Training Log Archive: Bash

It's been a week since a devastating earthquake hit Christchurch, the beautiful city that welcomed us with open arms. 'Bent and I tuned into Radio New Zealand at 6:51 p.m. to share in their national two minutes of silence exactly seven days later. The latest estimate is that about 240 people have lost their lives. Officials have warned families that the damage is so severe that some of their loved ones may never be found. Many more people have lost their homes or workplaces. Families have left town, some of them for good. Their children are frightened after two major earthquakes in five months. The town's centre is in ruins.

We hear about tragedies on the news every day but sadly, we aren't able to give them all the attention they deserve. This one feels more real to us because we recognize the rubble-strewn downtown streets we shopped on, the damaged coffee shop we sat in, the heaved-up roads we drove on, the broken cliff we stood under and the collapsed cathedral we explored. Sometimes when things like this happen, you feel relieved, "Holy crap, if that had happened a week earlier, I could have been killed." But honestly, my thoughts haven't gone there, at least not so far. I'm heartbroken for the people of Christchurch who treated us with such kindness and for their lovely city that lies in ruins.

Over the past week, Jack and I have communicated with some of the people we met. A couple have lost their homes and places of work but thankfully, none have lost family members or their own lives. Because I shared so many of our NZ experiences with AP, I want to share some post-earthquake follow-up.

For our first week in Christchurch, we rented a house next to Hagley Park, a huge urban green area. There is now an evacuation camp on the manicured grass.



The couple who rented us the house by the park also own a nearby motel. They did not suffer any property damage but they've been worked off their feet since the quake. First, all the people who were booked to stay with them left town or cancelled their reservations. Then they were flooded with rescue workers needing a place to stay. They feel sick about what has happened to their beloved city but don't have much time to think about it now.

The earthquake was centred under the harbour of Lyttelton where we first tested our kayaks.



To get there, we drove through a long tunnel under a mountain; it was closed for several days after the quake due to rockfall. After paddling, we visited shops and went for coffee on Lyttelton's charming main street which is now filled with rubble. Luckily, no one died there.

Our kayak guide Gaz, who has river and climbing rescue skills, joined in the urban search and rescue efforts for the first few days until the international teams arrived. He described the work as truly heartbreaking and emotionally draining. I can only imagine (thank God).



Sam, the paddler who drove the van to shuttle us on the Waimakariri River, was lucky. Thanks to "a very well timed leap", he is alive and well.



He works in the shop where my kayak is being packed in a custom-built box for shipment to Canada. The shop is structurally sound with damage to some of their wares. I haven't yet heard whether my kayak survived the quake undamaged. It doesn't matter to me at all compared to the big losses other people have suffered but it is strange having this small personal connection to a natural disaster halfway around the world.

Race Director Robin Judkins and the Coast to Coast organizers are fine.



They are based in Sumner where the race finishes. This beautiful beach suburb suffered particularly severe property damage although fortunately the loss of life was fairly low. Some cliffs in Sumner and adjacent areas have collapsed, sending large rocks plummeting onto the road where C2C competitors biked and destroying a few buildings. Some homes on top of the cliffs are closer to the edge now and may not be safe.



The apartment building we stayed in at Sumner Beach has been evacuated due to structural integrity concerns.



The senior couple who rented it to us also ran a B&B in a lovely old house where they'd lived for 34 years and raised three children. Their house - and thus their business - was destroyed and they aren't allowed to stay in the evacuated apartment, which was their intended retirement home, so they've had to leave town for now. They snuck back into their house to retrieve some treasures. They can't even drive a car up their road because of big cracks in the road. Their story made the local paper.

Finally, there is major damage to the heart of Christchurch, including the collapse of their iconic stone cathedral. It is believed that 22 bodies lie beneath the rubble.



This link uses a fascinating technique to let you compare before and after images of the cathedral and other parts of town.

If you also feel a connection to New Zealand and its current crisis, you may be interested in the international earthquake appeal fund set up by the NZ government. We don't get tax receipts for a donation but I can't find a Canadian organization that is sending a comparable percentage of their funds to NZ. I suspect the admin overhead for the new fund is relatively low so most of the money should get to where it is needed.

Spinervals 1.0 "No Slackers Allowed". Interval session with the merciless Coach Troy. Who knew I could sweat that much in a 12C basement? Must do more of these.

While watching The Daily Show. It's getting so I really don't mind the kayak erg which is good because it might be awhile till we can get out on the water.

Damn, the SPOT tracker was nice but it really is too bad I didn't have this technology for our trip to NZ.

Desperation skiing in Palgrave West with BulletDog. Temperature was 2C and rising with misty rain just starting. The forecast for the next 24 hours is rain and more rain, going up to 5C. At this time of year, you never know which ski in our woods is going to be the last one for the season so I skied because it was possible, not because I expected it to be good. When I stayed in 'Bent's tracks from this morning, it was fine other than occasional debris. When I broke trail through fresh snow, it was like skiing on warm toffee.

Of course it would have been sheer madness to ski for 42 minutes without a break so I stopped off at Crash's place for some freshly brewed coffee and good conversation. That got my strength up for the gruelling 11-minute journey home.

Hard Core DVD. It *has* been awhile, hasn't it? (Oooff!) I muted the sound so I could listen to a CBC Radio podcast while watching the core routine on TV. I missed hearing the "8 more, 7 more..." cues but that's probably a good thing since it made things more difficult mentally. Must do this more often. Valerie has been doing THE DVD 11 times a week and making me feel guilty.

Goose, Coach LD, 'Bent and I carpooled to Highlands for some awesome classic skiing. Great to spend time with the Doughtys again although there's nothing like hanging out with a couple of ski coaches to remind us how much room there is to improve!

Since we spent part of our winter in the New Zealand summer, it's been awhile since we've had the chance to focus on technique and pace on good trackset trails. I skied on my own and never felt really fast; my wax was a little dubious for both the morning and afternoon laps. But looking back at previous log entries from Highlands, it seems that my pace was good and it was my perception that was off.

Ran into Sudden briefly - looking good with the new facial hair! Had lunch with Susanne & Brian and our carpool gang. Also had a great chat with Tarno. He was on skate skis and I was on classic so that part was level 4!

Nothing but spectator sports for me today. Leanimal and 'Bent were visiting their respective parents tonight so Phatty and I headed to Schomberg for what FB would probably call: Hockey (Good).

FB was the coach. We almost walked right by him since we didn't recognize the serious-looking man in the tie and shiny black shoes.



Fortunately, we sat with the right set of parents because we were taking a risk by cheering against the home team. Will played well and had a great assist. The guys put on a good show for us, coming from behind with just a minute to go, tying the game at 4-4. They went into sudden death overtime and took the win. Woo hoo!



(iPhone pics... not always so great.)

Will smiled when he saw Phatty and me - honest - but it's hard to tell with the mouthguard. Man, that kid has grown up since I last saw him!

4 X 4 min intervals at a little faster than 10K race pace. Will keep increasing this. I haven't run many measured 10K courses and it would be a good speed goal to aim for a PB this year. I need some speed goals - not just endurance goals!

Woo hoo, I can focus on my mountain biking for awhile! Princess is still in the bike box and I'm in no rush to assemble her. I haven't decided yet but I'm thinking that I will sell her. But if I do that, I will buy a smaller road bike that fits me better. I've decided to keep a road bike in the rotation from now on - one of the little changes that resulted from doing C2C.

I've been giving my knee a chance to recover after treating it so badly in NZ. It seems to be making a good comeback. I didn't feel it on the treadmill at all but it whimpered a little on the bike trainer so I kept it short for this first ride back. I'll have to keep the cadence nice and high so it stays happy. I should be doing that anyway.

While watching The Daily Show.

Ten years ago today, we lost a close family member to an impaired driver. As a physician, he worked crazy hours for 40 years then enjoyed only a few weeks of retirement before his life was taken from him. His wife now travels alone to the places they'd dreamed of visiting together. He never met the woman his youngest son married. After delivering more than 5,000 babies in his career, he never got to see his own grandchildren. The guy who killed him had two previous driving-related criminal convictions, one of them involving alcohol.

Please drive safely and encourage your friends and kids to be responsible. One mistake can change lives forever.

Time to get back into normal training. Only 3 months till the next big race - eek! Felt surprisingly good considering how long it's been. Even bumped up the weight on a couple of exercises, thinking about Urthbuoy's comment about doing things to failure.

Another serious earthquake has struck Christchurch, this time a more devastating one with multiple fatalities. The residents had gone through so much to rebuild their homes, businesses and infrastructure from the last earthquake, and there was still plenty of work left to do. The people there were all so kind to us and my heart is with them tonight. The downtown core is built around this beautiful cathedral we visited two weeks ago. Its spire collapsed in today's quake. Sending thoughts and prayers to our friends there.

Snow was falling fast last night so 'Bent and I were excited about skiing in Palgrave for the first time in awhile.



I used my C2C swag for the first time. We all got a nice custom IceBreaker top. I bought the toque.



Turns out we only had 5-10 cm of powder on top of hard lumpy stuff so we had to be careful to avoid any potentially knee-twisting falls. Because of the recent high winds, a lot of branches were down on the trails. But aside from that, it was awesome to be out skiing in the forest again. Beautiful day!





BulletDog missed skiing while we were away and went absolutely nuts on the trails. She has now curled herself into a tiny chocolate Danish in her bed by the fireplace. (If you're reading this Trav, I am sort of plagiarizing you.) Not expecting to hear much more from her this afternoon. In fact, we're all feeling pretty relaxed after our efforts - even ThunderDog who stayed home and valiantly guarded the place.





I know some people are ready for spring but we're hoping for another 4-6 weeks of winter. Sorry! :)



Time discounted for putzing around, taking photos, talking to people we met, etc.

Before we forget (and I know for a fact that the winner has not), it's time to announce the winner of the how many times will Bash flip her kayak in NZ? pool.

Even though I dismissed his guess as ridiculous, Hammer won the pool with "0". Trav gets an honourable mention for his "-1" entry (it was negative because I was supposed to help a fellow paddler in trouble but all I did was watch sympathetically as the river swept him downstream toward our guide without a boat), as does Wombat with her guess of "1".

Trav gets bonus points for coming up with the most appropriate names for the rapids on the Waimakariri River: Diamond Splitter, Widow Maker, the Black Hole and the "Sucker"

Baloney gets bonus points for the most accurate description of some of my most memorable moments on the river: "...one partial holy crap, holy crap, HOLY CRAP, almost, partial tip, good to be counted as a .2 of a tip!"

If you count it Baloney's way, I had a total of 0.7 tips in three separate incidents. So if there were an actual prize, Wombat might contest Hammer for it.

NewPatrick - or whatever he is calling himself this afternoon - placed last with 9 tips. Sorry to let you down, mate, but I'll try to do better next time.

My own guess would have been in the 3-4 range including training and race day. But luckily for Hammer, there never *was* a race day paddle.

I went for three unplanned swims in rapids while in NZ but they all happened during river crossings while I was training and racing the C2C mountain run leg. I had one good swim on race day but Richard Ussher said he had several swims during the run and I think Frankenjack had a couple too. Damn those show-off guys - do they have to beat me at *everything*?

Interesting... In last year's Snowshoe Raid, only 3 of the top 25 teams took a penalty.

This year 13 of the top 17 teams had a penalty.

I wonder why. Many of the same people were here last year - and the year before that. Everyone racing at that level is experienced enough to account for different weather conditions and to adjust their route as they see how things are going. I suspect this year's course design enticed people to head to the far north of the map where a bail-out deadline would seem so early that it would be tempting to extend it a little to pick up a control or two. Any other thoughts on why this happened?

Nasty, nasty drive to Horseshoe Valley this morning for the Salomon Dontgetlost.ca Snowshoe Raid. 'Bent, Crash and I almost turned back after getting caught in whiteouts. Finally things improved and we made it up there. The race was delayed by an hour and I hope most teams made it.The police were advising against driving so I know some stayed home and I can't blame them. It's really bad luck after all the work that goes into an event like this.

I teamed up with Dee for the first time and she was as awesome a teammate as I'd imagined. She started the day by presenting me with a black Salomon toque to replace the one I'd lost at the IceBreaker, and it only got better from there. As we reviewed the map, the available points and our piece of string, she presented several out-of-the-box ideas, one of which we adopted after a bit of analysis. (Warning: without seeing the map or doing the event, my race report will probably make dull reading.)

Our first instinct was to leave the south loop for the end. It was a group of 4 controls close to the finish, and it's always nice in a rogaine-style event to leave a loop to do near the end when you know how much time you have left. The problem was that this was by far the most "lucrative" part of the map and it would really hurt us to miss it. So we decided to do it first. Using the all-important string, we established several bail-out times and locations along the way - very important if we weren't going to have a loop to play with at the end.

Starting the race in chilly blowing snow, we set out on the south loop accompanied by a crew of other like-minded racers. For #61 and 62, we just stayed with the group. Moving on to #64, most runners took off to the west. We quietly ducked east where we reached the control just after Phatty and Harps and well before most of the others. It was kind of cool on the way to #63 and running north along the road afterward since we were still with a bunch of top competitors after 20 minutes of racing. Eventually they disappeared over the horizon, and normal order was restored to the universe once again. :)

We hit Horseshoe Valley Road at the same time as our biggest (and friendliest) rivals, Leanimal and Crash, the defending female champions. They continued north into the Matrix while we headed east, then turned north on the road that runs along the east side of the map. Keeping careful track of our location, we ran up the road until we got close to #75.

We ducked in at the right spot then used terrain features since we couldn't see the trails. Travel in the woods was physically tough today. There was a thick crust that would sometimes hold us and sometimes break and it wasn't always possible to predict when it would do what. Travelling in other people's tracks was sometimes harder because of the crust. Coming down one steep hill, Dee slid, her foot caught and her knee bent back 180 degrees. Yikes! Her foot was so totally stuck that I had to dig it out with my hands, then lift the toe of her snowshoe until she could escape from the crust. Wild stuff!

We said hi to Bender and Dr. Wells as we all made our way to #74 together, then they turned north to clean the course while we turned south to #73.

Then into the Matrix. We hit #72 together on our way in then split up. I did #71 and #69. We gave Dee a serious hill climbing assignment where she picked up #70 and #68. We didn't divide it up quite evenly. I spent 10 minutes in blowing snow at the aid station and huddled against an old ski building when my fingertips started to freeze.

Reunited, we checked our watches and decided that #81 would be too much of a push so we ran on roads to access the golf fairway that would lead us to #82. After that, most of our running was on hard-packed snowshoe trails or roads. We got #67 and, as it turns out, could have got #66 for 10 more points but decided not to take the chance because we didn't know how tough the ski hill climb would be. We made a beeline for #65 and the golf club, arriving at the finish with 5 minutes to spare. I'm bad for cutting my time too tight in rogaines so it was a treat to get back with a few minutes to spare. Nice to see Frankenjack at the finish!

During the 3-hour race, I drank about 1 cup of eLoad and ate exactly one of the many treats in my pack. This was very wrong of me. Please don't try this at home.

Contrary to my prediction (and my monetary bet with 'Bent), we managed to sneak ahead of the talented Salomon Bobkittens for the win in the female category and 11th overall with 500 points.

One cool thing about today's event was the large number of women who participated. I'm not sure how many teams stayed home due to weather but 86 of 204 registered racers were women, including 27 female teams, many of whom were happily telling stories in the change room afterward. Excellent to see that.

The only bad aspect of the day was pain in my right knee, the one that was inflamed in Coast to Coast last Saturday. I guess it wasn't quite ready to jump back into action - road running, specifically. Ice and Vitamin I are flowing freely tonight.

Big thanks to Getawaystix who always organizes a top notch event. Although we've been in the same location for several years, each Snowshoe Raid has had a different character. The smaller number of controls this year and the restrictions placed on GHO by the landowners made the route choices in this year's Raid quite different and non-obvious. We looked at a bunch of options before settling on our plan. I didn't talk to anyone else who went the same way so I'm sure there were lots of other good routes.

Great to see so many friends out there, many of whom were on the podium in their various categories, including Goose and 'Bent. Honourable mention to Hammer and AdventureGirl! who won the Family category with an amazing 400 points. Congrats to all!

Someone shoot me, please! I can't get the "Double Dream Hands" song out of my head this afternoon.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dm7yAWpX1Mc

The idea has been brewing for awhile and today I sent the Tree Huggers' deposit for the APEX Race, a 4-day non-stop adventure race in Interlaken, Switzerland (the area where the Eiger is). Disciplines are paddling (lakes and class II whitewater rivers in kayaks and canoes), running / trekking, mountain biking, canyoning, whitewater rafting and paragliding. We look forward to sharing the experience with our friends from Team Running Free. I think I'll *have* to carry a camera for this one!

Just added the closing report from Coast to Coast on Sun. Feb. 13, including photos of Jack on the podium.

Back in Palgrave and loving it! Tough run through heavy, wet snow but my legs felt surprisingly good.

To close off the story of Coast to Coast, here's what happened the day after the race. Between racers, staff and support crew, there were thousands of people involved in the event. We got together at the Christchurch Convention Centre and the place was super crowded. This was just one of the areas where people congregated.



There was a brunch going on upstairs and another large atrium where people were chatting and looking at results. Speaking of results, about 1 in 8 racers DNFed on the 1-day course. I noticed that the DNFs included Bib #s 91, 92, 93 and 94 (me). Curious about this trend, I looked closer and discovered something interesting. Although about 30% of the 1-day racers were from outside NZ (hard to determine since NZ locals like Elina Ussher and Emily Miazga represent Finland and Canada), about 50% of the DNFs were from outside NZ. Looking at it another way, about 1 in 11 New Zealanders in the 1-day race DNFed compared with 1 in 5 foreigners. So there is definitely an advantage to living close by, testing the course and learning as you try the race more than once. Oooh, I wish it were practical to try again next year! :)

The prize giving ceremony was held in the big convention hall.







With Speight's as the title sponsor, anyone called onto the stage got a case of 12 beer in addition to any other prizing.



Race Director Robin Judkins is quite a character and kept things as entertaining as possible for an awards ceremony that lasted well over 2 hours.



Along with the prizes for various categories, there were trophies for people who had done something extraordinary, e.g. helping a fellow competitor beyond the call of duty. There was even a prize for the person who placed 100th in the 1-day race. It had been donated in memory of a man who had been very proud of placing exactly 100th. There were all kinds of prizes for the 2-day race - individuals and teams in all different age/gender categories, school teams (who did not get beer) and so on. Not so many for the 1-day race, which was also the World Championship and was only open to individuals. There were terrific draw prizes although they tended to be large things like kayaks or car racks so we weren't too disappointed when we failed to win.

The IceBreaker mascot was easy on the eyes.



Top 10 women from left to right. 1st - Sophie Hart, 2nd - Elina Ussher, 3rd - Emily Miazga.



Jack gave a bottle of maple syrup to Robin Judkins before lining up with the top 10 men. There were only 3 non-New Zealanders in the top 30, and Jack did the best. We cheered wildly and hopefully didn't embarrass him too much.





The overall male and female winners gave a speech. Here's Richard Ussher.



There's the top 10 men. From the left, 1st - Richard Ussher, 2nd - Dougal Allan, 3rd - Glen Currie.



As a race experience, Coast to Coast is definitely one to consider for your life list. It's not just the race itself, although the word "epic" likely applies to a race course that crosses an entire country from sea to sea including an Alpine pass and a 67 km whitewater river. What is most incredible for people in our obscure sport is the opportunity to participate in an event that everyone seems to know about and feel positive about. Whether we were in a grocery store, a hardware store or in a restaurant, if we got chatting to someone about it, they'd say, "Oh, are you doing the 1-day or the 2-day?" Or "I hear the Waimak water levels have been really high this week." Or "My wife and I live along the bike route in Christchurch. Every year we sit on the lawn for hours to cheer on the racers."

People bent over backwards to help us. New Zealanders are great people anyway, but as soon as we said the words "Coast to Coast" and indicated that we'd come to NZ specifically for the race, people from all walks of life went out of their way to make our experience as easy and positive as possible. Nobody said we were crazy fools. Most people had a story about a friend or relative doing the race. They respect this long-running event and they're proud of the way it shows off their beautiful country.

A small industry has sprung up around C2C. You can arrange guided runs over the Deception/Mingha route where different guides will compete to show you their faster shortcuts. Paddling outfitters run trips down the Waimakariri River. You can buy a detailed guidebook that covers the mountain run and paddling routes. Almost none of the course is marked so this is handy.

In outdoor stores, we could buy "multisport first aid kits" that just happened to have the exact items we needed for C2C. One store had a wall of C2C mandatory gear items on sale. Clerks could knowledgeably discuss whether a certain piece of gear would meet the criteria for the race. In some cases, the clerks were entered in the race themselves.

Jack and I were both mentioned in the Christchurch newspaper. The day after the event, the front page of the paper had a huge colour photo of Richard Ussher hugging Elina (the local equivalent of Brangelina) at the finish line, and all our race results - yes, even mine - sigh! - were listed along with a couple of news articles on the event.

There was even a radio station that broadcast C2C news all day.

This was all beyond anything I've experienced in adventure sports in North America, although the residents of Lower North Shore Quebec made us feel like rock stars at the Coast Raid, which was also amazing. If C2C sounds appealing to you at all, I'd say it is well worth doing at least once in your life.

Five months after the start of my Coast to Coast adventure, race day was finally here! Our alarm went off at 4 a.m. (yawn) after a short night. We were lucky though; the alarm in the Van Dorp family cabin went off at 3 a.m. after a finger slipped while setting the clock.

I got dressed and had a small breakfast with strong coffee. There wasn't much room in my stomach with all the butterflies in there.



It was about 20 minutes from our motel to the bike stands where we left our bikes and shoes lined up in order of our race numbers. I had a small coloured glow stick on my bike so it would be recognizable from a distance.



We could wear extra clothing to the start and they would take it to the end of the mountain run. Same with any running shoes we left at the bike racks after changing into bike shoes. As an aside, Speight's Coast to Coast is an absolute masterpiece of organization. There are 450 people working on the race ranging from paid safety specialists to a huge number of volunteers. The event is in its 29th year and has had the same title sponsor for 22 years so it has been able to grow and mature in a way that few other adventure events in the world have done. The entry fee for the 1-day race is about $800 Canadian so you pay for what you get but it is definitely a class act.

Anyway, back to the bike racks... Jack had race number 4 so he would be one of the first runners to reach his bike after the run.



Pieces of gooey energy bar were stuck to his top tube. Yum, so appetizing!



From here, it was close to 3 km to the starting line at Kumara Beach and we had to get there on foot without lights. I crossed my fingers that I wouldn't turn my ankle in a pothole. Along the way, I got chatting to a couple of New Zealanders. Upon learning I was from Canada, one of them asked me, "Are you the one writing posts on Attackpoint about this?" Small world! "Rabbit" said he was really enjoying the photos. I never know who reads my blog but it is always a nice surprise to learn about people I haven't met.

We headed down to the beach (see Wed. Feb. 9 log entry for beach pics). Most of us walked over to the water's edge in the moonlight and waited for a tame wave so we could stick our toe in the Tasman Sea. We were supposed to line up according to race number but it seemed to be just a big pack of people on the beach. I found some numbers in the same ballpark as mine and we wished one other good luck. It was still dark so we could barely see race director Robin Judkins as he counted down the last couple of minutes.

GO!! I ran three steps before bumping into some unseen-in-the-dark obstacle at shin height (hummock? piece of driftwood?) that knocked me onto my face. The fall was nothing serious but I'd already taken a starting position near the back of the pack and now I had lost another 3-4 precious seconds. By the time I scrambled up the big boulders onto the road, I was at the back of the line of runners. At the best of times, I'm not a sprinter, especially at the start of a 243-km race.

As it turns out, this short road run was the crux of my race even though it never seemed like I was that far behind the main pack. Looking at the Garmin data, the pace of my 2nd kilometer (the only "pure" road running km) was about 10 seconds/km slower than my 10K race pace so maybe a longer warm-up would have helped. Or maybe I should have focused on treadmill speed intervals this winter instead of all the trail running and paddling that I thought would be so important for C2C. ;) Forget that - this stuff is supposed to be fun!

Compared to yesterday's 2-day racers, these people were flying. In fact, a new course record was set today for the combined 3 km run / 55 km bike section. Apparently, some years the race starts more slowly than others. Just my luck to hit the fastest year ever! By the time I hopped on my bike (#94 - a long run along the racks in numerical order), I was in last place. Ugh.

In most long events, this would be no big deal. I often start out near the back then work my way up the ranks because I feel better as a long race progresses. However, in C2C, it is a *huge* deal to be at the back at the start because the next 55 km bike ride is the only draft-legal section of the race. Riders set out in various groups working together at different paces. I wasn't far behind the last group when I started riding, and I pedalled after their tail lights like a madwoman. But a group of riders working together can go much faster than any single rider so I never really had a chance. It took me a number of kilometers of hammering to reach that sad conclusion. Even if I'd had one other rider to share the work with, I could have avoided the full brunt of the wind half the time. I did catch one guy but he wasn't doing well so he asked me to keep going. Looking at the results later, it appears that maybe 3-4 riders out of 159 rode the full distance by themselves. Even the last pair of riders who were together finished the run/bike leg about 20 minutes faster than I did. Jack and the lead pack were 56 minutes ahead of me in their record time.

The horrible thought - "my race is over" - flashed through my mind briefly then I banished it for good. I'd never cared about beating any other competitor. I only wanted to beat the time cut-offs and now I was going to have to work my butt off to make that happen. There were ups and downs on this 55 km bike ride with a net climb of about 350 meters as we headed into the Alps. In some stretches, I was fighting a headwind - argghh. The highway was closed so I only saw occasional race vehicles and volunteers for over two hours. It was dark and I was feeling a bit lonely when I remembered to listen very carefully... and then I could "hear" friends back in Canada saying, "Go Barb go"! :) Thanks to those of you who followed the race real time and also to the people who followed my log and gave support leading up to the race. You have no idea how much strength I drew from you all that morning.

Physically, I was working much harder than I wanted to that early in the race but I felt good otherwise. The one bad thing was that my knees got a little sore from pushing hard on the uphills. I tried to keep a high cadence but I know I cheated at times because I felt such a sense of urgency. I stood up on my pedals more than I ever have!

While I was on the road, Richard and Andrew were waiting in the bike/run TA at Aicken's Corner with the other support crews.





At 2 hrs 34 min, shortly after they'd given me up for dead, I finally rolled into the TA.



We had a super quick transition then I was off on the run having moved up to (woo hoo!) 3rd last place. (The rider behind me dropped out injured and I passed a guy in the TA.) We started by running 3 km on private farmland that we hadn't been able to access on our training runs.



They sent us a fair distance upstream to cross the Otira River after some racers went swimming on purpose yesterday. Then I headed up the now-familiar Deception Valley. The river was fairly high and I got swept away for a swim on my second crossing of the Deception. I was so happy to be off my bike that I was running at a good pace whenever the terrain allowed it. For the most part, I remembered where the crossings and hidden trail fragments were. When I couldn't, I played it by ear and things went well. In the upper reaches of the Deception, I caught up with several other runners and we stayed together for the final section, much of which is power walking on steep, slippery, rooty trails and climbing over big boulders.

Somewhere in here, I stepped off a big boulder onto some rocks and hyper-extended my right knee, which was hurting from the long solo bike ride. It had already been bruised and swollen all week after I'd banged into a boulder during one of my river crossing swims when we test ran the course. By this point, my knee was getting seriously peeved at me for being so careless. As we approached Goat Pass, it was inflamed enough that I started to wonder whether I could be causing permanent damage. If Goat Pass had been at a road, I would have had to seriously consider the wisdom of dropping out.

But since I was on top of a wilderness mountain pass, I figured I might as well keep going down the other side. While my run up Goat Pass was faster than our training run, my time going down to the TA was about the same. I was tentative about landing too hard on that knee when there were big drops. I'd expected to go harder on race day but after watching Richard with his knee problems for the past 18 months, I didn't want to end up in the same boat. Even so, my overall mountain run time (5 hrs 51 min) was faster than our estimate. Combined with a proper group bike ride, I would have been in good shape at this point.

Photo credit to Paul's Camera Shop for several pics of me on the mountain run.







Richard and Andrew were waiting and watching at the run/bike TA at Klondyke Corner.







Richard Ussher's support crew member carried his racer's gear on a belt.



Ussher's transitions are smooooooth.





Our friend Sam Clark came in looking strong just a few minutes after Richard. More on him later.



Waiting for Jack, the boys wore some of his gear so it would be ready to transfer quickly.



No photos of Jack since all hands were on deck when he was in the TA. So here's a photo of someone else with his crew and you'll just have to pretend it is Jack.



One thing that went right today was the TAs. We were so efficient that I don't think I could have gained any time there. Richard and Andrew were awesome. We'd planned and discussed everything in detail and they made smart decisions on the fly. My crew didn't let me stand still for any longer than it took to change shoes - and after my transition practice with Jack, that went quickly! The boys said that our TAs were faster than many of the racers in our part of the pack. Of course, when you're fast enough on the race course, you can afford an extra minute or two in the TA.


Late in the run, I looked at my watch frequently, as if it would suddenly change its mind and tell me better news. The problem was this: I had to arrive on the north side of Mt. Whyte bridge by 3 p.m. That was the TA for the start of the kayak section. If I got there by 3 p.m., I had till 3:15 p.m. to get my boat in the water, which would be simple. To get there from the end of the mountain run, I had to do a hilly 15 km bike ride followed by an 800 meter run down a gravel road in bike shoes to get across the bridge. As I ran down the Mingha Valley, I kept doing the math and trying to be optimistic. A few kilometers from the end, I realized I was too late but I still wanted to push hard to miss the cut-off by as little as possible. A brief wave of emotion washed over me but after exactly one dry-eyed, gut wrenching sob, I was fine - and I've been fine about it ever since. When I scrambled up the bank into the Klondyke Corner TA, I expected my crew to tell me we had to pull the plug.





But no! An official had told Richard that the 3 p.m. arrival cut-off at Mt. Whyte was soft - that I should be fine as long as I could start paddling by 3:15 p.m. Sure, I could do that. No problem. So Richard ran with me along the chute and we planned what we would do after I'd crossed the timing mat when he would be allowed to start helping me.



I didn't take off my run pack - just asked Richard to pull all the mandatory mountain gear out of it, then I grabbed my bike shoes and helmet from Andrew and took off super quickly at 2:29 p.m.. So quickly that I had a big hunk of hair sticking out the front of my helmet over my face so I couldn't see very well! The next 15 km of biking was twisty and hilly, and the highway was open to traffic, so it would have been nice to be able to see. I pushed hard and it went well. I got over 50 kph on two curving descents with guard rails and steep drop-offs. Maybe it was best that I couldn't see! On one of the climbs I could feel a tailwind pushing me up. The road twisted enough that the wind wasn't always going in a helpful direction though.

Richard and Andrew packed up at the run/bike TA and sped past me to get to the bike/kayak TA before I did.





I got to the bike drop, then Richard and I ran together down the gravel road to Mt. Whyte bridge. I had 800 meters to run in bike shoes. Andrew was waiting on the far side of the bridge with my kayak. Chris and Nelvia had taken both kayaks there in the morning for "scrutineering", a formal check of the kayak and all mandatory gear. Andrew waited with my kayak until the official counted down and said, "OK, this TA is closed". Andrew picked up my boat immediately and walked along the riverbank to the bridge. Richard and I met him on the bridge so it's possible that the cut-off was extended a little after 3 p.m. on my watch. However, when I got across the bridge, it was 3:07 and I'd missed it for sure. The cut-off time to launch my kayak would have been 3:15 p.m. and it would have been easy to do that - but the rules don't work that way.

As it turns out, I was lucky. They cut off one of the women I'd met on the run even though she arrived *before* 3 p.m. They wouldn't let her go because she had a plastic kayak; they said she would hold up the sweep kayakers. I met another fellow who was told at 2:15 p.m. that they recommended against him going unless he was an experienced paddler because the wind was strong in the Gorge. He'd had a couple of swims on his training run so decided to call it a day. If I'd been there by 3 p.m. it would have taken a team of wild horses to prevent me from getting into my kayak! :)

It would have been a challenging day on the river. A number of kayakers, including Jack, were blown over by the wind. (Jack rolled up.) The day after the race, they had to extract 30 boats that were left behind, mostly by 2-day racers. Reviewing the times for the leg, it looks like a 3 p.m. arrival would have given me a shot at making it down the river before the cut-off in a moderately fast boat with reasonable paddling skills. I would have had to work hard to keep the pace up and do my best to avoid swimming. It wouldn't have been easy but I would like to have tried.

After sticking my toe in the Tasman Sea at the start, I decided it would be appropriate to stick my toe into the Waimakariri River where I finished. I didn't do Coast to Coast - just Coast Over The Alps to the Upper River. But at least I wanted to do it properly!



Such a beautiful place! It's a sign of progress that I was genuinely disappointed when I was denied the chance to paddle 67 km of whitewater at a relatively high water level. A few months ago, I might have been secretly relieved.



It's a bit of a production to get DNF'ed in a big event like this. I had to fill out and sign a form stating the reason for my DNF. The other woman in the photo is Shelley, the Australian woman with whom I ran the upper part of Goat Pass. She was the one turned back for having a plastic kayak.



Even worse, after doing the paperwork, the official had to strip us of our bibs! Some competitors find it tempting to continue from Coast to Coast using some other mode of transportation, e.g. biking to the finish. So they don't want you to look like you're in the race anymore. I'm hoping I will get my bib back some day; the official said that I would. Sniff sniff!

We packed up the car, looked at our watches and decided that Jack was already biking to the finish in Sumner Beach so we had better head straight there.



As soon as we got back into cell phone range, I checked Attackpoint and was stunned to see the "RACE DAY" thread on my log with 80 comments. I read them out loud to Richard and Andrew as we sped toward Christchurch. Chris, it is so cool that you prepared the map with TA locations and cut-off times. You made the race much more understandable for online spectators. Valerie, we were laughing so hard at your version of my race report that we nearly went off the road. We were blown away by how accurately you guys collectively guessed what was going on. Thanks so much to all of you who made me smile at a time when I might have started to feel down.

We parked by the finish line in Sumner Beach and dashed over to see who had come in. Only Richard Ussher (10 hrs 41 min) and a few other racers were done. We positioned ourselves to get good photos of Jack.







He finished looking strong and happy, placing 9th in a time of 11 hrs 58 min.



When you cross the finish line, they hand you a Speight's Ale.



When you DNF, they hand you nothing but a form to sign before stripping you of your bib. Honestly, I think the DNFers need the alcohol more than the finishers. But I digress...

As the only non-New Zealander in the top 10, Jack was a big enough deal that he had to be interviewed by the media before we could get to him.



A very proud group of Canadians!



Race Director Robin Judkins congratulated Jack too.



Richard Ussher was waiting for his wife Elina to cross the line.



Jack went over to congratulate Richard - and possibly to do some trash talking before their next race. Not sure. ;)



Dr. Sophie Hart, a multi-sport athlete from Nelson, took the win for the first time. She was so filled with joy, it was contagious.



Elina placed second and looked tired after a big effort. She had the fastest mountain run but got passed on the kayak.





Remember I was saying that her kayak looked wider than I'd expected for a top athlete? It turns out she has two kayaks that she uses on the Waimakariri River depending on the conditions. The wider kayak is for higher river levels.

Nathan Fa'avae was with the Media crew.



Jack is with Bill (left) and Sam Clark, a super friendly father and son we met half a dozen times during our trip to New Zealand. They were doing the same thing we were - testing different pieces of the course leading up to the race. When we did our training run up the Deception/Mingha, Sam was just starting as we arrived so Jack had a running buddy to push the pace. Sam won the 2-day race in 2008. This year he tried the 1-day race and placed 5th. He was just 5 minutes behind Richard Ussher after the mountain run. By the way, did I mention that Sam is 20 years old?!? Talk about an amazingly bright future in endurance sports!



After watching the top finishers come in, we all relaxed, asked each other about our respective days, and enjoyed the beach. No, just kidding. We all started tapping madly on our phones, ignoring each other completely as we sent out news flashes. ;)



We'd managed to score an amazing apartment overlooking the finish line so we sat out on the porch in the evening and watched until the last finisher came in around 10:40 p.m.



Huge congratulations to Jack on an awesome performance! And a big thank you to our amazing support crew - Richard, Andrew, Chris and Nelvia. It was fun travelling with the gang around New Zealand and it was a great experience to see how a top racer like Jack approaches an event like this.

As for me, of course I would have loved to finish C2C. I always knew that the cut-offs were going to be tight if not impossible - although I wasn't expecting it to happen quite the way it did. As it turns out, my mountain running and kayaking skills/speed were sufficient to finish the race on time. My road running sprints, however, need work.

Some time ago, organizers had advised us to switch to the 2-day race if we had any concerns about meeting cut-offs. If it was only about finishing ranked, that's what I would have done but I really wanted to take a shot at being the age group World Multisport Champion even if it meant going down in flames.

The 1-day event isn't really aimed at people like me. Only 24 of the 159 competitors in the 1-day race were women and only a handful of them were over 40. Almost all of them live in NZ and can train on the race course more often than I did. Comparing the Day 1 part of my course with the 2-day race results, I would have been leading my category by over an hour after the first day. So I think I made the right choice. I can come back to do the 2-day event another time, and I hope I do. But I'm glad I tried to "go big" this year, even though I ended up "going home".

No regrets whatsoever about the amazing 5-month adventure of preparing for and racing in C2C. It's been terrific training for anything I might do. I've become a stronger racer, improved my skills, deepened friendships and had a load of fun. I guess there is one regret... the fact that it's over now! I'll need to find a new adventure soon to keep things fun and motivating. Some ideas are brewing. Stay tuned to this space. :)

Last preparation day before Coast to Coast.

About 75-80% of participants do the 2-day version of Coast to Coast. You can do it as an individual or as a relay team. On Day 1, they do the 3 km road run, the 55 km bike ride and the 33 km mountain run, then they camp at Klondyke Corner. Relay teams switch at the end of the bike ride. On Day 2, the kayaker (who cannot also do the mountain run) bikes 15 km to the river and does the 67 km paddle then the other teammate rides 70K to Christchurch.

Because they have a shorter day, they start at 7 a.m. We thought it would be good practice for us to get up early and drive to the race start in Kumara - plus it would be cool to see what the start looked like!



It was just getting light when the gun went off. The 1-day race will start tomorrow at 6 a.m. when it's still dark.





The top runners were going at a good clip. The leaders want to get together into a group to push the pace together on the 55 km bike.



By the middle of the pack, racers were going at a more moderate pace. The last few competitors alternated walking and running as they went up a small rise a few hundred meters from the start. I was glad to see racers pacing themselves carefully at the start of a 243-km event. (Cue the ominous, foreshadowing music...)



After stopping in town to shop for some final supplies (the first of several "final" trips to town), we headed back to our motel to work on some pre-race projects. First on the list was some boatbuilding to make Jack's kayak more hydrodynamic after its recent repair.



Jack obviously needed to practise getting into his kayak since his first instinct wasn't so good. ;)



Chris and Jack also practised the way to get him out of the kayak when he arrives at the Gorge Bridge. After 4-6 hours in a kayak, paddlers may have trouble getting out on their own. Their leg muscles are probably sore and their feet may be numb. As a special treat for their support crew carrying the boat uphill to the vehicle, the kayak is often sloshing with urine. (We did not practise that...)



I had a few last-minute things to set up on my kayak then Richard practised lifting me out too.



At high noon, we scheduled a walkthrough of the entire race on the dining room table using items from our kitchenette. Here was the van starting the race with two kayaks on the roof.



The car was a small basket. I was represented by the wine glass with pink carabiner. Jack was represented by a can of beans. (Heard of Jack and the Beanstalk?) Each transition was represented by a piece of paper. As we moved along the dining room table, i.e. through the race, we referred to the times on our Gantt chart and determined which of our two support crews (Team Car and Team Van) would take care of each task, when they could have lunch, when they might have wireless Internet access or cell coverage, etc. The support crew added to their copious notes. This took 90 minutes!



I filled bladders, put food in pack pockets, finalized the "transition tasks" list for my support crew and organized my gear so they could locate it easily.



We figured out a way that I could carry the SPOT on each leg so it could easily be transferred to different packs and my PFD. For the mountain run, I planned to carry eLoad and drink water from the rivers, so Richard devised a way to clip a small plastic cup onto my vest pack. It was tucked into the vest when I wasn't using it. I had a similar drinking cup carabinered to my kayak skirt without any loose cord.



We loaded the vehicles in the evening since our alarm was set for 4 a.m. Before turning off the light, I read through the guidebook one last time, reviewing the photos of the river crossing locations on the mountain run and the various rapids on the Waimakariri River ("in Boulder Garden #2, start on the left then paddle quickly to the right to avoid the big rock at the bottom"). Then lights out.

P.S. As I write this, I realize how geeky this may sound! Because I'm not fast, I need to focus on little details. Those are the things I can improve on and hopefully learn to do almost as well as the top racers. More importantly for us, when someone is racing at Jack's level, every second matters. He leaves nothing to chance. Every detail is pre-planned. Every race activity is well-rehearsed - not just the athletic training. Very inspiring and interesting for us all to watch.

Signing off now. Race day is tomorrow. It's almost dinnertime Fri. night in NZ. If you're interested in keeping an eye on Jack and me as we race Coast to Coast, we start on Sat. at 6 a.m. in New Zealand. That's Friday noon in Toronto. Jack should be finished 12 hrs later. I'm aiming for 17 hrs, i.e. Sat. 5 a.m. at home.

Live race coverage is here - it's already started for the 2-day race. They'll mention the leaders here so be sure to cheer for Jack!
<http://www.sportzhubevents.com/ctc2011/#>

My SPOT tracker is here. This should be the most current info on what I'm doing. There won't be any messages until just before the race starts.
<http://share.findmespot.com/shared/faces/viewspots...>

Richard will attempt to update my Facebook status.
<http://www.facebook.com/Barb.J.Campbell>

Jack's team will be updating the Van Dorp Racing page. Anyone can "like" this page.
<http://www.facebook.com/vandorpracing>

Thanks so much for the long distance support. I don't know if I can do this thing but I'm going to try my hardest. Catch you on the other side!

Almost there! Jack developed a Gantt Chart last night for our two support crews and went over maps with 'Bent. Both crews will support Jack at different points to make things more efficient for him at the front of the race. I'll get by just fine with one crew!



We're mostly down to last-minute fussing with gear and food. I had to clean my boat and shoes to prevent the spread of didymo - an invasive species of algae. (We need to sign a form about this at registration.) Tomorrow we'll need to do more transition practice with support crew.

Today 'Bent and I figured out how to attach little plastic cups to my kayak skirt and Salomon vest pack so I can drink from rivers easily on the paddle and run. The one remaining task is to find a way to transfer the SPOT unit easily as I change disciplines. My iPhone has been wonky so the SPOT unit might be the only info available on my race. If the iPhone works, there'll be some updates on my Facebook profile. Jack's crew will be updating his Facebook page, "Van Dorp Racing" and there should also be updates on his progress on the main race website.

Because most racers do the two-day event, i.e. the same race course but at a more reasonable pace, the race registration, banquet and briefing were tonight. Registration was low key. Nice beer garden, a few vendor booths. I was one of the few racers picked for a mandatory gear check.





I've never seen so many expensive bikes and kayaks in one small town!



I've decided to bring my kayak home to Canada with me - assuming that it survives the race. The river is still high which is probably good since it will be similar to the way it was when we paddled it. Also, our paddle will go faster. But if I go for a swim, it could be a really, really long one. Speaking of kayaks, here's the hot pink one Elina Ussher paddles. It doesn't look as narrow and tippy as I would have expected from someone who has won the race.



The Kumara ladies put on a yummy banquet for over 1,000 people in two sittings. Apparently, it is the only fundraiser the local school needs each year. Our NZ support crew member, Andrew Connochie arrived to join us tonight.



'Bent made a new friend in Kumara.



I had the pleasure of meeting well-known adventure racer Steve Gurney and race director Robin Judkins. They are racing together in the 2-day event this year.

Transition practice. Run/bike/run/bike. Frankenjack was so much faster than me at switching from running to bike shoes that my head was spinning.





He had 150 meters on me before I was on my bike. We had a little shoe-change coaching session afterward and my speed has improved. The secret was to modify my shoes somewhat. I don't need no stinkin' laces!





We rode from our hotel and turned onto a road that had some big bends and a pretty good hill. I got up to 51 kph going downhill. When I turned around to come back, it wasn't quite as impressive, particularly in the wind. Trucks whizzed by a few inches away. Not my thing. But I'm still going to let Revy try to convince me. :)

Off the bike and onto the run. 'Bent was practising handing me things and taking things away. I can no longer hide the truth... as you can see here, I'm going to wear a Camelbak on a road bike so I can focus on drafting in a bunch. I realize that if I had any road biking cred, I would totally lose it over this decision. But that's OK - I don't.



More shoe-change practice is needed.



I was just planning a token run but I felt strangely obligated to meet the Urthbuoy standard of "20 minutes or it's not a brick". Stoopid Urthbuoy and his resolutions. 'Bent came with me and Chris joined us for the last section after he'd run with Frankenjack, so it was nice and social.

We drove south to Hokitika for some pre-race chillaxing. As Bender pointed out, there is a Sock Museum in town.



We elected to skip it and spent most of our time in shops or on the beach. It was cool and the surf was high (maybe cyclone related?) so no one was tempted to swim.



Note that I am continuing to wear my "safe journey over water" pendant.



There had been a recent driftwood sculpture contest on the beach. Some of the entries were worse for the wear but others looked great. It was like walking around ice sculptures after a short thaw.





This was the overall winner.



This guy was very cool.





We drove out of town to hike into Hokitika Gorge, a place that gets 7.5 m of rain a year - over twice as much as the town.



It felt like we'd been teleported to Costa Rica.









Nice gorge and suspension bridge.



Of course I had to check out the way eddies and boils were forming around the bluffs. There are a lot of bluffs on the Waimakariri River so it's been on my mind.



On the way back, we visited the Coast to Coast starting line at Kumara. The race is in its 29th year and there is a permanent marker with a plaque. We'll be going from here into those mountains behind us, starting with a 3 km road run to a 55 km bike leg.





Frankenjack and I looked at the Tasman Sea where we'll be dipping our toes on Saturday morning in the dark.



I walked down onto the beach where we'll be starting. The first thing we'll do is run up those rocks to get onto the road. I practised doing that a couple of times.



'Bent and our other support crew members won't come to Kumara on race day so he went down to the water's edge as well.

Our 8 nights in Christchurch flew by. Today we drove to the west coast to stay near Kumara where we'll start Coast to Coast. 'Bent and Frankenjack did a masterful packing job, filling the van with 2 bicycles, gear for 5 people (including bulky camping and race gear), groceries and more. We all got a seat although some of us had backpacks under our legs. You may wonder why there's only one kayak on the roof. Frankenjack's is in the shop. Without naming names, let's just say that one of us avoided rocks on the Waimak better than the other. :)



The road to Arthur's Pass National Park has become very, very familiar over the past week. This is the west side of the pass. If the rivers are too high, we will be running this steep road as part of the "Plan B" race course, which mostly consists of road biking and road running.



For the first time, we continued past the Deception Valley and drove in the reverse direction on the 55 km bike leg that we'll do near the start of the race. (We begin with a 3 km run from a beach on the Tasman Sea to the bikes.) From reading about the race, it sounds like the big challenge in this section will be riding in a peleton or "bunch" as they call it here. The first part of the challenge is running fast enough to your bike and changing your shoes (if you do) so you can get into a bunch. If you succeed, there are the usual challenges of riding in a group of people you don't know - avoiding each other's tires and praying that the people ahead of you don't crash.

Frankenjack advises staying on the left so I can ride onto the grass if anything happens ahead of me. (Remember that we'll be riding on the left side of the road.) It's safer to be near the front of the bunch although you don't want to end up working too hard and taking other people along for a free ride. We'll be climbing over 300 meters and there are a couple of steep sections, so it's going to be a great way to warm up for a long day!

It rains more on the west coast and the vegetation became more lush as we drove.



We're staying in the country north of Greymouth. Not much going on here - should be a great, restful place for our final preparations.



Because Bender was kind enough to recommend a good restaurant for our dinner, we went for Indian food tonight. It turns out Priya has several locations in the area so we went to the one in Greymouth. Yummy food - thanks for the suggestion!

It was 36C in Christchurch yesterday. We don't have A/C so we were melting while reading everyone's AP logs about playing in the snow back home. Gotta admit, we were jealous.

Today is 14C with rain pelting down. There are two cyclones near NZ but the weather is currently forecast to be relatively clear around the race course for a couple of days before C2C. This matters because the course will have to be altered dramatically if the rivers are high. That's what happened to Frankenjack last year and that's why he came back. Neither the mountain run nor the Waimakariri paddle can happen if the river is too high. It has been too high on several days since we arrived, including today/tomorrow.

We're leaving Christchurch to head to the west coast tomorrow. We have 4 nights there before C2C although we'll be setting the alarm before 4 a.m. on the last night so maybe it shouldn't count.

Frankenjack has seen the light and purchased a fast-looking pair of black Salomon Speedcross shoes for the mountain run. I'll be in Salomon XA Pros. I normally wear SLAB Wings for trail races but the Deception Valley terrain is too rough for me to go that light.

Most of my pre-race shopping is done. The bed is covered with little piles of clothing and gear for each transition. Gels and bars are in a central heap waiting to be divvied up.

We're still fussing with some final details like our kayak drinking systems. The current best idea is a long piece of tubing that we'll use like a straw to sip from the river, which is potable. Alternate plan is a plastic cup for dipping. I'll also have eLoad on the back of my PFD - but less is better since the bladder is above my centre of gravity.

To keep the river gods happy, I started wearing my "safe journey over water" pendant today.

Sunday - day of rest and boy, was I ready for *that*! 'Bent and I walked to downtown Christchurch through Hagley Park and the Botanical Gardens.







'Bent couldn't resist visiting the pull-up rings he'd found in the park a few days ago.



And I couldn't resist being a Tree Hugger.



We went to the Canterbury Museum's special exhibit of photography from the Scott and Shackleton Antarctic expeditions a century ago. Most Antarctic expeditions past and present have passed through Christchurch and there is some very cool stuff to be seen in the museum and International Antarctic Centre. A year or two ago, I read the #1 book on National Geographic's Top 100 Adventure Books List, "The Worst Journey in the World" by Apsley Cherry-Garrard. It is a fascinating story of the Scott expedition, well worth reading. Today we saw large, beautiful prints from Scott expedition photographer Herbert Ponting, a master of composition. The Shackleton photos were excellent too, although many of the negatives were lost when their ship sank.



This sculpture of Captain Robert Falcon Scott was made by his widow Kathleen and presented to the City of Christchurch.



Downtown Christchurch has a British feel.





There is also an Italian place.



We've seen earthquake damage and ongoing repairs in many places around town. Some businesses have closed or moved to different locations. Parts of some buildings have been condemned as unsafe. For the most part though, things look surprisingly normal.



Today is a national holiday - Waitangi Day. As one person explained to us, it's not really a celebration since it commemorates a treaty between Maori natives and British settlers, and apparently the treaty was not translated correctly from English to Maori. There are still disputes and Waitangi Day is a popular day for protests. However, it's also a day for family picnics and outdoor concerts and we only saw that sort of thing.



By the Arts Centre, there was an outdoor market and food fair. I bought a jade pendant that combines two traditional Maori symbols, the Koru (spiral) and the Fish Hook.



The Koru depicts growth, new beginnings and harmony. The Fish Hook represents strength and determination, and brings peace, prosperity and good health. Best of all, it provides a safe journey over water. That all sounded good to me.

Since I'm going to be doing a lot of journeying over water in C2C, between the river crossings and the whitewater kayaking, I bought another pendant - a Fish Hook made of paua shell. I should be well covered!

Back to the Deception/Mingha route in Arthur's Pass National Park. Frankenjack's brother-in-law Chris generously agreed to join me for a training "run" version of this route.

I'm using quotes because there were many places where we hauled ourselves over big boulders, crossed rivers, made our way over loose scree slopes or rock fields, or carefully balanced on slimy tree roots on steep, twisty forest paths. There are stretches where the running is relatively good but on the way up the Deception Valley, they rarely last long. On the descent from Goat Pass into the Mingha Valley, we were able to run more.

I carried my race pack with mandatory gear so I'm afraid I need to break the news gently to FB... I didn't take any photos. However, you can refer back to Tuesday to see exactly what it looked like. :)

The Deception River was higher today. I'd hoped to do all the crossings by myself, which I will need to do in the race unless I find a friendly fellow racer at the crucial moment. I succeeded on the first one but the next few crossings were swift, deep and treacherous. If Chris hadn't been there to link arms and fish me out of the current when things went awry, I would have turned back. Apparently, the most common type of wilderness death in NZ is hikers who screw up river crossings and go cartwheeling downriver away from their friends. Ironically, after having zero swims on a 70 km whitewater kayak paddle yesterday, my feet got swept out from under me and I went for two unplanned swims today. Guess I should stick with the kayaking!

Seems I'm always trying new stuff lately and today was no exception. Frankenjack taped my ankles, somewhat against my will. (He and 'Bent were insistent but I don't like making changes right before a race - especially to my feet.) It felt funny for the first few kms but then it was really good and I felt it save me from a couple of bigger ankle twists. Cool!

Also good for my ankles was Coach Frankenjack's latest advice: when you look ahead in rocky terrain and plan to take a step, take three smaller steps instead. Amongst other things, this can save you if a rock rolls when you step on it.

We added the extra 3 km from the Mingha parking lot to Klondyke Corner so this was almost all of the mountain run section with the exception of the first 2.5 km, which is on flat private farmland and is unavailable for training.

I hope to go a little faster on race day but I can't climb boulders or cross thigh-deep rivers any faster. To make cut-offs comfortably, I was hoping for a 5-hour mountain run and that doesn't appear possible for me in this terrain. So now I'm going to have to hope that the Waimakariri River is *really* big and fast on race day, and that I don't go for any swims. (Is that *me* saying this?!?) The paddle seems to be the only leg where I might be able to beat my time estimate if conditions are right. Who'd have thunk it?

Looks like paddling is a go! See SPOT link to follow us starting around 4pm Ont time. Nervous...

At last the weather cooperated so that Jack and I were able to paddle the Waimakariri River on a guided trip with Paddlerzone. Sunny and warm but the water was frigid.





It's helpful for Coast to Coast racers to go down the river with someone who is familiar with the way the rapids are running this year and the way they change from day to day depending on water levels. Our awesome guide Gaz knew his stuff inside out. Upon seeing the river level at our put-in at Mt. Whyte, he said, "I'll be honest - that's big. We'll do the first 15 km but we might have to pull the plug before the Gorge for safety reasons. If we're able to go in there, it'll be flowing really fast."



As you can imagine, that news increased my heart rate a little.



Note my fashionable look. To solve the problem of having no knee braces in my kayak and no glue to make them, I put pieces of closed cell foam into the knees of my fuzzy rubber pants. Worked like a charm. Looked ridiculous. I'll do this on race day.

In addition to Jack and me, there were two other paddlers. Bryce is in the 1-day race with us and Neil is doing the 2-day race. Both were using plastic sea kayaks; that seems like a common choice.







We did 70 km on the river, which had several distinct zones. Near the start and finish, there are braided sections where it's important to choose the right channel to avoid hitting shallow rocks or a dead end. Not far from the start are several rapids that can be significant, Boulder Gardens #1, 2 and 3.



About 25 km into the paddle, you enter the Gorge, a 25 km section where the river narrows and gets twisty. There are a few rapids but mostly the challenge comes from the fast-moving, often disorganized waves that build up along the outside of the curves and beneath cliffs, and from the resulting eddies and boils.





In addition to talking about how to approach specific rapids, Gaz went over some of the same whitewater tips that Urthbuoy had discussed with me, which was handy because I've been reviewing my course notes. :)



One of the key skills for the Waimak is going around bends safely while getting good speed. Nasty water, debris and sweepers tend to be on the outside of the curves. We'd stay near the inside of the bend as we approached it while aiming for the outside. There is nearly always an eddy on the inside of a bend and we wanted to just skim past its edge without getting sucked in. As soon as we'd paddled past the nastiest stuff on the outside of the bend, we'd turn the nose of our boats slightly toward the outside riverbank to get a free ride in the fast current. If you do this too soon or go too close to the outside edge, the waves - and, near the end of the paddle, the sweepers - can make this risky. Early on, I tended to sacrifice speed in favour of stability but I got braver as the day went on.



The recommended line would sometimes be in the narrow area between the edge of a wave train and an eddy line. For maximum speed, we're supposed to try to avoid the biggest waves but we need to stay close to them. If we get sucked into nasty water, the important thing is not to fight it - to aim the nose of our boat straight down it and paddle, paddle, paddle. Many racers tip because they've turned sideways trying in vain to avoid something. These long downriver boats are much more stable nose to tail than side to side.



We had lunch in the Gorge.





I was impressed by my new boat. It takes some getting used to because of all the things I need to do with my lower body - brace my knees against the sides, brace my feet on the foot braces and steer the rudder with my toes. It's way worse than chewing bubble gum and walking at the same time. It's weird not being able to control the boat with paddle strokes. It's important to remember that the rudder only works when the boat is moving - even better when it moves faster. That influences the way you have to approach whitewater - and not necessarily for the better.

I got bounced around by a lot of big waves, often getting hit from several directions at once. I took a few big waves that washed right over my head. Although my Eclipse feels tippier than the kayaks I'm used to, it seems to have excellent final stability. I had a couple of near tips in the first two hours when I was super lucky to regain my balance. There was a near disaster after lunch when I got sucked too close to a huge rock on the outside of a bend with fast water flowing over it and cascading off the sides. It knocked me to the left then I tilted way off balance to the right toward the rock and was 100% convinced that I was going to swim in some of the fastest water of the day. According to the guide, I executed an "awesome high brace". Although I do know how to do a high brace, I wish I could say I did it on purpose. It was just an unconscious "keep the paddle in the water and push hard toward an upright position to postpone the inevitable swim until I'm past this nasty stuff" thing. Amazingly, it worked. Huh. The guy behind me swam at the same rock so Gaz would have been busy if I'd gone in too. He said he's dealt with up to 4 swimmers simultaneously.



For obvious reasons, we didn't pause to take any photos of the big rapids so you'll just have to use your imagination.

So I still haven't tipped my new kayak. It will almost certainly happen in the race when I'm tired and don't have an experienced guide showing me the safest lines. Although I was ecstatic to make it down the river upright, I almost wished that I had gone for a swim just to get that experience out of my system while I had a guide watching me. The Waimak moves quickly and there are few breaks in the action. It's not easy to swim a boat to shore in the fast-moving current. In the Gorge, it just keeps moving. There are no pools at the bottoms of the rapids where you can take a break and get back into your kayak.

One fellow on our trip had two swims - not unusual on a day when the flow was so high and the waves were so big. Both times, he and our guide floated well past the rest of us as we waited by the riverbank. The procedure is to flip your kayak upright, stick your paddle into the cockpit, then swim hard for shore using one arm and kicking your feet. If you have to make a choice, swim for your paddle. Your boat is easier to locate.



Jack had a great paddle in his new JKK UFO, which is a speedier, tippier kayak than mine. No swims for him although he disappeared into a hole at one point and had us wondering until he popped back into view.

Although it was mentally exhausting since I had to be alert for 5 hours straight, it was a super fun day. We're heading back to do the mountain run again tomorrow. We might paddle part of the river again but otherwise we are ready to taper. Only one more week!

Quick ride around Hagley Park with 'Bent to make sure Princess was assembled properly after the flight. I tested the tri bars for the first time off the trainer. I feel OK when I'm in them but I'm a little wobbly moving on and off them - something I need to do smoothly since I don't have brakes on the tri bars. It'll take practice.

The phone rang at 6 a.m. to advise us that the Waimakariri River was too high to paddle today. It would not be good to paddle it for the first time in the race so my fingers are tightly crossed that the heavy rainfall warnings and severe gale warnings will stop. I'm not sure if the huge cyclone in Australia is affecting us here but this unstable weather is apparently quite unusual for February.

Our Plan B was a bike ride starting at the Gorge Bridge, which is where we start the final 70 km bike section after 67 km of paddling on the Waimak. The time cut-off here is 8:15 p.m. which means that if I make it to this point, I will be riding into Christchurch in the dark. The roads are open to traffic and about a third of the ride passes through the city so it isn't the part of the race that appeals to me most!

'Bent had borrowed a recumbent road bike from a friendly guy he'd heard about online.



Frankenjack looked very professional and speedy, of course.



He set off in the lead with the plan of doing the whole 70 km. I wanted to drive the route through Christchurch but had no interest in riding the city streets outside the race. Once will be enough.



So 'Bent and I planned to ride to Yaldhurst just inside Christchurch city limits, then Chris and Nelvia would pick us up and continue to Sumner Beach where we would meet Frankenjack.



This ride is a gentle downhill to the sea but - as warned by Getawaystix - we ran into killer headwinds and crosswinds, so we worked our butts off the entire time. I used the tri bars on and off for the first 7-8 km then gave up because I was being buffeted by gusts of wind and needed to hang on tight to Princess.



Most of our ride was on a relatively narrow 2-lane paved highway with a speed limit of 100 kph. Traffic was light at first but we were being passed constantly near the end. One truck with trailer whizzed by so close that I went off the road and used some foul language.

On a scale of 1 to 10 where 10 is a good day of mountain biking and 1 is a trainer ride (sometimes a 2 if Jon Stewart's interview is particularly insightful), I'd give today's ride a 2. As I rode along with the speeding trucks, I was thinking about the skills I had to beef up for C2C. Training whitewater paddling made me want to do more of it but road bike training made me want to do more mountain biking! I know I'm lucky to be in NZ and lucky to be able to ride a bike, etc., etc. But my bike *is* named Princess and I just feel like whining a little... OK, I'm done.

We drove the route to Sumner Beach with C&N, following the race maps closely and watching for landmarks, bike lane locations, railroad tracks, nervewracking roundabouts, etc. C&N were awesome at pointing out useful details. Assuming I get to this point on the race course, I should be able to find my way to the finish line, no problem. Sumner Beach is beautiful although there are big signs with the warning, "Polluted Water - Avoid Contact". I don't care - if I make it all the way from coast to coast, I *will* be dipping my toe in the ocean.

Frankenjack picked up his loaner kayak this morning so we went to a beach in Lyttelton to test our new boats on the South Pacific. (!!) Our whole crew came along to carry gear and take photos in case we did anything silly.





Frankenjack's boat belongs to a woman who has painted huge pink stars and put the name "Mary" on her kayak deck. The rudder is hot pink. A guy really has to be secure in his masculinity to paddle this boat in public.



My JKK Eclipse 5.2 is challenging to climb into because of its small cockpit but once I got in, it wasn't as unstable as I'd expected.



The beach was crowded so the first thing we did was paddle through some rough, disorganized, 1 meter surf to get to a quieter beach where we could get a feel for our boats in calmer water.







I leaned back and forth to test the stability of my kayak and practised my low braces. Frankenjack worked on his roll. Then we went back out into the choppy water for awhile. No photos of the waves for obvious reasons!







I didn't tip while paddling today and didn't have any close calls, other than when I was getting into the boat at the beach. After awhile, I started purposely hitting waves at bad angles to see how the boat would respond. This is the kind of rough water I'm accustomed to from sea kayaking so I'd expect it to feel easier than going through rapids. It will be interesting to see how this long boat behaves when part of it crosses an eddy line and the rest of it doesn't. I used to think whitewater playboats were too cramped but I will be missing H's boat when I get onto the Waimakariri River!

This kayak has a relatively roomy cockpit even though the opening is small. There isn't a good way to wedge my knees along the sides of the boat so I can control the side-to-side motion so we're going to pick up some foam tomorrow to make some knee braces. Frankenjack wants to do some boat customization too.

In the town of Lyttelton, we were reminded of absent friends.



We're booked to do the guided paddle down the Waimak. tomorrow if the weather holds. I'm nervous but can't wait to see what it's like and find out how I'm going to manage in Class 2 in a long, tippy boat. I'm *hoping* it will be a confidence building experience...?

This covers the portion of the Deception/Mingha route that I ran (slowly) but I've logged the full distance and GPS track with the trek portion.

We headed back to Arthur's Pass to hike/jog the Deception/Mingha route, which makes up all but 6 km of the C2C mountain run leg.

Today we were travelling in the footsteps of Richard and Elina Ussher. I'm not saying that in the metaphorical sense. The Usshers started up the Deception Valley shortly before we did and we occasionally saw their footprints in the sand. Cool!

We met their support vehicle in Arthur's Pass and Jack headed right over to see if he could extract any secrets from the competition. We were curious about why their driver was putting a blanket on their bikes while he went for coffee. Turns out it prevents keas (parrots) from eating the seats! The Usshers are doing both the mountain run and kayak paddle legs today. Elina's kayak (other side of the truck) is hot pink - love it!



We'd been told that the rivers were running a little high today but we should be able to get over the pass - unlike yesterday when it was considered to be unsafe. We started by crossing the Otira River which runs west from Arthur's Pass to the Tasman Sea. The Deception River runs into it here. All five of us linked arms but this was still a tough crossing.





I'll pause here to introduce the cast of characters since I know some new people are reading my AP blog to learn about Coast to Coast. Many of you know Jack VD, aka Frankenjack, the winner of GUATS Logs Rocks and Steel. He wore the "King of the Mountains" polka dot cap he earned by climbing K2 the fastest a couple of weeks ago. (That's the K2 in Hamilton, not the one in Pakistan.) Today he was aiming to be first up Goat Pass - and he was.



Jack's big sister N.and her husband Hodgepodge have generously come to NZ to support Jack and me in Coast to Coast.



My husband Richard Ehrlich wouldn't miss this for the world.



Those of you who know me won't be surprised to learn that I carried a copy of our route and read it as we went.



But you might be surprised that I was reading a C2C guidebook where the map played only a minor role. The route up the Deception involves a lot of river crossings, rock scrambling and small sections of trail. Local knowledge can save you a lot of time. This remarkable race guidebook includes detailed photos and shows you exactly where to go, occasionally showing "low river" and "high river" options. If you're interested, click on the photo below then click on the magnifying glass to see the amount of detail in the book. It is incredible.



However, it isn't 100% accurate because the river has been flooding recently. In fact, people were kayaking on Arthur's Pass a couple of weeks ago. On the highway, not in a river!

http://www.stuff.co.nz/the-press/news/4499866/Floo...

OK, back to our trip up the Deception Valley.



Jack remembered much of the route from last year and shared lots of good info with me.



We did about 25 river crossings and some of them were thigh-deep - not the sort of thing I'd usually try alone. The first few were the hardest and we did them together. Nelvia is only 5'2" so the river was a lot deeper on her.



This was the first time I've thought about river crossings as being another way of doing whitewater. I'd look for eddies behind rocks where I could take a break partway across.



As the tallest member of our crew, Jack loved the crossings.



But even *he* looked a little concerned when the rushing river got waist deep at one point.



When we weren't busy trying to avoid a swim, we enjoyed the fantastic scenery.



In between sections of the route that went in or along the river, there were pieces of trail of varying quality. Some trail was heavily overgrown and barely visible. This was a really good one.



Much of the footing in the first 8 km was like this - medium-sized rocks. Jack coached us to invest an additional 10-15% effort to step up on top of the rocks to get a 40% increase in speed. His other good advice was to look 3-4 steps ahead and modify what you're doing to prepare for what's coming up.



The rocks got bigger as we went up the valley.



The views got more and more spectacular.





We kept on crossing the river back and forth, usually because it got too steep on the side we were on.





There were a few good sections for running.





The scenery along the trails was rain forest gorgeous.



The river got much narrower as we moved further up the valley. Although there was less flow, we still had to deal with some impressive rapids and big drops.





There is a section called The Boulders where we did some scrambling.





Does this cliff make my butt look big?



By this point, the trail sections were all quite rough.



But it was really pretty.





We crossed a few scree slopes.





For the last part of the climb, we left the Deception River to climb up Goat Creek - mostly travelling right in the creek!





At last we made it up to Goat Pass and ducked into the hut for a quick lunch. It was cold and we were wet. I put on a few toasty layers and we didn't stay long.





The first part of the descent down the Mingha River Valley should be easy because of the boardwalks.



However, it's not so good if you turn around to see where your friends are, then slip off the boardwalk and smash your good knee really hard on the wood. I'm just sayin'. Luckily, there were lots of creeks where I could ice it.

There were some good stretches of trail at first. In the race, I'm going to have to push as hard as I can whenever I hit a trail like this, because there are other sections where it will be difficult to do more than power walk.





The Mingha Valley has a different feel and different vegetation.









The easy trail doesn't last. The path gets rougher and there is a final knob to climb in addition to a number of steep creek gullies to descend/ascend.









There are only a few river crossings on the Mingha - much easier navigation here. Naturally, since things were a little easier, I slacked off and managed to smash both my knees - even twisted an ankle.

We followed the Mingha River down until it met the Bealey River. In the race, there were be 3 additional km of running along rocky river flats including two more crossings of the Bealey.



Because we stopped our trek short of the run finish at Klondyke Corner, we drove over there on our way back. Jack and I were rocking our new GUATS wear.



What a great day! Jack and I hope to go back to do this section as a run while somehow (?!) staying within range of one another. Once that's happened, I'll officially declare this to be the most technical run I've ever done. My target time for this leg in order to make later cut-offs is 5 hours. In addition to what we did today, the race day route will include 6 km through farmers' fields and along rocky river flats. It's going to be really, really tough to do the run fast enough to finish the race.

Hiking/running the Deception/Mingha route today (mountain run in C2C). See Jan. 20 log entry for SPOT link - I'm testing it today so you should be able to see us go.

[ Later: Yes, it worked. I was on my iPhone before and didn't have time to post the link. Lots of photos to come but I need to zzzzzzz!
http://share.findmespot.com/shared/faces/viewspots... ]

P.S. My new kayak paddle and Salomon pack were found at the hotel in Arthur's Pass and they're here with us now. It's very rare that I hug a strange man! (The hotel manager.)