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Gilmore Adventure Race
9/20/08
by
Mike Zampino
Team Big Fish Creative
left the hot Phoenix deserts for the mile
high terrain of Prescott, AZ to participate
in the annual
Gilmore Adventure Race. This is the
third race this year for
me after
getting back into racing this season after a
two year hiatus. The first two were sprint
races, finishing in about two hours or less,
but this one would be my first of
substantial length that I estimated would
take us 4 or 5 hours to complete…or so I
thought.
To my surprise
at the prerace meeting we were told the race
would start with a running section followed
by the bike section and conclude |
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with a
freestyle orienteering, meaning we
would be out on the course until the
7 hour cutoff time. No problem, a
slight mental adjustment and the
team was ready for the challenge.
Being
seasoned racers, none of us thought
too much of it when the race started
and we still had NO map. We were
told at the prerace meeting that the
first “special test” would be to
race to the railroad tunnel and
retrieve our coordinates (and map
right?). We were the second team to
the tunnel and were handed the
coordinates, but where was the map?
Looking around we saw that all the
other teams already had maps in
their hands. Certainly if we were
supposed to bring our own maps we
would have read it in the required
gear list, but the thought did cross
our minds. We ran back to the
check-in table with a confused look
on our face to find out we were
supposed to ask for a map before the
race started. So a little
flustered, we grabbed the map and
ran into our TA to plot our points.
Just a slight setback since I had
been studying a similar map the
night before and prior to the race. |
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We decided to plot
all the coordinates (instead of just
the run points) while we had the
plotting tool out and we had a great
system of 1 person reading the
coordinates, 1 person plotting the
point, and 1 person labeling the
point. All but 1 point landed on a
trail or road so I was confident the
points were accurate as we headed
out on the run. There was a little
strategy involved in pacing, as
there were three teams behind us and
two or three in front of us that we
could see. Not wanting to be
followed when we found the trail we
needed to turn onto, we pulled away
from the group behind us.
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Vickie
spotted the trail and off we went up
the hill passing a few teams along
the way to the first point. The
trail continued to loop around to
the second point and back down to
the main road where we passed teams
coming in the opposite direction.
We had a
smooth transition onto the bikes and
headed to bike points 1 and 2
without any problems. We arrived at
bike point 2 (a manned checkpoint at
the Conteras Ranch) to find we were
in first place. Bike point 2 also
included a special test. The
special test was to fill a large jug
with water using a smaller container
to fill the jug. The catch was we
had to transport the water in the
smaller container balanced on a
small board held by a rope on each
corner. Each of us had to hold at
least one rope, working as a team to
keep it balance and from spilling
the water. A few teams showed up as
we were finishing the special test,
but the real issue as we were
getting back on the bikes was that I
had a flat tire. We all worked
together to change the tire and left
the checkpoint still in first place. |
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We
started heading to
bike point 3 (B3)
using a direct path
out of the ranch
area, but soon found
out that trail was
too steep and rugged
to make it worth
while. We headed
back to the ranch to
make sure we had the
correct trail, but
soon saw other teams
heading out down the
road. We elected to
follow them figuring
the longer route
would still be
faster using the
well groomed road.
This was true except
the climb out of the
ranch area was
fairly steep and
with it being hot
out I started
bonking.
Vickie
contributed by
towing me up a few
of the hills. I was
feeling a little
light headed as I
flatted a second
time within 10
minutes. Ron pretty
much changed the
second tire himself
as I tried to
recover from being
overheated. It
didn’t help that we
had given up our
lead and quickly
dropped to 4th
or 5th
place. Once the tire
was changed, we
continued onto B3. |
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However, due to
bonking I was not paying attention
to our progress and lost where we
were on the map. After spending at
least 15 minutes searching for B3 we
determined we had not gone far
enough and soon after found the
small creek bed where B3 was
hiding. This was another manned
point and soon found we had only
dropped to 3rd place.
The next
section to B4 was the hike-a-bike
section down the creek bed for
roughly a mile. The good part was
there was no way to miss B4, if we
stayed in the creek bed and sure
enough a mile later we found the
checkpoint and remounted our bikes
as we headed to B5. B5 was back
near the TA, mostly downhill, and
where the next special test awaited
us. This special test was a wood
puzzle where we had to match the
numbers to the adjacent piece. It
was a bit of a struggle at first,
but as soon as we found a number
that had no match we realized it had
to be the bottom piece of the
puzzle. After that, the rest of the
pieces just fell into place. Since
we were near the TA, we decided to
quickly refuel prior to heading out
to finish the bike section.
Bike
point 6, 7, 8, and 9 were all
uneventful and easily found. The
section between 6 and 7 was a two
mile downhill stretch where we
reached speeds of 30+ mph on our
mountain bikes. After point 9 we
headed back to the TA to finish the
race by crawling through a tunnel
and then over the A-frame wall. We
finished in second place overall (to
an all male team) by 4 minutes with
a time of 4 hours 44 minutes. But
wait…we weren’t done. As I
mentioned earlier, there was still a
freestyle orienteering section where
we have the option of locating as
many points as possible prior to the
7 hour race cutoff.
Mentally it is hard
to restart the body when it thinks
it is done with a race, but not
wanting to disappoint your teammates
plus our competitive nature soon
took over and we were on our way.
After a quick look of the map, we
decided to attack the north section
of the course first since there
seemed to be more of a concentration
of points in that area. We took the
shortest route from points N4 to N3,
to N1 and found each one without any
difficulties. The only problem was
that it crossed the tracks 3 times
which meant climbing (or crawling
under) 6 barbed wired fences. Then
we headed to N2, the furthest point
before working our way back. The
bearing we took to N5 was a little
off and we were about to give up on
that point when we finally located
it. Heading to N6 we ran into some
other teams which got us moving
quicker. N6, N8, and N9 were all
close together and came easy.
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At
this point we had 8
of the possible 13
points with 45
minutes left.
Looking at the map
we decided N11 and
N12 were too far off
to make them
worthwhile. N10 and
N13, although out of
the way were right
by each other. So
we decided to go for
those two points and
also pick up N7 on
the way back in. We
had no problems
locating N10 and
N13, but because of
the distance and the
rough terrain we had
only 15 minutes to
get back to the
finish and made the
decision to skip N7
with the risk of
returning late and
receiving a
penalty. So we
headed down the
tacks back towards
the finish. We were
making good time so
I started figuring
out where N7 might
be since it was just
off the tracks. As
we got near the area
where I thought it
might be I told
everyone to keep an
eye out for it
because if we see it
we will have time to
punch our card. |
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Just as I started
speaking I saw it, and by chance it
was on the correct side of the
barbed wire fence. This gave us 11
of the 13 points and we returned
with 8 minutes to spare and a
FIRST
place VICTORY. It turned
out that this last point was the
deciding factor in our win as the
second place team scored 10 of the
13 points. |
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As always none of this would
be possible (or at the very best would be a
lot more difficult) without our excellent
sponsors:
Big Fish Creative,
Maxxis,
Rudy Project,
Fox Racing,
Carb Boom,
Sierra Adventure Sports and
Racelab. |
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