ADVENTURE Race!

About a month ago, Danny's very good friend Brian asked him to enter a race with him. It was a very unique kind of race called an Adventure Race . There are some extreme versions of this race, but the one we did was put on by a local group, and you can check the invite website here: www.metzgeroutdoors.com/

To prepare for this race we, well we, ummm we......Okay we did absolutely nothing. We found out what gear we had to have and got that. Backpacks, knife, whistle, oars, life jackets, bikes..... We had no idea what we were getting into. We arrived at 6:30AM (the race started at 8). We dropped off our canoeing gear and left to go to the canoeing drop (which we had no idea the location of). At 7AM (1 hour before race time). Winners of this race are determined by the time and the number of check points collected. We were given a map and directions to begin our search for check points. Here is the map we were given.



We were told we would do a small exercise at 8AM in the fairgrounds (where we were), and then we would had to go to TA1. From there we would canoe (C Check points), Hike (O Points), and then bike (B points that had to be attained in order). After those activities are completed come back to the fairgrounds for some "Special events" and then you will head to TA2 for another map and instructions. Race runs until 12 Noon, you must be back or lose a point for every minute past noon.

Right at 8AM we received an additional map. We had to find 2 check points in the fairgrounds, bring them back and then get on our bikes and head to TA1. Working great as a team we were the first team to find those check points and get on the road. We managed to be the first teams into TA1, where we transitioned into the canoes. A kayak quickly pulled ahead of us. We decided to head the same directions as him, to get the idea of what we were looking for (for check points). We found all the water check points and only flipped the boat once (so now at this point we got very wet).

When we got back to land we had no idea where we are in the mix of everyone, because 1/3 of the people did canoe first, 1/3 did hiking, and 1/3 did biking so who knew who was winning at that point! We headed to hiking which worked great for Brian and I. I was a better runner and would get a head of him by as much as 100 yards (allowed by the rules), and get to the check point, giving him time to catch up and move ahead checking the map for where we should head to next and not really having to run all-the-way to the check points.

Back to the transition area we got on the bikes for the biking portion. Brian is the stronger biker so I just stayed on his back tire and he PULLED me. Well not literally -- he blocked the wind for me and made it easier. It was great. We saw a couple of people during this part, but not many. When we got back to the transition area it was at this point that all teams would have done the same 3 things, we asked where we were in the pack, they said you are 2nd!!!!!!! We were shocked!!

At this point it was special event time. The 4 special events that ONLY one teammate had to do were: Climb an A frame wall (Brian did it), Climb under about 30 yards military crawl (Danny did it), throw a football through a hole (Brian), and run about 1/8 of a mile in a stream and cut a tag at the end, you had to stay in the stream (Danny did and was SOAKED).

Now onto Transition area 2 (sorry don't have the map they gave us then). We had to do Navigating from here with a compass. We did okay for not knowing how to use a compass, but we managed to get 3 bonus check points on this part that no else did because we were hustling. After this we had to do some mountain biking, we brought hybrid bikes which was a bit more of a challenge on the mountain bike trails, but we managed. We were running VERY short on time, so we skipped 2 points on the mountain biking (meaning we got 38 out of a possible 40 check points). I think something like 24-28 were required.

We biked back as hard as we could passing MANY teams. We arrived almost to the second 12 Noon, BUT they didn't tell us that when we got there we would have to climb a hill and go down a HUGE slip-n-slide, which we did and then checked in. We were clocked in 3 minutes late. Little bummed at our time but VERY excited. Then we waited around for awards to see who won.

First they did door prizes, and I managed to win a NICE sweatshirt. Below is the sweatshirt and all the other goodies we had for registering.



Now it is time for awards. They award first and second in 4 divisions. Family, Co-Ed, Women's, and Men's. When they announced first place in the Men's division we were SHOCKED, they announced the winners as team "Left Behind". That was US!!!!! We WON. We were ecstatic. Our trophy was a cool Oar.






With there only being 1 oar we are having joint custody. Every 6 months we will switch who has it. I have it first, and of course you must ask. Where do you put a trophy oar? Well, just take a look.



As you can tell we had a GREAT time, and plan to do it again next year, and maybe try to find some other similar races in the area to do as well.