Race Evaluation
Blue Hills Traverse:
Charlie
| 1. | Basically following the pack from 1 to 4, although it was receding all the time. | ||||||
| 2. | |||||||
| 3. | |||||||
| 4. | |||||||
| 5. | Last I saw of the pack was leaving 4 and heading to the southern trail. Followed trail to cross marsh, up and over. Saw Jeff Shapiro on the way. | ||||||
| 6. | Straight, and pretty easy. | ||||||
| 7. | Contoured around the hill to the E to the second trail, picked up J-J before the road. crosssed on the trail, took first left, through the saddle to the trail and crossed above the cliffs, down the reentrant E of the boulder down the spur. Pretty nice running. J-J and I are together. | ||||||
| 8. | +02:30 | With J-J, too much up and down, should have contoured more. Overshot to the next boulders to the NE and had to come back. | |||||
| 9. | With J-J. | ||||||
| 10. | Picked up by James Tasker leaving 9, to the intersection. He and J-J head NW on the trail. I go south to the nest intersection, then W to the second bend and right in. Sweet. James is coming in as I leave, but blows by me quickly on the trail. | ||||||
| 11. | All alone from here past the aid station, but see some folks on the loop. | ||||||
| 12. | Up the stone wall, tough footing. | ||||||
| 13. | Straight down and right to it. | ||||||
| 14. | See Terry K and Jim Henderson and Rich Nietupski heading to 13 as I'm going up. | ||||||
| 15. | Meet J-J on the trail as he's heading to 14. | ||||||
| 16. | +03:00 | Oops! Got too high, then J-J showed up and pulled me higher. Finally hit the trail and have to head back down hill. Bob Dangel is leaving as we get there. | |||||
| 17. | Too much detail there for my eyes, so I wasn't sure what I'd find. Follow J-J and Bob up the hill, but get to the bag first. | ||||||
| 18. | +00:15 | Fairly straight, but find a cliff to the N first, relocate quickly. A guy named Dave is coming up the hill to it as we leave. | |||||
| 19. | +01:00 | Can't stay with those guys on the trail. They headed out to the road which was smart. I went on the trail around the N of the marsh, then up the reentrant to near the trail junction on top, and down the other side, through a dry part of the marsh, and along the trail W of the marsh to near the road. Got a little low and had to backtrack and head up. | |||||
| 20. | Popped out near the trail that crosses the triangle, but for some reason stayed on the road around the acute angle, and on for 100 M. Very long and painful slog up the hill. Found the guy Dave up there, but he was a fair amount lower and looking around. | ||||||
| 21. | +13:00 | Over the top and down the steep slope to the NW, then N on the downhill trail. Back W along the trail across the reeentrant, and N to the small trail. Found plenty of veg boundary, but not the control, so after a while I headed down to the stream where I found Jim H and Rich N and got the control from there. This is a very difficult area for me. I have probably been on that hillside at least 5 times over the years, and have always lost at least 10 minutes. | |||||
| 22. | Alone again, angle down across the intermittent stone wall to the trail, follow it uphill across the NS trail to the top of the reentrant, easy from there. | ||||||
| 23. | Around N side of marsh on trail. | ||||||
| 24. | +02:00 | Dumb route choice. Went S to the trail, then by the marshes and down the reentrant, around the N side of hill to marsh and to control. My feet are killing me and my hamstrings are grabbing. See Pete B. and Terry K. leaving the control. | |||||
| 25. | Can barely move, but pass Terry anyway, and catch Pete near the flag. We had this control a few years ago and it looks familiar all the way. | ||||||
| 26. | Stay on the spur with the big reentrant on my right. I see the flag from a long way off. | ||||||
| 27. | Follow the "magnetic" trail to the road and up to the bend near the control. Look back for Pete, and he's far enough back I can relax. | ||||||
| 28. | +00:15 | Got past it on the right and had to climb back up. | |||||
| F. |
Total Time Lost - 00:22:00