November weather in Philly could be just about anything, from 35 degree rain to warm and humid. We were excited when the forecasts predicted dry conditions and comfy temps in the 40s and 50s. After withstanding the obligatory eastern corridor traffic, we arrived at our hotel Friday night around 5:00 PM, checked in, shlepped gear up to our room and then headed to race check-in at the Discovery Center in the eastern part of Philly's main green space, Fairmount Park.
The pre-race activities would begin at the unfortunate hour of 4:00 AM Saturday. so if you were looking to bank some solid sleep before the ensuing 26 hours of racing, you were out of luck. We boarded buses at 5:00 to reach the race start, which was on the Cooper River in Camden, NJ. Rob and I were expecting the buses to leave at 6:30 because we did not bother to read the update which we had received the night before indicating that it was actually 5:00. This infused a lot of chaotic hurrying to our morning. The bus dropped us off at Cooper River park and we were soon inflating our packrafts in the pre-dawn darkness to jump on the river and start the race.
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| Topping off the packraft just before the race start. Photo: Nic Wynia |
We kicked off our race by making an immediate mistake. All of the boats around us began paddling upriver (to an optional CP that we had decided to skip) and no one was heading downriver (our intended direction). I was pretty sure this was wrong but followed the herd upriver like a good little sheep. Although we did get that optional CP, this added a slow 1.5k to our paddle leg. We were in our single-person packrafts which were significantly slower than the majority of the other boats, which made this seeming short (8+ mi) paddle section quite a slog, especially since we were facing the incoming tidal current for almost all of it. The upside of having to work hard to maintain our 2 mph pace was that we were not at all cold.
We found a few CPs along the way, managed two easy portages and eventually reached the end of Cooper River, merging into the mighty Delaware. There was some interesting terrain to see during the paddle and the sight of Philly, across the river illuminated by the morning sun, was pretty cool.
We finally reached the end of the paddle at TA1, located on the eastern (NJ) bank of the Delaware. Here we transitioned to bike mode, but first had to complete a brief "mystery challenge". We found out that this would be a short orienteering course on the docked Battleship New Jersey - very cool. You could not run on the boat, so this was a pleasant way to spend a half-hour after the paddle.
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| Photo: Nic Wynia |
Then, it was back to the TA where we got to meet a sweet stray dog that Race Director Brent had found near the Cooper River (subsequently named "Cooper River" and adopted by a volunteer, from what I heard). We jumped on our bikes, rode briefly through Camden and crossed the river via the Ben Franklin bridge, to begin the urban bike leg in Center City and then South Philly. Rob led us accurately through the downtown CPs in light city traffic. I really enjoyed this section - interesting and easy riding.
After passing the Phillies and Eagles stadiums, we landed at FDR Park - a large green space at the southern edge of the city. Here, we could find up to 20 checkpoints. We set off at a jog to tackle these. We don't always jog flat ground during races, but this was easy non-technical terrain and we were feeling like we needed to play catch-up; we were probably an hour behind the teams which had had faster packrafts. We had one moderate navigation bobble but otherwise did well here, getting all but one of the CPs, I think.
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| Awesome shot at FDR by Nic Wynia |
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| Traversing the urban jungle behind the FDR skate park. |
Having completed this section, it was back on bikes, though the city, then on a bike path and then on singletrack, then crossing the Schuylkill River for another fun surprise orienteering section at...the Zoo!
Again on this section, there was no running and it was a fun and interesting trip all around the zoo to find 16 checkpoints. We saw hippos, giraffes, tigers and several other critters as we made relatively quick work of this compact scavenger hunt-like section.
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| Sweet shot by Nic of us transitioning after the zoo leg. |
We grabbed some quick calories and headed back out on bikes into Fairmount Park, as Rob led us around some roads and trails in the park to find a bunch of CPs as the sun set. We realized at this point that we should probably skip some optional CPs in order to leave enough time to complete the rest of the course - there were a ton of CPs to find in the final sections of the race in Wissahickon Park north of town.
We exited trails and entered back on roads as we worked northward. We were a little navigationally stymied at times here, trying to find a bike path that was marked on the trail. After poking around at length in the Bala Cynwyd neighborhood, we eventually found a very inconspicuous sign indicating the bike path. We left the road at the sign to find the path, only to discover that we were about 40 feet above it, but with no evident access. While wondering what the purpose of that sign was, we bike-whacked down very steep brushy terrain to reach the path.
From here, it was mainly roads, through cute Saturday evening Manayunk and then up into the hills of NW Philly. Our next target was a 24-hour McDonalds, which had been thoughtfully indicated on our race maps. Our nutrition and hydration had been adequate so far but seemingly always borderline low. We really could use a major calorie input and this was definitely the spot. An employee nicely allowed us to park our bikes inside the restaurant. We used our time time here to plan our attack of the Wissahickon section for which we had just received the maps, so it was not a big waste of time. Afterward, we both marvelled at the fact that we were hungry again in like 2 hours after each eating a big McD's meal.
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| Mid-race McDonalds scene |
We began by not nailing this section. I was confused by multiple intersecting convoluted trails and led us a bit astray before getting to area of the 2nd CP. When we got there, we had some trouble finding it. Because of the urban nature of the race and risk of people tampering with the CP markers, they were not standard orienteering flags but something much less conspicuous, which led to a few delays at certain CPs.
We eventually found it and after this, things got moderately better but not always smooth. I was becoming quite worried because we still had to complete a potentially tricky section in which we had to hike in a rocky stream to find 8 unmapped CPs in sequence (one of Brent's specialties). Fortunately, this was not as lengthy or technical as I feared. We made good time up the creek, found all the CPs, and soon exited out onto roads, not far from the final TA.
This was a quick TA back to bikes as we were feeling very anxious about our remaining time, and also hoped we might have a chance to grab one or 2 more easier CPs as we left the park. We selected a fast road route that would seemingly drop us right into the heart of lower Wissahickon. As we neared our destination, however, we discovered that this road was a bridge over the Wissahickon valley, not a road into it. So, us and a few other teams made an improvised route from the end of the bridge down into the valley, with no one being very sure as to which trail we were actually on. We rode generally south in order to reach the park exit. We eventually figured out where we probably were, whiffed on CP CC despite being in the right place, but managed to get CP EE before we left Wiss behind.
Here, we basically just needed to find the Schuylkill bike path on the eastern bank of the river and ride easy back to town - we seemingly had plenty of clock left to finish on time. We scooted south on the path, chatting with Strong Machine before biking away from them, down the path, not paying much attention to the map because we were obviously home free at this point. Riding south, we started to approach downtown, we kept biking, and biking, and biking. Then we reached the Phila Art Museum. Hmm. My rudimentary memory of Philly geography was telling me that there was no part of Fairmount Park (the finish line location) south of the Art Museum. I check my watch - we had ten minutes left at this point and we were off of our current map. Shit!
We began panic-riding back north. I guessed on a turn off of the bike path and we continued north, recognizing nothing and seeing no helpful signs. 4 minutes left. I'm mentally dealing with the realization that we will not make it. We stop a passerby. Miraculously she knows exact directions to where we need to go and we race off on our all-out northward push. With 2 minutes left we spot the Discovery Center parking lot and we rush there, finishing just under the wire.
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| Photo: Nic Wynia |
After the emotional roller coaster, we heaved a sigh of relief (pardon the cliches) and happily enjoyed some Athletic Brewing libations and tasty egg sandwiches.
We enjoyed this race. It was a great course that hit so many different neighborhoods and highlights and really showcased Philly with a great variety of terrain and disciplines. You can always count on Rootstock for a quality event and we look forward to many more. A big thanks to Brent and Abby and all of the Rootstock crew, volunteers and sponsors!
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