2021 ADVENTURE RACING WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP
Oh memory. I have learned over my life that I seem to have a more vague and variable memory than most people I know. My memory smooths over details in favor of recalling general vibes and feelings, takeaway lessons, maybe a single poignant moment from an experience. This has often served me well in adventure racing. Nordic Islands AR? I remember vast fjords and stunning mountain summits. Fiji? Maybe there was some mud but also super cool people living in remote villages. ITERA? I remember being wet, but I think it was mostly because we took a hot tub. My memory has a way of cleaning up the messy bits and highlighting the best parts (and maybe a couple low moments), making me ever-willing to sign up for the next adventure.
For this reason, I struggle to write race reports. I feel like they deserve a level of accuracy and detail that my mind can’t usually provide. On top of that, I sit down to write this a mere 5+ days after finishing the Adventure Racing World Championships 2021 in Spain, and my mind is still very fuzzy - like a prolonged jetlag, a fog, or a numbness that starts behind my eyes and extends through my temples. I am still tired. So, with that disclaimer, I present my ARWC race report.
Pre-Race.
As always, getting there is half the battle. Mike Garrison and I started musing about an ARWC team months earlier when it became clear that our planned race, ITERA, wouldn’t be happening and Cliff had already - VERY optimistically - secured a spot at the event for Strong Machine. Due to childcare limits, Cliff and I would not be able to race it together, so Garrison and I took on the task of filling out the roster. We easily settled on Mark Lattanzi, navigator-extraordinaire and uber-racer, and Jason Urckfitz, master of all trades and hero of Attackpoint. We were set to go, or so we thought - Garrison’s knee started acting up badly after the Maine Summer AR (something about a treacherous night swamp swim?) and he was 50/50 about whether he would be able to go. A week out from leaving for Spain, we scrambled to see if we could find a replacement. With no other options, Garrison heroically committed to upping his ibuprofen regimen and sucking it up. I was secretly relieved - we had a great time racing in Fiji and some unfinished business to resolve.
The team had a relatively uneventful trip to Spain and convened in A Coruna for the usual pre-race preparations - procuring about 40000 calories each in food, sorting gear based on the pre-race schematic, sampling the local Galician specialties (and alarming each server with the amount of food we ordered… oops), and generally having a lovely time socializing and bonding with each other and the other racers. Notable aspects of the pre-race prep included COVID testing by the race organization for all racers (everyone was negative) and lots of World Champs fanfare - including a “parade” and presentation of teams in the central square of A Coruna. By the end of it all, we felt well-prepped and ready to race when we loaded onto the buses the morning of Saturday, October 2.
The buses transported us to Monforte de Lemos, a mid-sized town in the hills of the Galicia region and the location of the race start. Upon arrival we received ALL 51 RACE MAPS. Yes. With 2 hours to prep them. And since we ordered a 2nd set of maps, that meant we would carry ALL 102 RACE MAPS (half of them on heavy waterproof paper) for the first stage. And by we, I mean Jay :) The team made quick work on the first 3 stages of race maps at a local cafe, sucking down some cafe con leches as we worked. It was clear that the race would primarily utilize paved and dirt roads and tracks, with very little bushwacking. The trick would be in choosing efficient routes and staying found in a maze of tiny routes through the Spanish countryside. We had a good laugh as Mari Chandler entertained us with observations about “her Swedes” - racing with the Orbital guys (“Even their plastic bags are IKEA!!”) and meandered to the start line just as the gun was going off....
Stage 1: Trek. 122 km distance, 5800 m elevation gain.
Wait, what? Yes, the race began with a 75-mile trekking leg with 19,000 feet of vertical gain. And yes, we fell into the pack of lemmings who jogged the first 5 miles as part of the “neutralized start” (i.e., following a police car who - IMHO - was travelling way too fast for what we had coming up). We commented on how silly it was that we were running with our heavy packs, and eventually convinced ourselves it was time to settle into a comfortable trekking pace - moving with purpose but not overly taxing ourselves too early. The route turned out to be a lot of pavement, with the occasional dirt road and a few trails taking us up, over, and down again for just about every mountain peak we could scan in the distance. It turns out you can climb a lot of mountains in 75 miles. We laughed that the route took us over every mountain peak we could see, until this hilarious observation began to feel less and less funny. If you want to know details about where we went, go ask Garrison or Mark or look at our tracker. It was a big, f***ed up circle with the end of the stage only a few miles away from the start.
This stage was easily the most brutal I have encountered in a race. It was long, the weather turned awful (downpours, wind, cold), the pavement aggravated our feet and joints, my headlight became glitchy in the rain requiring me to travel with a buddy and eventually borrow a backup, and my stomach took a turn - first with lots of poop (sorry MRC for the shitty view!) and eventually with two bouts of puking. Miraculously it seemed we kept moving through the stage, but at a pace that was slower than we hoped and with the growing awareness that we would be out there for awhile. I tried my hardest to do what tends to work best for me when I’m suffering: notice that I am in a world of pain and accept that I chose to be here and would continue to endure it until it eventually ended (because it most certainly would)... and then completely turn my brain off except to make jokes and communicate as needed with my teammates. I would say I was 50% successful here. The suffering level became so intense at times that it really got in my head. I found myself thinking that I didn’t belong here - I was holding back my team, we would emerge from this section in last place, and I was delusional for thinking I could ever take on such a ridiculous feat. At my lowest points, I fantasized about catastrophes that would end my misery. I cried about leaving my son for two weeks to do something so silly, and thought about dropping out at the next TA and rebooking my flight to get home early. I begged my teammates to leave me behind at a random river crossing. Thankfully much of this happened internally or was visible only in grimaces and a few tears, but wow - I don’t know if my brain has ever been to a place this dark before. I should say that this was my first expedition race without Cliff, and the longest I had been away from him and Wilder on my own before, and I think that made the suffering harder than usual to endure. Thankfully my teammates encouraged me to keep moving forward, made me laugh when I needed it and allowed me to sob a bit now and then, and - amazingly - we moved along. First emerging from the mountains into a vineyard popping with delicious grapes, then into a town where we revived with some cafe con leche and croissants, and finally onto the last climb up to the ski area where TA 1 was located. As I lay down to sleep in the TA, about 36 hours into the race, I rolled my eyes when Mark suggested that I might feel much better and ready to push into stage 2 after 3 hours of sleep and the hot meal I had shoveled into my mouth. What did he know.
Stage 2: Bike. 80 km distance, 2500 m elevation gain.
When I woke up, at first I continued to feel quite discouraged. We rolled in around 75th place (extrapolating from the vague info Jason’s wife Kelly, who was traveling around the race course to cheer us on, could give). Oof. But I built my bike, changed into my stage 2 clothes, and packed my race pack. Why not go out into the sleet and wind and see what happened next? It couldn’t possibly be worse than what we had just done.
Mark and I headed to the zip line while Jason and Garrison took the chairlift up for a downhill mountain bike ride. The thrill of the zipline (the person operating it neglected to mention to us that there was an automatic braking system at the end of the zipline, which had both Mark and I bracing for maximum impact on our respective rides until we unexpectedly braked and sailed in for a gentle landing… phew!) woke my brain up and then we all mounted the chairlift together to start the 80 km ride that started along a chilly ridgeline. The weather had not improved but we were prepared with layers and warm gloves, and the hilly ride helped keep my core temperature at a comfortable spot. We moved well along the ridge and eventually dropped onto some paved roads through tiny towns that had been there for maybe 500 years. Each town had a lovely stone drinking fountain in the center (convenient!) and quaint cobbled streets…which it took us some time to figure out with the maps as it was nearly impossible to distinguish between streets and driveways. We got turned around a few times but the guys increasingly got the hang of it as Mark and Garrison expertly navigated through the jumble of tiny roads. Okay, this was feeling much better.
At this point, we became quite obsessed with projecting our time on this stage. We knew we had to be out of TA 2 at the end of this section by 4:00 on Monday, 52 hours into the race. We knew that we could continue on a short-course if we didn’t make it, but really hoped to make the cutoff if possible. As we got closer to the end of the stage, it became clear that we could make it - but we would really need to hustle. We were on top of a mountain and needed to make it into the town in the valley where the TA was, but an off-limits road made this very difficult. We descended on every path that took us in the right-ish direction. Mark took over the maps and navigated like a wild animal - stopping to occasionally gather information but otherwise pushing relentlessly and by the gut sense of an experienced navigator to get us out of there. The routes were technical and slow but we threw ourselves down that mountain and burst into the TA with just under an hour to spare. We disassembled our bikes, changed clothes, repacked our packs, and shoved in as many calories as we could, then exited the TA with about 8 minutes to spare. We sidled up to a tiny cafe where Jason amusingly ordered 8 cafe con leches (SI, OCHO CAFE CON LECHE POR FAVOR!) and we sat in the park to drink them, savoring our successful battle against the first cutoff.
Stage 3: Paddle. 90 km distance, 350 m elevation gain.
We sauntered down to the boat area, paddle bag in hand, only to discover that we were the last team to choose our boats and that left us as the only team paddling heavy (+10 kg) boats with a portage wheel instead of a skeg. We took it in stride and figured we would offset this disadvantage with our massive upper torso strength…? We nailed the timing of this paddle in terms of dark zones - the RD specified a number of short class 2+ rapids that we could only paddle during daylight hours. Mark/Garrison and Jay/me set out in good spirits, happy to be off our tired feet and bouncing through some enjoyable rapids down the Rio Sil. I was pleased to take the maps during this section. I generally enjoy paddle navigation and the challenge of staying found along a river using time as a primary marker of distance and careful checks of the river’s direction. It felt like a nice way to give the others a mental break as well and engage my mind during what can be a very sleepy part of an expedition race - paddling into the night. Once darkness fell we entered what was considered to be the most beautiful part of the paddle, through a rocky canyon that we could only sense soaring above us. We motored along, passing several teams, and idling away the hours discussing inane topics and singing songs. Little known fact: Jason Urckfitz is also a guitar hero - the real kind, not the video game (though maybe that too?). I enjoyed our chat as we made good time down to a checkpoint hidden up a side creek along a hiking trail, and then finally to a big portage takeout above a hydroelectric dam system. This was a 12 km portage, and thankfully our portage wheels brought all the way from the USA were quite functional. The portage was paved but not flat (hence the 350 m gain on the stage), and the route felt desolate without the little villages and homes we were accustomed to coming across. We did find several abandoned buildings but none with a roof, so we had to put off our desire for a nap (it was, of course, raining) and slog on along the long, straightforward route. I went into full zombie-mode here, and I don’t think I was the only one. When we finally emerged in a small town where the put-in was, Garrison excitedly reported that he found a “perfect!!!” place for a short snooze. We strolled into a large walk-out basement, disturbing several bats with our presence and breathing in the foul air of what smelled like many pisses and shits in one corner, and slept for an hour until the sun had fully risen. Mark noted upon waking that he fell asleep with a massive spider in sight. Good stuff.
Back on the water, we were excited to get this stage over with. The guys were amused as, with a sleepy mind, my nav error for the stage was that I estimated we had 12 km left until we encountered another dam and portage when it was only probably 4 km. I suppose that’s the best kind of error. We finally rounded the last bend to see Kelly in the distance, sunning herself on a dock near the TA. This is when Kelly sightings started to bring me a lot of energy and reassurance. We were doing it, and all of our friends and family at home were cheering us on (or so Kelly said). That felt pretty great.
When we arrived at the TA, we had some disagreement about whether or not to sleep at the sweet hotel that was located there. While in the hotel basement assembling our bikes, we decided that it would be best for the team to snag a few good quality hours so I ran upstairs and booked 2 rooms. Getting into bed in those crisp white sheets felt like a crime after the grossness my body had accumulated over the past few days, so I rinsed myself in the shower before slipping into a deep sleep.
Stage 4: Bike. 210 km distance, 5200 m elevation gain.
Three hours later the alarm sounded and it was a rough start to rip myself from the comfort of bed and get back into race mode. We got onto our bikes fairly efficiently but before we even left the parking lot I discovered that my DiNotte lighting system was broken. Grrr. Garrison gave me a weak handlebar light and we were on our way, pedaling for about an hour before losing daylight. This was the long bike stage, which the RD warned would be “very difficult”. But aside from being really long, the terrain felt fairly friendly as we cruised along mostly paved road through tiny ancient towns and villages dotted along the Galician countryside. Of note, everyone took (or nearly took) a big fall during this stage -- first Mark nearly rode into a concrete crevasse (quick brakes!), then I fell off my bike after being startled by a passing car (soft leafy landing!), then Garrison took a BIG fall digging into a hidden, wheel-sized hole in the ground (and spun over his bike like a windmill, injuring his shoulder but thankfully not more), then Jay tipped into a thorny ditch on our final bikewhack into the TA. Biking sections always get me nervous for injury but I felt good overall about how the team looked out for each other on this stage and made it through with minimal injury. Garrison might disagree - not sure how his shoulder is feeling one week later!
Highlights of this stage included following Mark’s steady nav along a maze of idyllic farm roads as the sun rose, riding some smooth singletrack into Lugo, and recovering with a slick bikewhack to avoid an off-limits route on the way into the TA. We also slept in a cozy bus station for 20 minutes, which was surprisingly refreshing and confirmed that I was getting better at sleeping out during expeditions. We enjoyed the town of Lugo - a great tourist destination with a vibrant modern town as well as an ancient walled city - and took the required photos at the various monuments, trying to convey our utter exhaustion in each photo. But the clock was, once again, ticking away. The next cutoff loomed - 8:00 on Wednesday morning, we needed to be out of TA 4. And so we pushed once again, pedaling our hearts out along a hilly ridgeline where we could look down on the giant, phallus-like concrete power plant blinking with angry red lights that was at the center of our destination: As Pontes. We flew downhill, pleased with ourselves for our easy glide into town, only to discover that we were hurtling towards an off-limits road. Argh! Garrison quickly found a trail to bikewhack that ended up being a decent short-cut around this issue, so we made it to the TA with 45 minutes (again) to transition. We wildly packed our bikes and said goodbye to our bike boxes; we would not see them again during the race. I pulled out my 1000-fill down jacket - even though the weather was improving, the later into a race I get, the more my body temperature matches that of the outside air - and we made a few dehydrated meals before leaving the TA with a minute to spare. Unfortunately the race organization made what appeared to be a change to the rules: the SUP mini-stage that was meant to open stage 5 actually had to be completed by 8:00 and teams that could not do this would be penalized 1 hour. I can only assume their SUP rental dude was getting antsy down by the waterfront. A little annoying that this information was not accurately conveyed in the race materials, but no one on the team grumbled about missing the SUP :)
Stage 5: Trek. 65 km distance, 2600 m elevation gain.
I think this was my favorite stage, but it started out fairly awfully. After an hour of inefficiency in As Pontes where we drank some cafe con leches ostensibly to wait until the sun warmed up the wet grass enough to find a place for a quick snooze, we eventually began our trek only to find all the grass still quite wet and cold. On the way out of town we found a broken pavement lot behind the wastewater treatment and powerplant buildings (scenic!) and laid down in the warmth, only to wake up an hour later sizzling in the sun like bits of tough old meat (we were no longer sexy enough to look like bacon). Kelly found us here and appeared concerned by our choice of sleeping location. Were we all 4 at the same time losing our minds??? Maybe. Spirits were low-ish as we began the trudge into the forest and along a trail that followed a swift-moving river. We were to cross this river after several kms and climb up onto the ridgeline. The river crossing was exciting. It took us a while to find a suitable crossing location, with Jason leading the charge by scouting several potential locations before finding the best one. I personally enjoyed the opportunity to cool off and had half a mind to stay there, maybe forever…but up we went. [Side note: if you have a chance, ask Quest to describe their river crossing. One of my favorite, most hilarious stories of the race.]
I loved this next section. We walked along a continuous ridgeline with a few steep climbs and expansive views out on the valley below. We hit this during an extended “golden hour” before sunset and even enjoyed passing the many huge windmills along the route, which made me feel like I was in Star Wars. We were moving well and I think we all were surprised that our feet had recovered as well as they had from the opening trekking leg. The route moved into an area with some more (relatively speaking) modern farming and we started to talk about finding a hay barn. There sure were a ton of them, and Mark insisted they were the best for sleeping, but it took awhile to find something suitable between the farmers wandering around still and their dogs with the incessant barking. Finally we crept quietly into a lean-to garage with a large tractor and a bit of hay. It would do. We settled in for a planned 1 hour of sleep, but were awoken within 15 minutes by a very curious farmer. Oops! Thankfully José was a fan. He had apparently been tracking the race online and was excited to see our dot approach his farm and then tuck into one of his farm buildings. He graciously offered us a spot in his man cave, a beautiful stone structure with a futon, fireplace, table, and sink. He invited us to stay until the morning and offered a shower and breakfast, but we insisted that we would be gone in a couple short hours and thanked him for his generosity. Mark had a nice idea to leave him the race map of his farm, signed by our team.
Despite the needed sleep, our minds started to really show their wear on this stage. Luckily this usually took the form of amusing hallucinations, déjà vus, and strange beliefs - like the case of the missing teammate (Who are we missing? I see Garrison… Mark… Jason… Where is that other guy?? Who is it and why isn’t that dude pulling his weight more?). Also we forgot each other’s names constantly and were endlessly amused by the ways our minds were deteriorating. At least we were entertaining to ourselves.
The section ended with a beautiful trek along another river into what was essentially our final TA. We knew that we were arriving at the worst time for the tide but also recognized that some food and sleep would likely help us get through the final push to the finish line. We feasted in the TA and relaxed/snoozed for a bit, waiting for the tide to rise.
Stage 6: Paddle. 11 km distance (shortened to about 6 km), 0 m elevation gain.
A short trek down to the put-in with our paddle bag revealed water rushing in the wrong direction and a mucky channel. We snoozed a bit longer after hearing that 2 teams ahead of us turned around once they hit the ocean and were being transported to the next TA… We are still unsure of why exactly but we later saw on our paddle out that the sea was pretty choppy with wind and a heavy fog was lurking off the coastline. As we waited, a crowd of tweens descended on our dock lugging carbon paddles and sweet racing kayaks. We watched them with amusement as they zipped up and down the canal.
Eventually we were told by race staff that the paddle would be shortened by about half; we would take out at a bridge before the ocean and be transported by van to the final TA and start of the trek, but would retain our full-course status. Fine, I suppose. When we saw the ocean paddle conditions, they didn’t appear all that treacherous and the fog stayed off shore for the rest of the afternoon, so it was a bit annoying to find ourselves in motorized transport.
The paddle was uneventful. About 6 km through a tidal canal and channel and under two bridges out to the sea, which was lined with breakers over what appeared to be a small reef. We TA’d at the take-out then waited about 20 minutes for a van to arrive and transport us another 20 minutes or so to the start of the final trek.
Stage 7: Trek. 32 km distance, 900 m elevation gain.
This stage was bittersweet. Mostly bitter really, but with a touch of sweet knowing that only 20 miles stood between us and a full course finish of the 2021 ARWC.We started through a maze of trails along the bluffs overlooking the ocean. We laughed about how the trail builders must have been drunk - they wanted to create switchbacks along the sharply undulating terrain but they decided to switchback straight up and down the hills instead of against the elevation gain. We attempted a few tracks along the upper, less steep part of the park but too often found ourselves in the backyards of disgruntled residents or on circuitous roads or trails that we finally gave in and trudged along the coastal route, trying to savor the sunset over the ocean. But really we savored the excruciating pain in our feet and lower joints. The previous almost 190 km had taken their toll, especially the pavement, and no amount of distraction or ibuprofen could lessen the suffering. The route increasingly brought us onto pavement (of course) as we meandered through the outskirts of A Coruna and eventually through its uninspiring industrial district. Jay took over the maps somewhere in here, with Garrison managing a particularly high level of pain from toughing out this intense race with less than his usual amount of training (especially time on feet!) and Mark sinking into a half-asleep, half-awake state that had him dream-walking through the streets, amusingly weaving between parked cars and nearly taking us down with him as he sought structures to lean/sleep on. In short, we were a bit of a mess. At one point we tried to revive ourselves through a zombie-version of true confessions: early dating life edition. It turns out we had all been pretty bad dates to our high school crushes. Once an hour or so we would regroup and agree that we should try to pick up the pace so that we could finish this f***ing leg a little faster, only to find that our fastest pace was our current hobble.
The hours passed. I knew we would be finishing around 5 a.m., so I focused on the time passing on my little purple wristwatch. Luckily with the sleepiness I kept forgetting what time it was so even if I checked incessantly the answer was always a surprise.
By 5 a.m., we found ourselves in familiar territory: the vibrant downtown of A Coruna, currently fast asleep and quite chilly. We limped down the main street, finish line within our grasp. And, at 5:45 local time, we passed under the finish arch, greeted by a photographer, one member of the race staff, and our own superfan, Kelly. A little underwhelming, but I don’t know if I could have handled much more fanfare than that anyway. We were ushered to a chilly seating area and attempted to party over beers and semi-frozen lentil stew (why?). It was clear that we needed to get warm and find a place to sleep, so Kelly drove us back to the hotel and we collapsed into bed for a couple of hours… before waking soon after to get COVID tested and pack up our gear in preparation for the plane ride home the next morning.
Final ranking: 41 of 45 total full course teams, 90 total teams.
Final time: 6 days, 17 hours, 45 minutes, 44 seconds.
Post-Race.
No rest for the weary. I napped for another hour that afternoon to get myself through the awards ceremony, which was back downtown by the finish line. It was fun to see all of the teams together and celebrate the incredible accomplishment of the top teams having finished in just over four days. We went out to dinner at a restaurant that specialized in octopus… maybe not the best post-race food but it had seating for 15!) with Quest, Bend, and a smattering of other American racers. This was super fun and was followed by some super delicious ice cream. The party ended by 9 p.m. due to the general consensus of total and complete exhaustion, and we laughed as we passed by the post-race festivities area again and saw people dancing to euro-techno music on stage. They must have been the volunteers?
I flew home the next morning, sharing my flights with Matt Hayes of Quest (we also flew to Spain together). We were a sorry sight in the airport. We ate an absurd amount of food, hobbled extremely slowly between gates, and elevated our feet as best we could in the room available on the plane. Arriving home that night felt amazing.
Takeaways? Well, probably the one I almost always take from a challenging adventure race, but this time it was especially true. I found myself in a place of serious self-doubt during this race, but ended up finishing the full course and enjoying myself along the way. I am stronger - mentally and physically - than I realize. If I can suffer through this then I can suffer through just about anything. I also really appreciated the opportunity to race with such an experienced team. They are all people I love and respect and we had a ton of fun together as a team. I learned some veteran tricks along way that I will definitely bring to future races. Thank you to my team for their support and “endeavoring to persevere” with me, to my friends and family for their good vibes that made it all the way to Spain when I needed it the most, and to Cliff, Wilder, and Mose for their endless love and the best welcome home ever.
For this reason, I struggle to write race reports. I feel like they deserve a level of accuracy and detail that my mind can’t usually provide. On top of that, I sit down to write this a mere 5+ days after finishing the Adventure Racing World Championships 2021 in Spain, and my mind is still very fuzzy - like a prolonged jetlag, a fog, or a numbness that starts behind my eyes and extends through my temples. I am still tired. So, with that disclaimer, I present my ARWC race report.
Pre-Race.
As always, getting there is half the battle. Mike Garrison and I started musing about an ARWC team months earlier when it became clear that our planned race, ITERA, wouldn’t be happening and Cliff had already - VERY optimistically - secured a spot at the event for Strong Machine. Due to childcare limits, Cliff and I would not be able to race it together, so Garrison and I took on the task of filling out the roster. We easily settled on Mark Lattanzi, navigator-extraordinaire and uber-racer, and Jason Urckfitz, master of all trades and hero of Attackpoint. We were set to go, or so we thought - Garrison’s knee started acting up badly after the Maine Summer AR (something about a treacherous night swamp swim?) and he was 50/50 about whether he would be able to go. A week out from leaving for Spain, we scrambled to see if we could find a replacement. With no other options, Garrison heroically committed to upping his ibuprofen regimen and sucking it up. I was secretly relieved - we had a great time racing in Fiji and some unfinished business to resolve.
The team had a relatively uneventful trip to Spain and convened in A Coruna for the usual pre-race preparations - procuring about 40000 calories each in food, sorting gear based on the pre-race schematic, sampling the local Galician specialties (and alarming each server with the amount of food we ordered… oops), and generally having a lovely time socializing and bonding with each other and the other racers. Notable aspects of the pre-race prep included COVID testing by the race organization for all racers (everyone was negative) and lots of World Champs fanfare - including a “parade” and presentation of teams in the central square of A Coruna. By the end of it all, we felt well-prepped and ready to race when we loaded onto the buses the morning of Saturday, October 2.
The buses transported us to Monforte de Lemos, a mid-sized town in the hills of the Galicia region and the location of the race start. Upon arrival we received ALL 51 RACE MAPS. Yes. With 2 hours to prep them. And since we ordered a 2nd set of maps, that meant we would carry ALL 102 RACE MAPS (half of them on heavy waterproof paper) for the first stage. And by we, I mean Jay :) The team made quick work on the first 3 stages of race maps at a local cafe, sucking down some cafe con leches as we worked. It was clear that the race would primarily utilize paved and dirt roads and tracks, with very little bushwacking. The trick would be in choosing efficient routes and staying found in a maze of tiny routes through the Spanish countryside. We had a good laugh as Mari Chandler entertained us with observations about “her Swedes” - racing with the Orbital guys (“Even their plastic bags are IKEA!!”) and meandered to the start line just as the gun was going off....
Stage 1: Trek. 122 km distance, 5800 m elevation gain.
Wait, what? Yes, the race began with a 75-mile trekking leg with 19,000 feet of vertical gain. And yes, we fell into the pack of lemmings who jogged the first 5 miles as part of the “neutralized start” (i.e., following a police car who - IMHO - was travelling way too fast for what we had coming up). We commented on how silly it was that we were running with our heavy packs, and eventually convinced ourselves it was time to settle into a comfortable trekking pace - moving with purpose but not overly taxing ourselves too early. The route turned out to be a lot of pavement, with the occasional dirt road and a few trails taking us up, over, and down again for just about every mountain peak we could scan in the distance. It turns out you can climb a lot of mountains in 75 miles. We laughed that the route took us over every mountain peak we could see, until this hilarious observation began to feel less and less funny. If you want to know details about where we went, go ask Garrison or Mark or look at our tracker. It was a big, f***ed up circle with the end of the stage only a few miles away from the start.
This stage was easily the most brutal I have encountered in a race. It was long, the weather turned awful (downpours, wind, cold), the pavement aggravated our feet and joints, my headlight became glitchy in the rain requiring me to travel with a buddy and eventually borrow a backup, and my stomach took a turn - first with lots of poop (sorry MRC for the shitty view!) and eventually with two bouts of puking. Miraculously it seemed we kept moving through the stage, but at a pace that was slower than we hoped and with the growing awareness that we would be out there for awhile. I tried my hardest to do what tends to work best for me when I’m suffering: notice that I am in a world of pain and accept that I chose to be here and would continue to endure it until it eventually ended (because it most certainly would)... and then completely turn my brain off except to make jokes and communicate as needed with my teammates. I would say I was 50% successful here. The suffering level became so intense at times that it really got in my head. I found myself thinking that I didn’t belong here - I was holding back my team, we would emerge from this section in last place, and I was delusional for thinking I could ever take on such a ridiculous feat. At my lowest points, I fantasized about catastrophes that would end my misery. I cried about leaving my son for two weeks to do something so silly, and thought about dropping out at the next TA and rebooking my flight to get home early. I begged my teammates to leave me behind at a random river crossing. Thankfully much of this happened internally or was visible only in grimaces and a few tears, but wow - I don’t know if my brain has ever been to a place this dark before. I should say that this was my first expedition race without Cliff, and the longest I had been away from him and Wilder on my own before, and I think that made the suffering harder than usual to endure. Thankfully my teammates encouraged me to keep moving forward, made me laugh when I needed it and allowed me to sob a bit now and then, and - amazingly - we moved along. First emerging from the mountains into a vineyard popping with delicious grapes, then into a town where we revived with some cafe con leche and croissants, and finally onto the last climb up to the ski area where TA 1 was located. As I lay down to sleep in the TA, about 36 hours into the race, I rolled my eyes when Mark suggested that I might feel much better and ready to push into stage 2 after 3 hours of sleep and the hot meal I had shoveled into my mouth. What did he know.
Stage 2: Bike. 80 km distance, 2500 m elevation gain.
When I woke up, at first I continued to feel quite discouraged. We rolled in around 75th place (extrapolating from the vague info Jason’s wife Kelly, who was traveling around the race course to cheer us on, could give). Oof. But I built my bike, changed into my stage 2 clothes, and packed my race pack. Why not go out into the sleet and wind and see what happened next? It couldn’t possibly be worse than what we had just done.
Mark and I headed to the zip line while Jason and Garrison took the chairlift up for a downhill mountain bike ride. The thrill of the zipline (the person operating it neglected to mention to us that there was an automatic braking system at the end of the zipline, which had both Mark and I bracing for maximum impact on our respective rides until we unexpectedly braked and sailed in for a gentle landing… phew!) woke my brain up and then we all mounted the chairlift together to start the 80 km ride that started along a chilly ridgeline. The weather had not improved but we were prepared with layers and warm gloves, and the hilly ride helped keep my core temperature at a comfortable spot. We moved well along the ridge and eventually dropped onto some paved roads through tiny towns that had been there for maybe 500 years. Each town had a lovely stone drinking fountain in the center (convenient!) and quaint cobbled streets…which it took us some time to figure out with the maps as it was nearly impossible to distinguish between streets and driveways. We got turned around a few times but the guys increasingly got the hang of it as Mark and Garrison expertly navigated through the jumble of tiny roads. Okay, this was feeling much better.
At this point, we became quite obsessed with projecting our time on this stage. We knew we had to be out of TA 2 at the end of this section by 4:00 on Monday, 52 hours into the race. We knew that we could continue on a short-course if we didn’t make it, but really hoped to make the cutoff if possible. As we got closer to the end of the stage, it became clear that we could make it - but we would really need to hustle. We were on top of a mountain and needed to make it into the town in the valley where the TA was, but an off-limits road made this very difficult. We descended on every path that took us in the right-ish direction. Mark took over the maps and navigated like a wild animal - stopping to occasionally gather information but otherwise pushing relentlessly and by the gut sense of an experienced navigator to get us out of there. The routes were technical and slow but we threw ourselves down that mountain and burst into the TA with just under an hour to spare. We disassembled our bikes, changed clothes, repacked our packs, and shoved in as many calories as we could, then exited the TA with about 8 minutes to spare. We sidled up to a tiny cafe where Jason amusingly ordered 8 cafe con leches (SI, OCHO CAFE CON LECHE POR FAVOR!) and we sat in the park to drink them, savoring our successful battle against the first cutoff.
Stage 3: Paddle. 90 km distance, 350 m elevation gain.
We sauntered down to the boat area, paddle bag in hand, only to discover that we were the last team to choose our boats and that left us as the only team paddling heavy (+10 kg) boats with a portage wheel instead of a skeg. We took it in stride and figured we would offset this disadvantage with our massive upper torso strength…? We nailed the timing of this paddle in terms of dark zones - the RD specified a number of short class 2+ rapids that we could only paddle during daylight hours. Mark/Garrison and Jay/me set out in good spirits, happy to be off our tired feet and bouncing through some enjoyable rapids down the Rio Sil. I was pleased to take the maps during this section. I generally enjoy paddle navigation and the challenge of staying found along a river using time as a primary marker of distance and careful checks of the river’s direction. It felt like a nice way to give the others a mental break as well and engage my mind during what can be a very sleepy part of an expedition race - paddling into the night. Once darkness fell we entered what was considered to be the most beautiful part of the paddle, through a rocky canyon that we could only sense soaring above us. We motored along, passing several teams, and idling away the hours discussing inane topics and singing songs. Little known fact: Jason Urckfitz is also a guitar hero - the real kind, not the video game (though maybe that too?). I enjoyed our chat as we made good time down to a checkpoint hidden up a side creek along a hiking trail, and then finally to a big portage takeout above a hydroelectric dam system. This was a 12 km portage, and thankfully our portage wheels brought all the way from the USA were quite functional. The portage was paved but not flat (hence the 350 m gain on the stage), and the route felt desolate without the little villages and homes we were accustomed to coming across. We did find several abandoned buildings but none with a roof, so we had to put off our desire for a nap (it was, of course, raining) and slog on along the long, straightforward route. I went into full zombie-mode here, and I don’t think I was the only one. When we finally emerged in a small town where the put-in was, Garrison excitedly reported that he found a “perfect!!!” place for a short snooze. We strolled into a large walk-out basement, disturbing several bats with our presence and breathing in the foul air of what smelled like many pisses and shits in one corner, and slept for an hour until the sun had fully risen. Mark noted upon waking that he fell asleep with a massive spider in sight. Good stuff.
Back on the water, we were excited to get this stage over with. The guys were amused as, with a sleepy mind, my nav error for the stage was that I estimated we had 12 km left until we encountered another dam and portage when it was only probably 4 km. I suppose that’s the best kind of error. We finally rounded the last bend to see Kelly in the distance, sunning herself on a dock near the TA. This is when Kelly sightings started to bring me a lot of energy and reassurance. We were doing it, and all of our friends and family at home were cheering us on (or so Kelly said). That felt pretty great.
When we arrived at the TA, we had some disagreement about whether or not to sleep at the sweet hotel that was located there. While in the hotel basement assembling our bikes, we decided that it would be best for the team to snag a few good quality hours so I ran upstairs and booked 2 rooms. Getting into bed in those crisp white sheets felt like a crime after the grossness my body had accumulated over the past few days, so I rinsed myself in the shower before slipping into a deep sleep.
Stage 4: Bike. 210 km distance, 5200 m elevation gain.
Three hours later the alarm sounded and it was a rough start to rip myself from the comfort of bed and get back into race mode. We got onto our bikes fairly efficiently but before we even left the parking lot I discovered that my DiNotte lighting system was broken. Grrr. Garrison gave me a weak handlebar light and we were on our way, pedaling for about an hour before losing daylight. This was the long bike stage, which the RD warned would be “very difficult”. But aside from being really long, the terrain felt fairly friendly as we cruised along mostly paved road through tiny ancient towns and villages dotted along the Galician countryside. Of note, everyone took (or nearly took) a big fall during this stage -- first Mark nearly rode into a concrete crevasse (quick brakes!), then I fell off my bike after being startled by a passing car (soft leafy landing!), then Garrison took a BIG fall digging into a hidden, wheel-sized hole in the ground (and spun over his bike like a windmill, injuring his shoulder but thankfully not more), then Jay tipped into a thorny ditch on our final bikewhack into the TA. Biking sections always get me nervous for injury but I felt good overall about how the team looked out for each other on this stage and made it through with minimal injury. Garrison might disagree - not sure how his shoulder is feeling one week later!
Highlights of this stage included following Mark’s steady nav along a maze of idyllic farm roads as the sun rose, riding some smooth singletrack into Lugo, and recovering with a slick bikewhack to avoid an off-limits route on the way into the TA. We also slept in a cozy bus station for 20 minutes, which was surprisingly refreshing and confirmed that I was getting better at sleeping out during expeditions. We enjoyed the town of Lugo - a great tourist destination with a vibrant modern town as well as an ancient walled city - and took the required photos at the various monuments, trying to convey our utter exhaustion in each photo. But the clock was, once again, ticking away. The next cutoff loomed - 8:00 on Wednesday morning, we needed to be out of TA 4. And so we pushed once again, pedaling our hearts out along a hilly ridgeline where we could look down on the giant, phallus-like concrete power plant blinking with angry red lights that was at the center of our destination: As Pontes. We flew downhill, pleased with ourselves for our easy glide into town, only to discover that we were hurtling towards an off-limits road. Argh! Garrison quickly found a trail to bikewhack that ended up being a decent short-cut around this issue, so we made it to the TA with 45 minutes (again) to transition. We wildly packed our bikes and said goodbye to our bike boxes; we would not see them again during the race. I pulled out my 1000-fill down jacket - even though the weather was improving, the later into a race I get, the more my body temperature matches that of the outside air - and we made a few dehydrated meals before leaving the TA with a minute to spare. Unfortunately the race organization made what appeared to be a change to the rules: the SUP mini-stage that was meant to open stage 5 actually had to be completed by 8:00 and teams that could not do this would be penalized 1 hour. I can only assume their SUP rental dude was getting antsy down by the waterfront. A little annoying that this information was not accurately conveyed in the race materials, but no one on the team grumbled about missing the SUP :)
Stage 5: Trek. 65 km distance, 2600 m elevation gain.
I think this was my favorite stage, but it started out fairly awfully. After an hour of inefficiency in As Pontes where we drank some cafe con leches ostensibly to wait until the sun warmed up the wet grass enough to find a place for a quick snooze, we eventually began our trek only to find all the grass still quite wet and cold. On the way out of town we found a broken pavement lot behind the wastewater treatment and powerplant buildings (scenic!) and laid down in the warmth, only to wake up an hour later sizzling in the sun like bits of tough old meat (we were no longer sexy enough to look like bacon). Kelly found us here and appeared concerned by our choice of sleeping location. Were we all 4 at the same time losing our minds??? Maybe. Spirits were low-ish as we began the trudge into the forest and along a trail that followed a swift-moving river. We were to cross this river after several kms and climb up onto the ridgeline. The river crossing was exciting. It took us a while to find a suitable crossing location, with Jason leading the charge by scouting several potential locations before finding the best one. I personally enjoyed the opportunity to cool off and had half a mind to stay there, maybe forever…but up we went. [Side note: if you have a chance, ask Quest to describe their river crossing. One of my favorite, most hilarious stories of the race.]
I loved this next section. We walked along a continuous ridgeline with a few steep climbs and expansive views out on the valley below. We hit this during an extended “golden hour” before sunset and even enjoyed passing the many huge windmills along the route, which made me feel like I was in Star Wars. We were moving well and I think we all were surprised that our feet had recovered as well as they had from the opening trekking leg. The route moved into an area with some more (relatively speaking) modern farming and we started to talk about finding a hay barn. There sure were a ton of them, and Mark insisted they were the best for sleeping, but it took awhile to find something suitable between the farmers wandering around still and their dogs with the incessant barking. Finally we crept quietly into a lean-to garage with a large tractor and a bit of hay. It would do. We settled in for a planned 1 hour of sleep, but were awoken within 15 minutes by a very curious farmer. Oops! Thankfully José was a fan. He had apparently been tracking the race online and was excited to see our dot approach his farm and then tuck into one of his farm buildings. He graciously offered us a spot in his man cave, a beautiful stone structure with a futon, fireplace, table, and sink. He invited us to stay until the morning and offered a shower and breakfast, but we insisted that we would be gone in a couple short hours and thanked him for his generosity. Mark had a nice idea to leave him the race map of his farm, signed by our team.
Despite the needed sleep, our minds started to really show their wear on this stage. Luckily this usually took the form of amusing hallucinations, déjà vus, and strange beliefs - like the case of the missing teammate (Who are we missing? I see Garrison… Mark… Jason… Where is that other guy?? Who is it and why isn’t that dude pulling his weight more?). Also we forgot each other’s names constantly and were endlessly amused by the ways our minds were deteriorating. At least we were entertaining to ourselves.
The section ended with a beautiful trek along another river into what was essentially our final TA. We knew that we were arriving at the worst time for the tide but also recognized that some food and sleep would likely help us get through the final push to the finish line. We feasted in the TA and relaxed/snoozed for a bit, waiting for the tide to rise.
Stage 6: Paddle. 11 km distance (shortened to about 6 km), 0 m elevation gain.
A short trek down to the put-in with our paddle bag revealed water rushing in the wrong direction and a mucky channel. We snoozed a bit longer after hearing that 2 teams ahead of us turned around once they hit the ocean and were being transported to the next TA… We are still unsure of why exactly but we later saw on our paddle out that the sea was pretty choppy with wind and a heavy fog was lurking off the coastline. As we waited, a crowd of tweens descended on our dock lugging carbon paddles and sweet racing kayaks. We watched them with amusement as they zipped up and down the canal.
Eventually we were told by race staff that the paddle would be shortened by about half; we would take out at a bridge before the ocean and be transported by van to the final TA and start of the trek, but would retain our full-course status. Fine, I suppose. When we saw the ocean paddle conditions, they didn’t appear all that treacherous and the fog stayed off shore for the rest of the afternoon, so it was a bit annoying to find ourselves in motorized transport.
The paddle was uneventful. About 6 km through a tidal canal and channel and under two bridges out to the sea, which was lined with breakers over what appeared to be a small reef. We TA’d at the take-out then waited about 20 minutes for a van to arrive and transport us another 20 minutes or so to the start of the final trek.
Stage 7: Trek. 32 km distance, 900 m elevation gain.
This stage was bittersweet. Mostly bitter really, but with a touch of sweet knowing that only 20 miles stood between us and a full course finish of the 2021 ARWC.We started through a maze of trails along the bluffs overlooking the ocean. We laughed about how the trail builders must have been drunk - they wanted to create switchbacks along the sharply undulating terrain but they decided to switchback straight up and down the hills instead of against the elevation gain. We attempted a few tracks along the upper, less steep part of the park but too often found ourselves in the backyards of disgruntled residents or on circuitous roads or trails that we finally gave in and trudged along the coastal route, trying to savor the sunset over the ocean. But really we savored the excruciating pain in our feet and lower joints. The previous almost 190 km had taken their toll, especially the pavement, and no amount of distraction or ibuprofen could lessen the suffering. The route increasingly brought us onto pavement (of course) as we meandered through the outskirts of A Coruna and eventually through its uninspiring industrial district. Jay took over the maps somewhere in here, with Garrison managing a particularly high level of pain from toughing out this intense race with less than his usual amount of training (especially time on feet!) and Mark sinking into a half-asleep, half-awake state that had him dream-walking through the streets, amusingly weaving between parked cars and nearly taking us down with him as he sought structures to lean/sleep on. In short, we were a bit of a mess. At one point we tried to revive ourselves through a zombie-version of true confessions: early dating life edition. It turns out we had all been pretty bad dates to our high school crushes. Once an hour or so we would regroup and agree that we should try to pick up the pace so that we could finish this f***ing leg a little faster, only to find that our fastest pace was our current hobble.
The hours passed. I knew we would be finishing around 5 a.m., so I focused on the time passing on my little purple wristwatch. Luckily with the sleepiness I kept forgetting what time it was so even if I checked incessantly the answer was always a surprise.
By 5 a.m., we found ourselves in familiar territory: the vibrant downtown of A Coruna, currently fast asleep and quite chilly. We limped down the main street, finish line within our grasp. And, at 5:45 local time, we passed under the finish arch, greeted by a photographer, one member of the race staff, and our own superfan, Kelly. A little underwhelming, but I don’t know if I could have handled much more fanfare than that anyway. We were ushered to a chilly seating area and attempted to party over beers and semi-frozen lentil stew (why?). It was clear that we needed to get warm and find a place to sleep, so Kelly drove us back to the hotel and we collapsed into bed for a couple of hours… before waking soon after to get COVID tested and pack up our gear in preparation for the plane ride home the next morning.
Final ranking: 41 of 45 total full course teams, 90 total teams.
Final time: 6 days, 17 hours, 45 minutes, 44 seconds.
Post-Race.
No rest for the weary. I napped for another hour that afternoon to get myself through the awards ceremony, which was back downtown by the finish line. It was fun to see all of the teams together and celebrate the incredible accomplishment of the top teams having finished in just over four days. We went out to dinner at a restaurant that specialized in octopus… maybe not the best post-race food but it had seating for 15!) with Quest, Bend, and a smattering of other American racers. This was super fun and was followed by some super delicious ice cream. The party ended by 9 p.m. due to the general consensus of total and complete exhaustion, and we laughed as we passed by the post-race festivities area again and saw people dancing to euro-techno music on stage. They must have been the volunteers?
I flew home the next morning, sharing my flights with Matt Hayes of Quest (we also flew to Spain together). We were a sorry sight in the airport. We ate an absurd amount of food, hobbled extremely slowly between gates, and elevated our feet as best we could in the room available on the plane. Arriving home that night felt amazing.
Takeaways? Well, probably the one I almost always take from a challenging adventure race, but this time it was especially true. I found myself in a place of serious self-doubt during this race, but ended up finishing the full course and enjoying myself along the way. I am stronger - mentally and physically - than I realize. If I can suffer through this then I can suffer through just about anything. I also really appreciated the opportunity to race with such an experienced team. They are all people I love and respect and we had a ton of fun together as a team. I learned some veteran tricks along way that I will definitely bring to future races. Thank you to my team for their support and “endeavoring to persevere” with me, to my friends and family for their good vibes that made it all the way to Spain when I needed it the most, and to Cliff, Wilder, and Mose for their endless love and the best welcome home ever.
