Stars W.A.R., Wasaga Beach
Always a fun event. More people should do this!
Results -
http://data.whyjustrun.ca/files/8/2/GjLLa1oKumDjSB...
'Bent and I were racing together.
(Thanks for the pics, Hermes!)
Our day got off to a bad start when AdventureDog started whining and barking at 4:30 a.m. after too many visits to his water bowl last night. Then we had a white knuckle drive on snow-covered roads in freezing drizzle that only left a small section of our windshield open, even with the defroster blasting. We were tempted to turn back but kept giving it "just a few more minutes". Finally, the freezing drizzle changed to beautiful light snow. Phew.
The race course had a bunch of CPs with different values that could be visited by ski or snowshoe according to our preference. There were two big bonuses for doing groups of two or three CPs in a particular sequence. The Matrix was set up with three pairs of controls that had to be visited by the same person. It sounded like a lot of effort for the points it was worth, and we couldn't see the map ahead of time so we made it a low priority.
Other than that, we didn't bother with much rogaine-style planning. Our strategy could be summed up as: "We have two classic ski races in the next six weeks." So we planned to ski as much as we could, then switch to snowshoes for some of the later CPs. It was permitted to leave our skis somewhere in the woods and pick them up after the race. Our packs had snowshoes, running shoes, gaiters, extra layers, snacks and water; mine weighed almost 10 lb.
As it turned out, we never switched to snowshoes and the only thing I took from my pack was two peanut butter cups. Oh well, an extra workout never hurts. The hills at Gatineau will seem so easy next week! ;)
Wasaga Beach is an awesome area for ski-O with lots of trail junctions. It took me awhile to get into the map, partly because 'Bent is a faster skier so I don't always take as much time to read the map as I should. But today was especially bad... My mind was elsewhere last night and I failed to pack my wonderful ski map holder or any other way to carry a map while skiing. 'Bent insisted that I take his homemade map holder, which sagged well below horizontal by halfway through the race. Even weirder, my expensive compass that has worked well in recent months got stuck and needed constant shaking to loosen the needle. So other than my inability to see the map or trust the compass, navigating was easy. ;)
36-37-33-34-35-32-31
We were going to drop our skis near #31 but it had been so easy to ski in the snowshoe tracks that we just kept going and never bothered to switch. There were a couple of hilltop CPs where we had to drop our skis and scramble up a steep climb in ski boots but it wasn't bad.
We were having an OK-but-not-great race until #39, which was a Bermuda Triangle control for several of us who should have known better. There were two sets of tracks leaving the trail. I noticed a team on a different set from the one 'Bent had turned onto and asked him if he was sure. If only I had recognized Bob and Hermes, our race would have been a whole lot better! We ended up losing 27 minutes, according to my stupid Ambit which makes it hard to lie. ;) There was another team in there with us who never found the control; we relocated - obviously much later than we should have - and found it. So then we had to abandon our plan and do a quick ski back to the finish, picking up a few controls close to our route.
45-39-40-41-42
So glad we got up there and had the chance to see some good friends. Conditions were fantastic and, as Timato said, it felt like a true winter adventure race. Thank you to Nick and the Stars for all your hard work to make this a fun and creative event!