Swamp Stomp 2006

Swamp Stomp 2006 – Travel Country Outdoors

Here is a slideshow of the race; http://checkpointzero.smugmug.com/photos/sspopup.mg?AlbumID=1221100

PART I

One of the greatest things in racing is that you never really know what is going to happen. In adventure racing the uncertainty is even greater as different types of races can favor different teams. The mix of paddling, biking, trekking, navigation, and weather can play havoc with teams and strategies – and there is always the uncertainty of bringing together four athletes who must rely entirely on each other entirely for long periods of time. Once again, the swamp stomp has shown me that anything can happen – even though these might be things you might never have thought possible.

The Swamp Stomp has always been a great race, and this year with a Rogaine format (30 hour) it would once again be an incredible experience. Rogaine is a navigators format, and requires an extremely high level of strategy and planning for success. After receiving our sets of maps all the team navigators knew we had a long night ahead of us before we would be ready to race. The course contained 14 mandatory checkpoints (must be visited) and over 35 bonus checkpoints some of which were preplotted, many of which were not. While my team hit the sack at 11 PM (at my request – they were willing to stay up with me), I stayed up until 1 AM plotting and checking the course, and then woke up the next morning at 4 AM to recheck everything and get prepared for the 8 AM start.

The next morning over 60 teams had their boats in the water and ready for a deep water start (most appropriately called bumper boats), a race official yelled go and we were off. We started with a 90 minute paddle from Nobleton to Silver Lake along a wonderful stretch of the Withlacoochee River. It was a beautiful morning and the sun low on the horizon was catching the spray of the water as it came off 120 sets of kayak paddles that sent it dancing in wide arcs through the sky. It was an incredibly scenic and enjoyable start.

Arriving at the beach in Silver Lake, we pulled the boats out of the water we then headed off on our bikes for a point in the Withlacoochee/Croom forest where we would be given a passport for a standard orienteering (foot) and a bike-O course. We chose to collect all points in this section and were moving solidly and rapidly through the course. Amazingly, the temperature in February was going to peak above 80 degrees and it was really starting to get hot on the course. The orienteering was a simple four CP red level course with 2 of the controls being optional. We could run the controls in any order – and while the majority of teams selected a clockwise route, I selected a counter clockwise route. The reason was the first control in the clockwise direction had a strong backstop from that direction, while the other direction did not. This also allowed us to cross paths with the many lead teams that chose to go the opposite direction. Sure enough near the half-way point of the course we ran across Mighty Dog, Flight, and a few other teams. At some point Team GoLite came running up from behind us going the same direction, but then turned off in a different direction after one of the CP’s. We finished the orienteering and were told that all the top 15 teams were all within 20 minutes of each other.

We quickly mounted the bikes again and headed out to collect all the bike checkpoints. For some reason my legs were feeling like lead and I was hardly able to move my bike through the sand. The bike was a mixture of single-track rollers (lots of rollers), straight cross-country riding, and sandy forest roads. My route selection was not optimal as I chose some shorter sandier routes that could have been much easier taking the longer routes. After some walking and pushing, which I am sure was frustrating my team – we came into the TA and I noticed my front tire was completely flat. I am not sure how long it had been flat, but it did explain why I was having such a difficult ride.

At the TA we learned only 4 teams had collected all bonus CP’s for that section and we were still right on the schedule I had put together for the team. The exertion of the bike leg had taken an incredible toll and I was quite nauseous as we prepared for a very long upstream paddle from Silver Lake to Lacoochee. In addition we were going to have to carry one bike per canoe (the race officials would carry the other). The paddle would end up taking about 5 hours of hard paddling – and here I was entering the water nauseous and overheated. JJ was in the back of the boat and was looking strong, as were Jamie and Greg in the other boat. Even though the paddle was mostly a painful memory, I was able to recover, mostly due to JJ’s strong paddling. About 2 hours into the paddle I pulled off to the shore, and after a good “purge” came back weak – but no longer nauseous. For the next 2 hours I used successive intake of water, Gatorade, and Hammer Gel to get my energy back and normalized my stomach. By the time it got dark (shortly after 6 PM) I had just about kicked the nausea.

The next turn of events took me completely by surprise. At first Greg, and then JJ, and then after that Jamie – all decided to drop from the race. It was easy to see that Greg was suffering, but I had raced with Greg many times before and knew that he was nowhere near withdrawing due to physical causes. We had suffered many time together before and he had always overcome, just as I always seemed to recover even when I was in terrible condition. I was in complete disbelief (or it could have been fatigue) – that my team of incredibly strong athletes were driving away and I was standing there at Lacoochee TA with my bike and gear. I was not even sure why they had dropped and it had all happened very fast. Of course it was about 30 minutes later I realized that they had also taken off with the maps of the next section! Doh.

It is sometimes amazing what strengthens resolve. Watching my team drive off made one thing certain – I would finish this race, and finish strong. I am not even sure why this turn of events made me determined – it simply did. Maybe I felt that I needed to prove something for the entire team, or maybe I was simply proving something to myself. Twelve hours into a race – you don’t spend a lot of effort pondering, you simply “do.” I went up to tell the TA volunteer that I wanted to continue the race. I was told I could continue but had to go out with another team, of course I had no maps – so that was a moot point. A few teams were willing to take me with them, and team Hoof-hearted looked like they were ready for some fun – so I started chatting with my two new team-mates, John and Greg.

Our next leg was a 10+ mile bike leg that turned out to be quite interesting. We canoed our bikes across the river at one point, and then had a nice long ride down a soft sand road. John, an avid roadie was a bit new to mountain biking. After I heard or saw him fall off his bike 3 times in soft sand I was a bit worried for him, after he endoed and went over his handlebars into a ditch I knew we might have some trouble. John, however was tough – after each fall he would get up, brush off, and remount his bike. We were not making fast progress, but we were making progress and we had a long way to go. I’m not sure how many times John fell off his bike – but it did seem to become routine, however we did try to help him by calling out areas of sand so he could be ready (it was dark).

Finally we pulled into Compressco in the middle of the Green Swamp where we would start the night trek. I was in my element, I had a new team and we were ready to do some real racing…

PART II

Green Swamp was a turning point for me. The slower bike ride to Green Swamp had me completely recovered. Chatting with John and Greg had refreshed my perspective on racing. My last few races had been with winning in mind, I had forgotten that I also enjoyed the sport. Somewhere with my team now gone, I realized I had forgotten the enjoyment aspect of racing with them. They had not been enjoying the race, and as their heads weren’t into the race – I had made it worse by pushing with too much intensity. I use racing as a release from many things, and my primary release is from the hectic pace of my work. Unfortunately I had carried the same intensity I carry at work into racing – and forgot that it was my release. As we rolled into Green Swamp – I was ready to begin one of my favorite disiciplines – night foot navigation.

The mandatory checkpoints in the Green Swamp were quite easy. The bonus checkpoints appeared to be a mixed bag of difficult and easy. We wanted to collect at least a couple bonus CP’s along the route and planned a route accordingly. After watching John suffer from all the falls on the bike I was also glad to get him onto his feet and away from any more hard falls. This of course turned out to be incredibly naïve of me as John seemed to be able to find every hole, rut, or snag in the foot trail and continued to take hard falls throughout the majority of the trek.

The first bonus CP (BCP 26) was uneventful and quite easy. The second one was a different story. After visiting BCP 27 on the marked trail we continued northward on the trail – which eventually petered out completely into cypress swamp. By my reckoning it was a 500 meter swamp-whack northeast to hit a major marked trail that led to CP8. This proved to be true and we performed the swamp-whack flawlessly, but any time it is 1 AM and you are in waist deep water in a remote isolated swamp, you do start to question the sanity of what you are doing. Greg was encouraging as he said that he that if he was going to be under these conditions – he was glad it was with me. I’m glad he had faith as every navigator, even though they know they they will eventually come out of the swamp – always has those fears of the “endless swamp or bushwhack”. Sure enough after 20 minutes we ran into the Orange blazed trail and began following it to CP8.

The remainder of the trek from CP8 to the TA (through CP9) was about as uneventful as a trek could be. We chatted and I gave orienteering tips. They liked my policy of “when one team-mate eats – we all eat”. I shared cheese cubes and deli-ham. After Greg asked me to find a power bar in his pack and instead I pulled out a pop-tart, we had a small celebration. We talked about how it is possible to walk and sleep simultaneously (though it is dangerous). And we finally ended up at the Cumpressco TA where cans of Red Bull and our bikes awaited us.

After having watched John fall at least 15 times, I really admired his courage as he mounted his bike and took off on the next leg. As I pulled up besides Greg and John I realized something – it wasn’t Greg and John. Another 2 person team had gone out and I had followed, they did invite me to ride with them – but I said I had committed to ride with my adopted team. I rode back to the TA, got my team-mates and we headed out again. The sun was now beginning to come up and with it everyone’s energy level began to rise. I decided that to make good time I would put John on the tow rope and we moved to CP 11 at a good clip.

I nearly missed CP11 as race director Kip had said it was on the River Road hunt station, thus I headed that way. As we passed by the Compressco hunt station we saw the control and we stopped, of course I could have simply misunderstood what Kip had said, which is highly likely considering that I was half-asleep at 5 AM as we had the conversation. The fog in the Green Swamp now lent an eerie feeling to the rolling landscape of dunes and swamps. It was a cool, cloudy day with a light fog – and we had about 15 miles of sandy roads to get back past the canoe crossing and then to Lacoochee where we would head out on the final leg. At this point John was riding better so I unhooked the tow and we moved at an easy pace back to the TA.

We arrived at the TA and I realized we had enough time to pick up at least one and possibly more optional paddle points. We selected a couple of boats – and I started solo with John and Greg behind me up the river to BCP7. BCP 7 was an easy find, and BCP 8 had been cancelled leaving BCP9 as the last one for us to get. I paddled hard and was pretty sure we had passed the mapped location, but no control. Finally we called off the search (after a frustrating 40 minutes of paddling past BCP7). We did not see it on the return trip – so we did get some paddle points, but not all that we had attempted. The downstream paddle was wonderful – the current that was so punishing on the upstream legs, carried the boats wonderfully downstream. I dropped into an easy paddle pace and simply let myself enjoy the movement.

Back at the TA we needed to mount the bikes and get back to Nobleton. Leaving at 11:30 AM we had 2 ½ hours to make it to Nobleton – enough time to get at least a single BCP (which we did). We stropped at a convenience store and gouged on cherry fruit pies (450 calories each) and Reeses cups. With this high quality fuel in our bodies we were ready to go. The ride out to BCP 30 was rolling hills, and on the way back John had to start walking. I knew that this would jeopardize our finish before the 2 PM deadline – so I broke out the tow rope and we started moving. The majority of the ride was along the Withlacooche Rail-trail. No traffic, essentially flat – and open. We rode hard and holding a consistent 16-18 mph into the slight headwind. We picked up the last to mandatory CP’s along the way – with only a slight scare as CP14 (the last one) was slightly off of where I expected it to be. We finished with 7 minutes to spare (plenty of time).

In the end – I enjoyed the race, enjoyed the format, made some new friend – but most important of all – I found the fun again!