Lorton, Virginia

Last year I signed my entire family up for the 4-hour Fall Foliage Adventure race held in Spotsylvania, Virginia. And I mean my WHOLE family. From my 71-year-old mother all the way down to my 5-year-old son, I had plans to submerse the entire family into this awesome world of Adventure racing. Mother nature decided to thwart that attempt by sending a forecast that had 100% chances of rain, wind, and misery for the less inclined of the crew. It ended up that only Annika and I were still willing to attack the challenge. And attack it we did! I fell in love with the beginner friendly style of the race and knew it wouldn’t be my last race directed by Broad Run Off Road. At the awards ceremony (which Annika and I placed 2nd in the family division, BY ONLY 13 SECONDS from the 1st place team!!) they announced that the following year the race would be held on October 19. Serendipity!! That is Chris and my anniversary! I knew racing through the woods with my man would be the best way to spend our 16th anniversary, and so, we signed up as soon as registration opened.

The Thursday night before the race I had to work an overnight shift. I don’t recommend this prior to a race. In fact, I hate doing it. However, adventure racing, and life in a family of 7, isn’t cheap. After a quick 3-hour nap, Annika ever so kindly awoke me from my pillow drooling with a lovely cup of coffee. I slowly brought myself into the land of the living, and by noon Chris and I were on the road to Lorton, Virginia. I’m never really chatty after a night shift, so the ride across the bay wasn’t remarkably entertaining, and soon enough we were merging off the beltway onto smaller and smaller roads leading to Mason Neck peninsula.

This race, being as it was on our anniversary, Chris and I were on our own 2-person co-ed team. But we weren’t the only racers from Delmarva that weekend. Many of my regular teammates were also racing on different teams. Kristin, Jenn, and Justin were representing Delmarva Adventure Sports, and Dennis was racing solo in the same 14-hour race we were signed up for. Jonathan, his son Christopher, and daughter Everly were representing Delmarva Adventure Sports in the 4-hour race. We had hoped we would see our friends at check-in, but we were there early, picked up our packets quickly, and headed to our hotel. We opted for a meal of BBQ take out in our room rather than eating out at a restaurant. One problem with having a husband who can BBQ better than most professionals is that my standards for anything grilled or smoked are too high. So even though I can whole heartedly say “I’ve had better”, the meal was still enjoyable, and soon enough we were tucking in for as much sleep as we could muster before a race.

Promptly at 5:30, our alarms simultaneously started blaring for us to get out of bed and head over to Gunston Hall for the race. The roads were empty, and it was pitch black out. We pulled in, parked nice and tight, and proceeded to check in our bikes and paddle bag to the race staff. We finally got a chance to see our friends, but only for a few moments in the fast-paced, pre-race, dawn. One twist with this race was that we didn’t get our maps for the race until the official start. For that reason, we didn’t have too much down time prior to shooting off in race mode. After a quick pre-race briefing, everyone lined up for map distribution. Justin and Dennis were literally at the front of the line. I filed in somewhere about halfway back and took the chance to look around at the other teams. I recognized about as many as I didn’t, but everyone was excited, social, and eager to get started. Jonathan, Everly, and Christopher swung by the map line to say “Hi” and wish us all luck. It was fantastic to see little Ms. Everly so excited for their race. Another adventure racing fanatic was brought into the fold that day!

Once all teams had their maps, the race officially began. We knew that the first leg was a bike section with points that had to be obtained in order and on a trail system that had a set direction of travel. For that reason, many teams chose to shoot off and begin the race without pouring over the maps. I am simply not that type of navigator. I needed time to get an overview of the course and choose a general route. While we weren’t the very last team to head out, we were certainly one of the last to mount our bikes and head west. I think we left after about 20 minutes of plotting and organizing, and I felt relatively confident in most of our preliminary plans.

Did I say it was chilly that morning? It was chilly that morning. As we biked over paved roads and trails, we quickly warmed up and shook off the dead legs I always seem to get at the beginning of a ride. By the time we arrived at the bike park, I felt primed and ready for some single track. The first CP was at the trail head, and as easy as it was to locate it, it still gave me an endorphin hit and readiness for more. Passing our buddies on Delmarva Adventure Sports, we gave hoots and pretend high fives to Jenn, Justin, and Kristin. We scooted along the flowy trails with other teams, thankfully missing an illegal turn off onto a short cut that would have caused us to lose points. A handful of teams weren’t as fortunate to realize the mistake, and I assume they were docked the 5-point penalty for wrong directional travel. Together, Chris and I navigated, climbed, swooped, and dare I say it… shredded to all the check points, except one, on this leg. We opted to leave CP 5 behind to avoid having to retrace our tracks on the one-way trails. Arriving to CP 6, I hit my brakes pretty hard once I spotted the flag. A little too hard, in Chris’s opinion. He fussed, I snarled, I punched the CP and we headed back out of the trail system. Married couples can do that right? Fuss, snarl, and continue on. I let him know about 30 minutes later that I was finished being mad at him for being mad at me. He’s my person.

It was an easy ride to the TA, and we made a fast transition. Racers had to leave bikes at this TA and hike a short trek to a boat ramp nearby where the next leg was a paddle. Leaving the TA, we had a few options on how to get to the boats. We ended up going with a powerlines trail, even though I have an AR motto of “never trust a power line trail.” I’ve been emotionally scarred too many times by those misleading blazes of treeless track. Thankfully, this time it worked out well for us. We were trotting alongside a few other teams at this point, but still in our own zone. I felt a little sluggish and realized I hadn’t eaten or drank anything. After a few a few gulps of tailwind, I felt much improved.

We checked in at the boat ramp, located our paddle bag, grabbed a canoe, and headed out on Pohick Creek. Usually, Chris is always in the back of the boat and I’m in the front seat. We decided to change things up on this race and swap positions. We had heard that having the stronger paddler in the front helps with keeping up speed on the water. Also, I have a thing about being in control on the water 🙂 It worked out well for us! We chose a clockwise direction and punched every point out on the water in that leg. I felt like we were fast, efficient and on point. Paddling back to the ramp, the day had become absolutely perfect. The skies were clear, the sun was bright, the scenery was glorious, and the temps were still refreshing. Man, it was perfection in AR form.

After trading off our canoe to an arriving team, we repacked our paddle bag and headed back out for our first trekking leg. Our plan for this section had been conservative, and we had already decided to drop 7 of the 13 points on the section. Looking back, we definitely should not have been so quick to drop points from the get-go. Although I followed the wrong branch of a stream, and wasted about 45 minutes on stubborn insistence, we really could have pick up more points if I had routed out our plan better. We ended up only dropping 6 points, and I whole heartedly regret at least 3 of those. Save that headstrong nav error, I felt like Chris, and I did well on the points we grabbed. We got stumped on another reentrant, but relatively quickly saw our confusion for what it was and reattacked. Toward the end of the trek, Chris was beginning to feel some hot spots on his feet and was eager to transition. After chatting, I was surprised to find that Chris was wearing synthetic compression socks. I personally swear by wool socks for these races and suggested as much to him. We’re signed up to race in Sea to Sea in February and foot care is going to be HUGE for him (and me) on that long of a race. Better to figure this out on a 14-hour versus a 72-hour race!

Once we returned to the TA with our bikes, we ran into Dennis, who immediately asked us how our race was going and whether we had dropped any points. I gave a terse response of “Run your own race, fool!” We all laughed, and Chris and I headed out on the next bike leg toward Belmont Bay along another easy, paved trail. We grabbed the one checkpoint on that leg and arrived at our next TA. We went through the same routine of checking in, grabbing our paddle gear, and launching our canoe into the water. The tide was super low, and the plethora of river weed caused a lot more drag than the previous paddle. We still paddled strong, in the same formation, on this whole section. We grabbed every point and kept up our pace well. We were docked at the final CP on the paddle when Dennis arrived in his speedy little kayak. We hadn’t seen Jenn, Kristin, or Justin in a while, but we were running into Dennis pretty regularly for the remainer of the race. After cleaning out the pounds of river weed and muck from our canoe, we dropped our canoe back off at the ramp.

Transitioning back at the TA, we repacked our paddle bag and headed out on our next trek as the sun started its descent into the horizon. We had a pretty conservative plan for the 10 CP section that lay ahead of us. We easily grabbed the first 2 points on our plan and decided to go for a point we had originally planned to leave. After flawlessly grabbing that point, we went on the next logical point. We were on a long, straight, level, gravel road for a little over a mile and we were obviously slowing down from our peppy previous pace. Chris’s feet were really beginning to bother him. We shot a bearing to the next CP and hit it dead on. I *may* have gotten a little cocky at this point and decided I would shoot a bearing through a much longer section of woods for the next CP. My thought was with the next CP being on an obvious bend in a creek, we would hit the creek a little north of where the CP was to ensure we didn’t overshoot the location, and then simply follow the creek south to the CP. If only I had double checked what the clue was. If only I had trusted my gut when I realized the topography was now going up rather than down toward a “creek.” If only. So, yea. I did none of those things. I didn’t realize the clue was “DRY CREEK BED.” And I convinced myself the topography was undulating and not steadily going up. As the sun sank lower and lower, I continued to tell myself “You never go as far as you think you’ve gone when you’re bushwacking in the dark.” Until finally we came upon a dirt road… that was so far past where the CP was supposed to be I almost cussed. This was my turning point in the race. I felt like I was sucker punched by an inanimate orange and white flag hanging out in the woods on a flipping DRY creek bed. Lesson(S) learned. I licked my proverbial wounds, and we reoriented ourselves. Chris’s feet were shredded, but his wife is irritatingly optimistic in the worst of situations, so we went for just one more point on this leg. By the time we got to CP 35 we missed the peak of the sunset, yet we were still treated to a few wisps of bright orange, purples, and blues before all sunlight disappeared for the day. We trudged back over the road to the TA and flopped back onto our bikes for the final bike leg to the last trek section. Chris was so much more comfortable being off his feet that he zipped down that trail much faster than me.

We eventually arrived at the final TA, which was also the finish line. The last curve ball the director threw at us was having to independently plot out a few points on the map for the last trek. I had looked up how to do this at work on a slow night few months prior, but having to do it on the final leg, with the race director watching, was too much for my brain. We (I mean I) decided to go for just one point. The CP was on a bluff overlook that showcased the moon in all its low horizon glory. It was the kind of moon that looks abnormally large and almost palpable if you could just reach out far enough. I wish I could say it felt as magical as it sounded. Alas, we were at that point of a race where there isn’t much chipper chatting, and we’re just focused on finishing. Following this point, we had to retrace our steps to return to the finish. Chris was lagging behind slightly, so I took the chance to veer to the left, away from the finish line instead of toward it. Chris probably knew what I was scheming even before my trajectory changed. But he’s such a fantastic husband and teammate that he quietly followed along without a grumble. We navigated to the next point which only required a short bearing to a trail. Just like bad DeJa’Vu, after this point, I wordlessly veered away from the finish for just one more point that was along a small stream. After we punched that one, we started the hike back to the finish. I timidly tested the waters of his love for me by meekly and quietly verbally suggesting one final CP that we would practically walk right by. (Or at least within half a kilometer.) He indulges me. So, all told on that last trek section we added 4 points to our total, and a few more centimeters of lost skin integrity on Chris’s feet.

We ambled back to the finish, for real this time. Chris even allowed me to hold his hand and gaze into his eyes while whispering sweet nothings about how awesome it was to race with him. He didn’t return the sediment, but I know he still loves me. Entering the twinkling soft lighting of the finish line, we were kindly directed to the final punch and had our picture taken. We handed over our tracker and e-punch and stood back as our score and standings were uploaded to the main tracking screen. For just the shortest timeframe we were in 3rd place for our division. That was until all the other teams in our division checked in. In the end, we came in 8th out of 10 in our division, and 51st out of 71 overall. Not our best, but not our worst showing. Our cohorts all made out great though! Jenn, Justin, and Kristin nabbed 3rd in the 3/4 division, and Jonathan and his kiddos placed 1st in their division in the 4-hour race! Dennis didn’t podium, but still did great overall.

In all the hustle and bustle of the post-race meal and awards, we had lost sight of our friends. We found them in the parking lot and gave them all a hearty congratulations on such a great race, and for podiuming! We chatted for a while in a circle, exchanging highlights from our day. If we would have had a few camping chairs, a fire, and hard ciders, I’m sure we could have sat and talked for a couple hours. Unfortunately, we didn’t, and the director had made an announcement that everyone had to get their tushes out of there by 11pm. So we gave just one more congratulations and said goodnight. Grabbing our paddle bag, and each other’s hand, Chris and I walked toward our van to head back to the hotel for a well-deserved slumber. It wasn’t our best race, but it was one of our best anniversary celebrations. What better way to show someone how much you love them than by pushing yourselves physically for 14 hours, searching for silly little orange and white flags, wearing off the flesh of your feet, in the name of fun? Maybe there are other ways, but this was our way of showing love and devotion for 16 years of marital bliss.