Big Blue Adventure Race
Big Buzz at Big Blue
Team CyclePath - Karl and Cynthia Royer / 24.04.2005
Continuing on, we arrived at the event site Friday evening and checked our team (all two of us) in, hung around a little while and then proceeded to our hotel room to get all our stuff organized for the next day’s race. Mandatory gear…check; extra clothes; check, feminine hygiene products; (that’s right…great way to start the season off!!) check!!
The staging areas for our kayak and bikes opened the next day at 6:00 AM. We arrived at the staging area around 6:30 (older folks need their sleep) and were able to set up our kayak and bike areas quickly, with 15 minutes to spare no less, before the 8 AM race briefing. Gear staged, check! So far, so good…feeling good, confident. At 8:30 AM the maps were handed out with the CPs and TAs already marked so we used the time before the 9 AM start to plot our intended course (including cleaver shortcuts!!). Then the call went out for all racers to assemble at the race start down by the lake. We made our way there, touched the cool lake water sang the national anthem and before we knew it, we were off, our hearts racing faster than our feet could go.
The first leg was about a one mile run to the kayak staging area. Cyn was attached to the WeGo team link system (tow harness) by Meridian Geographics http://www.wegoteamlink.com/ and then attached to me to tow her during the running/trekking portions of the race (Cyn loves running, NOT!!!). So off we go, over the park’s grassy knolls, across a creek, up a drainage ditch, along the dam (complete with plastic and sandbags covering a portion of the slope that had washed out due to recent rains), over the wetland muck to our trusty kayak. Once there, we put on our PFD’s while simultaneously shoving some food into our mouths (too sweet, YUCK!! Still full from breakfast) and were able to transition very quickly carrying the kayak about 100 yards to the lake’s edge. Not bad, we thought, considering our kayak is a heavy sit on top cobra tandem AND one of the handles used to carry it is broken off.
We hit the water in the bottom third of the pack and managed to pass about three teams on our way to CP1. The course was set so that when you hit both CP1 and CP2, the teams had to orienteer out to CP1a and CP2a, which, as navigator, I thought was a cool twist to the race. We arrived at CP1 feeling pretty good about our paddling thus far. Cyn jumped out of the kayak, whipped out our passport and handed it to the only person looking relaxed. The volunteer happily signs for CP1. Off we go down the beach in search of CP1a approximately ½ mile down the relatively flat beach and woods. Flat of course means up and down small ditches, bushes, trees, poison oak etc…found a guy looking even more relaxed sitting in his lawn chair. Back to the kayak and were off in search of CP2.
SleepMonsters
