This report was written by Aja Cook. Enjoy!

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Who finished first?
Four big Avocados and one baby Avocado went to the Presidio early morning Sunday to participate in a challenging, fast paced orienteering course. The three big Avocados went to a BOAC advanced pre-course training clinic, jam packed with vital information. The baby Avocado, along with daddy Avocado, headed out on the orange course (4.4 km), one of the four courses available, while the three other Avocados watched, and waited patiently in anticipation for their departure time. Unable to handle the waiting, the three big Avocados bottled up from the clinic and headed to the start line. With maps of the long orange course (6.6 km) in hand and clock ticking, the big Avocados headed out in search for the first of eleven CP’s .

Teams scattered in all directions, on all different courses, some looking like they knew what they were doing, others not so confident. One thing that all the teams had in common was constant chatter and laughter associated with having fun. By the time the team of three big Avocados gained their bearings, they found themselves at the location of CP1. The big Avocados had all been under the impression that the course would be used that day for skills training. Dependent upon others in the past to lead them through races, they decided it was time to learn these navigation skills for themselves. Each Avocado carried a map in hand and listened to one anothers suggestions about where they thought the upcoming CP would be found.

Group naving proved to be successful for CP 1-6, although it became apparent that certain Avocados had stronger skills than others and were being relied upon for their strengths. Together the Avocados decided the remainder of the CP’s should be naved out individually. The least experienced naving female Avocado took the first challenge of locating CP 7. All went well until she cut the trail short, costing the team about 7 minutes of unnecessary searching. With CP 7 located, the short ultra fast Avocado set out to find CP 8.

Up and over obstacles, down steep embankments, bush waking through shrubs of all sizes, the team of Avocados finally made it to the CP that proved to be the hardest to find on the course. A half hour out, the team had time to make up if they planned to arrive back at the finish before the father/son Avocado duo. The giant organic Avocado was placed in charge of finding the next CP, which was found less than a mile away. With only two CP’s left, the team decided to revert to naving together, which had proven to be a much more effective strategy for the first set of CP’s.

Within a few short minutes, the team of three Avocados had their finish line in sight. They sprinted off to cross the finish line with assurance in their eyes that they had arrived before their friendly Avocado competition. Just as they were crossing the finish line, the infectious sound of a baby’s laughter could be heard. The baby Avocado had been hiding behind a tree with his father awaiting the other team’s arrival. The baby Avocado looked up at his dad and said, “See dad, two smart heads are better than three strong heads…our wits proved to be stronger than their physical strength!” before running out into the field to greet his fellow Avocados.

[RACE REPORT] September 18, 2006.

This was my second year at a classic that’s existed for more than 45 years–the Mt Tam Hill Climb! (I plan to hit this race as long as my climbing legs will churn.)

This year I was out to better last year’s time of 52:28. A far thought was breaking 50 minutes. Lofty–but doable.

I started with the Cat 5 group from Stinson Beach and headed north on Route 1 for about 4 miles. Basically it was a pack ride. Everyone stuck together to efficiently get to the meat of the race–the climb! During this stretch, though, I thought the pack traveled relatively slowly. Looking back, I would’ve made the break with a few guys that broke from the pack early. But would that move have come back to hurt me later on? Who knows. I plan to give it a try next year, if it feels right.

We then get to Bolinas-Fairfax road and the pain–I mean climb–starts. That tight pack was now shattered by Madam Tam. It’s at this point I put my head down and…HAMMER!!

My heartrate boils (my AVG HR for the race was 180)! Luckly the air temp was manageable, so I wasn’t boiling. For the next 40 minutes I delicately managed my pain, HR, and the course itself.

Most of the climb was a steady–sometimes steep–climb, until you hit the ridge. Then it’s rollers known as the Seven Sisters–some refer to them as the Seven Bitches. Either way, they will tease and hurt you like the best of ‘em!

Finally I roll over the Sister #6 and hammer up Sister #7–a short climb to the finish.

I finish in 50:17–bettering last year’s time by more than 2 minutes!!

Good times.

Madam Tam, see you next year!

Last night, I joined organizers of the SF Oyster, Jen and Galen of baarbd.org and fellow racer Adam Chase to discuss adventure racing and specifically the upcoming SF Oyster Urban Adventure Race Oct. 15th.

It was nice to see the room above capacity (30+) for the talk. This is just more data that the sport is growing here in California. The audience was only 1/3 triathlon and/or marathon experienced and about 1/8 had done an adventure race before.

The race organizer, Jason Ornstein gave a great overview of what racers should expect on the course. One important thng to know for the race is that REI will be where all transitions will be made and that the course will resemble a wheel with spoke. Racers will head out on one leg of the race on say a trek or a bike and then return after hiting a few checkpoints to REI before going out again in another format such as skating.

Adam Chase, showed a video before talking one that his brother made to help people visualize the sport in general. He discussed AR in general before introducing Jen and Galen of the local community adventure racing portal baarbd.org sharing their own experience with AR and why they love the sport and most importanltly how people can discover the local AR community through baarbd.org. It was good to add balance to the stage and more voices sharing unique experiences and why each in particular loves the sport.

Adam Chase then picked up his talk again going quickly into the nuts and bolts of doing well in this urban race. His talk specifically emphasized the need for coming to the race to race as a team and knowing each others weaknesses and strengths.

Adam then turned over the floor to me to discussing training. I had prepped and passed out copies of a basic plan of exercize and skill building that was intended to build more confidence then actual physical abilities in the last 3 weeks before the race.

If anyone is looking for tips and help training for this up coming race then send me an email at wgilmore (at) pacwestathletics.com or check out our site for more info about the adventure racing program and other outdoor fitness programs at PacWestAthletics.com

Tonight, I am speaking again with the group at San Carlos REI at 7:00PM. Come and join us if you are in the nieghborhood.

Another great event report by Aja.

Another run in the park… Not!

Event photos by Galen: http://www.flickr.com/photos/dolface/sets/72157594288793832/

Saturday morning Adam Armijo and I woke up at the crack of dawn to hook up with the BAARBDs for their Rev It Clinic, hosted by Rich Brazeau, held out in the Santa Cruz Mountains. I was under the impression that Adam and I were going to practice how to become better orienteer’s in case anything ever happened to Doti. Once at the park entrance we were greeted by fellow Dirty Avocado Will Gilmore, and Mark Manning from Team AR Nav Supply, for a quick clinic on how to use maps, compasses, and other useful navigation tips. Once we were briefed, we set out the get our gear together before Rich arrived with the maps.

9 am hit and still no Rich. Apparently he had been at a bachelor party the night before (Shhh!!) causing him not to arrive home till 4 am, the same time Armijo and I got up to head to the clinic. Around 9:30 he finally arrived, passed out maps, and gave us a course briefing. At that point it became quiet apparent that we weren’t just going for a run in the park. We were going to do a mock mini Primal Quest.

10 am hit and Jen Klafin was yelling out the count down. Adam had the maps, apparently plotted with coordinates, and stated that he was prepared for battle. 25 eager adventure racers took off in two different directions. Will, Jen, and a large number of racers headed off in one direction. All the others, including AR Nav Supply, went the other way. Adam and I just stood there. I yelled to Adam “Which way nav?” He looked at me blankly and said, “I don’t know lets follow these guys.” It was at that point I knew we were in trouble, and it hit me how lucky we are to have Doti as a teammate. We headed out down a dirt road following both AR Nav Supply and Sharon, both trustworthy groups to follow. Right?

We lost both groups in less than a mile for much a needed bathroom brake. At that point we began practicing our nav skills, teaching ourselves to be more realistic. About 45 minutes into the course, we arrived at a ridge that we thought to be close to where we needed to be. From that location, racers could be seen running around like ants in an ant farm, coming and going from all different directions. Some crazy fast AR guy came by, having already been at CP1, and gave us a pointer for which direction to head.

As we headed down the ridge per crazy guys suggestions, we ran into Will, Jen, and a few other racers who seemed to know what they were doing, all of which had been to CP1. We apparently added an extra two miles to what should have only been .5. Oh well, we had a few extra pounds to work off anyway. As we headed to CP1, nearly 6 groups passed by us heading in the direction we had just come from. They all gave us very funny looks, sort of like, Uh-oh you guys messed up, huh?

We pounded the down the hill hoping for some short cut that could possibly be taken to get us to CP1 just a bit faster. While bush wacking through a steep section, Adam and I found a fence that we thought we could go up and around to get to the trail head faster. It was a great idea if it actually got us to the trail head. Adam scampered up and around the fence with me and my slippery shoes following closely behind. My last step before sliding past the fence landed directly in a pile of loose rock causing me to loose my footing and slam straight into the side of the hill. Unable to see anything but stars, I decided it was smart to stay sitting for a few minutes. It was then I realized my running shoes were not going to cut it anymore. Battered, bruised, and bloody, we resumed our mission; after all we had not even made it to CP1 yet.

A few minutes later we found ourselves alone on the ridge were CP1 should have been spotted from. From atop the ridge we found that all other teams had left the valley and were well on their way to CP2, leaving us to look for some random human made object that was the ruminants of an old water tower. What a joke that was. After 15 minutes of searching we decided that it had to be this rusty old pipe sticking out of the ground.

Nearly two hours into the race, three miles deep, Adam and I had only reached CP1, but we had smiles on our faces and good feelings about the remainder of the race. We jogged back up the ridge we had just come down to start our journey towards CP2, which was positioned some 2 or so miles away. At about the 1 mile marker we stopped to asses the course markers. It was them we found that we had missed our trail and had been heading in the wrong direction. Oops! We were looking at the map upside down.

Finally on the right track, we flew through CP2-4. From CP4 there was a long rolling trek that clung closely to the mountains base line. Together we switched lead positions as we charged the four or so miles back to the cars, where CP5 awaited our signature. We were told in the beginning of the race that if we did not reach CP5 by 2 pm we should re-park our cars outside of the park in order to prevent our cars from being locked in by the parks sunset deadline. Apparently, Rich was expecting the bike course to take more than 6 hours. YIPPEE! Since it was 2:30 Adam and I decided to re-park the car.

We assessed the bike map and decided that we had a pretty big climb ahead of us in order to get to CP6. Pretty big did not accurately describe the climb up to Black Mountain Communication Tower. The map made it look like a doable road climb. This was not the case. An hour and 15 minutes later, we finally reached the top after playing dodge ball will oncoming Mercedes, Jags and BMR’s. It was decided at that point that we would ride down to CP7, turn back around and call it a day.

We dropped 800 feet from the 2600 we stood at for CP6. We wound down a fun little single track with small woops and banked walls that lead us to CP7 and threw high fives. It was then that Adam and I knew we were heading back to the city for beers. An incomplete Rev It Up event took us 7 hours to complete 11 running miles, and about 12 bike miles, can you say SLOW? For me, for Adam, we had a great time; we worked on our skills, and lived to tell a story about it. Who cares if we were the slowest out of the bunch?

Place: Second place coed premier division. (Uno Avocado, 6th in solo cat.)
MotionBased Data: View Digest
National Geographic Topo! Route and Waypoints: Download
Google Earth Route: Download
Team and crew photo links from ExploreCa.com:
Karen and Paul’s Photos
Team Feed the Machine’s Photos (thanks Mark Richardson!)
Team Feed the Machines’ Photos (thanks Kristen Francis)
Team Dirty Avocado/BAARbd’s Photos (thanks Adam Doti)
Team DART / NUUN Photos (thanks Ryan Van Gorder & Welcome Back!)
Carl Davis - Volunteer Photos (thanks Carl!)
Team Wild Burro (thanks Chelsea and Tony!)
Race Results: Excel | PDF

THE PREP
About this time 2 weeks ago, we got that fateful, and somewhat expected notice from CSM Events. The next installment of the Cal Eco series to be held in Downieville was cancelled! Argh! (…among a few other profanities…) was our gut reaction of what had just happened, communicated by all in our virtual conference room. As we were firing off emails and voicemails vigorously tying to regroup, we explored our options as to what we could do to fill this void and get our AR “fix”. You can read more about the ethics and bickering of the west coast trend of directors cancelling races here: http://www.baarbd.org/community/forum/view_topic?topic_id=155
We had wanted to do Karen and Paul’s Explore the West – Southern California race since it was announced, but because we had committed ourselves to the Cal Eco series and wanted to participate in a multi-day race this year, we were holding out for Cal Eco’s Downieville. Now that it was cancelled, we had an opportunity to take Karen and Paul up on their offer.

We had one week, the race had virtually started!

It was going to be tough and we needed to scramble, because in exactly 1 week to the day, we needed to be in Big Bear with our team intact, all our gear, a 4X4, and most importantly, a crew! A-Bomb was MIA, goofing off in Tahoe on his mountain bike, and I was on the home front with my 2 year old son for the holiday weekend while my wife was visiting her sister. That left me and Donato, via hundreds of phone calls and emails, to pull together a team, crew and logistics at the last minute. Were we going to make it? Fortunately, it wasn’t hard to find racers out of the ever-growing network of DA’s ‘n friends. Everything was in place, except for that one minor detail…mandatory crew! Talk about make it or break it…I must have made 50 calls and emails, and came up empty every time. Seems like this is *the* weekend for weddings, funerals, and Bat Mitzvahs. Long story short, the frustration continued until Wednesday when we were lucky enough to hook up with Jen and Galen from baarbd.org. Jen would race as our female to round out the team, and Galen would be our star crew, to form Team Dirty Avocados – Skins/baarbd.com.

With all the pieces in place, all we needed to do was make it to Big Bear Lake by 6pm Friday. This also proved to be challenging, due to the fact that I was working in Seattle all week, and on top of that, organizing the logistics of this event. I landed late Thursday, went home, packed, loaded the truck, went to bed. In the morning, I hit the road to pick up A-Bomb and our kayak from CityKayak (www.citykayak.com) and then we high tailed it to So Cal! Whew! We were finally on our way.

We rolled into Big Bear at about 5:30pm after caffeine fueled, Mario Andretti paced roll down the highway. With time to spare, we picked up some last minute groceries and made our way to the pre-race meeting at a local Italian restaurant. After stuffing our selves with our final meal, Paul and Karen handed out the maps and went over the race rules.

The race was to start at 6am, with a check in time of 5:15, in a small town east of Big Bear, in the desert valley called Pioneertown. Approximate ETA, 1.5 hours. By now, it was already almost 10pm. A drive to Yucca Valley would put us to sleep between midnight and 1am. We were reassured there would be plenty of motel rooms in Yucca Valley, so we loaded up the truck with our gear and pizza and high tailed it down the hill so that we’d be closer to the start in the morning. We always like to get to a race early and avoid the rush of a long drive hours before a race. As Jen drive down the mountain, I vigorously plotted the CP’s on the race maps, knowing that once we got to the motel, I was going to need to get as much sleep as possible.

We arrived in Yucca Valley, and the first motel we checked was sold out. The desk lady said that actually all motels in town were sold out! What happened to wide open availability!? We got a bit frustrated at this point. Couldn’t we have gotten some amount of notice ahead of time so we could secure a room? A campsite? Couldn’t a block of rooms been reserved? Anything to avoid the aggravation and the hassle that is eating into our much needed rest only hours before the race start.

Did I mention the race already started?…

We finally found a vacancy and quickly filed into the room and crashed as soon as our route was plotted.

4:15am came quick. Again, it was hard to wake up DP, but when isn’t it. We geared up and loaded into the truck and made our way to the start. It was still dark but teams, were scurrying about with their headlamps preparing their bikes, packs and other race gadgets.

We gathered at the start line around Paul and Karen, and after a few final words the race had officially started at 6:05am.

THE RACE

The order of events in this race was to be; bike, run, bike, run, bike, kayak, run. Paul estimated it would be 90 miles and 11,000 ft elevation gain. This turned out to be an “estimate” alright!

We started biking west by north west towards a little town of Rimrock. The roads turned form paved to dirt to gravel. Eventually the road made its way through a canyon, which was nice as it provided shade from the rising sun. On this first bike leg, whatever could have gone wrong, did. First I experienced one of the important lessons in bike maintenance and racing. Never get your cables replaced just before a race. My derailleur was ghost shifting all over the place. I could not stay in a single gear no matter what I tried. It sounded like popcorn coming form my bike. This proved to be very tiring as I tried to maintain forward momentum. We managed to keep our place in the pack in the front quarter. Jen also sprang a leak in her camelback and was loosing all her fluid quickly. Armijo’s seat and post didn’t want to stay up and he had to keep retightening it.

As we shook out the bugs, we picked up CP1, which was a quick run up and around a “lollypop” loop above a bike drop. On foot proved be faster, so we jammed up the hill, got the checkpoint and headed back down to our bikes. One down, and it was off it was to the first TA. We transitioned very quickly and set out on the trek/run. Not sure what team we were behind, but they were wearing blue. We entered a large reentrant with what looked like a trail that disappeared. We decided to let the other team gain some distance on us and we watched them as they tried to make their way straight up the reentrant. From prior experience, that would prove to be very slow moving. We decided to back track just a few yards or so and Jen found the trail we were looking for behind a clump of bushes. This trail took us up to the ridgeline where we caught a 4X4 road down to the next CP. We were just behind Team Fuzzy Logic (I think). After checking the point, they continued up the path out the backside of the CP. Again the maps did not represent the trails as they were, so we had to scrap our plans of catching the Pacific Crest Trail and wing it up and over the ridge to the TA.

We ran down to the TA and transitioned to bikes again. Galen had fixed my ghost shifting problem whule we were on foot and it rode like a new bike again! Overall, our transition times were very fast for this race, which is something that we’re constantly working on. Sub 5 minutes!
We hopped on the bikes and made for Heart Bar Camp.

*And now a brief word from our sponsor… (Jen adds a piece)
Upon departing from TA 2 Paul said that we had a “short” hike-a-bike section which he followed up with, “if I were a race director I’d NEVER put a hike-a-bike in a race” and if that wasn’t enough sarcasm from one source, he later said that Karen had done the whole section in her big ring! I don’t know about the boys, but my mind was hung up on the word “short” despite the other warnings… for the next hour we humped our bikes up loose rock at pitches you could have skied down! Paul alluded to the fact that the reward was worth the price, so we kept trucking until we topped out around 7k. Now, to resume the mechanicals we began with, my bike decide to take part in the festivities. My bottom bracket started to seize. On a bike just over a year old I was shocked - ok, pissed - this was happening. DP greased her up and she held up to the next TA. Felt like I was riding with my brakes on. *

We passed a small gate up initially, and had to back track to locate the next CP and the start to the Santa Anna River Trail (SART). The SART, as you probably have read in other race reports, is a fun little trail. It was a rolly-polly trail with an average loss in elevation. We took this trail west for a while, and then down a technical rocky trail that never seemed to end. Armijo and DP loved it! But I shared Jen frustrations in the extreme amount of concentration needed to stay upright, many times almost resulting in an endo. After what seemed like hours, we made it to the end of the trail and to the general vicinity of the TA. At the end of the trail was a TA location update sign. The sign stated “…follow road - turn left and cross bridge and look for TA on left” (…well, something along those lines). So we turned left, uphill mind you, and crossed a white bridge. There was no TA to be found. We rode almost half way to Road 38 with no TA in sight. We headed back to the sign to get a better read of what it was telling us to do. After a second look, it appears we zigged when we should have zagged and headed RIGHT down the hill, and into the TA. Turns out we weren’t the only ones to make this mistake.

When we pulled into the TA we caught a glimpse of Mark Richardson, who was racing with Feed The Machine, bound off into the bushes and across a river apparently attempting to make a b-line for the SART up on the ridge in front of us. We decided to take the conservative quick moving route and following the paved road back around and up to the trail ahead. We hit the trail running, turning our headlamps on and off as we spotted teams down in the valley below us working their way up, so that we wouldn’t give away the location of the trail. We ran by moonlight for about a half hour until no team was close enough to pick up on us. We continued trekking and running up to the next TA where we were once again united with our bikes.

We were consistiently holding 6 – 9th place throughout the race, which fluctuated as the race progressed due to solos and the unranked. We had a feeling we were doing well. We were feeling strong, transitions were short and we continued to move quickly.

Now here’s where things got interesting. We set out west on 38, and started to look for a trailhead which was supposed to take us down to the SART. We stopped in a strip mall parking lot under the parking lights and checked the maps. As we did, we caught a glimpse of another team, I think it was Team PETA, emerging from behind the building and headed off down an alley. We rode over and it turns out they had been trying to locate the trail head for almost an hour. As we discussed our plan with the other team, I looked over the shoulder of a PETA and noticed a guy on a smoke break under a light in the alley behind the buildings we were now behind. I rode over and asked him if he knew where the trail head was. He said that he believed it was down at the end of the alley, and then up the hill. PETA had tried this earlier, but didn’t make it very far before turning back. We decided to check it our further.

I later found out that Mark and FTM crossed the road and made a B-Line down to the trail. The trail took us more west than we wanted to go. I soon realized we were on a different trail, but it would be ok as it would eventually take us to the SART crossing which would eventually take us right to the CP. This trail was pretty nerve-racking to ride. On the right was a cliff wall going up and on the left was a very steep drop off. The trail was loose gravel and sand in places making it difficult to maintain total control.

Once we emerged onto the fire road that would take us to the base of Clarks Grade, we came up on a couple other teams. Hey, it was Richardson! We rode down to the valley floor with Mark and then made a slight right and pulled away. Turns out he made the correct turn to the left and started up Clarks Grade about 10 minutes ahead of us.

Clarks Grade was tough! We rode about half way up, and then it just became too steep for us to ride. On the way up we passed a team wrapped in their space blankets taking a nap on the side of the trail. When we finally made it to the ridge crest and checked in at the CP, the temperature dropped drastically! What was left of the bike leg was a single track down to the road and through the neighborhood to the kayak TA. On the way down we froze! When we reached the TA, Galen had the truck running with the heat on. Jen was frozen to the bone. She he got in along with A-bomb and DP and warmed up while I changed, put on warmer clothes and got the kayaks and kayak gear ready for the paddle. Frost covered everything.

*Jen again. The decent from 9k on bikes breached freezing temps - frost bite started to set in on my fingers, unfortunately I’ve had it before so the pain was familiar. Albeit, we made it otherwise unscathed where Doti led us, seamless like a mouse through a maze to the TA. A 30 minute power nap was a long TA, though it thawed the team enough for us to motivate and put on enough clothes to pour ourselves into the frosty boats. The most painful part of the kayak was not only the perimeter course we had to take, but the fresh scents of biscuits and home-made donuts wafting over the water. It was just before 6am, the sun was rising and we had been going for 24 hours, with another 4-6 to go… Cliff bars lost their essence.*

After an extremely long transition Galen and I woke up the rest and got them moving. We had a race to finish guys! We squeezed into our frost covered kayaks and took off on the paddle. The water was completely calm and glassy. We were required to stay between the 5 mile per hour buoys and the shore the entire leg. This was painful, as it added a lot of distance on what looked like a straight shot to the CPs. We found CP14 with ease on the dock by the meadow. CP 15 and CP/TA16 were also easily attainable, and before we knew it, we in transition for the final leg of this ever increasing epic adventure.

We left the TA at the exact same time as Team PETA, as well as Dean from Team Baja who was now solo. He asked if he could travel with us and we gladly accepted. We let PETA enter and start the steep scramble to Greys Peak ahead of us so they would not see our route choice. Once they were out of sight, we continued across the road and up the hillside a few house down from where PETA began their trek. We found a very fast ascent route on an exposed ridge/boulder field. This was a much better route than bushwhacking through a reentrant again. We needed to climb 1000+ feet from the lake shore to the top of Greys Peak. Every time we thought we had the peak bagged and the CP near, we saw just off ahead of us another peak which was higher. We descended, and then climbed…decended, and then climbed, and so on. We peaked out on about 4-5 peaks until we finally reached Greys Peak. Tears of joy slowly began to blur my vision.
Descending from Greys, we found the trail and thought we were home free! We followed the trail down and as it started going more east than I would have liked. It continued heading east and we never came across the fire road that was shown on the map. We decided to take it further and eventually we did pop out on the fire road. This was much further east than we had aimed for. We regrouped and found a single track that would take us right to the finish.

We came up over a hill and saw the finish! There were the volunteers, other teams, crew and Paul and Karen all waiting around a bonfire. We all crossed the line as a group, Dirty Avocados Skins/baarbd.org, the Uno-Avocado and Dean from Team Baja/Total Fitness!

We ended up placing 2nd in the premier coed division. I technically got 6th in the solo category, but since we raced together as one team, all four of us were recognized on the podium next to Team DART who received first place!

THE AFTERMATH
After some lunch in the town of Fawnskin, Galen, DP and Jen headed back to the Bay Area. Since Galen was able to catch some cat naps at the TAs, he was feeling fresh enough to drive. A-Bomb and I on the other hand were in desperate needed of some sleep. We drove along the shore, scouting parks and campgrounds that we could sack out and take a nap before we hit the road. When we found the perfect spot, we parked the car, rolled out our bags and crashed. We expected to sleep for just a few hours. We went down around 3pm, and woke up in the pitch dark at 8 o’clock! We needed to get home! We drove to the store loaded, up on caffeine and made our way back up north.

This race was truly epic and loads of fun! The distance was about 90 miles total as Paul estimated, but we calculated the elevation gain at 15,850ft.

Thanks Paul and Karen, for setting up an awesome challenge and in such a beautiful area!

–Dirty Avocados – Skins / baarbd.com

Team Feed the Machine at Explore the West, Big Bear, Sept 9-10, 2006
By Mark Richardson

When I decided to race the Explore the West So Cal event I had no DA teammates available to race with me. They were either participating in a ropes clinic arranged by Will to get needed certs for Adventure Extreme, or they were planning racing the ill fated Cal Eco Finals near Downieville the following weekend. Not to be easily defeated I threw my name out on BAAR and SCARABS and was promptly contacted by Christian Burke of Team Feed the Machine. We exchanged e-mails and spoke a bit and decided to race together as Team Feed the Machine along with “K” who came highly recommended after a strong performance at the event in Baja earlier in the season.

As of Wednesday morning before the race we had no crew to move our gear for us. Then Christian found Evan and his girlfriend Clara. The next day Bill from Big Bear returned a call to Christian and confirmed that he was also available. Now we were fat!

On race day we’d requested a 3am wakeup call with a plan to leave the Motel 6 by 4am. We woke to a knock on the door by our local crew person, Bill…it was 4am. We dressed and flew out of the rooms and arrived at the start tem minutes before the race was supposed to start. The race started at 6:05, we started at about 6:08. As we rode along, Christian noticed that his chain was making a lot of noise. A few mile from the start his chain broke…oh no, BAAR Brawl 2 rerun? Christian repaired the chain while I left some bait for the dung beetles behind a rock. We were off again and not far along when the chain broke again. This time I discover that Christian’s hub is broken. It’s clear that the chin will continue to break and Christian didn’t want to ruin the race for me and “K” so he wished us well and returned to the start with my phone.

As Christian left us we continued on up a mostly uphill dirt road. “K” was struggling a bit so we towed as much as possible. She was growing more frustrated as we went on as she’s usually pretty strong. Even the hike a bike was a struggle. I just kept hoping that she’d get over the hump and start to feel better. As we neared CP1 we met up with Christian who’d run down from CP2 to meet us. He joined me as we trekked up the “lollipop” to CP1. A short way up the hill “K” sat down and told us to go on and meet her on our way back down. We asked if she was sure. She was sure and we were already unofficial so we went with it. We arrived at CP1 with at the same time as Rob Harsh in last place. We flew down the hill and picked up “K”. “K” and I rode and Christian ran to CP2. By the time we got there we’re passed several teams.

At CP3 “K” called it quits. She had a headache and nausea, the altitude was getting to her and the course wasn’t going down hill anytime soon. She was pretty disappointed, I don’t think she has many bad days in competition. Christian and I took off at a brisk pace, going just slow enough to allow the food we’d just eaten to digest. We took a cross country route over a knoll and descended a hillside directly into CP3. By the time we got to CP3 we were in 17th place. As we left the CP, solo competitor Bob Myers was arriving. Out cross country route may not have saved any time but it was more fun than taking a dirt road. As we neared CP 4 we passed a team and met up with another team where the dirt road we were on met the Pacific Crest Trail. Our map showed the PCT paralleling a creek line but the trail clearly labeled as the Pacific Crest Trail was making switchbacks up a hillside. We followed it with another team for a couple minutes before I was sure that we didn’t want to go that way. We returned to the intersection and discovered the old PCT route. The erosion of the trails made it clear why this section had been rerouted. We got to the summit and crossed the highway right into CP4.

We did a moderately fast transition at CP4/TA2 and started the second bike leg. This leg began with an uphill hike-a-bike that took us from Onyx Summit at about 8440ft to a peak at 9465ft peak about 4K away. I made one minor nav glitch on the way that cost us about 25 minutes. Once at the summit we descended some rocky and treacherous single track until we met the dirt road that took us to CP5. At CP5 the volunteer made sure that we knew how to find the single track trailhead to the Wild Horse Trail. The course instructions said we could only travel on Highway 38 between Heart Bar Road and Wild Horse Trail. Unfortunately this left two options and we might have chosen the wrong one if we hadn’t been given the huge hint. The single track started a side slope trail across a steep and moist hillside. We followed it until it came next to a creek then we crossed the creek. After a short time we were greeted with miles of fantastic single track descending. About 2/3 of the way down there was a series of waterbars made of skull sized stones. The last one was pretty beat up and as I crossed over it my bike stopped and I did a very acrobatic endo but managed to land on my feet. Christian was impressed. As we finished the single track we caught three guys riding as a team. We passed then on the way to the trailhead for the Santa Anna River Trail (SART). The SART is an amazing single track trail that travels west to east following the contours of the valley with plenty of down and very little up. It’s a must do for any mountain biker and was easily the highlight of the race. Unfortunately it was too fun to stop and take pictures.

This TA was fun because we had a huge crew. Evan, Clara, and Bill were there as well as “K” who’d been crewing since she had to drop out. Christian’s girlfriend Melissa had also arrived and so we had five people taking care of two racers.

We saw the Dirty Avocados/BAARBD team leaving the TA as we approached at dusk. We transitioned pretty quickly. I took out the map to plan our route and our crew suggested that we bushwhack directly south to the SART. I studied the map and decided to go with their idea. We had some thick bush right by the stream but we managed to get to the trail in just a few minutes, a fine example of the advantage a good crew can be. We started trotting down the trail at a brisk pace, cruising on autopilot. We caught a couple guys just before CP9. From CP9 we jogged a bit more before we began to follow a fire road up to CP10. We stopped jogging and strode briskly up the road. Our crew was a bit surprised to see us so soon as we were expected to take 2 hours and did it in an hour and forty minutes. We were surprised to find the Dirty Avocados were there at CP10, we thought we’d passed them on our shortcut. We were the 9th team to arrive at that CP/TA. It didn’t appear they’d been there long. In fact our crew guy Evan did some brake repair for the Avocados.

The next leg was on bikes again. The map showed an non-existent intersection across the street from the CP. We dove off of the road with our bikes and looked for the trail we wanted below the highway. The DA’s went west up the highway and were stopped to figure out a plan when we left the road. We descended to CP11 down a bunch of switchbacks on the SART. After the CP, there was a cliffed out section of the SART where the trail was also very sandy. The dark of night made it even more nerve wracking so we proceeded through that section with great caution. We popped back out on the dirt road we’d hiked to the prior TA. I knew when we left the TA that the bladder in my pack had lost some liquid when I set it on the bite valve. It was here that I discovered that my bladder had drained completely. We had to stop at a small stream to refill the bladder and drop in some iodine tablets. We got back on the trail and caught up to a team that had been short coursed for arriving at CP10 after 10pm. As we descended to the river with them we were joined by the Avocados/BAARBD team again. We all crossed the river together. Christian and I stopped at the left turn to Clark’s Grade which caused the other team to stop. The Avocados/BAARBD rode up the road and around the corner. That was the last we saw of them during the race. We rode about half way up the 3000ft Clark’s Grade before we dismounted and started hike-a-biking though the moonlit night to the top. Christian was going just a bit faster than me so we hooked up a tow between the bikes and hiked briskly up the mountain. We stopped only to eat and took one three minute rest. We were the 6th team to arrive at the Clark’s Summit and CP12. I added a couple layers for the freakin’ freezing downhill to Big Bear Lake. We caught some nice single track at the top but the cold made me tremble which shook my whole bike so it was a bit dicey at first.

We arrived at CP13 after 4 hours 40 minutes where we transitioned to the Kayak. We were a little slow in this transition but knowing that some one just left on a kayak before we arrived kept us from lingering long. Out fingers were freezing cold and stinging like crazy. Our crew had our gear laid out for us in a running car with the heater on, sweet. They’d moved it into the car because when they’d laid it out by the boat if was quickly covered with frost, burrrr. I changed, warmed my fingers in some gloves, ate a Cup-O-Noodles. I’m larger than Christian so I sat in back of the 23ft kayak and handed him the map. As we approached CP14 it was hard to follow the shoreline because of all the large floating docks on the lake. We weren’t sure where we were for a bit but eventually found where I was sure the CP should have been. We were within ten yard of it and never saw it. Christian even got out of the boat and looked around. After taking over an hour and twenty minutes and not finding CP14 we were pretty frustrated. We decided to remember everything we could about the location in case the marker was lost and continued on. Teams after us found it but confirmed my suspicion that the glow stick had died. Oh well, we were unofficial anyway. At least no teams passed us on the kayak leg. We got the next CP easily and headed towards the end of the Kayak leg as the sun rose behind us. The paddling inside the 5mph buoys sucked.

From the kayak take out we did a cross country scramble directly up the very steep hill and scrambled around at the top until we located Gray’s Peak. From there we began to follow a hiking trail towards the finish. We expected the trail to fork and intersect with a dirt road but it didn’t. The trail kept going east and we wanted to go south. I spotted a road grade below us and to the south. We cut through some pretty open country to the road. A few hundred yards from the road we met the hiking trail that would take us to the finish. The finish required that we leave the trail and cross country. I initially missed the point where we should have left the trail and we had to back track about three minutes to the spot. We left the trail and headed south. Within a minute or so I spotted pick-ups with kayaks in top of them parked at the bottom of the hill. The finish was about 100 yards east of there.

We crossed the line just after 9am, 27 hours from when we started. Our crew and Karen took our pictures and Paul handed us a bottle of Champaign. Christian sprayed it all over the place, then I took it and enjoyed a few swigs. Kristen came over and handed us each a Newcastle beer which was the best beer ever at that moment. I hung out to watch the Avocados finish, socialize with other racers, enjoy the cool and eclectic music mix playing on the PA system, and wait for the awards ceremony. 28 teams started the race. When I left it think 11 had finished and 4 were still out on the final trek. The promoters said this course wasn’t for novices and that proved true with about half of the teams dropping out.

I had a blast at this race. I have never had so much fun at a race that I can remember. The course was epic but the trails were so cool that we hardly noticed. Christian and I both didn’t eat and drink enough during the Kayak and ended of feeling pretty weak on the last trek to the finish. Good thing the kayak was so close to the end. We overcame a lot of initial adversity and salvaged an pretty great experience for our efforts. We had the best and largest crew at the race which was very cool. Christian and I had never met but raced together like we’d known each other forever. It’s sad that such a great event was also the last Paul and Karen are putting on in California.

The below race report was authored by Aja Cook on behalf of the DA Skins. This was Aja’s first race with the Dirty Avocados! Where approporiate we have added some personal notes or color to the report. Ejnoy. Adam….

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Where to start… pancake breakfast, pasta dinner, or bike tuning session? Hmm, start with the first stage of stress.

I arrived in the city on Friday knowing that my bike was in serious need to of tunage, yet there was still a hundred million things on my agenda that needed to be finished before I could start working on it. All day Saturday, Armijo and I ran frantically around the city picking up that last of the gear that would be needed for the race. Based on our morning calculations, we SHOULD have had all of the shopping finished by 1 pm, leaving us enough time for a swim in Aquatic Park. Those calculations were obviously based on the fact that we were shopping in some docile country town were the word traffic does not exist. Before long 3pm had rolled around, we had not swam, not gone grocery shopping for dinner, and I had not even cracked open a book to complete my lesson plans for my day job, (High school teacher :), which I was SUPPOSED to do on Friday.

Late in the afternoon, we made our way down to Chrissy Field where we found a bay filled with wet mut’s, transients, screaming children, families, and not to mention, 2 foot white caps out in the bay. We began to get a little worried about our early morning kayaking adventure. We huddled around the registration booth, clinging to one another to retain whatever warmth could be found in the typical SF cold and very breezey afternoon. To add to our apprehension to the water trek, it was announced that there was yet another obstacle standing in our way of safe water travels…we had no kayaks! Apparently, Ted with City Kayaks was having mechanical problems with the vehicle that was supposed to be transporting our boats. Expecting boats to arrive in the staging area around 5pm, the team began to assess what could be done. Fortunately, all teams waiting on Ted did not have to wait too long. Todd, the race director, informed all racers that the boats would arrive, but, they would be a bit a late. Two hours to be exact. With good news upon us, Armijo and I headed out to finish the grocery shopping that still had not been done, and back to his house to continue with the remainder of the nights prep.

A few hours had gone by, and DP and Doti had finally arrived at Armijo’s house with news that the boats had arrived, leaving the team with nothing but eating and a few finishing touches to lay down with gear preparation. As I frantically cooked up a pasta feast, the guys tuned and cleaned the bikes. Mine of which was still ghost shifting, creaking, slipping, rubbing, you name it, my bike was a mess. As I slaved in the kitchen, as most women do, Armijo assured me that my biked would be fixed. This worried me. I had been on the trail only 3 times with these guys and every time we were out together, something mechanical always went wrong, and inevitably nobody knew how to fix it. I knew how to cook a feast, but could the tuning task be handled?

10 pm rolled around, and there were four stuffed bellies and 8 tired eyes. We all knew it was time to get to bed in order to ensure a small amount of liveliness for our 4 am wake-up call. However, I still had not ridden my bike to see if it even worked. I lugged my over stuffed body down the stairs to check out what Armijo had done. Low and behold, I discovered that Armijo is man of many talents and he just pretends not to know how to do anything while on the trail. My bike was fixed, and we were ready for bed.

RING RING RING… 4am rolled around way too fast! We had 45 minutes to make breakfast, eat breakfast, load the cars, and get down to Chrissy Field. This task was not difficult for many of us, except…DP. DP did everything but get ready. He talked, rolled around on the futon, talked some more, looked at the food on the table, watched it get cold, and then decided to eat while we were all doing dishes. As Doti, Armijo, and I loaded cars, we watched DP run around like a chicken with his cut off, hollering things like “Oh my balls” and “I got to drop the kids off at the pool.” Before long everyone was ready except for DP. Eventually, we left him at the house and headed down to the staging area.

The streets were empty, and the light fog left a mist upon everything. We arrived at a cold calm Chrissy Field to find one or two other competitors organizing their gear. It wasn’t long after that the music began from the staging area, more competitors strolled in, and voices could be heard. As the sun crept over the hills, the frenzy began, last minute gear checks were completed, high fives were thrown, and smiles could be seen all around.

At 7:00 am, passports and maps were given out to the team captains. Doti laid the map out on one of the teams gear buckets and the rest of us hovered over his shoulder to determine what our best routes would be. To our surprise, we received an incomplete trail map; it seemed that we would be left in the dark on specific sections of the race! As a team, we plotted our best routes for the sections we knew. 7:30 crept up on us as quickly as the sun, and before we knew it, we were being called to stage on the beach.

60 teams filled the shore of Chrissy Field, some anxiously awaited the start of the race, a few racers were seen nervously biting their nails, myself included, and others threw high fives to their team mates. Some competitors looked as scared as a deer in a set of head lights. At 7:40 the race finally started with a member of the Big Blue Race Crew running across the front of the kayaks signaling it was alright for them to lug their heavy vessels 30 feet down to shore. This was new to me; I never actually had to carry a kayak before. Somehow, I was fortunate enough to have someone around to do the work for me. Armijo proceeded to push me faster than my legs would move, damn near making me face plant into a sandy pile of Chrissy. Luckily, we made it to the waters edge safely where DP and Doti awaited us rather impatiently. It was game on and all teams flooded into the bay.

From about 25 feet off shore, a very excited DP could be heard, “What are you doing? Let’s go.” As Armijo and I struggled to get our water skirts on, racers of all sizes passed us on their way out to the first marker. It wasn’t long before Armijo and I caught up to Doti and DP, in the meantime, we managed to pass several of the other racers. As minutes flew by, racers spread out on each of their predetermined routes. The Dirty Avocados, along with 3 other teams, decided to follow the shores edge until we were parallel to the first marker, which was just passed Alcatraz. Knowing the tides in the San Francisco Bay, we knew this would be the easiest route.

About 10 minutes into the kayak leg, an eerie feeling developed in the back of my mind. Within seconds, later the horrific sound of a fully loaded cargo ship sounded its horn as it entered a bay that was covered with miniature kayaks. As it plunged through the water, kayakers could be seen scattering left and right. We knew our only chance was to pick up the pace, get passed the ship, and hope that its wake would send us closer to our marker. With my little arms already burning, I did what I was told, and by luck the Dirty Avocados made their path safely in front of the cargo ship.

About 45 minutes into the leg we made it passed the Check Point and headed to our second required stop, which we knew nothing about. We were given a picture of a ship and were told to find it. The only thing that we knew was that it was docked somewhere in the San Francisco Bay. Good luck huh? Making one of the first mistakes in Adventure Racing, we decided to follow some of the other teams who seemed to know where they were going, which happened to be in the general vicinity of where we thought the ship may be. Luckily, within 15 minutes, we had our eye on CP2.

With CP 2 completed, we knew all that was left was to get back to Chrissy Field as quickly as possible. At this point we counted about 7 teams that were up in front of us, some three man teams, two man, and two of the four man coed teams that we were looking to beat. With a fast pace, Armijo and I trailed behind Doti and DP who seemed to struggle with their strokes. Armijo and I watched the two damn near hit each other in the head, we laughed hysterically, commenting on the fact that they looked like a struggling couple trying the kayak and argue at the same time. It was great to have such entertainment to focus on; it kept the mind of the burning muscles.

Lining the shore of Chrissy Field were curious bystanders, screaming wives, and again, barking dogs. Doti and DP were seen running up on shore to T1 when Armijo and I began to make our way up the sandy beach. To my dismay, the boat had somehow taken on a few extra pounds of water. The kayak that had already been difficult to carry down to the shore was now even more trying. We finally made our way to the transition area where we spent 10 minutes changing clothes, replenishing fluids, and trying to figure out how many and which teams were in front of us.

Four Dirty Avocados emerged from the transition area in matching avocado uniforms, the same screaming wives could be heard as we pulled out of T1, “Go Avocados”. With smiles on our faces, we knew that we were in good standings. Now we just had to get to the other side of the Golden Gate Bridge in 25 minutes or less. Once on the other side of the GGB, we received our next trail map that would lead us through the biking section of the race.

We rallied over the GGB with 6 minutes to spare, new maps were passed out, and once again we found that Todd had thrown yet another twist into the race. The next four CP’s were not given in the typical plotted coordinates format, rather we were given four more pictures of land marks that we would find somewhere in the thirty square miles of the Marin Headlands. All of the CP’s were battery towers, which was great because they could be seen from far distances. Problem was, it was a typical fogy day in the SF Bay. So we were left to take guesses of where we thought the towers may be. Luckily, DP hollered “Follow me, this is my stomping ground.” The three of us looked at each other nervously, hoping that DP wasn’t just talking out of his ass.

Within 15 minutes, DP had brought us to the first battery tower where we would be able to spot the next through a break in the fog. From the second battery tower, we would have to get off of our bikes and run to the next CP. We would have to run an unknown distance to an abandoned building where we would count the number of Mona Lisa’s painted on the building. The Avocado’s took off running to a building that was less than a mile away; we counted 8 ladies and proceeded back to our bikes. All the way back to the bikes DP could be heard, “Common guys pick it up,” “I could walk faster that this” and “We are not going to win the race at this pace,”…nobody responded.

Once on the bikes, we were off to the next checkpoint that laid somewhere up and over the Tennessee Valley Trail about 8 miles away, all of which was uphill. As we began to climb the first of the days many hills, I found the three boys were slowly pulling away from me. Armijo looked back at me, slowed down and offered me the first of many tows that would be offered that day. At first he and I were 20 or so feet behind Doti and DP, but not for long. Armijo is a freaking monster; he pulled us right past the guys and right on up the hill at lightning speed. As we reached the top, another 4 man coed team passed right by us. DP was heard, “Go, go, get in front of them.” Luckily for us, the down hill to the next CP was just ahead. The Dirty Avocados proved to be much better at descending than our competitors.

We arrived at the next CP only seconds before our closest competitors to find that we were in second place. We were in second place, an amazing feeling at halfway through the cycling CP. The other team rallied off in front of us with fury in their eyes. They knew what I did not; to get to our next set of CP’s, we would be climbing for days.

On the next set of hills, hunger and thirst began to set in. My legs became weak and my spirit began to slip into the fog that still surrounded us. Armijo continued to pull me up the hill, as he was doing so I began to realize I was going to need to eat something or I was going to go down hard. I casually mentioned to my team members the needs that I was having, hoping that they would stop at the next hill top. Instead I got a, “Suck down some Gu, let’s go.” As frustration began to boil, I realized this was a race, and they were right, no stopping, eat on the run. Damn that sucked to say, because I was ready for a nap. A few miles later, we rounded the hill top and proceeded back the way we had come in order to switch back around to the next CP.

With a few minor errors setting us back a few minutes, we managed to get our selves to CP 11 with the other coed teams in our sight. From there, we were given the next set of clues that would lead us to CP 12 and 13. The Dirty Avacados began trucking away up more of the Marin Headlands finest hills. This time I was up in front and feeling strong. We climbed for a good 30 minutes before we reached the summit. Doti mentioned to be careful on the downhill, for there would be several trail merges and we would not want to miss our turn. Down the hill we went along with 2 other guys competing as a duo. The six of us flew down some of the fastest downhill tracks seen all day. Trail heads flew by the corner of our eyes and no turns were made. We knew we were on the right track, that’s until we hit CP 13. Somehow, we had missed CP 12. The wording of the nav instructions threw us off, and we didn’t take the time to sort things out. Thinking that we could plot CP 12 from CP 13, as the directions clearly stated, it slipped our minds that we were to get each checkpoint in this section of the course in order. Yeah….clear as mud! Oh well, you live and you learn.

Our friends Karen Rehder and John Bonwick came up to the CP only seconds after us to catch a glimpse of the look on our faces. Karen asked “What’s wrong?” As we informed her of our situation, her chin dropped and hit the dusty ground. That was when we would learn of our biggest mistake of the race. Karen and John both looked up the hill, pointed in unison, and then proceeded to tell us that CP 12 was back about a mile at the top of the hill that we just came down. Not believing what we were hearing, anger and frustration began to well up inside of each of us. None of us wanted to climb that hill, we had just come down it, and were well aware of what we were about to endure. Somber faces, empty bellies, and lips zipped, the four of us began our climb back up the hill, finally nabbing CP 12 and then back down to CP 13. Our little mistake cost us an hour, and 7 positions.

We had 2 more CP’s from that point to hit before we could head back over the GGB. For the last stretch, we would fight a bad case of the pissy attitudes while struggling up the last 2 hills. In the back of my head, being the competitor that I am, I was thinking, “There is no way that I am going to do the foot race now. We aren’t going to win. This SHIT SUCKS!” On the outside I pretended like everything was okay. The boys had no idea of my internal struggle. I was hoping that they were all feeling the same way.

As we began to climb out of the Marin Head Lands, attitudes began to get in the way. Team members had slowed down, including me, and there seemed to be no end in sight for the hill climb. Climbing up the first hill I was found once again towing on the back of Armijo. He was still charging along. It wasn’t long before Doti had mentioned he to was bonking and would need a tow to save his legs for the foot race. Off the tow I went, and on went Doti. Up the hill I climbed, as low and behold I had found some extra energy that gave me the power I needed to chug right up to the top as the other Dirty Avocados trailed steadily behind. We emerged at the top of the hill with the GGB down below us; we knew at that point that it would be smooth sailing back to the transition area.

As we bolted into the transition area, the same screaming wives were there, and photographers and reporters stood eagerly around awaiting our reasoning for the tremendous delay. When we left 4 hours before, we had locked in a solid second place, those that were there to help anxiously awaited the story, “What happened?” Paul and Will asked. As we stripped off wet socks, switched out gear, and replenished fluids, we told the crew what had happened. A photographer from the SF Chronicle shot picture after picture as we headed over to find the trail maps for the foot race. Again, we were thrown another twist. All that was provided was an address somewhere in SF on Mason St. The beginning of this stretch would prove to be the last for the many teams who knew nothing about San Francisco. Luckily for me; I had a team comprised of three SF dwellers. As we sped off to our first destination, smiles had been found, and attitudes were changed, including mine.

About a half mile away, we came to our first CP of the foot race at the Sports Basement. There we were provided with a list of coordinates that were to be plotted on a map. The CP’s were to be plotted on an approximate 8 mile course that would take us in and out of SF’s famous Presidio. We spent a good 30 minutes in the Sports Basement trying to plot the most accurate course. I stood and watched from the couch a few feet away. Armijo and DP watched over Doti’s shoulder as he fumbled around with a compass that he was not convinced of its accuracy. Frustration began to rise as plots just did not seem to look right. Based on the coordinates, and the guys familiarity with the park, they knew several of the plots were just not lining up.

As I watched the boys work vigorously at plotting the map, I noticed that DP was getting distracted with something in his pants. He squirmed around as if someone had dropped ants down the back of his spandex. He made no noise, yet showed complete discomfort. With interest increasing, I just had to ask, “DP, what is your problem?” I soon came to find that, that was the wrong question to ask. DP then proceeded to give me a very detailed explanation to his chaffing problem. I suggested that he run and get some body butter to reduce the friction that he had, and would inevitably be experiencing on this final leg of the race. After all, we were in a sporting goods store. That idea was quickly shot down by Doti, who was almost done plotting the coordinates on the map. DP’s eyes could be seen swelling the idea that he would be running the foot race with an already chafed crotch.

Within the last few minutes in the store, DP spotted a bottle lingering on a store counter. I watched as he walked over, grabbed it, and began to mull it over. I could not believe what I was seeing. The bottle that he had in his hand was sports sunscreen, also known as Bullfrog. He was actually thinking of putting some of the fluid down his pants. I quickly warned him, “DP you don’t want to do that. That stuff is alcohol based, meaning it’s going to burn if you put it down there.” He rolled the bottle over and over again in his hand as if he were considering taking the initial pain in order to achieve some long term comfort. Apparently, my warning made no difference. DP squirted a big wad into his hand and shoved it down his pants. Armijo, Doti, and I all waited for the expected response. At first, DP got the biggest smiles on his face, and then, as expected the look of discomfort began the well in his eyes. “I told you so” I said.

With no feelings of remorse, we were off to trek through the Presidio. Having used Bullfrog several times before, I knew that DP would begin experiencing a sense of stickiness as the product began to dry. I said nothing; I simply waited for the moment to come when he could no longer handle the irritation.

Our first CP on the trek was less than a mile away. As we trekked to a coordinate that was known before we even plotted, Doti began to realize that his initial plot was about 15 degrees off. As we answered the trivia question at the first CP, Doti frantically replotted the map, Armijo stood by to help, and DP and I ran up ahead to find the answer. As we searched for our answer I noticed DP beginning to squirm, and I did all I could do to hold back the laughter. Answers in hand, and map replotted, we were off to a destination somewhere by Baker Beach, 2 or so miles away.

Up hills, on roads, down single tracks, the Dirty Avocados were trekking swiftly along. On the way to the 2nd CP in the foot race, we ran smack into the opponents which we most wanted to meet. They were heading back into the finish area. No loner doubting ourselves and what we had overcome, we continued on with smiles on our faces, and no goals needing to be met. We were at the point of racing our own race.

Once we rounded the hill, Baker Beach could be seen. Doti told us to spread out since he was not exactly sure of where the next CP was. For about a half an hour we scavenged the oceans shore, the rolling dunes, garbage cans, and anywhere else that a marker could be hid. As frustration began to rise again, Doti rechecked the map and the rest of us pressed on through our search. Several other teams could be seen in the same predicament. Having already gone through the parking lot twice, I decided to run one more swoop. As I was heading back up to the rest of the team I noticed another battery tower, similar to the ones found in the Marin Head Lands. I thought, maybe just maybe, even though it was way off of the plotted coordinate, the CP could be located there.

As I rounded the corner, a cold Big Blue crew member was found wrapped up in a blanket. Ecstatic, I called for my team members to come over and have the passport signed off. It was smooth sailing from there! We had two CP’s left, a small hill to climb, and we knew there was only about three miles left.

Up the hill we climbed and tow ropes were once again thrown on. DP eagerly towed Doti, and Armijo through a bungee my way. I was warned to pick up my legs or be drug along the ground. Armijo needed to say nothing else. With this warning, my pace picked up and I damn near towed his but the rest of the way to the next CP, a CP that would prove to be a challenge to find. We searched low and high for a CP that should have been easy to find. Luckily for us, a team of three found the CP stuck to the inside wall of a well and hollered loud enough to get our attention. There was one CP left, and with it came a trivia question. How many balls can be found at the General’s house? Fitting question for the topic of the day.

We jogged off, chuckling at the irony of the final CP. At that point, I had to announce the amount of times that I had heard DP refer to his balls that day, 24 to be exact. We all laughed as we ran off to count the General’s balls.

At our final destination, we counted 16 balls. I looked to double check because I wanted there to be no more mistakes. I only counted 10. I looked up to catch the smirk upon DP’s face; he added a few that obviously should not have been counted. Happiness could be heard, felt, and seen. At that point, we were able to look down at the finish line on the beaches of Chrissy Field, which was less than 2 mile away! Down the hill we sprinted, eager to eat solid food, sip on micro brews, and bask in the reality that we finished the race.

As we rounded the corner, the Big Blue finish line could be seen about 100 yards away. The smiles got bigger upon our faces as the cheers of our friends and family members could be heard as we approached the end. Emotions flew threw our bodies and we wrapped our arms around one another in attempts to cross the finish line as one. We stared that race, never having raced together as a whole, though throughout the 9 hour battle, we would find the glue that would bind us together as one. Together Doti, DP, Armijo, and myself, would prove that that the Dirty Avocado’s had more than just the strength, desire, and knowledge…we had the heart and the ambition needed to be considered accomplished athletes.

This Saturday’s ropes training was good times!

Scott and his gal from California Alpine Guides were super instructors. We learned (or relearned) decending/rappeling, accending, and some traditional rock climbing techniques; plus the basic knots and saftey techniques. Basically, everything we’ll need for most adventure races!

Wow, what a crazy week! Just last Friday we get the news that Cal Eco Downieville expedition was cancelled. We quickly regrouped and decided to try and make Paul and Karens race down in Big Bear Lake area.With only a week to get gear and more importantly crew togeather is was going to be tough! I spent the entire Labor Day weekend calling and emailing everybody I knew to see if they could help us out for the weekend. After 50 attempts I came up empty. We contacted Jen and Galen from baarbd.org and decided to join forces. Jen would race as our female and Galen would be our crew. We also decided to register as a 4 some. Which consisted of a 3 person co-ed team “Dirty Avocados - baarbd.org” and a solo “Uno Avocado”. Since the only team configuration options are 3 and solo. Now were on the road to so cal and we have to be in Big Bear by 6pm for pre race meeting. Race start is 2 hours away near some music festival and race starts at 5am! No camping and no prearranged motels or place for us to crash or organize! Jesus! Basically the race has started! Stay tuned…