USARA Nationals

 

Team Dragon's Back

Several months ago, I was approached by John Eichler and and Jeff Glassbrenner, who were looking for a female to round out their team for USARA Nationals, being held in Bentonville, Arkansas.  He had touched base with Susie Farmer, who had given him my name.  We set up a Zoom meet and greet in May, which went well, and then I rode with them in Little Rock, when I was on my way to the Maah Daah Hey 100.  These guys were super cool and super chill and definitely not "man-babies" as Lisa had mentioned looking out for 😂.

Blaze, my trusty adventure race steed

On September 12 at 6 am, we loaded buses for an hour ride to an undisclosed location.  At 7:15 am we were given our course instructions and maps.  That left 1 1/2 hours to plot our route.    The first leg was a trek with 15 CP's.  During the pre-race briefing the night before, the race director told us that we needed to be finishing the trek to TA1 and starting the paddle no later than 2 pm in order to make the cut off at CP 17 and therefore be able to continue the paddle to TA2.

The race started at 9 am. With 77 teams of 3 starting, it was a conga line to the first 3 check points.  The teams then thinned out and we were able to motor on at our own pace.  John's nav skills were spot on and we had nabbed 7 of the 15 in 2 1/2 hours. We continued on to get 4 more as the day was beginning to get hotter than damnit.  Both John and Jeff had started out with 3 liters of water and I had 2 liters.  Having been so dry leading up to the race, there was nowhere along this first trek to filter; all the creeks were dry as a bone. We all ended up without water for the last 1 1/2 hours.  And we still had 5 miles along a gravel road to TA1.  

John began to struggle in the heat and Jeff had a mechanical with his artificial leg.  The tread came unglued to the carbon plate and would repeatedly slide off.  Between our slowed pace due to the heat and Jeff's leg issue, our forward progress was significantly hampered.  We weren't the only team to seriously underestimate the time it would take to get to TA1.  What should have taken us 60 minutes to get to the TA ended up taking 90 minutes.  

We arrived at TA 1 at 2:22 pm.  No water was provided by the race, but we had 1 gallon in our paddle bag and I had a full 50 ounce bladder in my PFD.  Jeff was able to find some medical tape at the TA and temporarily fix his leg issue. We ended up getting on the water at 2:35.

Transitioning to the paddle

The second leg was an 8 mile paddle on the Illinois River with 1 CP midway.  It was a meandering river with a lot of strainers so we had to be on point.  It was also shallow in a few spots, where we had to get out and drag the canoe a short ways.  Although it was flowing roughly 3mph and we were paddling as fast as we could, it still took us 2 hours to get to the take out and CP17.  The final 100 yard stretch had some man made class 2/3 rapids. We made it down the first, but took in quite a bit of water and ended up sinking after clearing the second set of rapids.  Fortunately there were a couple of spotters in the river who grabbed our "yard-saled" items, including Jeff's hydration bladder.

We missed the 4 pm cut-off by 28 minutes ... meh.  We were then short-coursed, causing us to miss the second paddle leg and a trekking leg.  22 teams ended up getting short-coursed, including a few of the big names (Rootstock Racing, ThisAbility, TanZ Navigation).  

From TA3, we were on bikes to TA4 at Siloam Springs.  We transitioned to foot for a Photo O course. There were 6 CP's.  And once at each CP, we wrote down the number of the photo that was taken at the precise spot indicated on the map.  There were 12 photos to choose from, 6 of them being decoys. During this leg, Jeff noticed that his shorts and prosthetic liner were sopping wet.  It ended up being that his hydration bladder got a hole in it during the canoe fiasco at take out.  Fortunately he had an extra liner and a couple of smaller hydration flasks. 

We nabbed all 6 correctly and quickly transitioned back to our bikes. This next leg had us biking on pavement and gravel, collecting 5 CP's along the way (all of which were right alongside the road, no need to hop off the bikes and do any bushwhacking). Leaving the nicer side of town, heading into the less nice side, we got to witness a police versus toothless woman in a night gown and flip flops, similar to an episode of "Cops."  Now, that was funny!

We made it to the TA5 on the University of Health and Performance campus at 9 pm.  This was the "chuck wagon TA"  where a hot breakfast was being served (pancakes, bacon, and sausage), while individual team members would tackle a portion of the 0-relay course.

There were 3 parts:  one had you getting 1 CP (of the 6 possible), one had you getting 3 CP's (of the 6 possible), and one had you getting all 6 CP's.  But each part was only worth 1 point.  John went first on the 3 CP course.  Meanwhile, Jeff worked on his prosthetic leg, having secured 3 feet of duct tape.  I ate some sausage, drank a Coke, popped a 200mg caffeine tab and then tended to my gear, getting my hydration ready for the next leg.  I was gonna nab the 1 CP once Jeff got back, so I studied the map. The map had a satellite image, making it extremely difficult to pick out any trails due to all the tree cover.  

Once John got back, he told me about a trail that went down to the river and then from there I could walk the river bed to the CP.  That made it so much easier, as you could not see that trail on the map.  I quickly acquired that one and headed back to the TA.  Since Jeff had never navigated before, we opted out of  the 6 CP course.

We left the TA around 11:00 pm on the 20+ mile biking leg.  There was only 1 CP on this leg.  At one point about midway through this leg, we came to an intersection where there was another team.  They went left onto the gravel and having briefly talked to them thought they were taking a different route than us to TA 6.  So we continued on the paved road, but after about a mile, John realized we were off course heading south instead of northeast.  We quickly backtracked and got back on the gravel road where the other team had headed.

CP 34 was a little tricky as there were several hard lefts and rights on the course, with the CP being at one of these corners.  In this area we came upon a few teams having difficulties, but John managed to get us right to it, without any wandering and wondering.  His nav skills were close to impeccable. I was very impressed as he was suffering the most, yet still had enough brain power to make good choices.

Arriving at TA 6, we were greeted by the enthusiastic crew of volunteers.  We were in the middle of nowhere but could hear I-49 traffic to the east.  We were told that this was the seed tick trek ... wonderful.  There were no trails here so all CP's would require extensive bush whacking. I had pre-treated my clothing earlier that day, but was pretty sure it was all washed off when our canoe sunk. They had DEET spray/wipes so I sprayed my shoes and that was it.  I did not want to melt my clothing with that Deep Woods Off shit.

The witching hour

Shit's beginning to get real!

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We attempted CP 38 first, but the undergrowth was insane.  We managed to get into a clearing , but when we continued onward, we hit a second patch that was even worse.  To me it looked like a wall of concertina wire, with a million ticks just waiting to ambush us.  It wasn't hard to make the decision to turn around and try nabbing CP 37.  That one was way more doable and without the tick infested undergrowth.

We decided to call it after 1 CP and move on to the next leg. We were also out of water once again and the TA as well was bone dry.  One volunteer had gone to procure some, but we knew that once we got to Little Sugar trail system, there would be water there. It was an 8 mile pedal to the CP40 and the beginning of Tunnel Vision single track. We only made one slight nav error on the pavement as we were following Glasgow Road and missed the left hand turn on to Glasgow Lane.  

At the trailhead (CP 40), we stopped and filled with water.  Then we decided to go after 3 of the dog bones.  A dog bone is where you have to get a pair of CP's before moving on to the next one.  So we were going after 6 in total.  The Tunnel Vision trail is not technical, but demanding with its short punchy climbs and descents, and loose over hardpack tread.  It is like riding gravel single track.  John was so ready to be done; I don't think he ever fully recovered from dehydration on that initial trek.  I took over navigating, with an occasional redirection.  I was just having too much fun zipping along.  With the sun coming up, I got a second wind.  Actually, anytime I go from riding pavement/gravel to single track, my spirits rise, and the legs shine.

Once we got the 6 CP's, it was a easy pedal on the Razorback Greenway from Bella Vista to the Ledger Building in down town Bentonville. The nav was a little tricky once we got close to I-49 (I had not ridden the greenway since all the improvements were made).  Fortunately John knew which way to go and we nabbed the final CP 42 and then booked it to the finish.  Of course, the last 2 miles had a pitchy 200 foot climb, including the 6 story climb up the Ledger.  This building had a bike lane built on the outside of it ... super cool!

The Ledger climb

We finshed at 11:36 am with 34 CP's, out of a possible 56.  We ended up mid-pack in the short course. I thoroughly enjoyed this adventure.  It was super fun to race with these outstanding fellas. 6 months ago, I was questioning my decision to sign on with them, but so happy I took the chance.

Love these guys!