in a giant crock pot, slowly cooking.  Early afternoon, John, myself and Shari ran out of water.  We estimated we had about 2-3 hours of trekking left.  I felt like I was walking in hell and by golly, it was sandy too.  I asked John if he saw the camper at the end of the path.  There was a man sitting by a tent and a fire cooking hot dogs.  I started to get excited because I knew he had water.  I asked John if he saw this man.  He looked at me puzzled, too tired to answer.  I knew in the back of my head, it was not real, but I sure wanted it to be real.  Every step it became clearer and clearer.  It was brush.  Damn, no water.  My spirits were getting lower and lower, but we had to go on.  I also looked to my left.  There was a carcass of a dead steer.  I asked Brian if he saw that?  He answered with his southern draw…..yep.  That steer was looking like I felt.  We had to take more and more breaks in the shade.  Team Mighty dogs came by looking strong.  We asked them if they had water.  They were low too, but in an amazing display of generosity, shared their water with us; sharing water in the deserts demonstrates some real character. 

The Mirage that saved our race - Other than being exhausted, I was starting to go into the first stages of heat exhaustion.  We would travel for 15 minutes and I could feel myself not being able to regulate my core temperature.  John was looking (and later confirmed he was feeling) just as bad.  Maybe I was being a big wimp, but I was really concerned.  I had not felt this bad ever.  After several stops in the shade, we came to the disturbing realization that we could not find the trailhead that would take us to the next CP.  We had no water, and John and I were in very bad shape.  Shari and Brian decided they were going to go to the road for help..aka water… and leave John and I under a tree.  We talked about whether or not to split up, however after Shari and Brian looked at us, they knew we needed help now.  As they were walking off, I called out to them….”Can you bring back something with sugar in it?”  Here I am wiped out from heat exhaustion and I want something with sugar in it.  I would be the butt of many jokes for days to come.  Remember guys, I was delirious.  

I was sitting under a tree concerned that my race was going to end.  All the training…all the sacrifice…I was concerned that I would be too stubborn to quit and put myself at real risk.  Would I know when to pull the plug?  Probably not.  I figured they had to travel many miles to the closest road, so they would not be back for a couple of hours.  15 minutes went by, which did not seem like a long time.  I could hear Brian.  The desert was playing tricks on me.  I heard him again.  I stood up to see him walking my way with water in hand and a big ass smile.  He handed me a water, smiled and said, “it’s race time.”  We were back in business. 

In the middle of the desert, not even a quarter mile from where we last rested was a camp ground with two campers: Brian and Edna.  They happened to also have three coolers full of generic soda, water and a meat we think was a hot dogs.  I must have gone through four sodas and two waters in 15 minutes.  I felt a different kind of sick….it was a good… I need to digest all this fluid sick.  They were the sweetest people who shared their hose with us and also a frozen Popsicle.  That hit the spot and we were ready to go.    I think we spent $40 with them, and we were their new best friends.  As we left, Brain was doing the hamster happy dance with his wind fall.  I think they were going to celebrate that night at the Golden Corral.  (That is an all you can eat place)

I was feeling stronger by the step, but I don’t think we realized how bad John was feeling.  We tried to lighten the mood by kidding him that they way he was walking looked like a new dance move.  All the kids would be doing the HR (Hells Roaring) shuffle.  His feet were getting more trashed by the step and his dehydration was still pretty bad.  In hindsight, we should have rested more at next water station and focused on hydration, but we wanted to get this stage done and get some sleep.  We also were passed by a Japanese team East Wind.  They were jogging the flats and towing each other.  The woman looked at us in agony.  In very broken English, she said, “Hoooooooooot….very hoooooooooooot”.  The oriental express was soon gone in the horizon.  I am very impressed with their determination.  After an incredible 400 ft rappel, we found an off the path spot, dropped our bags and took in a well needed four hours of sleep. 

We got up at 11 p.m., finally implementing our plan to travel at night.  To navigate through canyons during the day successfully is amazing, to stay on track at night and keep us from doing extra mile is outstanding.  The combination of Brian, our navigator and Shari, our scout, was a winning combination.  Our navigation was as close flawless for a rookie team as it gets.  

We were quiet for most of the night, however fits of laughter did come out as we discussed Adam Sandler’s Hanukkah song.  We did learn that OJ Simpson was not a Jew, but Gene Simmons lit the menorah. 

Thursday 9:18 a.m. back in to Mineral Bottom –

The next leg was a two mile hike up 2000 ft to Horse Thief Point.  We decided to spend the day on the beach getting sleep and waiting for night time to travel.  We had once again ran out of water during our trek and we were all dehydrated, especially John.  He needed fluids in a big way…..we could not leave until we got all our body fluids back on track.  Almost 10 bottles of Gatorade helped get him back on track.  This allowed a lot of time for John to hydrate and the team to sleep. 

Once again, we ran into Pete and the rest of Adventure Poconos.  It was good to see familiar faces.  My Dad showed us a beautiful shaded area by the water to rest and relax.  It also allowed us ample time to review the maps and for me to catch up with my dad.  You could tell he was having a great time.  We also saw the helicopter leaving to rescue people from the hell we just came from.  It was so bad that one racer experienced heat stroke (which, if not immediately treated, has a high mortality rate); his wife was airlifted from our transition area to join her husband at the hospital.  5 pm rolled around and the temperature was again very bearable.  We decided to get on the road to get to our bikes. 

 

Thursday Horse thief point – 6:48-8:20 out

We had to climb a winding road carrying all our gear, including paddles up a winding switch back.  We were happy to see some
familiar faces on the hike up;  Carl and Cynthia, our volunteer friend were driving to the T/A, and John’s wife Gina was traveling with them, giving John’s spirits a boost.  At the top of the road, I got to see another familiar face, Donna Mummert of Sutliff Hummer.  I had met her and the team when I did my climbing certification.  She was helping with the logistics crew.  Another wonderful face to see.  I have to say this part of the race, we looked like we were getting stronger.  We were on our bikes, which was our strongest discipline, when we could ride.  We knew this trail going to Gemini bridges because we had rode it the opposite way the other during a training session and the night was beautiful. 

We had lots of company during this ride as well.  Photographers from Odyssey shot photos of us riding at dusk.  We did everything we could to look like the part of a professional team.  We rode in line, we had stern looks on our faces, we laughed at how ridiculous this was; we were enjoying the moment.  [Our next visitor was one of our favorites.  A person in a jeep asked if we wanted to supper.  A hot dog and a coke for $4.  DONE!!!!!!  We enjoyed 2 jumbo hotdogs and great conversation with our new found friend.  He couldn’t understand why the Gatorade was not selling.  Little did he know how much Gatorade we had drank.  We felt bad, because as we left, his jeep would not start.  Hopefully, he would find a jump.  We were off to one of the most spectacular rappels of the course….Gemini Bridges

Gemini Bridges 11:46           

Gemini Bridges is a natural rock formation bridge that allowed 2 people to rappel down one side and two people to rappel down the other side.  Shari and I teamed up and Bryan and John were on the other ropes.                    

The interesting thing about this section was we were going to rappel down two different sections and over 400 feet.  During the day, this must have been spectacular, at night, it was eerie.  Other than falling all over my buddy Shari, it went off without a hitch.  We also had a pleasant surprise.  The beautiful and cheery Suzanna from Odyssey was holding the ropes to greet us.  With a hug and a kiss, we were off.  There was one hitch, how was our bikes going to get down?  They did have a master plan ….a bike rappel.  By the time we got down to the bottom, our bikes were waiting for us.  I did not want to know how it had been done, just that all my parts were there. 

Friday - Gold Bar Trail – A life time of emotions –

On this section, we realized how good our navigation really was.  The Gold Bar and Poison Spider was some of the best slick rock trails in the world.  For those of you who do not know what slick rock is, it is not actually slick, it is a course rock that allows average riders to climb very steep inclines.  The first challenge we had was to get from the bottom of Gemini Bridges to the Gold Bar Trail.  This was complicated for the average team that did not have special bike maps.  But we were not the average team.  We had almost every map you could find of the area.  As we winded through this area, we ran across some New Zealand team hopeless lost.  We helped them a bit, but part of our sick pleasure was watching some of the best teams in the world struggle with navigation.  After our brief conversation, we peddled as hard as we could and soon, they were well behind us. 

As we found the Gold Bar trail, it was littered with teams, lost, sleeping, scratching their heads.  This was a complicated section to get through at night because the trail was blazed with spray painted markers that were close to impossible to see at night.  It was very easy to get off course and lost.  There were a lot of teams that had problems finding CP 26.  We slowly crept up the trail paying close attention when we did not see the markers.  We would back track and fan out to find the next one.  Slowly, we were passing teams one by one. 

 
Never leave a willing racer behind - This section was a very technical riding section, so we were on and off our bikes constantly.  Brian and Shari were up front and Keith and John were in back.  You could tell that John’s feet were at a new level of agony.  He had taken some medication to help, however it did not do a lot to kill the pain.  This was our pivotal team point.  John was trying to stay on his bike as much as possible, however pulling his left foot out of the clip became almost impossible with the placement of one blister.  This was causing him to crash more than normal.  The team was getting extremely concern about his safety.  This was a Catch-22, his feet hurt so bad that only riding helped alleviate the pressure, but the riding at times was so hard you had to walk. 

This was a time where hard decisions had to be made.  Do you pull a team mate from a race against their will?  Do you confront an issue the whole team is concerned about?   How do you get through something like this and keep going as a ranked team?  We finally discussed it as a team.  Needless to say, there was a lot of emotion during our 3 a.m. heated discussion.  What is boiled down to was John, Keith and Brian’s original pledge to each other.  We did not care if we were first or last.  Our pledge was to get everyone to the finish line…safe and as friends.  We convinced John to change into his walking shoes to ride his bike and we would help him however we could.  I have to give John credit here.  The average racer would hung up his shoes and called it quits.  John was not your average racer, he was stubborn just like us.  This was not just a race for us, this was a life defining moment of being taken to edge of our personal extreme and finding a way to push through it, which we did.  We were back on the bikes with adrenaline running through our veins and rode harder than ever.  Game on.

CP26 – 5::35   The illusive checkpoint 26.  After a long and mostly upward continuous climb, we nailed it.   We looked at the log book and it had been several hours since the last team was through.  The CP guy asked us to take only the water we needed.  He did not have a lot left.  We fell into the trap before.  We filled our bladders.  That was what we needed.  We were off to Poison Spider trail.  This was some of the best riding of the race.  There were many technical parts that just kept going and going.  Everyone was quiet and tired. 

During the morning part of the ride, we had some of the most spectacular views of the race.  We ran across Team Canada and Tracey Robertson.  Her team had lost her for a while as she fell asleep, while they were looking for her. 

As the day crept up on us, all we could think about was the town of Moab was about half a day in front of us and we were.  This day was another scorcher and water was scarce.   Shari was blazing a trail ahead of us with an intensity of a women who wanted to get the hell out of the desert. 

Poison Spider Trail Head 11:16 – When we had gotten to Poison Spider trail head, there seemed to be a convergence of teams.  Everyone was dangerously low on water.  The volunteer indicated that the trail was a short one, only one hour tops.  He only allowed one of us to fill up half a bladder.  Little did we know, it would be well over 100, and all of us ran out of water.  As for the Poison Spider, it must live in the sand, because that was just about all there was.  Sand, Sand and more Sand.  Another brutal section.  This was the only time I saw Shari hurting during the race.  You could tell she was dehydrated and out of water.  I was trying to share what I had, but she just wanted to get to the next CP.  We caravanned with the Too Much Fun Club and several others teams to the bottom. 

Williams Bottom 2:06 –

We all looked like the walking dead at this CP.    I tried to help a fellow female racer who was especially hurting, however like many woman I interact with, it ended in the usual reaction, vomiting and disorientation.  One woman who was happy to see us was Jordan from the BLM.  We got her hooked on watching our team’s progress and rooting for the under dog.  

BLM Story – Well we knew that a race of this magnitude must need some permits and those permits might have race details on them, so off to the BLM we went, where we met Jordan.  We told her what we were doing and if we could see the permits.  It did not hurt to ask.  She thought about it and asked us if that was fair.  Our response was that adventure racing rewards those who do their homework and due diligence.  It was not cheating, but good detective work.  She was about to hook us up, when she decided to consult her supervisor.  He came out and was also on the fence.  [FOI requests have to be in writing and they have 20 days to respond…he could have just said no, but I think we was torn between there normal practice of helping the public and the unusual situations of the race.   He asked us if we would object to him calling the race director, Don Mann.  We said ok, what could they do, say no.  They called us in back and put us on speaker phone.  There was an awkward silence, before Shari said “Don, do you know who this is?”, and Don responded “Very much so!”.  After a moment of silence, Shari spoke up.  “It Shari.” She said in her New York accent.  The tension was broken.  Don and Shari were old friends, and Shari went on to schmooze him by saying that is what he taught back in the days of Odyssey.  They laughed and we agreed to withdraw our request.  It was worth the try and makes for a good story.  Jordan was now our fan.  She liked us for our honesty.  So, she was there to cheer us on.   We also had some other special guests.  Brian’s family had showed up to watch him and cheer him on.  It made me emotional to see how proud of him they were.  I could only imagine the emotions that were running through his mind. 

Back at the race, we had heard there was a river down the road and we all needed cooling off.  We all jumped into the river, however it almost sent our bodies into shock from going from so hot to so cold. 

Only 9 miles to Moab on straight roads.  This was a breeze.  We rounded the last turn into Moab only to be great by our own fan club.  Cheers from the side of the road came from Brian’s family as we rode by.   The team rode on to a designated area, while I stopped at the Holiday Inn Express, where we stayed before the race.  I knew our GPS had broken and wanted to call Katie to say hi and we were ok.  I had $20 in my wallet.  After seeing Brian’s family, the one voice I wanted to hear was Kate’s.  I have never gone more than a couple of days without speaking to her.  The 10 minute call came to $20.11, but it was worth every cent.  That conversation gave me a new found strength to carry on.  I also got to check our status on their web in the lobby. 

At this point, the team found a rest area where we could ditch our bikes, order a pizza, wash up and get a few hours of sleep.  Before we left Moab, we did make a quick stop at the local 7-11 to refill our supplies of Gator Aid, Twinkies and other snacks to get us through the night. 

At the 7-11, there were several groups of young Latinos coming in to get their case of beer for the evening’s parties.  When they saw what we were doing and heard what we have been through, they cheered us on like no one else.  They wanted to come with us or better yet, us to go party with them.  In any event, the unexpected support raised our spirits, and as much as we appreciated the invite, we had a race to finish.  We were off to find Pricherts Canyon.

The trail once again was sandy, rocky and unrideable.   The sign in front of the canyon said “Danger, this road is unrideable for most 4 wheel drive vehicles.  Maybe bikes would be different.  Wrong!  Whoever said Moab has some of the best mountain biking trails obviously did not travel on the trails we did.  At this point, Brian’s feet were killing him.  He had a couple of blisters rubbing against his shoes.  We were trying to move faster, however Brian indicated this was his high gear.  It was time for some more foot work.  We taped up his feet again, however this time we cut some holes in his $100 shoes to alleviate the pressure.  We think this did the trick. 

Once again, we got to a group of racers that had bunched up.  It seems everyone had lost the trail and many had chosen to get some sleep and look for it in the morning.  Shari and Brian went out for 30 minutes and came back.  They had found the trail, but did not want to let other people know.  We turned off our headlamps and headed up once again.  What seemed to be the hardest possible way and in no way looked like a trail, was the way we needed to go and we did.  We were followed by Anne Batista and Team Tango, who we traveled with for most of this section. 

We could see the La Salle Mountains in the distance, our next destination.  It looked so close, but it was a long 17 hour ride with nothing easy about it.  Monkey Butt – many of the people reading this many never have the pleasure of this occurrence and thank your lucky stars.  This is where your butt becomes so raw and red, it hurts to sit, ride or pretty much anything.  It feels as red as one of the zoo monkey’s butt.  Thank God for the experience of Shari, who shared her Desatine, aka Baby ointment.  During the last section of this trail, Keith needed a pit stop.  He found a secluded camp group that looked like a retreat.  While the others lounged under a tree, Keith went in search of a real toilet.  I walked into what looked like a common cabin.  To my right was a group of elderly woman having a team party.  They looked at this filthy bike rider with a little bit of a horror.  I waived at them and pointed to the bathroom.  I smiled and used it.  As I walked out, I smiled at them and did a Japanese thank you with a smile and walked out.   I heard as I left one of ladies asking if they knew me. 

Saturday PAC Creek 2:51

We had another major decision to make here.  We could easily make the cutoff to start the mountain section, however with Brian and John’s feet, it would mean we would most likely not see the finish line.  After little debate, we decided to skip the mountain section like almost all the other teams.  John was still not recovered from dehydration and his feet were now stumps.  He consulted the team to see if it was ok to get an IV.  If he did, that meant a four hour penalty.  We all agreed.  That meant we should break out the tent, get some food in us and get some sleep.  In all the confusion, a couple of us did not remember the four hour penalty and was frustrated we would be held up.  In hindsight, we most likely would not have gotten out any faster.  Several days together is taking the toll on the team.  We are struggling to keep together as a team, but between Brian’s navigation, Shari’s experience and John’s determination we push on.  At times, I feel like the interpreter of team, but my job is to keep the team glued together.  After the race, when I hear the stories from the other teams, ours is nothing in comparison.   

We leave at 9:21 for a 66 Mile bike ride.  Have you ever ridden up a steep hill, where half way you have to get off to walk your bike?  Now imagine that hill being over 10 miles with little to no flat parts.  This leg is a 4,000 foot climb.  It should take around 10 hours, however we do this one in 5.  Amazing.  We are cruising, the night is cool and we are doing well.  John is talking about seeing a candy store.  I like his hallucinations.  We know the last part of this climb goes up a hill that we have to come back down, so we drop much of the gear from our packs we do not need and hide them.  This makes the ride so much easier.  Because we made such good time to the top, we give ourselves a gift and rest by the area we dropped our gear on the way back.  For once, I was actually chilly. 

Sun Rise Breakfast.  – This next section was another gift.  A downhill section for descending over 5000 feet over 41 miles.  We pull off on a great overlook to get a picture of Priest and Nuns, the next section we are going to.  There we meet this great couple who was having a sunrise breakfast before their biking trip.  They offered us bagels and juice, which we obliged them.  The morning could not get any better.  Biking downhill was an awesome experience.  We then rode a trail called the Kompelli Trail, which took us through Cowhead Hill and Onion Creek.  This section was like riding a roller coaster of rolling hills.  At the bottom of several hills was a refreshing stream we had to ride through.  The canyons were absolutely magnificent.  There were tall spires and beautiful canyons on all sides.  This by far was the most enjoyable part of the journey. 

Onion Creek – 6:23 – 15 hard Miles of Trekking - As we broke down out bikes, we received another piece of  bad news, teams on the short course were not going to be allowed to do the Priest and Nun Ascend and Traverse, a highlight of the course.  I was very bummed, but I also knew that the team was better off not doing it.  Once again, we got a dose of familiar faces from Brian’s family before we left. 

After many days of asking questions like how many miles for this section or what “handrails should I be looking out for, Brian decided to put me in charge of navigation for a little bit.  He knows I am the anti-navigator on the team and get lost finding the bathroom at a restaurant.  Staying true to form, I seemed to miss our first turn off in no more than 10 minutes.  That was the extent of my navigating for Racing with Giants.  Castle Rock was our next destination.  These were beautifully carved pillars we would have to climb and traverse.  We also had to climb the Priests and Nuns section, which was one of the most dangerous of the course.  The trail started off straight and flat, but don’t be fooled by this 15 miles.  After feeling fairly strong on the bike, John was surprised to learn walking was extremely painful; John by now is in more agony than I have ever seen someone.  You can tell on this terrain, every step is torture.  To keep up the pace, we worked as a team, shuffling his pack between team members, to get some weight off his feet, and throwing on a tow line, to keep the pace up.  We were able to cover the flat portion of the trek in good time.  We reached the challenging Castle Rock formation in the waning light.  John requested his pack, and although initially refusing (stubborn as always), I relinquished it when I realized the trek ahead would not only be difficult, but dangerous as well.

Once it started going up, it was steep, rocky and full of loose skree.  During one section, we had to climb 50-75 ft down an extremely steep slope with a handing rope.  I was the last to go down.  As I made my way down, a loose boulder clipped my leg an opened up a gash.  I called to the team to look at my bloody leg and possibly triage it.  Shari, being the compassionate nurse she was looked at it, pulled up my sock over the cut and said, “consider it triaged.  You will live  Let’s get going.”  Ok, she was the medic, I thought. 

The next major climb was up the Priest’s and Nuns range.  We followed a climbers trail, which was almost non existent.  Unbelievably, Shari kept us on track the whole way up.  Her determination, kept us all following with confidence.  There were a few times we lost the trail, however we would pick it up pretty quickly.  Walking this trail was the most dangerous part of the face.  It was a John Howard special.  One poorly placed foot and you were a goner.  We traveled this section at midnight with little sleep which accentuated everything.   We traveled this one ridge line, where we laughed because the penalty for failure was Death!

I sure the views from this areas was absolutely outstanding, but at night, we just wanted to keep going.  In the early morning, we finally hit our last section down.  Only 3 hours to the boats and we will be done!!!!

On our last trek down, every time Shari looks at me, she laughs.  I guess that is better than the vomiting response I got earlier.  She tells me I look like a Hobo racer.  Dirty, non matching apparel.  It just cracked her up.  I got upset, because I did not want her telling everyone I was a hobo, but looking at the pictures, I guess I did look like a one. 

We walked the last three miles at a comfortable pace, we talked about all the things we were going to do when we got back.  We talked about what we were going to eat.  We talked about how nice it was to finally get out of our last wash.  It was all around a great feeling, until……we looked back.

There was another team running to gain on our position.  It was Dynamic Earth running.  John popped out of his catatonic state and started yelling that no one was going to pass him.  Not after this long hard found battle.  He digs in deep, from a place within and starts running and yells back at us to get moving.  We all start running for the boats.  They are catching up to us.  We jump on the boats and paddle like with every last once of energy.  They almost catch us, but we all pull together and make this a strong finish.  The end was in sight.  All we had to do is get the boats up a muddy embankment and cross the finish line. 

Monday 7:39 7/3/06 – Racing with Giants crosses the finish line.   It has been a lifetime of emotions since we first left the ranch.  If I were to have written this right after the race, all I would have written about it the pain, challenge and our trials and tribulations that made our race so difficult.  After a couple of months, the pain and emotions have faded and the lifetime of memories are of friends, the shear magnitude of this race and what we accomplished as a team.  There are many things I will remember about my team mates and our adventures.

As for my team mates, I will remember:

 Brian -  I will remember how funny he was, cutting his new shoes and his dead on navigation.  He kept us from doing extra miles, which we all appreciated.  I will remember him and Shari finding hillbilly Brian and Edna’s desert snack stand.  I will remember smelling wag every time I was behind him in Hells Canyon. 

Shari – I will remember her bubbly personality off the race course and hardened edge on the course.  She kept us going at the right pace and helped us boys make decisions that we might not have made which got us to the finish line.  She climbed things I thought twice about She was solid and strong.  She still has some work for her American Idol audition.

John – I will remember his determination the most.  He dug in the deepest of us all.  He tapped into something that was primal to keep him going.  Some of the best racers out there would have quit, but for John and many of us, this race would take us to our outer limits of what we believed we could endure.  Some would push through this point, other would quit.  John never quit.   I will remember him helping push my bike up that hill on day two or was it day three.  I will also remember his “dance”.  I will remember in times of pain, we would look to each other and think whose dumb idea was this?  J

Keith – As for me, I will remember my highs – feeling as good as I did at the end of the race and my lows, being so dehydrated and delirious, I didn’t just want water, I wanted something with sugar in it J.  I feel like I went from a being a boy to man in my racing transformation.  It took a couple of days, but I felt like all the cylinders were firing. 

Some of the other images I will always remember are:

1. Looking at Brian and saying “We are here!”  This is a dream we both talked about from the very beginning at our Adventure Racing academy.
2. The helicopter flying over us after we recovered at Brian and Edna’s desert diner.
3. Family - My dad and Brian’s family there to cheer me us on.
4. Sand – need I say more
5. A jeep hotdog stand in the middle of the night.  Hotdogs and a coke for $4.
6. The final run to the finish.  Where did this energy come from?
7. Singing Adam Sandler and Meatloaf.  Meatloaf……not a Jew.
8. Drinking a beer while kayaking – redneck racing
9. Walking Priest and Nuns ridgeline thinking the penalty for failure is death.
10. The finish line - completing the journey of a lifetime and hugging friends who I have just spent the last nine days with.  We have just completed one of the hardest races in the world.

Our foot note – When looking at the Primal Quest website, it says we came in 56th (the last of the teams to finish the short course).  Did we come in last?  We don’t think so.  We came in 42nd according to time (including penalties for missed check points). 
For teams that took the long course, Primal Quest counted the number of check points, obtained and any penalty time to rank the competitors.  For the teams that missed time cut offs or, like us, decided to do the shorter course, the staff decided to assessed time penalties for each section missed to fairly rank the racers.

• Three Canyon - 21 hours – 7 CPs
• Hells Roaring Canyon – 30 hours – 3 CPs
• Pritchets Canyon – 28 hours – 0 CPs
• Mountaineering – 60 hours – 6 CPs

 

When the official ranking came out, however, the teams were ranked by the number of CPs obtained, then time, an odd ranking methodology.  As you can see above the number of CPs obtained is a poor way to rank the teams because it does not factor into the equation the difficulty of obtaining a CP.  In some places, easier sections had more CPs than harder sections.  For example, a team that skipped the Three Canyon section, but did the mountaineering section would be ranked below a team that did the Three Canyon section but skipped the mountaineering, despite the mountaineering section being almost three times more difficult.  Presumably a team that skipped the entire Pritcher Canyon section (as several teams did), would be ranked ahead of a team that missed a single CP on the course.

Moreover, before the race began, the race organizers provided for an official short course (the “adventure course”), which included the options of skipping the Three Canyons section and the mountaineering section.  At the time teams reached the Three Canyons section and were required to make the initial short course decision, there wasn’t an option to skip Hells Roaring Canyon.  Only mid-race did management eliminate that section to bring teams closer together.  In retrospect, once we elected to skip Three Canyons, and undertake the official short course we were unknowingly relegated to last place, whether we finished in 5 days or 10 days (ultimately, we were the only team to skip Three Canyons that was able to finish the race as a full team).

Wa Wa Wa…..I know we are crying like little babies, when we approached PQ, their response was we should be happy with the accomplishment of finishing.  (Which we are!)  While there has been significant discussions on the various PQ forums complaining of the ranking methodology (which affected numerous teams), we have not been participants in this.  While, we are disappointed that PQ did not choose a more traditional or reasonable method to rank the short course teams, we all are happy to have been allowed the opportunity to experience this outstanding course.

In the end, it does not matter what placed we finished.  This was our journey and we all took something significant from it.  We pushed ourselves in ways we never thought was possible.  We learned from each other, we cursed each other and we laughed with each other.  This was our experience and I was glad to be a part of this team.