BRMAR 2001

We finished last year’s race with four objectives for this year; have fun, don't get injured, finish, and don't get lost. We felt quite prepared and confident going into this year’s race. In fact, our team name "In Omnia Paratis" means "ready for all things." We had a new team member, Jon Barker, with his wife Diane as our support person. We had been working out with Jon on a regular basis and on race day we had a good weather forecast. What we didn’t realize was that the course has been changed to make it longer and more challenging. It was still the same river and mountains as last year, but this year there was more river and more mountains. The combined mileage for the kayaking, mountain biking, and trail running and other special events were officially 33 miles but the actual distance was over 35 miles. Officially, it was 8 miles of kayaking, 12 miles of mountain biking 11 miles of running, and 5 mystery events. We thought the nicer weather would work to our advantage but as the day progressed and temperatures moved above 80, it became challenging just to stay hydrated. Like last year the race was limited to 75 teams and ours was the second oldest.

The race started the same as last year with a 2.5 mile run over one side of a mountain and down the other side. Jon and Zach ran ahead to secure the equipment for the 3-person kayak. When Cathy arrived we started down the river. After two miles of kayaking we had to land and complete the first special event, the 12-foot wall. The three of us had to climb over in less than 3 minutes. Our execution was perfect. Zach went up first, pushed up by Jon and Cathy. Cathy came second pushed by Jon and pulled by Zach. Jon came up last pulled up by Zach.

Then, it was back to the kayak and down the river. The water was lower than last year, so there were more problems with rocks and boulders. We got stuck quite a few times and many times Jon and Zach had to exit the kayak to move us off the rocks. In fact, Jon was exiting the raft head first on a regular basis. These, however, were not intentional. We made it through the Aska rapids but later in the kayaking hit another set of rapids and flipped. After seven miles of kayaking our arms were getting a bit tired. At this point we hit our next special event. We dropped Jon off and he had to trail run for the last mile, then swim across the river and meet us as we exited the river. Unfortunately at this point the river became wider and deeper and made it more difficult to paddle since we didn’t have the current helping anymore. It was a long last mile of kayaking.

Jon was waiting as we exited the river. Then we had to carry the kayak up a hill a quarter of a mile and complete the third special event, orienteering. We were given a compass, a distance, and an azimuth and had to retrieve an object within two minutes. What we forgot is the tendency of left-handed people to drift left and all three of us are left-handed. We drifted left and were a little slow retrieving the object. As a result we were assessed 5 penalty minutes.

Diane met us at the transition point for a change to dry footwear and some fluid and food before we started biking. After transitioning as quickly as possible, we started off on our bikes for the first segment of the biking. The first leg was 6.5 miles and the second part was 5.5 miles, mostly on narrow single-track trails. The mountain biking was tough. We were walking up the mountains pushing our bikes and riding down braking all the time to keep from going too fast and crashing. Unfortunately, as careful as we were, Cathy crashed on a rocky downhill. After some anxious moments she said she was ok, although she did have quite a few cuts and bruises on her left arm and leg. She’s tough and determined and was able to continue. The biking took us three hours and that was as fast as we could possibly complete it with so much of the time walking the bikes up mountains.

We were then faced with the next special event, the inclined wall that was oiled up to make it difficult to ascend. Zach laid out on the wall with Jon and Cathy pushing until he was able to grab the top. Then Cathy, pushed up by Jon grabbed on Zach’s legs and pulled herself part way up using Zach as a ladder. Jon grabbed Cathy legs and pulled up until he could grab Zach’s legs. Then Cathy laddered up Zach, followed closely by Jon, and Cathy and Jon pulled up Zach. Our execution on the incline was described as the best of the day.

After this Diane met us with fluids and food for our transition to the 11+ mile run. As with the biking we walked up the mountains and ran the flats and downhills. This was the part of the race where we got lost last year and were determined not to repeat that event. It was a long hot run and like the biking took us about three hours, but we didn’t get lost. We passed at least a half a dozen teams during this segment.

As we reached the finish line we had to complete the last special event, the railroad tie carry. At this point the tie felt much heavier than usual. Our objective was to carry the tie 25 yards, move it over a bar that was about six feet above the ground without losing contact with the tie and without knocking the bar off, and then return the tie to where we picked it up. We knocked the bar off and were assessed another 5-minute penalty.

We crossed the finish line in a respectable 8 hours and 38 minutes and with the 10-minutes of penalties our official time was 8 hours, 48 minutes, and 18 seconds. 40th place! 62 of the 75 teams that started the race finished. Next year we’ll try to go under 8 hours.