August 12, 2010

Untamed New England Adventure Race Journal

Lake County Leader Co-worker Ali Bronsdon is currently doing the Untamed New England Adventure Race and sending updates via email. It's a three-day race through New Hampshire and Maine and from the sound of it... it's pretty freaking crazy. Without further delay, here's the first update from Ali...

After three fun, including one red-eye, flights last night, I've already been up for 24 hours. A little sleep tonight and race start tomorrow around noon. You can follow online at untamedne.com. Our team is #14 GOALS ARA 2. We're packed with enough food and spare clothes for 40 miles of paddling/portaging, an orienteering relay (unknown length), 3 small conservation projects, a 30 mile bike, 35 mile trek, including a ropes course. 

So, we're carrying A TON OF CRAP! It's the most, by far that I've ever had to carry, so we'll see how the heavy load will affect energy. Also, the orienteering relay could be at night, which means COLD and wet, coming off the water. We won't see our gear/food bins until after that 35 mile trek, so we're thinking Friday night or Saturday morning. Then it's a 12 mile trek/swim, and 65 mile bike with a waterfall rappel and more conservation projects mixed in. The end of the bike marks the end of the official course, but there is an optional bonus rogaine section at the end, where we will try to nab as many points as we can before the race time ends. This will be where strategy and race planning will come into play. 

Teams that are in better mental shape should be able to plan the better attack and get more points on the rogaine. We are planning to sleep in one of the transition areas, maybe Friday night for an hour or two, depending on where we are. We haven't seen any maps yet, so things may change, but this is as much as I can tell you and the last time I can update before Sunday. I'm sure I'll have some good stories by then... hopefully we'll make it to the finish!
Thanks for all the support!

Oh and meanwhile, I'll be sitting on the couch eating Cheetos tracking the race. I'm that cool.

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