Training Log Archive: Mr Wonderful

Event: Wilderness Traverse 2019
 

2019 Wilderness Traverse with BNM, BCB, and Shane

tl;dr - use this comment as an easy copy-paste into this and other entries of mine.

Buoyed by false hope inspired by a successful Traverse City edition, I thought I would be okay. I was not.

Pre Race

Ever since my first WT, where I rode a 29er hardtail but desperately missed my 26" full suspension after getting pummeled by hydrocut, I thought it would be more fun on a full suspension. FB marketplace to the rescue - a well maintained 2015 Specialized Camber Comp popped up. When the guy mentioned he worked about eight minutes from the house, clearly that was a sign! 110 mm front and rear. I picked it up on Monday the 19th, converted the front to tubeless on Tuesday, bounced it around the grass next door Wednesday, and raced it Saturday. Seller's inseam was the same, so I didn't even touch the seat. I've done dumber things, but this panned out well.

I was even well-packed! Almost everything organized, checked off, and where it needed to be.

I created my best Jenstimates, where I pick paces that get us to 29:30. Paces seemed feasible. Then we got the cut offs, which were much more aggressive. Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooo (Note to self, make the targets far more aggressive next time....)

Portage (and occasional paddling)

Being an elite four person coed team, we were assigned (1) nice Kevlar boat and (1) red plastic canoe. This red barge would prove to be the bane of my existence.

In roughly comparable shape last year, I schlepped a white boat over far more rugged portages, solo and without much trouble.

This year, that red boat...even on the nicest portages I've ever had at WT, it was grueling. I could not find comfort. The best option was to push the boat up and forward. Or backward? The yoke was backwards so at every take out and every put in, you got to do an extra half rotation. Cherry on top!

We also mussed a few portages - should pay more attention to how we expect they should work pre race. Also I can't navigate while carrying a boat, something to work around next time.

The portage strain and paddling wore me out. I told Brenda she should take me behind the next TA, and old yeller me with the flare gun in order to have any chance at full course. I wanted to curl up in the bottom of the boat and stop doing anything. I was miserable.

Trek 1

Despite our troubles, we did hit our original 8 hour goal, AND we TA'd in 10 minutes I think.

We marched up the road, and saw Lost Arrow break off to shoot a bearing cross country. I wanted to use the trail longer, and then lead to use finding a team who turned onto an unmapped trail, with rumors that they had found it went most of the way during their research. It was certainly easier than brush bashing so we took it, although at times it started going not great directions, we had been on it a while, so we decided to abandon it and brush bash. By sheer luck rather than skill, this occurred at the south end of the correct lake, so we could hear and see the CP. Phew!

We elected the direct swim route to 5. Since we paddled past it, I had scouted a short swim option, and we successfully got there and I only had to swim maybe 5-10 meters between being able to touch.

The next part went fine, but then at the end where we were supposed to cross a creek and find the road...the pace and bearing were good, but we must have been a little short and turned just enough to unknowingly cross the N/S creek instead of the E/W creek. Climbed a hill, found roads not doing what we wanted. Assumed we had gotten west, bashed east, found a lake, guessed what lake, heard campers, asked campers what lake, were surprised, got nice chicken skewers, potatoes, and deet bug spray spritzes, and went back to the n/s creek and brute forced it up. We were so close! I was crestfallen. If I can't be fit, I should at least be good. Team didn't give me any grief. I yielded the map, since it was a a straight shot with minimal topo so I wasn't going to be helpful anyways and I could get a break for later. That final bushwhack started fine but towards the end slowed a lot. I think the final "100 meters" took 15 minutes and involved lots of up and down, thick veg, and Tyler getting stung (had fallen in with Lost Arrow after the first 1 km of the bash).

But BCB and BNM were on the case and we got to TA2.

I was feeling tired and delicate and chaffed heavily by the stupid tri shorts I did last WT in successfully, so I forewent by 10 minute TA target and took my junk behind a van and changed base layer in private. TA was slow, but cut offs were out of reach anyway, so F it was kind of my mental state.

I had also thought about dropping out here, but figured I brought the new to me bike out, may as well ride it a bit.

Bike 1

Opening paved was no fun, I hate biking while tired when BCB is chomping, I just feel bad moving so slowing. Lock out worked nice though.

One day we will get the trail numbers onto our race maps. We overshot the second turn by a couple k, but BNM sorted it out very well and we had some of the best WT biking ever for me - dry and lots of fun undulations. The Camber ate it up, so comfy. I never checked or set the suspension, so I suspect the rear might be a shade soft and the front a shade firm, but certainly close enough for comfy work on those trails.

Unfortunately at CP 5/7, Shane got off his bike, laid down, and was done. Thankfully, BNM talked him into eating and walking bikes and then pedaling a bit. She is excellent at managing and caring for people and getting the most out of them. Upside: he would be our bike limiter instead of me, which kept me slightly further away from the bottom of the well.

We elected to use flats rather than clips to not carry shoes, and I also liked it, and would probably do it again, since it would be a thousand times easier on any rainy year to not crash and also bike push.

On the final approach to CP8, pushing our bikes around on a cliff edge was not anticipated!

Trek 2

Give me a map with usable topograpy and I perk up. Once again we ran into Lost Arrow, who was TA'ing at a leisurely pace. We quickly got away from the TA, leaving them, and scrambled up the steep slope. We used the trails to set up the attack to 9, pretty straightforward. I gave BCB paces just to stay in touch, and they came up so much faster than the 1k bushwacks from Trek 1! 10 was the tricky one of the bunch - I was slightly under it on the first pass, found another reentrant with no flag, decided that was the next one, doubled back and was a bit high but could see it. Final one was straightforward - follow trails to saddle, climb a hill. We had a comfy 20-30 minutes to the departure cut off.

Bike 2

We knew were really short coursed - to have a shot at Trek 3, you needed to be through 13 by 3 am, and it was approaching 6. ARGH. And in true WT fashion, a short course means: a lot more of something you've already been doing. Exiting the o course via bike was fun. The final road to 13 had "washout" signs. I was picture a 3' deep rut. No, more like 15-20 feet, and 30 feet across. Massive! Thankfully there was a worn in path so you could skirt it a bit.

BCB really wanted to bike to 14 for fun, but we convinced her of the short course and headed for the barn. We figured we were roughly locked in position (I think the other team skipped some portion of the o course), so it was a survival ride. I got tired and had to walk some hills, almost more mentally not ready to spin up. A few full course teams flew by - so fast! Had a nice chat with Stark Raving Mad for a bit, great people.

Todd and Joe were waiting at the finish - highly recommended, saved us a 5km bike to HQ. Also, we didn't have to worry about sleepies on the drive having these guys handle that chore.

I really don't know how to find the five hours. Two hours of errors ish still leaves three hours of fitness...that hurdle seems insurmountable at the moment, for me. I think BCB and BNM could make it. Shane probably could on a different day.

Sixth times the charm or pick a nice CP to camp at? One idea I've had since is using Cannonsburg in June - if I can't be within close pace to MRA, then there's no chance at a full course and adjust from there. If I can, then there's a shot. That's a huge part of the WT charm - it obliterates you and then you start to wonder what you could do differently, and the next thing you know you are asking people to race....

Fun Arb race. Some interesting legs, I generally tried to avoid climb. Great time and will super miss Tom.