Orienteering race (Rogaine) 9:20:00 [3] **
Leanimal and I teamed up for the North American Rogaining Championships, held this year at the Laurentian Rogaine. This is a fun and different event that takes place in an area of gorgeous vacation homes, ski resorts, Quebecois villages and winding cross-country ski trails. There are several challenges in addition to the usual list - frequent attempts (sometimes in vain) to avoid trespassing on private property, many kilometers of foot-pounding pavement, and - most difficult of all, especially at night - tempting glimpses through windows of people enjoying their comforts - relaxing in front of the TV, sipping wine, enjoying a hot dinner, or reading a book.
Leanimal is one of Canada's top adventure racers - out of my league when it comes to athleticism and youth. This was her first 24-hr rogaine, so my contribution was to share some rogaine planning and strategy experience. Because she is a skilled navigator with a strategic, analytical style of racing, I knew that rogaining would be a perfect fit.
The weather forecast was nasty - rain, possible thunderstorms, more rain, then finally clearing during the night. I fussed with my pack the night before, adding and removing layers and food. Some vivid nightmares woke me during the night, leaving me sleepy when the alarm went off. The Laurentian Rogaine has a short preparation time - maps were handed out at 9 a.m., and the race started at 10 a.m. Leanimal and I had gone through a practice run using last year's map, so we were fairly quick to get our 65 km string and map pins in place. With more time, we undoubtedly could have chosen a better route, but I'm pleased with what we designed in 30 minutes. Then we attended to other tasks, like manually marking out of bounds areas, sealing our maps, throwing unwanted gear into the van, and dashing to the loo one last time. Working at the same table, 'Bent and 3PinJim were using a 100 km string and planned to get most, but not all, controls. Mique and Storm had a similar target. Our goal was 1785 out of a possible 2392 pts.
We started off running down the P'tit Train du Nord rail trail, then slowed down to check our route. In spite of heavy rain throughout much of the event, the only time we wore our raincoats was for the first 10 minutes of the 24 hrs, then we got too hot. We headed up to #55 on a high clifftop that felt a bit sketchy in heavy rain, even in daylight. If I could change one thing about this event, it would be to move the clifftop controls to features further inland to reduce the risk to competitors at night. Cliffs aren't marked on the 1:40,000 map, but there are a LOT of cliffs in this terrain.
We headed downhill toward the base of the Piedmont Ski Resort and, in spite of our best efforts, ended up dashing along the edge of someone's back yard to reach a road. We cracked out the tow rope so that Leanimal could haul me smartly up the ski hill to #61, then we unhooked and bashed through the hydro corridor toward #22. As we checked our maps after punching, there was a sudden crash in the forest, and Leanimal clutched my arm as we spun around to face the large wild animal. It turned out that Bender and Dr. Wells had landed beside us, as if dropped by a helicopter. After a quick greeting, they flew off again. Bender broke his arm last month, and he mentioned that he'd been grabbing trees with it out of habit, much to his chagrin.
We sloshed along an ATV trail on the hydro corridor, and I got sucked into a mud slurry up to my mid-thighs. We turned onto a more civilized forest trail toward #24 and enjoyed a steady downhill run on a soft trail. Most of the event, we just tried to powerwalk, but it was easier on the legs to run the downhills. As we squelched through the treed marsh, we met Mique and Storm coming out. Some more downhill running, then we turned onto a trail to attack #53, where we met a couple of teams coming the other way. Then a quick discussion on whether it was still worth getting #13, and - once we agreed that it was - deciding between two routes. Then we followed trails most of the way to #41, passing through some open areas with lots of raspberry bushes - ouch. Mique and Storm were running toward us as we approached the control.
Glancing at #45, next on our list, we scratched our heads for a moment: "What WERE we thinking?" Once we decided it still made sense, we headed down a nasty hillside with logging debris and rocks hidden beneath big, scratchy vegetation. We almost began to doubt the trail, but a faint track finally appeared beneath the raspberry bushes, right where it was supposed to be. Because the mapped trails are mostly ski trails, they can disappear beneath summer vegetation in open areas, so we sometimes had to move forward with a bit of faith. We followed trails around to approach #45, where we stopped to reapply silicone foot cream. In retrospect, we probably left this too long, although it's uncertain whether we could have dried our feet enough for the cream to keep them from shrivelling up. It had rained at differing levels of intensity all day, with occasional periods of calm when the dripping foliage was just as good as rain. We took trails toward a residential area, but were forced to divert when we hit a Trespassers Will Be Prosecuted sign. Even our new route came a bit too close to someone's yard, so I unfolded my map and tried to look harmless, lost and blonde, in case someone preferred to shoot intruders and ask questions later. (To my knowledge, Quebec is the only place where a lethal weapon has been aimed at me - in an adventure race during moose hunting season.)
We hit pavement and ran downhill until we hit the final climb to #70, our first "house" control. All the controls ending in zero are at residences where the people have left their hoses outside to refill water bottles. Bender and Dr. Wells were at the corner as we headed up. More road running to reach our attack point for #33, the first of a series of tiny marshes that required precise navigation. We ran the downhill and flat sections back toward #70, then cut south to climb through a subdivision, where we had a nice conversation in broken French with two ladies who were curious about what all the funny-looking people were doing. Then we bushwhacked to the road that led to #90 near Lac Echo. At the start of this leg, we had foolishly complained about the heat when the sun briefly appeared. As if to punish us for ingratitude, the rain started lashing down again with a light breeze, and we wondered how cold the night would get. (Not very cold, as it turned out. This is the first rogaine where I've kept the same shirt on from start to finish.) We walked 250 m past #90 before Leanimal noticed our error, then we had our first water refill break. I reached into my pack to get food and yelped when I found a 20 cm long toy cougar labelled "Palgrave Patsy", wearing a little bear bell around its neck. Apparently, it was a generous gift from 3Pin's 7-year-old daughter Skye, and if it was intended to ward off predators during this rogaine, it did its job well!
We headed north and east on roads toward the big communications tower at #81, meeting a stream of teams going the other way. Leaving #81, we both slipped on the steep, muddy trail. I managed to land hard with my bad knee bent straight back so that I was sitting on my foot - not good, since I'm never supposed to let it bend past 90 degrees. However, the only ongoing pain from the fall was on top of my ankle on the other leg, and I can't remember how that leg landed, since I was so freaked out about the knee. I was actually really lucky with joints in this event. I carried my ankle brace, but chose not to use it to avoid blistering, and my bad ankle held up through some difficult terrain. I've worn a brace for bushwhacking almost 100% of the time over the past 16 months. Perhaps my good luck came from racing with my sports chiropractor! :-)
Another long, rainy trail section to reach our attack point for #63, then down to the road where we met Mique and Storm again. Although we'd prepared our routes at the same table, we'd never compared notes, but apparently we had similar strategies. We chatted as we walked to our attack point for #66, then separated in the bush. We later learned that this small marsh proved difficult for many people, and we heard of several teams who gave up on it. We knew we'd come the right distance, but we ended up in the wrong marsh and spent some time looking before we saw the patch of light over the correct marsh. It was a good reminder that on a 1:40,000 map, even a tiny marsh is actually not that small in real life. We headed west over the hill to the next marsh at #25, where we met Dr. Wells and a sick-feeling Bender. We continued west to an indistinct trail, deciding to follow it north to the more major trail that we could follow most of the way to #64. It petered out, but we hit the major trail and put on our headlamps. In the misty light beam, it could be difficult to tell the difference between the trail and the open forest floor. We arrived at the trail bend to attack #64 at the same time as Bender and Dr. Wells. The four of us went down to the marsh together, then they headed north to #36, which was the first control that we elected to drop from our planned route. Instead, we headed back to #40, munching on yummy Caruso's vegetarian focaccia pizza as we walked. We had tried to push hard until the light was gone, and now we could take a deep breath before our night route.
At #40, we met Joe's masters male team, who ultimately won the event. They were dealing with foot problems, and we chatted as we filled our bladders and re-organized our food. Leanimal and I headed around the lake to attack #56, another tricky little marsh in a rocky bit of bush. Once again, we measured the right distance, and we recognized the hills beyond the marshy area, but we had drifted right of our bearing. We started to check further left, assuming that we'd drifted in a similar direction as at #66, and a talkative team with bright headlamps confirmed our guess. Back to the road and over to one of my least favourite features - a treed marsh. On our first attempt to reach #35, we followed a stream, thinking it would lead us to our beaver dam. When it ran south too long, we got concerned and bailed to the road where we took a compass bearing and came back in, pace counting and ignoring the features until we got close. Then we followed a stream to what was probably a beaver dam, although we never saw it (although we found the control).
North to the road, then a long hike to #50. We passed some people having a roaring bonfire, and it was tempting to sit down and dry out our clothes... Maybe this was where PG and Barb met the friendly drunk? Out from #50, then we stopped to put on dry socks, assuming (correctly, as it turned out) that the rain was finally over. PG and Barb came by, looking energetic, and there were introductions all around, including Attackpoint nicknames. (This was Leanimal's first exposure to events where people walk up to ask, "Hey, are you Bash? I'm So-And-So.") We found a ski trail and headed to #42 at the tip of a heart-shaped lake. The trail nearly vanished in high vegetation around our attack point, so we made a point of looking for other things to locate on our return trip. We met Mique and Storm coming out, and they advised us that the trail ended after the lake, which seemed entirely possible. The vegetation was thick around the irregularly-shaped lake tip, and it was disorienting to check our compasses as the shore weaved in and out while we scrambled through terrain with such poor visibility. We popped out right where we went in and found a small ski trail sign in a tree that we'd noticed before - woo hoo! A short distance from the lake, the trail became very distinct, and we had a great hike over toward #52. There was a big climb on trail, then we set out from a road junction to locate the clifftop. We went too far downhill and noticed cliffs above us. When we scrambled back up, we ran into Mique and Storm again. They were surprised to see us ahead of them, since they had bushwhacked over and scrambled up the steep hill. "Did you find the trail?", they asked. "Yup, it was great. Lots of signs." "Bitches!" :-)
We had planned to go west to #54, #32 and #21, but after some analysis, we realized that with 2/3 of our time gone, we still had 28 km left of our original 65 km straight-line route. We decided to drop those controls and head to #51, which should give us time to get to the northeast quadrant of the map. Running down the hill (the last running I had any urge to do), we met Mique and Storm again. Mique's feet were killing him in the same way mine were - deep blisters on the balls of each foot arising from wrinkles in shrivelled wet skin. We travelled with them for a few of the "road" controls - #51, #60 and #91 - and it was nice to have some new energy in our conversations. From #60, there was an obvious exit route where a dog had bothered the race organizer. We decided that he wouldn't be around at 3 a.m., and we all love dogs anyway, so we started down that trail. Not one, but TWO dogs started barking angrily, and one of them came to the road. The four of us retreated at high speed - didn't know we still had it in us! The fastest runner, Storm, chivalrously stayed behind me, ignoring the cardinal rule that you don't need to outrun nasty beasts, you only need to outrun the people you're with. At this point, my feet were so disastrous that I went on tow behind Leanimal. Except for uneven trail sections and bushwhacking, I stayed on tow for most of the rest of the race. It hurt my feet more to be towed, but we were getting nervous about the time limit, given my painful plodding. My upper legs were screaming too, and I learned later that the thread in the side and pocket seams of my wet trekking pants were chafing them, turning my thighs into raw meat. Until this event, I'd thought of chafing as an embarrassing boy problem, but the rain was so heavy and unrelenting that tights would have been the correct choice. I was soooooooo frustrated. I was totally prepared to hold the team back at some point because Leanimal is fitter than I am, but I wasn't prepared to still feel energetic, yet be unable to use my body because of silly surface pains.
We picked up #73 at first light, then headed for #80. We passed beneath the #23 hilltop, and in retrospect, should have gone up to get it. At the time, we were worried about how far I had left to hobble, because a late arrival at the finish line would cost us points. We wanted to be sure that we had time to get #72, and we ended up having lots of time. We spent the last few kilometers hobbling along the rail trail - Leanimal's feet were deeply painful at this point, too. Local cyclists and joggers went by, and we laughed that we must look like a couple of sad sacks, so we made a Herculean effort to draw up the corners of our lips and wish them a cheerful "Bonjour!" We arrived at the finish line at 9:20 a.m., with 40 minutes left. If I hadn't been so crippled, we could have attempted several additional lower-value controls in the morning, but it simply wasn't in the cards.
In summary, Leanimal and I earned 1508 out of a possible 2392 pts. We were the North American champions in the (very small) female division, and it looks like we did respectably overall, given that the elite male champions were also in the 1500-pt range. Joe's masters male team, the overall winners, had 1968 pts. PG and Barb, the top mixed masters team, had 1706 pts. 'Bent and 3Pin had 1528 pts and finished one place ahead of us.
Looking back at the race, I think that our route choice was reasonably good for the small amount of preparation time we were given, although I'm sure we'll look over the map and slap our foreheads at some "obvious", superior route that we missed. Some teams who pushed harder physically ended up with similar points to us, which is a good sign. Leanimal and I worked well as a team, both keeping our eyes on the map at all times, and taking advantage of our different strengths. I'm very grateful for Leanimal's cheerfulness and power at the front of the tow rope in the latter hours of the race. If I could change two things that I did: (1) I would have stopped beside #23 and recalculated the remaining time and distance, because we were hobbling faster than we'd estimated, and we had time to go up that hill. I was in such pain that I never considered it, and - as Leanimal points out - we didn't know if things might get worse. (2) I would have considered crossing moderately big rivers. At last year's event, which went west of Ste. Adele, Francis had advised against river crossings, so I'd ruled them out from the start. However, he didn't say anything this year, and some of the top teams benefited by doing so.
As a final note, there is NO event - not even a wet 3-day adventure race in the Appalachians - that has damaged my body as much as this one did. My trekking pants, which I've worn without incident in a dozen adventure races and rogaines, chafed horribly wherever there was thread. I've always worn trekking pants instead of tights for long treks, since they don't tear, but I'll have to reconsider that for super-rainy conditions. The only other time my feet have become an issue was in last year's Laurentian Rogaine, which was also rainy, but cleared up after 8 hrs. I'm hopeful that sturdier shoes and trekking poles could help in similar conditions, and possibly I could have postponed the damage by reapplying foot cream more often in the early hours of the race - although that's only a guess. I'll have to do some experiments.
Anyway, it was a very fun weekend - in that crazy way that folks like us define the word "fun"! :-)