Training Log Archive: KFish

Beautiful day

Perfect half mile loop for intervals. Fast at ~ 5:45, recover at ~9:30. 3x

Nice night for a run

Easy ride, still recovering

Legs feel pretty good

BIKE 4: 1:42, 11.8 (1/1 cp)
After the demoralizing trek we had to come out the same we went into the TA, which meant up the rocky several km long two track we had come in on. To our surprise it was more ride-able (maybe 50%?) than we thought it would be when we came down, and we reached the road much faster than expected. From there it was roads back to the TA/ start/finish area with some fun hills to bomb down.

TREK 4: 0:46, 1.7 (1/1cp)
Finally back at our gear bins we were able to dump some extra gear, grab mood boosting snacks (pringles!) and head out. Grabbed 1 cp on the way to the paddle.

PADDLE 2: 1:52, 2.9 (3/5 cp)
Started out slowly down an unmapped creek to take peeks at several locations for a cp labeled only as "Swamp". It became clear we didnt have a good idea of where we were in relation to the swamp, so eventually we gave up and headed for the lake where we could get our position. Headed to the end to pick up a CP by the dam, and then made our way back up the lake hitting 2 more cp. It became clear that this was also slower than we expected, so we decided to skip the swamp cp and another one upstream on the creek. Sucks skipping points but we were hoping to maximize points in the last few hours of the race and the last bike seemed more promising.

TREK 5: 0:34, 1.6 (1/1 cp)
Back to the TA a slightly different way to grab one more CP. Also scouted a few of the upcoming bike trails on the way back.

BIKE 5: 1:24, 5.1 (5/7 cp)
We knew where to hop on the trail from our trek scouting just before, and found the first 2 cps no problem. Then syd got super confused with the trails (she wasnt the only one, several other teams making similar choices!) and eventually we decided to go all the way back to the last cp and start over. Problem is, we apparently made a different turn choice and ended up on a different than expected trail. This became very stressful because we had no clue where we were and only about 40 minutes left on the clock. We decided to keep heading north and downhill and worst case we'd get to the lake and be able to find the finish. Ended up riding along a cliff face and which point syd suspected she knew where we were, which was confirmed when we came across another team at cp 44. These points were supposed to be done in order, and we had missed 2 in between, so we punched and skipped the 2 we had missed (rules were very clear on this, but apparently many teams didnt see it so they negated this rule and scored everything. Which means we could have easily punched 1 of the 2 we skipped as we were very close, but it was out of order so we skipped entirely.). Then very carefully made our way back to the finish and finished with about 15 min to spare. We find a way to make the end of every race unnecessarily stressful.

Overall I am super impressed with how we did both as a team, and me as an individual. 2 low hours out of 24 makes me very happy, and I even believe I could eliminate those with a little bit better planning. I kept up on electrolytes and food very well through the first 21 hours of racing before ignoring the watch beeps. Physical fitness wise I felt great the entire time, although I was definitely ready to be off my feet by the end of the long trek. The team was always supportive of each other and kept moving through each of our low points.

We ended with 43/50 cps (including TAs) and I believe in 5th/20, with the top 3 being big name teams that cleared the course (kudos!). Not bad for my first 24 hour :). While we have a few minor complaints about the race (unhelpful control descriptions, changed rules at the end) overall we thought it was very well and professionally organized and would definitely consider going back - the nav and terrain were great, the volunteers and organizers were great, as was the competition!