GMARA Bitter Pill, East Burke VT, 7/25/2025

 Vermont is a great state for adventure racing - green forested hills and scenic historic and agricultural landscapes abound. GMARA has been organizing races here for over 20 years and their flagship summer race is the 12-hour Bitter Pill. NH Trail Vets cut our teeth doing GMARA races starting back in 2010. This would be my 15th GMARA race, not including their awesome Nationals in 2023.

This year the race was based out of the MTB mecca of East Burke, the preferred bike playground of Nick, who had plenty of local knowledge. Nick would be racing with Rob and I was racing with Reed under the team name Holland Asses. We would be funnily going head-to-head with NH Trail Vets (Nick and Rob) in the 2-male division. Also in the division were our friends, first time adventure racers and locals Tim and Ben (Snow Patrol).

After nice dinner together, we went our separate ways for a very early bedtime. We needed to be at the race HQ at 4:15 AM to board buses to the start of the race. We were told virtually nothing - maps and race info would be dispersed at the end of the bus ride to ????

The next morning, we plowed down some pre-race calories and coffee.  Nick's wife Alison kindly delivered some fresh-cooked pre-dawn egg sandwiches to us before we boarded the buses. The bus ride was concerningly lengthy - taking us well away from race HQ (location of the finish line) including many speedy highway miles, as the sun gradually brightened the landscape outside the bus windows. When we finally arrived at our mystery destination, we were in New Hampshire, on the southern shore of the Moore Reservoir - a dammed section of the Connecticut River.

Here we were finally told about the format of the race and, in old-school GMARA fashion, given the maps as the clock started. You could take as long as you wanted poring over the maps but that left you less time to reach the finish before the 12 hour time limit elapsed.

Bitter Pill planning session 2025

Flashback to the 2012 Bitter Pill planning session

Reed and I elected to draw up a quick approach to the first leg and then head out. The first leg consisted of a smallish orienteering section and moderate-sized paddle with a few strategic decisions to be made to optimize efficiency. We were out of the gates a few minutes before the Trail Vets but they soon closed the gap. The first 2 CPs did not go very well, especially CP3 - in an old cellar hole. Some of the woods here were very dense and brushy. You could be standing 20 feet from the flag and not see it, in many cases. This resulted in a bit of an easter egg hunt scenario at several CPs in this leg - and added an element of luck. We eventually found these but things were running pretty slow to start the race. We found 2 more CPs on this leg without problem and contemplated attacking CP1 from land (you could also paddle to it) before discovering that the forest was all shitty post-logging regrowth in this area - full of raspberries and other slow, dense flora. Paddle was the call.

We hustled back downhill to the start area, grabbing a CP using what is a mandatory thing for an adventure race in New England - a beaver themed CP clue, in this case a beaver pond. There would be a beaver dam CP as well, later in the race.

We were a near the rear of the race when we finally landed back at the start area to start the paddle. We chowed pizza, tanked up on water and headed out onto the reservoir on our tubby tandem kayak.

Pizza paddle

 We first paddled to CP1, a 20-minute round trip, before attacking the rest of the paddle CPs in counter-clockwise fashion. There was still a bit of fog on the water (and wildfire smoke haze) and temps were still mercifully cool. This was a nice comfortable stage.

At one point, we had the opportunity to split up and both get CPs. Reed came up with the idea of dropping me off on the shore to grab 2 CPs on a lakeside trail while he grabbed a paddle point solo in the kayak. We then paddled into the TA, on the Vermont shore of the reservoir to begin the big bike section. We got all the CPs on this section and had had a few nav delays, so we were one of the last teams off of the water. We knew that we would have to keep an eye on the clock and maps to stay on track for the finish cutoff time of 6:10PM.

We transitioned quickly and devised a quick bike route on the maps that would direct us eventually to a few CPs along rural VT roads on our way back toward Burke. But the first job was to grab a number of CPs in the area via several roads/trails.  These ranged from asphalt to cleared logging paths now knee-high in weeds. One upside of being near the back of the race was that these knee-high weedy roads had already been transformed into beaten-down singletrack by the teams ahead of us, which sped things up a bit. We got all of the local mountain bike CPs without much trouble but we were still pretty far back, having spent time finding every CP so far.

Riding under power lines in the warm sun to begin the second leg

Although we wanted to keep up our speed, the full heat of the day was now upon us as we cruised north up long hills and (briefly) down them. We were plowing through our water supplies and trying to find any shade under the noon sun in order to stay somewhat cool. This long road section was navigationally straightforward, mainly just slogging north for 21 miles, generally uphill. We took a couple quick breaks to fill water or eat along the way.

At the end of the bike was TA2 - the location of the big trek, in Victory, Vermont. For us, this would actually be quite a small trek because we had used a lot of clock finding all the CPs so far. Now it was time to strategically drop some things. It was 2:30 and the race instructions suggested that you wouldn't want to leave this trek much after 3:00 - sooooo, not much time to trek. After checking into the TA and receiving a freeze-pop each (heaven!) from the merciful folks at GMARA, we were off for a very abbreviated trek.

I hatched a plan to grab 4 CPs in a short circuit near the TA. We accomplished this without any significant delays, nabbing 4 CPs (including the beaver dam one) in about an hour - nice. We knew that the race clock was dwindling and kept the gas on for this trek.  Soon enough, we were back on bike for the final leg - the bike to the finish. 

We headed out on wooded trails before winding up back on pavement after a few miles. I was having trouble following us on the map through this section, so I just kept us headed in the approximate right direction. This worked out fairly well but we did overshoot a turn significantly and had a few moments of hesitation as we switched from one trail to another, finding a few CPs along we way. We raced with our friends Strong Machine for a while before they outpaced us on the climbs to the finish. 

Like I said, for a lot of this section I didn't have a great idea exactly where we were or what lay between us and the finish line.  The strategy was basically full gas to the finish at this point. 

The final CP was just a bit off the trail with the clue "roof of cliff band". I directed us to the location of the CP and then we began searching the tops of all the local cliff formations (there were a lot), several of which had convincing roof-like stuff atop them. We wasted a good 20-25 minutes here looking at all kinds of "roofs" on cliffs. We found no flag and ran out of time and headed back to the bikes, which were parked adjacent to a ground-level rock cave. This, we incredulously noticed, contained the CP flag. 

From here, it was really full gas to the finish. I didn't have a good idea what was ahead but we now needed to get through all of it in about 25 minutes. We were glad to find out that much of this was downhill. We rode this with gradually building panic until we arrived on the hotel grounds with just enough time left. We hit the finish line with 4 minutes of clock time left - whew!

Although "only" 12 hours long, this race was quite a butt-kicker, between the hills, heat and harried sprint to the finish. We traded some stories with friends at the finish line and rehydrated on some Shrubbly sodas that really hit the spot. At the post race dinner, we found out that Nick and Rob edged us by 13 minutes for the final podium spot in the 2M division - good for 8th overall, and we squeaked in at 11th overall out of 45 teams, covering about 48 miles and climbing 5200 feet.

We'd like to give a big thanks to team GMARA and first time RD, Taylor, and especially all the volunteers and sponsors as well. We'll be looking forward to our next trip to VT!

Maine Summer AR, Bethel, ME 7/12/2025

 Another summer...another MSAR. Reed and I did our first one in 2016, an 8-hour affair which was then 13-year old Reed's first. Now, we were about to start his 6th 24-hour race. This year the race was based out of Bethel. We drove the 2.5 hrs up and checked into our hotel and scoped out the quaint downtown with it's historic New England charm.

After a decent night of sleep, we loaded up on an obscene amount of Dunkin calories and headed to race check-in at Gould Academy's Pine Hill MTB and XC trails. We waited in line for maps and actually had plenty of time to map/plan our tentative race approach and complete any final readying.

At 10:00 we were off, along with 45-50 other teams. The finish line was back here in 24 hours: 10:00 AM Sunday. The first leg was a fairly short orienteering leg on the trails around us. There was no one way to attack these, which helped to split everyone up. I had a few navigation stumbles in the first 30 minutes. For some reason, this happens to me at the start of most ARs, before I hit my stride navigationally. In this case this only cost us 15 minutes or so. We trotted and hiked around the trails for ~75 minutes in order to pick up the 10 checkpoints (CPs) here.

Although the race weather was not scorching hot, it pretty warm and very humid. We were already sweating a lot and dipping significantly into our water stores in order to stay hydrated. * Here is the part in my race report where I again point out that there are 9 lovely months in New England in which the woods are not full of heat, humidity and insects. These are all great months for adventure racing. *

Next we hopped on our bikes to begin the first bike leg. This would take us all the way from Pine Hill past Sunday River, over 33 miles and almost 6 hours.  After a little hilly road riding, we tucked into some ATV/snowmobile type trails. These were not made for bikes but were pretty easy to ride and the navigation was straightforward from the maps we'd received. The teams were still pretty clustered at this point but we managed to scoot ahead a bit and bust back out to road. We took a southern loop on road to get one more CP before heading back through Bethel and up to the Bethel Community MTB trails. These were very nice bike trails - many machine-built and bermed out. There were long sections of swooping turns interrupted up uphill slogs in the heat. We managed to collect all the CPs here without delay but only with a bit of luck. It was pretty much impossible to closely navigate on the small trail map while safely zooming along the singletrack. A few of the CP flags were right on the trail but several times, I was lucky to glance in the right direction at the right time to spy a flag deeper in the woods or under a bridge. So I learned to take my time on the trails and keep my head swiveling about when I felt we were getting close.

After climbing quite a bit on the bike trails we had to head north on the muddy, slow Community Access Trail for several miles, picking up 2 more CPs.  After all the hot humid climbing in the park, we were very metabolically depleted and had little love for this frustrating stretch of trail. I'm sure it's a lovely community asset in the winter and during droughts.

Then we popped out onto pavement near Sunday River ski area, riding pleasant flat roads parallel to the scenic Sunday River, stopping for CPs at a cute covered bridge and a waterfall. Following this, we climbed for a while on dirt road toward the trek. Along the way we couldn't resist a quick dip in the adjacent Bull Branch to rinse off the sweat, omnipresent bugs and cool off a bit. Randy Ericksen caught sight of us and snapped a few pics. 

We were soon back on the bikes feeling genuinely refreshed - definitely worth the little bit of lost time.  We climbed a bit more to reach TA1 in the Mahoosuc State Forest to begin the big trek of the race around 5:00 PM.

Here we had access to our gear bin containing food and other refueling supplies. The absolute highlight was an Italian wrap we bought at Hannaford on the way up, topped with some incredibly satisfying garlic pesto aioli out of a plastic squirt pouch. 

We set out on the trek with conservative goals. We wanted to be out of there around sunset (8:30 ish) to allow plenty of time to tackle the subsequent bike leg which sounded quite intense. First we grabbed the 2 easiest CPs, adjacent to the central logging road/trail. We didn't do this super-efficiently but well enough. The lowlight was me falling down during a stony river crossing and finding out later that I had lost our only compass with adjustable declination. So we had to use the backup compass for the rest of the race, and there was a LOT of remaining compass work on this leg and the next.

We confirmed that the woods here were like a lot of the woods in Maine and Canada - in regrowth from fairly recent logging. This results in a dense brushy growth of various shrubby things, raspberries and saplings. On an orienteering map this would all be light and dark green.

Next we headed up a fairly steep reentrant for a lengthy attack on CP 31. We opted to curtail this slow, brushy leg and just go after 2 more CPs before heading back. The next target was CP 32. We found this without any problem other than withstanding the super slow dense bushwhacking. From here, we decided to hit CP 33 and then head back into the TA. CP33 was at the east end of a prominent ridge and my plan was to head south, perpendicular to the ridge and then eastward, along the ridge to the CP.  Unfortunately now it was getting dark, further limiting visibility in the dense brush. When we started to definitely descend while heading south, I assumed we had hit the ridge and began to head along the soft ridge we had found. In reality we were nowhere close to far enough south and we wasted a fair amount of time exploring this area. The problem was that the visibility was so limited, you could never get a sense of the surrounding topography beyond 30 feet or so - a constant state of uncertainty.

Soon enough it was clear that we had no way to determine where exactly we were and needed to move on - we bushwhacked scratchily due east back to the main road and then south back to TA1.

It was now about 9:00 and full dark. We ate some welcome "real" food provided by the organizers - a little mac and cheese and chicken and contemplated our next move. The trek was sucky and slow - a bad way to spend race time, so we weren't heading out for any more CPs on foot. We would leave on bike, but we still had 12+ hours of race time left. We knew the last 2 stages (paddle and trek) would take about 3.5 hours total, which left a good 8 hours of time for the upcoming bike. According to the race instructions we had 2 options at this point

1) Attack the notorious bikewhack we had been told/warned about. We knew this would probably be like the abrasive rugged trek we just did...except with a bike...uphill...for several km. We had very little enthusiasm for this option at this time. This would give us a shot at finding at least a half-dozen hard-won CPs.

2) Ride around the bikewhack by backtracking on the roads we used to get here (TA1) - easy road riding but no CPs gained. This was a comfortable and attractive option but it felt kind of wimpy. Also, we'd arrive at the paddle too early to even start it (5:00 was the earliest we could get on the water).

There was also a hybrid option that most teams ended up choosing (get a few of the CPs near the start of the bikewhack and then ride around on road), but this didn't seem great to us at the time.

After much vacillating, we accepted that the honorable thing to do was to do the bikewhack. We decided to go straight through to the bikewhack route and not attempt any of the CPs prior to it, because they looked to be on crappy steep trails and we didn't want to underbudget the time required for the 'whack in case navigation got weird - a very real possibility.

So, we sped off down the dirt road toward the 'whack. After a small amount of generally uphill roads and minimal nav uncertainty, we turned onto ATV/SnoMo type trails of progressively lower quality, picking up a CP along the way every 30-60 minutes. We were walking the bikes at this point - there was never rideable trail that lasted more than 50 ft. After another hour of this, it was time to leave the trail and continue onward through the rocky, brushy forest, with our bikes, strongly uphill for several km. This was exactly as bad as we expected. It was really humid and this bikewhack required near-constant shoving, maneuvering and disentangling your bike, uphill.  Our slow-moving bodies and headlamps also provided easy targets for all of the local insects, several of which we inhaled.

Climbing up a vertical riverbank after first hoisting up the bike

To stay on track, we had to follow a small winding rocky creek, switching to the left or right bank depending on what looked the most navigable. Sometimes we used the creek bed itself. I kept an eye on the compass, making sure we were staying on track, This was interrupted with lots of water breaks since we were constantly sweating. We kept refilling water bottles in the handy creek. We don't treat/filter remote mountain stream water, so that sped things up.

Looking back at our GPS track, this 1.4 mile bikewhack took us about 3.5 hours, including a 15 minute backtrack on foot to find CP47. Time went by pretty quickly, being constantly focused on finding the best way to move forward for the next 10-15 feet and cursing the race designer. We climbed about 800 feet in elevation to reach to highest elevation and location of CP47. We could tell by the absence of tracks around the CPs that we were the first ones over the pass.

Once we were over the top of the saddle, things cleared up a bit, bush-wise. I directed us west for a bit through some marshy level ground and then on a direct SW bearing toward where the map suggested we would likely find some kind of road. This all went very smoothly and soon enough we had found the road - a fairly overgrown doubletrack affair. We followed this, and its continuations, in a generally south direction for a long time - dipping for a while over the border into New Hampshire, as dawn gradually broke. Then it was east on flattish pavement for several miles to reach TA2 - the start of the paddle - around 5:45.

We shared a sixer of mini-donettes and suited up for the paddle. We were assigned a tubby tandem kayak, which we loaded up and headed down the nicely flowing MSAR fave Androscoggin River.  This leg was pretty pleasant overall. We had 5 CPs to find along the way, primarily located on river islands.  When we got to the first one, there were lots of teams milling around talking about their troubles finding the CPs. After a quick look, I just decided to bail - it sounded hard and seemingly required a decent bushwhack. After the excoriating trek and bikewhack, I just didn't care to dig out this flag, so we left and headed downriver. In retrospect, this wasn't a bad decision - plenty of teams searched for a while and never found it. 

The next 4 CPs were much more straightforward and we coasted into the final TA, having seen 10+ miles of the Andro in a bit under 3 hours. There was a bald eagle sighting, the only significant wildlife we spotted during this race.

We transitioned quickly and completed the next section - a couple miles on foot through Bethel, recording a few Q&A CPs on the way back to the start/finish line, including an inspired sprint across the finish line!  There were delicious breakfast burritos here. I had consumed about 500 calories total in the last 6 hours, so this was fantastic. SoMe brewing also supplied some AM libations - ahhhh.

All told, we logged about 72 miles and 7k feet of gain. Our slow and steady approach was good enough for 9th place overall and 3rd among the all-male teams. We were very happy with this outcome.

We'd like to give huge thanks to the whole of the Strong Machine crew and all the lovely sponsors and volunteers.

Race the Phantom, Dalhousie NB, August 2024

After my 7-year absence from the Canadian AR scene, Reed and I decided to head well north of the border, to the northern-most town in New Brunswick, Dalhousie, to tackle Natural Selection's premier event Race the Phantom. It was an easy, fairly scenic drive. Just across the border, we met up with out friends from Strong Machine and grabbed a solid lunch at a gas station/diner. After arriving in Dalhousie, we checked into our Airbnb cottage in town and quickly headed to race HQ to grab maps and subsequently, load up on pizza. Plotting the CPs took a long time and this pushed back bedtime a bit, but we were able to grab sufficient sleep (5+ hours) before heading out in the AM to the race start/finish/HQ.

Race HQ was located on Native American land, the Eel River Bar First Nation. Here we received a blessing from an elder of the tribe and then set off on bikes for the first leg of the race.

Heading north over the Eel River Bar with Quebec in the far distance across Chaleur Bay.

We completed the bike leg with a couple snafus, including a bee sting (Reed) and becoming concerningly separated for 10-15 minutes while navigating some coastal trails. Soon enough, we reached TA1 and set off on foot to find a couple fairly easy trailside CPs. The only snag we had here was my poor recall of the race instructions and accidentally navigating to and punching a bike CP for the upcoming leg (we would have to revisit on bike 1-2 hours later).

We rode trails for a while, picked up a few CPs in town and then headed down to the canoe put-in in Dalhousie. We dropped bikes and set off into the placid marine waters of the Chaleur Bay. Our first target was the scenic lighthouse. Then we paddled into the mouth of the Eel river, which, due to the timing of the tides, was directly upstream. The current and shallowness of the approaching low-tide led to some pretty slow paddle kms, but we eventually made our way upriver to the next TA in Eel River Crossing.

Up the shallow Eel

We had been noticing some ominous clouds approaching from the west as we neared the TA and were hearing some occasional thunder but so far, the weather had missed us. From the TA, we decided to go grab a bonus CP, which looked to be about a 45 minute out-and-back round trip. We found the location of the CP fairly easily, but when we arrived and searched the area indicated on the clue sheet (SE of bridge), we found nothing. We spent the next 30-40 minutes fruitlessly bushwhacking around the area to no avail. Returning from a random northern attack from the bridge, Reed happened to spot the CP, barely visible right under the bridge. 

I was fumbling with buttons on the camera and ended up with this strange hybrid image.

From the TA, we headed out on bikes via a circuitous route of dirt and paved roads west toward Sugarloaf Park. Within minutes of leaving the TA, we got whacked by a serious thunderstorm.  This delivered 20-30 minutes of driving rain and thunder as we rode along road shoulders. We didn't really mind this cool-off, as the weather had been a little warm and humid for our tastes thus far. After finding  a couple CPs over a couple hours, we arrived at the dirt road heading into the park (below) and slowly grinded uphill for a long time through variable precipitation.

We worked through the saturated dirt roads toward the park for the next several hours into early evening, finding a couple more CPs.

We eventually reached the TA, located under powerlines at the edge of the park, and switched to foot mode.

Pretty landscape and skies at the beginning of the night trek.

We hiked initially on dirt roads, after choosing our route, and targeting the first few CPs. The sun set and we continued trekking, eventually ending up at a CP which required this fun waterfall traverse. We commented that this was one of the best CP locations we'd ever experienced.

We continued on park trails and roads. We noticed how well-maintained and well-signed the foot trails were, even in this fairly remote part of the province. The US definitely can learn something from Canada about having appropriate tax funding to provide for quality infrastructure .

 

We trekked on through the night, skipping 2 CPs and eventually heading back to the powerline CP to retrieve our bikes. After gearing up, eating and giving some TLC to our soaked muddy bikes, we set off (after addressing a surprise flat tire). We biked on muddy roads, through foot-soaking puddles before eventually regaining pavement en route to the TA at Eel River Crossing, where our canoes were waiting.

Nighttime bike CP in an abandoned RV

We arrived at the final TA just before dawn and, after gathering our paddle gear and enduring some moderate mosquitoes, we were back on the Eel. This time, though, we had the benefit of a nice downstream current. So, the sunrise return trip to race HQ/finish was quite a bit quicker. We had plenty of remaining time so we made a side trip to grab a bonus CP which was on the north bank of the river down an inlet. We ran into our friends Strong Machine friends here, who ended up clearing the course. A short paddle from here had us at the finish line.

All told, we covered 81 miles of maritime Canadian terrain, while accomplishing 8000+ ft of climbing. We had a very pleasant race, mostly free of bugs and without any of the excoriating bushwhacking that I had previously experienced at RTP. Thanks to Troy and the rest of the NSAR team for organizing this great event. We'll be looking forward to our next trip north of the border!

Sorry, bike. I'll make it up to you

Scoring some sweet swag from RD Troy Johnston

NYARA The Longest Day, 6/29/2024, North Creek, NY

 This year's TLD was being held a mere 4.5 hours away, included guided whitewater rafting and was taking place within Adirondack Park, for the first time. For these reasons, plus the fact that we know that we can count on NYARA for a quality event, this was an obvious choice for a summer race - our first of the year.

For a summer race in the northeast, you never know what's in store. Depleting hot humidity? Thunderstorms? Gorgeous dry air? Insect swarms? As race day approached, it became clear that we would be in for some solid rain - over an inch was predicted during the race period. This prediction turned out to be absolutely correct.

The day prior to the race, by contrast, was gorgeous - breezy, warm dry air. Since this race included a short orienteering prologue following registration, the day prior to the race, we got to enjoy a little of this. This consisted of 3 checkpoints in the woods around the Ski Bowl in North Creek, NY. I got a little turned around and cost us about 10 minutes but this was otherwise straightforward. Having not packed another set of race clothes, I ran in cotton boxers and cargo shorts.

After a nice dinner in quaint North Creek, we got to bed fairly early in preparation for the early alarm to get to race HQ - back at the Ski Bowl. We woke to the rain which would come and go with varying intensity throughout the race. We spent an hour or so with the maps, dropped our bikes and then drove ourselves to race HQ #2, Garnet Hill Outdoor Center. Here we dropped gear bins, got some race info and then boarded busses to Beaver Brook Outfitters. Here we picked up rafting gear, stood around and then got back on the bus to reach the put-in. 

At the put-in, we met our raftmates, our raft guide, got more instruction and then got in line to hit the water. We learned some commands on the water and soon after we were on our way down the Indian River to its confluence with the Hudson. Reed had a good bit of whitewater training during his Outward Bound trip a couple years ago and he took the point paddling position (front right), while I, a newb, sat across from him in the front row. I had been tasked with GoProing the river section by race media man Jeff O'Connor and I wanted to have a front row seat.

This was a scenic, fun, interesting and, at times, exciting race leg. We survived rapids up to class 3/3+  while covering 16 miles over 3 hours or so. We rafted at the normal, safe, recreational/instructional pace that the guides were used to, stopping to regroup after the sections of rapids. We also had a mid-trip break on the shore, to eat, use the bathroom, etc. For the final, flatter section of the river, we were allowed to "race" the other boats. Reed and I dug in and tried to boost the pace, but it wasn't really possible to gain any significant time in this way.

We left the river a little cold and hungry, so we were happy to grab some food out of our waiting backpacks at TA1 and get walking. Everyone was transitioning very hurriedly. We had been awake for almost 10 hours at this point without really racing, which felt a little strange, honestly. Everyone was very ready to get out and put some of the hard part of the course behind us.

We set out on pavement and then dirt road toward the entry point into the woods, a little over 2 uphill miles away. We ate, warmed up and got wet on the way.

Now, ahead of us, was a big hilly trek. We could attack the CPs of this trek during this leg and, because of the loop shape of the course, again on the penultimate leg. We elected a plan of grabbing a good chunk of these now. Our plan was to get most or all of this trek done, with fresh legs in the daylight, as we'd probably not have time left to re-attack the wilderness later

We grabbed the first 3 without issue, navigating through open forest and later, a bit of trail. The forest was fairly open and not too difficult to traverse. We had occasional contact with a few other teams who had also chosen this route.

After the 3rd CP, we made the decision to undergo a long trek on trail to 4 CPs which were located around the heights of Gore Mtn. Ski Resort. This began as a straightforward, mostly uphill trek. After a while however, the trail became harder to follow, dumping us into boggy meadows and leaving us searching for the non-obvious linear tracts of ferns which defined the trail. We began feeling the first twinges of fatigue as the steepness of Gore Mtn loomed ahead. Reed was also feeling some early chafing from trekking in wet bike shorts for hours.

We climbed steeper and steeper grades now, sometimes on all fours in the wind and fog near the top of Gore, after gaining over 2000ft on the trek. I'm not sure if it's just me but I often struggle to navigate on USGS maps in these highly modified ski resort landscapes. There were enough clues, however, to eventually navigate to the first of the Gore CPs (CP13). Now that we knew exactly where we were, it seemed easy enough to stay on track to find the next 3 up here. What seemed easy ended up being fairly challenging, however, which became a theme during this race. We did not make great time up here, but we were ultimately successful in finding all 4 using adequate nav and plenty of determination. Highlights included a tough scramble up a very steep brushy knoll for CP 16 and a nice foggy lookoff from the Twister Cliffs.

Looking down the slopes of Gore Mountain

Deer in the mist

After the 4 high-elevation CPs, it was time to drop down off the mountain to find 2 more CPs in the woods en route to TA2. At this time there was a lengthy downpour and the sun was setting. We wasted a bit of time trying to find a trail that was incorrectly mapped on the wrong side of a power line cut and stream instead of just bushwhacking to it perpendicularly. Then it was a soggy trek on trails which became progressively more slow and technical as we paralleled the aptly named Roaring Brook. By this point, we were definitely feeling the trek. My lower back and knee were hurting but both responded nicely to a strong dose of ibuprofen. Reed, on the other hand, had developed worse and worse chafing and was having a lot of discomfort even at an easy walk. This was concerning, with only one major stage behind us so far.

We made our way downhill to TA2 via the now somewhat familiar slopes of the Ski Bowl and found, to our great excitement, a bunch of hot food waiting for us.  NYARA staff had prepared several food options and we both dug appreciatively into a steaming plate of mashed potatoes, meatballs and gravy. Reed painfully, belatedly applied chamois cream while I changed maps and geared up for a long bike leg.

After slamming a post-dinner coffee, we left on bikes. There was a mountain bike and road/gravel bike option at this point and we decided to tackle the road bike first. This way we could get a break from the wet woods and hopefully Reed could recuperate with some non-technical saddle time.

There were 6 CPs to find along a big gravel and pavement loop that would end up being 33 miles. Some of these were straightforward. Others seemed like they would be easy but then ate unnecessary chunks of race time. The rain came and went as we clicked off the miles. As dawn broke, we found ourselves nearing the end of the loop, approaching TA3. I was, uncharacteristically, having trouble remaining fully conscious in the wee morning hours, and Reed's chafing was progressing. 

At this point, there was no way for Reed to hike or mount a bike without major pain and there was a substantial chunk of each yet to come. So, we decided to call it quits here after 19 hours, 65 miles and 7k ft of elevation gain.

Although we were rendered unofficial for the 2nd straight TLD (broken pedal last year), we came away having had a solid race experience and were happy to have made the trip and experience the majority of the course which NYARA had created for us. We will certainly be back to give it our all for the next edition.

Post-race gear dry-out

USARA National Championship, 9/15/2023, Jeffersonville, VT

When we got word last year that USARA Nationals were nearby this year, we knew we had to get there somehow. The race was being held in the gorgeous northern Green Mountains of Vermont and organized by our long time friends Green Mountain Adventure Racing Association (GMARA). The open registration portion of the race sold out almost immediately, but we were thankfully able to wriggle our way in off of the waitlist, after a few tense weeks of waiting.

The race was based out of Smugglers' Notch Ski Resort, which is where we would be finishing. We spent the night before the race there, after dropping off our bikes and getting some rudimentary instructions for the next morning (we would be getting up at 4:30 AM so that we could be bussed to the unknown start location)

After getting our gear in order, we turned in for a night of truncated sleep and were boarded on the buses by 7:00.  We had gotten the maps at 5:30, so we now had a good idea of what the next 30 hours were going to look like. We were told that it was a BIG course with LOTS of elevation and to choose wisely how much of the course we were going to take on, so that we did not risk missing a mid-race time cutoff or finishing over time (3:00 PM tomorrow).

We hopped off the buses onto an old logging road with a charismatic red sugar shack, a bit south of the town of Hardwick. Here we would begin the first leg of the race: an off-trail orienteering loop to find 10 checkpoints (CPs) in the surrounding woods.

After a sweet Rib Mtn. rendition of the Star Spangled Banner, we were off, trotting down a short stretch of dirt road before disappearing into the thick woods. We spent the next 3 hours or so finding these points while ascending, descending and getting a bit wet. The navigation here was fairly straightforward. We found them all without major issue. We lost a couple minutes finding the correct logging trail at CP9 and we should have grabbed CP5 on the way to CP2 (instead of after). CP10, which we initially whiffed on (that's a knoll?) was an easy grab on the way back to where we began, and where our bikes awaited us.

We spent the next 3 hours riding on smooth pavement, smooth dirt, un-smooth dirt and some really rough stuff which was beyond anyone's ability or desire to ride - necessitating a lengthy hike-a-bike or two. There was lots of mud too. After this, we cruised on roads toward the canoe put-in on the Lamoille River. We stopped at a convenience store along the way for some drinks and shared a ham & swiss sub.

At the canoe put-in, we had access to our staged gear/supplies. This included an improvised middle seat (short milk crate plus Crazy Creek seat) that we squeezed into our little 2-man canoe, along with 3 backpacks and our bulky paddle bag. We had to tote all of this during a 1/2 km portage to get to the put-in from the TA and there were 2 other lengthy portages downriver. Luckily, the race organizers let us know this (a week) before the race, so we were able to source a small set of portage wheels. This meant that we did not have to laboriously heft all this stuff, but rather roll it along the roads. We still had to to maneuver rough trails by hand, but having the portage wheels really eased things. At the beginning of the second portage, we had to lift the canoe up an 8 foot bank to reach the road. Nick and I carried some stuff up first and turned around to see Rob, in beast mode, singlehandedly throwing the boat atop the slope. 

We covered about 25 miles on the river, including two portages (around rapids). This took approximately 5 hours. For us, paddling tends to gets pretty old after the 3-hour mark. This was no exception but there was a lot to like about the leg - a nice, flowing, winding river with some interesting turns and light rapids, good temperatures and pretty nice scenery. The sun set about 30 minutes before we exited the river and so we paddled the last, seemingly never-ending, portion in increasing darkness.

We got to the TA and we were very cold and wet, especially Nick, and quickly put on as many dry layers as we had prior to eating and packing up food and and water (this was the last time we would have access to our gear). Rick of team Chaos Required made our day by dropping off some leftover warm jalapeno poppers and chicken tenders (from a nearby store, which we would soon also visit for coffee and food).

A lot of teams came off the river right after us, but, despite a fairly long TA and visit to the store, we left the TA ahead of them, riding on some river trails and up a hill toward a trail system where we'd find the next 2 CPs. About halfway up this hill, we hear Nick yell an expletive. That rarely means anything good.

"I left the tracker at the TA." 

Since the tracker is mandatory gear, we definitely had to turn around and fetch it. Nick felt bad about this, obviously, but it could have easily been any one of us. I've forgotten my camera on my PFD at the end of many a paddle section. I forgot to even bring it to this race at all (hence the dearth of photos).

Ultimately, it took less than 30 minutes to get back to where we had been when we turned around. But...as I noted above, there was a big pack of teams right behind us. They all passed us as we were riding back to the TA, which was definitely frustrating.

We re-climbed the hill and headed into the trail system which held the next 2 CPs. There were a lot of teams here sliding around on the peanut-buttery wet trails. One funny moment occurred when I hadn't noticed Nick punching a trailside CP and Rob was confused why, afterward, I kept directing us back toward it rather than onward to the next target.

We soon descended onto the singletrack Brewer trail, which roughly paralleled the Brewster River, leading us back toward Smuggler's Notch resort. This part was...interesting. It consisted of fairly flat and rideable trails interrupted by ridiculously steep and unwieldy hike-a-bike sections which crossed river tributaries/reentrants. Consequently these trails were pretty slow going, but we passed through them and found the needed connections and CPs without much issue. We then emerged onto paved road (briefly) before returning to dirt trails on the wide bike/hike trails of Smuggler's Notch Resort. Here, we navigated accurately to 4 of the 6 available CPs, which were located on doubletrack and singletrack. We spent much of the time here riding near or with team Electric Mayhem. 

Here we decided, for the first time in the race, to skip some checkpoints - there were 2 more distant CPs which would require additional ascending. We had had some delays and there was plenty of race to bite off, as needed, in subsequent stages.  

Next we sped downhill out of the resort toward our next target. We had covered about 17 miles on this leg, mostly on trails. It was a little after midnight. Our next job was to bike up toward the lofty heights of Smugglers' Notch toward the next TA, which was about 1/3 of the way up the climb.

During the climb, I was closely watching the map, the terrain and my compass. The TA was not on the road and I was worried it might not be obvious from the road. We were following Electric Mayhem up the climb and Nick had started to gap us all, cruising up the hill with his excellent bike strength. We passed a few side roads which seemed like they could lead to the TA, but I wasn't 100% sure. Electric Mayhem was just cruising along like we weren't anywhere close. Very soon after, the road changed direction and then I was convinced that we had passed the turnoff. I stopped and expressed my concerns to the other team and Rob but by this point Nick had blithely ridden ahead out of eyeshot and earshot. I rode up the road aways but still no sign of Nick, so I went back to where the others were waiting and we sat there, chilling on the roadside for 10 minutes or so, until Nick returned to us and we could backtrack to the TA.

Here, at TA 4, we had a lovely surprise - pancakes, sausage and maple syrup shooters, courtesy of the VT Board of Tourism. These were delicious and definitely bumped the team morale up a couple notches. This TA was manned (is "personed" more inclusive?) by veteran AR volunteer couple Scott and Marlana, with whom I had spent several volunteer days during Untamed NE 2014, with my son Reed. We had seen them countless times since, volunteering at various races throughout the Northeast.

Here we got ready for a night trekking leg. There were 8 possible CPs here. We hatched a conservative plan of only getting 3 of them. The thinking was that we were not going to come close to clearing this epic course and that we should focus on making all the time cutoffs. From what we had learned, the final trek leg was really big and we could use that to burn through any excess time which we had, after skipping these points. Off-trail trekking at night (i.e., here) is not typically where one can accumulate a bunch of easy CPs in a short period of time.

We found our 3 flags without much delay here. We (like a lot of teams I saw) went down a too-early reentrant to get to CP33 but we quickly corrected. We scooped up the next 2 without issue and then attempted to beeline uphill back to the TA. I led us a little off-target (too far left) which cost a couple minutes. We were trekking with the Nicki-led Rootstock team here.

Now it was back on bikes to climb over the notch, followed by a lengthy road descent in the wee hours of the AM to reach TA 6.  This was a trekking leg with 9 available CPs mapped on 3 maps of 3 CPs each. The wrinkle here was that you could split the team up and work simultaneously - a potentially big time saver. The CPs here were also fairly close together - a good chance to scoop up some easier points.

We each grabbed a map and set off. My intent was to grab the most difficult map but, in retrospect, it was not. I was back in just under an hour. Rob returned after another 20 mins and Nick after another 20 mins. One of Nick's target CPs (C3) had given him some trouble. I grabbed his map to run off and find it quickly while he transitioned, but, attacking from the main trail, the terrain did not line up at all with the map. I was almost immediately lost and decided to just return to the TA emptyhanded, after wasting 20 minutes. Despite this minor setback, we had gained 8 CPs in about 2 hours - not bad.

As we headed back onto the local roads on bike, the sun was finally starting to brighten the eastern sky. This is always a welcome change in an overnight race, nudging your brain into a happier, more alert place. The next, penultimate leg was a long bike leg. There was an embedded optional trail section with a couple CPs which involved a lot of climbing and trails of unknown quality. We had already elected to bypass this and focus on getting to big final trek. So, we rode the scenic, hilly backroads of VT for the next 2 to 2.5 hours, slowly covering about 16 miles. I love AR sections where you can bike-tour the area on rural roads. They are typically comfortable and low-stress, compared to, say, trying to navigate off-trail in the dark.

We rolled into the final TA right at the 24-hour mark - 9:00 AM. This gave us 6 hours to complete the final trek - a big, off-trail hike over a ridge of the Green Mountains which would lead us to the finish line, back at Smugglers' Notch Resort. At this point, our friend and race maestro Chris Yager gave us the advice that we should probably focus on getting the 3 mandatory CPs for the leg, and not so much on the optionals, as time was starting to run a little short. He also reiterated that, as a local team, we needed to "Represent!" 

With this in mind, I hatched a route plan to reach the first CP (nearby) and subsequently to surmount the ridge and approach the 2 other mandatory CPs near the top. We would pass near some optionals along the way, and so we hoped to grab those, if we could without spending too much extra time.

After the short on-trail section to the first mandatory CP, we were off into the woods again. We would parallel a deep gorge uphill, reach a predetermined elevation and then strike due north, over a small saddle. This all went according to plan. It was tough climb at times but we made steady progress. At the top of the saddle we made a short brushy side jaunt to get optional CP40. This was followed by a brushy descent, which soon flattened out into brushy level ground. We would pass close to optional CP44, so we were keeping an eye out for the small stream it would be on; we found this without too much trouble. 

We were feeling really good at this point - we had found the first mandatory CP and scored 2 optionals  and we had only used up 2 of our 6 hours. We were nearing the top of the ridge and still had 4 hours left to get to finish line - solid.

We continued on our compass bearing to where the Long Trail traversed a soft ridge and where we would find the next 2 CPs - both mandatory. It took a lot longer to hit the trail than I was expecting and I was also distractedly inspecting the terrain a lot in case we stumbled across the "reentrant" which held our next target. When we finally hit the trail, therefore, I hadn't been rigorously keeping us on our bearing. We also hadn't passed the flag or any nearby teams. The terrain at the top was lumpy and didn't have any obvious features. There were also reentrants everywhere, which made the clue for this CP (47) fairly useless. We were also not allowed to hike along the trail for any significant distance.

We began to poke around in various reentrants south of the trail, finding no flag and also no evidence of recent foot traffic. Most of the teams were ahead of us on the course and this was a mandatory CP - the ground should be well-trodden around it. Eventually we ran into team BRF Barf here, who had also been looking for a while, with no success.

This went on for a disconcerting amount of time. We were stuck between a rock and a hard place; this was a mandatory CP (we would be "unofficial" if we didn't find it) but, on the other hand, the race time clock was ticking away - we definitely didn't want to go overtime futilely searching for the CP.

After about 50 minutes and no good leads, we had arrived at the conclusion that we needed to move on and hustle to the finish without having found this CP. Before we departed I decided to pay closer attention to the terrain on both sides of the trail one more time, to try to see if I could figure out where we were. Wondrously, the terrain started to line up fairly convincingly with the map, and suggested that we needed to look further east for the flag. While approaching it, we saw another team for the first time in a while, who confirmed that it was indeed right here. Whew! - A huge relief. We had burned over an hour on one CP, but if we could still get to finish line on time, we'd be good.

The next CP was close by and was an easy find (once you had found CP47). Now we had only 2 hours to cover the remainder of the course - about 5km (3mi). It seemed doable...until we started doing it. After CP48, the vegetation took a real turn for the worse - very slow and brushy with very little open terrain. The primary culprit was an old friend from many Vermont races - hobblebush. This member of the witch hazel family grows from about knee-high to shoulder-high and, at its worst, creates dense thickets of grabby, intertwined branches. This was the worst of it that I had seen. As we contoured along (bypassing a hilltop optional CP) west toward the finish, we were nearly constantly fighting through some level of hobblebush thicket. This plus the uneven terrain was really slowing our progress. I knew that we were averaging less than 2 mph - not necessarily fast enough to finish on time. 

As we continued grinding (now uphill) through this slow terrain, I was keeping an eye on the map and realized that we were pointing ourselves directly at an optional CP (50). While our focus at this point was simply finishing on time, we would certainly not pass up a free CP along the way. After a quick punch of this knoll-top CP, we reassessed. We were on track and knew exactly where we were (thanks to the fortuitous CP) but we had averaged just over 1 mph to get here - there were 2 miles left to cover and only 68 minutes of race clock left.

We quickly pointed ourselves downhill, continuing west, and discovered that, miraculously, the hobblebush and all other significant underbrush had virtually disappeared! We began eagerly running downhill though the open woods. I kept expecting the underbrush to reappear, but after several more minutes of running downhill, it hadn't. I knew now that we would make it.

As a bonus, as we were zooming west through the woods, there was a flag just ahead of us to the left (CP52). Another lucky score! We encountered team Strong Machine in the woods here, briefly, and continued west until we started to hit the resort trails, on which we trotted easily downhill to cover the last mile. 

Because of the unexpected massive improvement in ground speed, we actually hit the finish line with 25 minutes to spare. In retrospect, we could have gone after another CP or two (as Strong Machine had, we found out later) but after stressing so hard about just finishing on time for the last 3 hours, the thought never crossed our minds.

At the finish line, we were greeted by the GMARA crew and volunteers, feeling fulfilled with our race and so pleased to sit down with a beer for a minute and take our shoes off. We chatted with the other teams about their races and enjoyed not racing. We then headed inside for a satisfying meal and the awards announcements. Amazingly, 3 teams had cleared the entire course. We ended up 28th out of 60 teams - a satisfactory result. In all, we covered about 110 miles and climbed nearly 14000 ft, over 30 hours of racing.

The competition at this race was really stiff - definitely the toughest field of participants we had encountered. There were many teams who regularly win 24-hour races who finished well off the podium. The mid-pack was also stacked with quality teams young and old. It was nice to see so many women at the race - definitely a rising demographic in AR thanks to the inclusive efforts of many race directors and officials.

This was a really tough, big course. Three off-trail treks, including the epic finale, a sizeable physical paddle, and the punishing bike terrain really combined to make a wonderful beast of a proving ground for all of us - perfect for a national championship. Hats off to GMARA and USARA for making it happen.

All race photos courtesy of USARA.

NYARA The Longest Day, Warren, PA, 8/12/23

 With Reed being a busy guy this summer, working and becoming Wilderness EMT-certified, this event was our only chance to race together this summer. So, we undertook the 9-hour drive to the western PA/NY border to brave The Longest Day. This would be my 6th The Longest Day and Reed's second.

This year, we were based out of Warren, PA, nicely situated in the northern Allegheny mountains. We checked in, got our maps, turned in our bikes, gear bin and paddle bag and then headed out to Bent Run Brewery for a couple hours of eating and route planning while enjoying the nice outdoor brewery atmosphere in (for now) nice summer evening weather.

The race start was early. We would have a pre-race meeting and board buses at 5:00 AM. Like most racers (and race staff) that I spoke to, this meant that the night before this 26-hour race promised little quality sleep. For me, it's tough to sleep after having seen the race maps/route. My brain wants to keep returning to strategic minutia instead of staying asleep. 

We were, uncharacteristically, able to each grab a little nap on the (school) bus, which is notoriously difficult. Then we unloaded at Holiday Valley ski area in Ellitcottville, PA for the race start. We began at 7:15 AM and would finish no later than 9:00 AM the next day. The first (prologue) stage was to hike to the top of the ski area, on ski slopes and trails, while grabbing 2 CPs and gaining 650 ft. No major nav here. There was the usual thing of many teams starting at an unsustainable initial pace (jogging uphill); we were happy to slide to the back of the pack and "race our race". We made the unpopular decision do do this 2.25 mile trek in our bike shoes. We both have comfy hikeable bike shoes and, by doing this, we wouldn't have to carry wet damp trek shoes for the next bike leg (up to 40 miles). We did not see any other team adopting this strategy but felt that we had made the right decision.

At the TA, we quickly switched to bike mode (just put the maps on the bike board and donned helmets) and set off onto the first, and longest, bike leg on the trails and forest roads at the top of the ski area. I immediately made a slight but highly consequential nav error and started off on what seemed to the right road, heading in the right direction, but quickly things were not lining up on the map and we consequently spent the next 40 minutes riding around trying to find out where we were. Once we were "found" again, we were able to start finding the trail CPs. We found one after some nice flowy trail riding and headed to the next. On the way, I had an abrupt crash on the classic front-tire-on-wet-diagonal-root, which immediately slammed me to the ground. No worse for the wear, we continued on to our next target. Here, I left the trail too early and sent us on foot, without the map (total rookie move) to a local high point where I expected to find the CP. After not finding it, I directed us back to the approximate location where we had left our bikes and eventually hit a trail, which I misidentified and sent us on a rambling 45 minute trail trek to eventually find our bikes and, shortly thereafter, the CP we were aiming for an hour earlier. Gah.

After this ignominious start, I directed us, more accurately on the trails to find the next 4 CPs without issue. The trails thus far had been pretty fun, smooth and flowy, but soon, continuing down Porcupine trail, they became more bony and with many sections which were best hike-a-biked. At the end of Porcupine, we were face with a big uphill hike-a-bike section on "Growler", part of which we had to reclimb because of bad Dad nav. That's when I heard a call from Reed, behind me "Dad! my pedal fell off!" Hmm. Okay, no worries, we'll just screw it back tight onto the crank arm, right? Examining Reed's bike, however, we found that the clip-in part of the pedal had fallen off of the axle, spewing grease and ball bearings onto the ground - not a field repair. By loosely sticking the pedal back onto the axle, however, we could continue. In fact, we were able to get 4 more CPs in this manner - riding slowly and having to put Reed's pedal back on every few minutes. We switched pedals after a while so that I could take a turn with the bad bike but, by this point, the pedal had tightly seized onto the axle and no longer spun. This seemed workable at first but we soon discovered that, with the pedal rigid, it unscrewed from the crank with every bit of downward pressure. So, the entire pedal was falling off the bike every minute or so. We then hiked to the last optional CP of the section with the knowledge that there was no feasible strategy to complete this leg, which included 20 more miles of riding.

Mid-race, a good time to work on your single-leg pedaling drills.

As luck would have it, we were above 2000ft at this point and therefore had enough cell reception to call race HQ and report our misfortune. Vice race director Aaron was able to come and pick us us, transport us to the next CP, and also loan us a pedal. This way we could continue through the race and experience nearly the whole course. Having skipped about 20 miles of this bike leg, however, we were an "unofficial" team and would be racing solely for "fun".

Arriving at TA2 by car, we quickly installed the loaner pedal and got ready to paddle on the scenic Allegheny Reservoir. The first part of this was quite pleasant - partly cloudy and nice to be seated in a canoe. During the last 2/3 of this leg however, we observed storm clouds approaching and soon found ourselves in monsoon-like downpours and accompanying high winds. The former were more of a nuisance but the wind raised a substantial chop on the water, eventually enough so that little waves would break over the bow and dump a little water into the boat. It was also, of course, a headwind, which slowed progress immensely. Many teams pulled their boats off the water to wait out the storm but we just plodded along, weathering 2 separate downpours. At one of the CPs, we stopped on shore to dump several gallons of water of water out of the boat. The last raging downpour coincided with our arrival at the takeout (TA3), so we had to transition in the rain - never a joy. In all we paddled 8 miles on this leg, picking up 2 of the 3 available CPs. 

Mid-downpour, pre-waves

This TA (paddle -> trek) was our last chance to see our gear, so we loaded up food to last the rest of the race and refilled our water reservoirs. As we left the TA, the rain was basically finished. We walked on the road for a few minutes and then on a trail and then headed off-trail. 

Skies clearing (temporarily) leaving TA3

We had made a conservative decision to go for only 2 optional CPs on the leg, which were more-or-less on the way to the mandatory CP for this leg. This was a cool area for off trail exploration, but, unless you were a team planning on clearing the course, it was not an efficient place to spend time because the CPs were few and far between. Other legs of the race featured more densely-placed CPs, and so, if you wanted the most payoff for your time, this was not the place, sadly. Navigating to our first CP, we had some difficulty, as my compass bearing and my intuition were in conflict with one another. We were climbing too slowly and walking too far but I kept telling myself "trust the compass". Well, eventually it became obvious that trusting the compass was leading us astray and, after a few minutes of map scrutiny, we discovered that we had overshot the CP by quite a distance. After correcting, we found the terrain to match up nicely with the map and after 30 minutes of bonus bushwhacking, we were at the CP. From here it was not too difficult to find the next CP, before eventually reaching some trail, on which we would spend the rest of the leg. Anytime you're off trail in the PA/NY area, you worry about encountering vast evil stands of mountain laurel but we found none here. The forest was pretty open and although brushy saplings and deadfall slowed you a bit, there was no thorny or stiff underbrush. We enjoyed the off-trail travel. The trail hiking was straightforward - just keep trudging. A soaking downpour arrived and continued for 30 mins or so, further muddying the trail and generally adding to the sloggy-soggy vibe of the final trek. We covered almost 10 miles here and picked up 3 total CPs before arriving at TA4 around midnight.

At the TA we were in for a real treat - the RDs and volunteers had set up an awesome rest stop inside the back of a rental truck. We we could sit (ahhhh) out of the rain (ahhh) and enjoy a fresh hot snack of taco toppings spooned into a Fritos bag (ahh yeah). It was a unexpected moment of comfort and a serious morale boost.

Soon enough, we had finished our snack, transitioned, and it was time head back out into the wet night for some more AR. The first part of this would be a speedy descent on road, so we clothed our wet bodies as best as we could (i.e., put on a windbreaker) and headed down. After a few miles of this, we reached a section which RD John Courain warned us pre-race "sucks so bad". This consisted of a rudimentary skinny trail through chest high weeds/bushes in muddy terrain which went on for about 1.5 miles. At this point, the RDs had placed pink flagging tape to show us the "best" way through this tangle. This was monumentally helpful. After following several sets of flagging, we were led to a low-elevation CP.  After this, the flagging stopped and our job was to steeply gain 600 feet elevation in a roughly southern direction and hope to find one of the hilltop roads which were on the map. There were some historic trails/roads? marked on the map that could theoretically be used to get there but it was difficult to match the overgrown terrain with anything that could be considered a "road/trail". Luckily there were tracks ahead of us through the weeds - either made by teams ahead of us or the RDs. These roughly followed what seemed to be an old road grade, which was somewhat encouraging. There was really no option other than following these tracks at this point. The main issue, however, was not the blind navigation (which was quite concerning) but that the steepness of the terrain necessitated a wet hike-a-bike for the entire duration. Even when the terrain flattened out enough to possibly ride, there were enough fallen trees to prevent it. This sweaty uphill slog took a full hour, while only covering a little more than a mile of horizontal distance.

At the end, the trail finally flattened out for good on a recognizable plateau feature, but by this point we had lost our enthusiasm for this race. There were several teams together at this point and we worked together to figure out how to complete the final connection to the road system that lie ahead. This was thankfully downhill and we soon punched into an odd labyrinthine forest road system.

Almost immediately after entering this road system we discovered it purpose.

We encountered several oil wells and oil tank installations and there was a frequent odor of oil in the forest air. It was interesting and a little eerie riding through the silent, unlit woods among this unusual machinery.

These roads were well-mapped and after a few turns we were back on public roads. We had been racing for 19 hours at this point; it was about 4:30 AM. Here again, we needed to descend speedily on pavement to our next destination. Strangely, there was almost no uphill riding on this race. We gained almost all of our elevation on foot and via hike-a-bike.

The next destination was Jake's Rocks, a nest of trails designed for mountain biking. These were initially fun trails and we picked up the initial CP while riding generally level and flowy trails. Soon, however, in order to get the next mandatory CP, we needed to ascend 550 ft on these trails. We were able to ride a few short switchbacked sections but the trail got rockier and steeper as we went along. So, again, we found ourselves undertaking a long arduous hike-a-bike.

At the top, we punched the CP and headed on forest roads to the next section. I'm sure there would have been some better trail riding experiences to be had in here while going after some optional CPs but, at this point, we just wanted to be done with this leg of the race.

After a few miles of flat forest roads, we reached the final TA. Here there were 5 optional checkpoints to be had on foot, if time/desire permitted. At the TA here and at the prior (TA4), we noticed a more-than-usual amount of carnage for a 24-hour race: racers dropping out, racers camping out at TAs and, here, multiple teams sleeping roadside just a few hours from the end of the race. We weren't judging. Heck, we had skipped 20 miles of the first bike and were feeling pretty spent nonetheless. It definitely wasn't the longest or climbiest race but it was taking it's toll for sure. Whatever it was: storms, mud, bad pre-race sleep, soul-sucking hike-a-bikes or other hardships, the racers were definitely feeling it.

Here we elected to find a single optional CP on this leg, I think it was CP28. We hiked out to it's approximate location and, immediately, the small nearby road was not corresponding to the map (at least to my sleepy pre-dawn brain) and I was not sure where exactly to point us as we looked for a "Waterfall". With all the recent rain, any waterfall should be really gushing, and so we were seeking with our ears as much as our eyes. We found several small falls but nothing substantial, while my altimeter told me that we had already gone far enough. I really didn't have the mental energy to figure it all out and re-attack, so after 20-30 minutes of fruitless bushwhacking in moderately technical terrain, I called off the search and directed us out of the woods back to the TA.

We said goodbye to TA boss Jason and biked off to the finish line in Warren, 10 miles away. This was easy nav once I we realized that a road called FR160 was not the same as an adjacent road called F160. Reed and I rode side-by-side trying to keep each other awake. We each blearily saw lots of hallucinated bears in the trees flying by us. We were revived quite a bit when daylight finally conquered the fog of dawn, and rode to the finish line without further issue.

It was really nice to be done. It was not a highly successful race but we were proud to have completed a version of the course, albeit unofficially. Discounting the car ride, we covered about 80 miles while climbing about 9000 feet and felt satisfied with the results of our trip.

We would love to thank the NYARA team (Courain branch) and all of the volunteers and sponsors who helped make this happen. It will certainly be a long-lasting memory for this father and son team.

Deposit in calorie bank on the trip home, Bath, NY.