Florida Coast to Coast Part II

Coast to Coast 2008 Part II

When we reached Blue Springs we knew that we were about half-way through the race. We were now unranked and we knew that if Nature Calls could keep the team healthy they would pull off the win. Julie and I are both pretty intense competitors, not in the mean sense, we simply like to go fast and see who comes out in front. The plan from this point on was to race hard as we could and see how we did. We also knew that in 3 more weeks we would be in Montana doing what is reputed to be the hardest race in the world – not just the hardest in Florida. Anyway it was strangely motivating. Of course the reality was that it was also stiflingly hot. We had received the control points for the next leg of the race, so I proceeded to mark the next section. I would let my crew mark the rest of the race after we left – I was only worried at this time about the next bike leg. After marking the next leg I knew we would be in for some serious biking. My time estimate was 12-20 hours of biking based on conditions. At least the leg started with some easy road riding from Blue Springs to Paisley Florida, where we would enter the Ocala Forest and start the difficult section.

As we rode I knew that we would need to fuel heavily, so we bypassed the turn in to Ocala and hit a convenience store in Paisley (there are two). I looked for the most caloric food I could find (Zingers and Twinkies won out) and downed a large Mountain Dew – I also got some Pop-Tarts for later. It was then into the woods. The first point was quite easy and we even passed by a forest ranger who told us the numbers of some of the trails, and also gave us road conditions of the roads we would need to take. Of course the news was not good – pretty much sandy and soft the entire way. The first flag was at the intersection of a road and the bike trail, so we decided to take the bike trail. I kept a constant eye on my compass – and odometer and calculated when we would be close to the next point which was manned. When we got within what I thought was 300 meters we started to yell, hoping the folks would answer. They didn’t – so we reverted to plan B. Plan B was to continue on the Ocala Bike trail to the power lines (mapped) and then use the contours along the line to determine the correct trail back (about 1 km) to the manned point. This worked perfectly, even though the trail back was too soft to ride. And then Julie got a flat – and realized she had given up her tube earlier in the race. She was using Presta and I had Schrader. And of course she had a Presta rim on her bike. In other words we were in the middle of nowhere and without a bike tube. So we devised a plan. Plan A – walk the bikes (we could not ride anyway) to the manned TA and hope they had and would give us a tube. Plan B – use my bike tool to score out Julies bike rim so my Schrader tube would fit. We walked to the Manned CP – and sure enough Dennis Godber (super-biker) was there and had multiple tubes. He had switched to tubeless – but still had all the tubes. The first tube had dry rotted and had split seams (lesson – they don’t last forever). We did however get her bike fixed – avoiding plan B and being able to continue on with the race. We even got one spare tube for me to carry in case Julie got another flat. My lesson – use Schrader rims, they will fit either tire. I’ve also learned from many adventure races that you need to be able to fix nearly anything that can happen to your bike in the field.

Notice the nice loops we made before the flat tire. We did finally find this Manned CP.


Well – regardless, one of the reasons we moved fast to that point was to make the orienteering course before it got dark, and it looked like we would make it. However, the O course had been cancelled and so had all the checkpoints between there and the next TA. In my calculation over 6 hours of trekking and biking were just shaved off that leg. I was disappointed about the O course as it looked pretty cool – though not terribly. The TA gave us directions and said basically follow the yellow bike trail to Alexander Springs, and then it was road from there. As we headed out (it was now dark) we missed the turn onto the bike trail and came out at Forest Road 538. I knew that this road would take us directly to 445 which is where we wanted to go anyway – and as a bonus it was packed solid. Now I had no idea of how to get to Moss Bluff from 445 – the folks at the CP just told us to “cut across the forest somehow”. I knew that we could take the road that led past Big Scrub, but that was probably the worst biking road in the world – so I was going to find an alternative. Plan A – head to Altoona (there were signs), find a convenience store, and get directions. Plan B – take whatever road we could find going west and hope for the best.

Once again Plan A prevailed. We got to Altoona, stopped in the Kangaroo Store, and were rewarded with more Mountain Dew, and fruit pies (500 calories in three easy bites!). Also a local was happy to give me directions when they saw me looking through the maps, and the directions were perfect. It was funny when they said – that’s a awful long way to bike. I joked with them a bit, they were really nice and it was interesting to see what folks did in Altoona on a Saturday night – these were good old country boys.

The rest of the ride was a blur with hills. It was dark and cool and we had a light tailwind. We flew – the downhills were great, the uphills were pounding, and the on the flats we tried to keep a solid 18-20 mph. I knew we had been traveling fast when we got to the next TA and they asked whether we had caught a ride. The SPOT tracker had showed our progress quite well.

It was now time to sleep! The next leg was a paddle downstream on the Ocklawaha River, followed by a turn upstream on the Silver River. I knew that paddling in this state would have both of us sleeping within an hour. Julie ate while I slept, then we switched. We had agreed to 30 minutes and then we were ready. Our crew was also doing a wonderful job. Oscar had the boats loaded and ready to go with everything we would need, Abhijit had the maps prepared and went over them with me including distances, and Heather had every food I could imagine ready to go. To make it even better; both Josh and Clay were now back to full strength and helping out.

As we hit the water it was perfect still and flat. I knew we were going downstream – but there was no perceptible current, but also no wind. We turned our headlamps off and used the moon and the horizon to navigate. I told Julie I could handle the paddle for a while and let her take a short nap while I soaked up the surroundings. She woke up on her own after about 15 minutes, and we paddled to the “iron bridge”. After the iron bridge there were lots of snags in the water so we had to switch to headlamps. With the headlamps on we got to see all the frogs (yellow eyes) and gators (red eyes). We also got to start some mild hallucinations. I kept hearing banjo music – which could have only been made by the frogs, Banjo Picking Frogs. I never actually saw the frogs picking the banjo’s – but it was obvious they were doing it. Meanwhile Julie was having a conversation about Amber Jack that went like this;

“Amber Jack”
“Do you want Amber Jack”
“Yes”
“The beer or the fish”
“The fish”
“You want fish?”
“No – just Amber Jack”

And then repeat again. Meanwhile the banjo-picking frogs were mocking me as we turned upstream into the Silver River. The current was now coming at us and hard. It took us over an hour to paddle to the take-out which was an abandoned dock. I bargained with Julie that if we did not find it I would paddle us both to the correct location. When we got to the dock there was no-one there and signs saying area closed. So we sat in the boat and hollered – and sure enough people came.

This is a map of the paddle. It is an incredible place to paddle at night. Long straight river lines with lots of wildlife and scenery.

We were now at Silver River State Park, it was about 6:30 AM, and we soon found out that the last paddle was cancelled so we only had a trek and a bike to go. We were psyched. Some oatmeal and Ramen noodles and a warm shower at the campsite later – I was feeling good and ready to trek. Also Clay and Josh were going to join us for the trek. Getting back to a 4 person dynamic was fun and with Clay and Josh both fresh – this leg was a lot of fun. My legs were fatigued (Julie and I had run much of the first trek, and the second one was just leg punishment) as were Julie’s – so we did not want to go too fast. We were able to chat and really just enjoy the trek – and it was hot. Good news was the CP that was later stolen, was still there – so we had no navigation problems (or even slow-downs). The entire trek was on the Florida trail – so it was simply following the orange blazes. In fact if it had not been for the oppressive heat and swarming horseflies – this would have been really fun.

We had no idea where the other teams were, I figured Nature Call’s was back there somewhere – and I knew Colin (solo guy) was still in the race somewhere as we had heard about some of the teams at the last TA. We did not know where the other teams were – we saw Colin at Blue Springs, but had not seen any other teams for a few hours.

Here is the trek from Sliver River State Park to Santos. It is only about 11-12 miles and all along the marked Florida Trail. The area has incredible trails and hiking, and Santos is truly the mountain bike capital of Florida.

Well – we had made it to Santos and the last leg of the race. The last long leg. I had no idea of the conditions of the off-road sections – though it was a long way from Santos to Crystal River. The first two checkpoints were pretty easy in the Santo’s main biking area. As we headed for the second one I ran into a group of bikers that I knew, and then a second group from Orlando who had done one of the CFAR races – so we ended up with an entourage of bikers helping us through the free-ride section of Santo’s heading to CP22. At this point, instead of biking through Spider Kingdom (there aren’t really spiders) we decided to take the road to the trail just east of the Land Bridge.

After crossing the land bridge we headed north on the bike trail, or at least I did. After going back I found Julie having a conversation with Tommy, so I interrupted her and told her she needed to come with me. She continued to talk to Tommy as we found CP23 (I overshot it at first) so I found a spot with nice pine trees and none of the swarming horseflies and let her sleep for about 10 minutes. The next section was really cool. I had never ridden the blue bike trail west of the land bridge – it was awesome. Dips, vortexes, drops, climbs – they were all there.

There was one two more checkpoints – one manned. CP 25 was a challenge (re-entrant on back side of ridge) There were about 100 re-entrants along the ridge and I really had no idea which was the front or back side. I joked with Julie we could never find it because whichever side we were on would always be the front side and the other side would be the back side. She asked Tommy what I meant. I figured she would be OK as long as she had someone to talk to.

We hit the manned CP, said hi – and then it was to the finish line. It was 20-30 miles to the finish. We flew, even passing a convenience store without stopping. In the end we finished strong in 60 hours 57 minutes. I was quite happy with out performance and hopefully we can be ready for Montana. My biggest thanks go out to all the volunteers, the other teams – and to Elias, Dave, Dennis, and all the others that make this incredible experience called the Florida Coast to Coast a reality.

Florida C2C part I

Florida Coast to Coast 2008

It was a small crowd of racers that would be facing what is now by far the most challenging race in Florida – the coast to coast. I would be racing with my Primal Quest partner – Julie Ardoin, and two of her friends – Clay Abney and Joshua Trivet. The pre-race and preparation were the usual – though we did not get our maps until 8 and did not get a chance to start plotting (40 UTM points) the first half of the course (all we had maps for) until 9 PM which as always makes it a long night. We finally got to sleep around midnight which would give us a good 5 hours of sleep before we headed out the next morning at 6 AM.

The race started with a prayer and then a 4 ½ mile beach run followed by a roughly 18 mile paddle across the Banana River, north up Sykes Creek, west down the 528 barge canal and then south to Hubert Humphrey Park on SR 520. The weather was cool and slightly overcast making for very pleasant paddling. The last 4 mile section was quite exciting for Julie and I as we were paddling in a Pamlico 160 with an open cockpit. Their was a strong headwind and the waves were cresting the boat. Our paddling experience helped keep us upright, but we did have to essentially paddle sprint the 4 mile section to keep the boat in solid control. Josh and Clay, paddling an Amaruk had a difficult time keeping up.

A pretty easy 20 mile paddle with beautiful scenery and waters.

The transition was to bikes at this point and our crew, made up of Heather, Oscar, and Abhijit showed us how a good crew can help keep you moving. Their were a few teams in front of us – but I was not concerned, this was way too early in a long race to worry about field placement. Our objective was to keep a strong pace for this bike leg which started with an easy, but long bike ride straight west on SR 520 to the southern entrance to Tossohatchee near SR 528 – about 34 km. The cooler weather we had on the paddle gave way to sun and heat and it was starting to get to Joshua. We stopped once to eat and cool him down. We were staying close with Troy Couture – one of the brave solo racers to attempt this challenging race.

The next leg of the race through Tosohatchee would be a much tougher experience for most teams than it looked. The navigation held some challenges, but the heat held more. This is where we started with problems. The heat was putting Joshua into heat exhaustion and Clay was suffering from a knee injury. We were finding it very difficult to keep the group moving. At one point Clay was curled up in fetal position, looking really pale. He told Julie that he might pass out. Julie deadpanned – “If you pass out we’ll stop – now get your bike and let’s go”. Josh meanwhile was showing early signs of heat exhaustion with serious muscle cramps and alien looking spasms in his leg muscles. We used combinations of walking, resting, coaxing, double biking, and pack carries to make it through this section and finally emerged at the other end of Tosohatchee a pretty bruised up team. The good news is that the remaining bike leg was a 26 km road ride. I had brought my tow rope so was able to tow Joshua to the TA and Clay had recovered enough that he was able to maintain pace. It was not necessarily a fast road ride, but it was good enough to get us there. At the TA it was pretty obvious that our 4 person team was about to become a 2 person team. Josh had full-blown heat exhaustion and Clay was pretty much in and out of pain. The only team ahead of us at the time was Nature Calls and there were a few other teams in the TA that looked like they had been sent straight to the TA. My family was here which gave me a great mental and psychological boost. We decided that Julie and I would continue on, we also started calling ourselves Team Blue (our Primal Quest team name).

This leg was deceptively hard. The tails were sandy and it was brutally hot. Clay and Josh took a real beating in this section. The road bike in (about 20 miles) and the road bike out (another 16 miles) did not make it any easier on them.

The next leg of the race would be a long trek across the Econlockhatchee State Forest. We would be picking up 5 checkpoints along the route. Julie and I decided that we would try to catch up with Nature Calls in this segment, who had a 30 minute lead out of the TA. It was starting to get cooler and we figured we could make it to the next TA (at Adventure Cycles) between 9 and 10 PM meaning we would be able to use the night to run better. Though many of the teams would hit this section in the dark, we hit all the points within the forest in the daylight and found them relatively easily. It did not hurt that I had a high level of familiarity with the area. Both checkpoint LBE2 and LBE3 had multiple flags hanging – it appeared that other groups were using the same locations (which made sense as the flags were hung in distinct or scenic locations and others would have noticed this). It was starting to get dark as we exited the forest at LBE5 and headed for the first numbered race checkpoint CP1. The final portion of the trek was through downtown Oviedo and on the paved Cross Seminole trail. CP2 gave us some difficulty in the dark, but some pace counting got us to it. We caught up with Nature Call’s who we could see resting and eating at an intersection up the road, but they continued on before we found CP2. As we left the CP we could see lightning and hear thunder in the distance. As we continued it got closer and we started back into our slow run. The rain started and then we had a large crack-boom of lightning. We were about a mile from the TA when it really started raining hard and lightning was all around us. There was nowhere to shelter so we simple ran harder to the TA where the teams were hanging out under the eaves of our local bike shop – Adventure Cycles.

Though many teams found this section difficult - we made it during daylight and were able to run most of the way. The storms kept the heat down and Julie is a great person to run with.


Our crew had cooked spaghetti and we decided we would take our time in the TA and eat and rest. It was still too dangerous to head out into the storm. My family was once again here providing mental support. The next leg of the race would be essentially a night bike ride across the city on back roads with a could of checkpoints and a stop at Travel Country Outdoors. One of the checkpoints turned out to be more challenging than it should. I decided to take the eastern-most entrance into the Bear Creek nature trails because the clue for the control there said to. This entrance was not from the parking area where there were two trail entrances. The clue had intended for us to take the easternmost trail from the parking lot, not another trail further from the side of the road. After about 15-20 minutes we figured it out and were ready to bike on. Julie had gotten a kick out of the entire thing. I figured I would try to make up some of this time by biking hard. It was cool (and wet) out – but the conditions would be good for biking as there was no risk of overheating.

We arrived at TA5 wet, happy, and a little exhilarated by the night ride. We were about 15 minutes behind Nature Call’s. The crew had good food at this TA also and we knew that we would need some serious food for this next leg of the race. It looked like a relatively short (30 km/18 mile) trek that would take about 4 hours. This did not, however take into account the terrain and difficulty of the controls. The first control point was due north of the “Bridge to Nowhere” in the Wekiva swamp. The bridge was an old massive concrete bridge that was probably built when people though wetland were only for filling and destroying. Now the bridge led into the swamp. We kept a due north bearing and simply go lucky coming right onto SP1 – the first checkpoint in this section. From this point we simply needed to bushwhack 2 km north through the swamp to a tram road to find SP2. This is where the going got tough.

For anyone who has never bushwhacked their way through a thick swamp in the dark, you have no frame of reference and cannot possibly understand what thing is like. Issue #1 – spiders and bugs. Swamps are full of them and they want nothing more than to sting or bite you. Every step entailed knocking down a few webs. Issue #2 – the terrain. This involved endless climbing over fallen trees, bashing through palmettos, crawling over and under trees, and fighting sticker bushes. Issue #3 – Direction. Without constantly checking the compass it is easy to simply do circles. It really does all look alike and it is very easy to get confused. It took us nearly 3 hours to cross the swamp. When we exited we came out on what used to be a logging trail marked on the map. The trail had been replanted with pine trees and was not really a trail – but it was obvious that it had one time been a logging road. Of course planted pine always comes with thorny vines – usually raspberries, and this was no different.

After 3 hours of swamp bashing we were just happy to be on a road. So happy in fact that we spent a couple of hours going up and down it looking for SP2, which was placed on the wrong intersection (east of the mapped one). Of course we did not go too far east looking – we checked too far west. We did go to the location where the control was mapped and I even took our GPS tracker and pointed it to the sky so I could prove we were in the right spot. Nature Call’s had found it which was impressive. After we gave up and headed north again we had no problems with the other controls – though they were definitely more challenging than the controls on the first trek. The SP7 was especially challenging – on an earth bank that was hard to get to – being surrounded by thick vines. Julie and I circled around it – and I finally found a spot to get to it. As I came out I heard Jim from team NC. I gave him directions to SP7 and then Julie and I headed out to the Horse Barn that had restrooms with running water. After a little sink shower to get the worst of the swamp mud off and also scrub with soap the bites that were all over my wrists and legs I felt much better and we headed to TA6 – Katie’s Landing.

This section was truly brutal. We walked well over 20 miles, though the first 2 miles through the swamp were the real killers. It took us 3 hours to make 2 miles. I headed NW after SP1 hoping to hit the river or the trail along the river. We did - but it was not much help... I made some notes of where things mentioned in the article happened.

At this point we learned that all the other teams (other than NC and ourselves) had been bypassed around this section. Some of the teams were really suffering – but the good news was our two downed members were feeling much better. There were plenty of teams that had already headed out on the paddle. Jamie (one of my regular team partners – who had done this race with me multiple times) and her family were here for support. It was a great chance for them to meet Julie – as they would be supporting us in a few weeks at Primal Quest.

Julie and I had been looking forward to a nice paddle down the Wekiva and St. Johns River heading to Blue Springs State Park. This turned out to be a pretty paddle, with lots of wildlife. Julie was even able to get a short nap in the Necky Amaruk. The only down side of this leg was the large number of big boats zooming up and down the St. Johns River. At Blue Springs we would get the maps and instructions for the second half of the course. We did not know where we were going – but we were feeling very strong after a solid 30 hours of racing and were ready to take on Coast to Coast Part II.

ACC Video

Pangea has posted a really cool video showing some of the ACC - mostly scenes from the adventure class course (not the elite) - but still really cool - it is at

http://www.pangeaadventureracing.com/race_archive.php?r=6

Seminole State Forest Hammerfest 5-10-2008

Pangea Adventure Racing http://www.pangeaadventureracing.com/ had a bike race today that was an absolute incredible amount of fun. I (and all the other adventure racer types) that went weree not really sure what to expect - the only information we really had was it would involve some navigation, was all on bike, and would last between 2-3 hours for the long course. Starts would be between 8:30 AM and 10:30 AM and you could show up any time, get a start and head off on the bike.

I had a soccer game that morning where I ended up refereeing the game, so was running late, but was still able to make it to Seminole State Forest and head off on the course around 10:55 AM (Greg held a spot for me).

SO here is what it was. A course of 12 checkpoints with 2 loops was done on bike. The navigation was simple enough that the course was essentially a marked course and the checkpoints simply proved that you actually did the entire course. I was able to get started about the same time Team Primal Instinct left the last manned checkpoint and was heading in. It was a bit hot out (I think the temp today was upper 80's) - but a nice breeze made the first part of the bike ride and packed sand double track quite easy.

The area was absoulutely beautiful (I'll have the map posted soon). The course headed north and crossed Blackwater Creek where it went along the sloped edge of the one of the basins and had some real live hills as I headed north towards the manned CP/TA and the start of the first loop. I had some knowledge of the area so I really did not need to navigate too much on this section and simply slowed down a few times to read the map and make sure I was heading the right direction. I passed a few teams that had started earlier, heading back towards the start/finish as I was heading out on the course.

The wildlife was incredible. I had to dodge a Gopher Tortoise who had decided he wanted to block my path. The at one point I came across a Doe and a Fawn that literally ran along side me for almost a full minute before deciding that it was smarter to go into the forest. This was a unique experience as I literally matched speed with the 2 deer and was able to watch them up close as they ran alongside and just in front of me. A little later I startled a flock of Turkeys and one Turkey also decided that the road I was on was the best way to run and also simply ran in front of me. Just so you know they can run really really fast!

All the terrain on the race was either low grass double track through pine and deep forest or hard gravel and sand - in other words great fast and non-technical mountain biking. Thus the term "hammer-fest" you could literally hammer as hard as you could for most of the ride - and I did my best to hammer this one hard.

After the second loop I could feel my energy level going a bit lower from fatigue and a bit of dehydration, though I was doing my best to keep a solid pace. In the end I ended up doing the 32 miles in 2 hrs 21 minutes, 2 minutes behind Team Primal Instinct who finished in 2 hrs 19 minutes. The CFAR group had a grill and food set up at the end of the race (and yes we plan to do this every race).

The format is a really cool format and I think a lot of folks who are not super-comfortable with difficult navigation would really enjoy it. I'd love to see Pangea make this - the Seminole Forest Hammer-fest, a name we coined after the race, a regular event. To do this we need mountain bikers to support the race format. The terrain was quite easy, so non-technical bikers could easily do it. The navigation was no more difficult then reading a road map, so that should make it easy enough for folks who are not nav-savvy. It was off-road, so unlike road races you don't have to deal with cars. In fact it was the best of what most roadies like about road riding without the cars.

If you would like to see Greg and Pangea do more of these types of events - and these should really appeal to roadies who want to try some mountain biking please e-mail him at greg@pangeaadventureracing.com and let him know. All you mountain bikers out there - let's hear from you!