From 4LPH41337.com

Contents 1 Gold Nugget Pictures 2 Gold Nugget Map 3 Gold Nugget Website 4 Gold Nugget Results 5 Gold Nugget Reviews 5.1 Josh's Take 5.2 Joanna's Take 5.3 Holly's Take 5.4 Jack's Take

Gold Nugget Pictures

Pictures
Holly Jack MTA1	Holly Jack Finish	Josh Joanna Finish	Joanna Holly O-Course
Joanna Josh Ropes Course	Joanna Ropes Course Log	Josh Ropes Course	Jack Holly Passing Map
Jack Joanna Holly Running	Joanna Jack Josh O-Course	Jack Holly Josh Running	Josh in Canoe Under Dam
Joanna Josh Jack O-Course	Joanna in Canoe Navigating	Joanna Rope Bridge	Jack Sitting Angry

Gold Nugget Map

Gold Nugget Website

Gold Nugget

Gold Nugget Results

Final Results

GPS Tracking For 4LPH4 1337 - Blue (1204)

Gold Nugget Reviews

We fielded two teams for the 12 hour race:

• 4LPH4 1337 - BLUE: Josh, Joanna (recruit)
• 4LPH4 1337 - RED: Jack, Holly

Josh's Take

For me, the hurt began 5 days previously, when I got sick with stomach virus-like conditions and was unable to take any food down without it coming back up. The morning of the race was no exception--I got 4 hours of sleep, every 30 minutes of which I woke up to relieve the building pressure in my stomach. Thankfully, my teammate Joanna was very gracious and understanding. I was apologizing profusely about not letting her know beforehand because I was sure I'd be over it 6 days later. Then apologizing again and again during the race as I tried to keep my malnourished body at some semblance of a race pace while contributing in other arenas (I'M THE BEARING TAKER!!!).

So not only was I sick, but was quite pissed to find out the night before that I forgot the critical piece of the bike towing system I'd built for this race. I was quite upset, since I'd spent the weak before designing and building it and the night before until midnight tweaking it. So we ended up reverting to the old stop-and-attach, stop-and-detach system we had tried out initially during training.

First section was bike up Morrow Mtn. This was where I realized that it was going to be a long day. My legs were already feeling tired and I was only at the base of the mountain. Fatigue 4K into a bike ride is not a good sign.

We got our passports at the top of the mountain, plotted our points relatively fast, gave ourselves 20 minutes for strategy, which we did not need since we were planning on getting most of the CPs and so we did not really have a ton to discuss. So we spent 10 minutes or so and left back down the mountain, close to last at this point. We got back down and passed many teams plotting at their tables in the campsite to go on to the orienteering course.

O-Course stunk strategically for us because we spent time gathering OP1, OP2, and OP3 when they were only worth 5 points a piece. Waste of time. We made the incorrect assumption, because we couldn't find anything mentioning individual points for OPs, that the O-Course was all or nothing. We later found that the OP point values were listed where the Control Code normally was (yes, we were studying ISOM Control Description specs in preparation for the race). So we did not notice the low numbers on the sheet until way after it was too late (we had already gotten 1-3 at that point). Holly and Joanna did a wonderful job orienteering, with me trying to keep up. I did get ill and puke my morning eggs all over the trail, and was debating my continuance of the race. However, given that our team racing mentality, I internally decided to compete for as long as I could.

Our OP course plot was 1,2,3,4,6,7,9,12,11,10,8,5. I would say I was officially bonked on the hike up Morrow Mtn. to OP10, though I wasn't exactly pressing the pace before then. I was energy zapped, and the only food I was able to take was a Gu shot and half a snickers bar immediately after throwing up. I popped some E-tabs and started drinking heavily as my legs were tightening up during the hike, since I knew if I started cramping that would be it for our race. Jack kept dashing around every time he found an OP. It was pretty funny. The O-Course was pretty fun, and we decided there to do some O-course training on future weekends. We also decided that with my lagging it was a good idea for the teams to split up on the way back to the camp; we would pick up OP8 and OP5 separately. Due to navigational errors, we ended up beating RED to OP8 and working on OP5 together anyway. People other than me were tired at that point, and so it was a little tough to sink that one but we got it done and heading on out. A helpful push from Joanna up the final hill to the main road went a long way to lift my spirits. We jogged/trekked back once on the road.

At this point (5 hours later), I lightened my pack of excess "emergency" gear, Joanna made herself some lunch, and I took a quick shower to cool off--I'm much better at fighting off hypothermia than nausea. Anyway, we had a painful portage down to the water, since we were also bringing two bicycles with us to be put in the canoe. We took them across the river, intending to get MTA1 but stopped at the dock (short) and continued up to MTA2 on foot. We completed the ropes course at MTA2, I had fun doing it. I'm not sure if it was the thrill of heights or the tangerine Gaterade, but I started feeling okay afterward. We left our bikes behind, and went on to pick up MTA1. We snagged it and started heading back out towards CP1, CP2, and CP3 on the canoe. It was then that we realized that we needed to head back to MTA2 to pickup the life vest that was left behind, since that was kind of...um...required gear. CP3 was pretty tricky as everyone we say said, "just go around that bend and it's on the right." So we started to think something was fishy. Sure enough, it was where they said it was. However, it was impossible to see as you come at it--only when you go back. So it wasn't until we decided to turn around to make another pass that we saw it.

We paddled back upstream to the dam for the portage, grabbing CP4 and after losing and argument with the navigator Joanna about the best way to get there, we came upon what we thought was the portage trail entrance. We only thought it was because it wasn't obvious that it was a portage trail. It was the gnarliest portage I've ever done, and I was thoroughly impressed with Joanna's strength in sharing the canoe weight with me. We spent 25-30 minutes making 150 yards progress before dropping down into the water prematurely because it was better than continuing on that trail. We paddled on through some in-the-middle-of-two-dams mucky water to grab CP6, since we made a pass at the shore CP5 was supposed to be on and couldn't find it, we figured we'd search harder on the way back. Stretching out to CP7, we were now at the base of dam #2 (Badin Dam) and found ourselves at odds with a very swift current. Even the recreational kayakers couldn't overcome it, so we decided to park our boat on the shore of the rock island CP7 was supposed to be on, and search out the CP on foot. Searching the shore, because that's where we'd plotted the point, we couldn't find it. We travelled on top of the rocks making our trip way north of where we'd thought it'd be, then turned around back south. No cigar. We decided it must be visible from the water, so we went back to the canoe and planned on dragging it past the turbulent water to the northern shore. Just as we were getting back in, I spotted the CP and we were rejoicing.

On the way back we knew we were running out of time. I was stressing a bit and paddling hard for it. We also had to pick up CP5 on the way, since that hellish portage was only worth it if we collected the full 150 points from the upper paddling section. Again, I spotted a little bit of orange and white and we punched and left. The paddle back I started getting waves of nausea again but was able to keep my mind off of it with some conversation. The portage down was just as bad as the one up, but we managed it more quickly, with the pressure of the clock on us. I sustained a shin injury stepping on ground that wasn't there, and we cut the portage short a bit on the other side by reentering the water off of some boulders. The canoe made a bul-bulp sound as it entered the oily water at the base of the dam. I was thinking it sounded funny when Joanna pointed it out. We paddled carefully out of that section as I'm sure Joanna didn't want a "wallop" of that water.

We paddled earnestly back and picked up our bikes. My nausea was gone again and I felt committed enough to carry the canoe on my shoulders up the hill to the finish while Joanna made two trips to get our bikes up. We finished with 10 or so minutes to spare--ideal. We had cleared the O-course and the Canoe, but hadn't done a lick of mountain biking save the initial climb up Morrow Mtn. and back down. I ate 3 pieces of pizza and had a mountain dew, took a shower, and passed out 20 minutes later in my tent. No vomiting that night--my body was too tired to cater to my nagging digestive system. It was the first full night of sleep I'd had in days.

Joanna's Take

Holly's Take

Jack's Take

First, I wasn't planning on doing this race at all, but Jordan decided he needed a break after the 30 hr Over Mountain Extreme race, so I said I'd fill in.

We were up til about midnight the night before, trying to get gear ready and figuring out how to portage a canoe and 2 bikes. There were some guys with some pretty cool setups, that involved using the fork mounts to hold the bikes on a 2x6 in the bottom of the canoe. In the end, we threw them in the canoe with one set of handlebars hanging over each side of the canoe (see pic at top of this page). It balanced nicely and was quick to get bikes on and off.

The race started out with a bike to the top of Morrow Mountain. The guys with their bikes bolted to their canoes were kicking themselves. We changed into bike shoes and got up the mountain pretty fast. We caught and passed Josh and Joanna on the way up the mountain. We finished plotting UTM coordinates at about the same time as they did, then it was back down the mountain to base camp.

We were getting ready to go out on canoe for mandatory transition area 1 (MTA1) to do the high ropes course, but Josh asked if we were doing the "O" (orienteering course)--"O" course? Where was that on the map? We managed to totally skip that point when plotting. We plotted it out to be at the actual start line, and we decided to do the "O" course together. This was our first "O" course, and we just memorized the symbols the day before, so we thought this would be a good learning process.

The "O" course was worth 250 pts, but we didn't realize that you could pick and choose your checkpoints. We managed to get through the course without too much difficulty. We had a couple of bad bearings (due to not being exactly where we thought we were), but we corrected based on topology without much loss in time. We were not doing much running (and Josh was throwing up occasionally), and the checkpoints at the top of Morrow Mt and O point 5 were rough, so we burned 5 hrs on the O course. Looking back, it would have been better to have saved this part for last. Holly's migraine began during this section.

We got back and took some time to refuel. I ate a banana and probably 2-3 oranges...mmmm...oranges.

We decided it was easier for me to carry the canoe overhead and Holly pushed the 2 bikes. We went straight down the hill on the north side of the campground, into the lake, and across to MTA1 with bikes in canoe. Josh and Joanna took out early and hiked straight up to the high ropes course (MTA2). We went ahead to MTA1 and got that punch, then biked up to MTA2. We were right in line behind Josh & Joanna, so we didn't really lose any time.

The high ropes course was well...interesting. Going from the log/rope ladder to standing on the horizontal telephone pole 25ft in the air took a bit to overcome, but once standing, it wasn't too bad. A short "rock" wall climb to the monkey ladder. The monkey ladder was a breeze (just like in Boy Scouts, but a lot higher), now about 30-40ft up. Then across another cable with a zig zag of rope to hold onto, ranging from overhead to about knee level, then to the cable underfoot and cable overhead. After that a quick rappel to the ground. This was my first high ropes course.

After that, we hopped back on bikes and went out for CP8. Now this should have taken about 15 minutes...tops, but we spend 1-1.5 hrs looking for that dang checkpoint. They didn't explain that that big bold green line was actually a rutted out jeep/ATV trail, and the dashed line marked "jeep trail" was actually this nice smooth gravel road. We kept looking for that curve, but it never came, bearings weren't lining up with anything, and we'd almost given up on the thing. Holly's headache had grown worse, and she was lagging back on the biking. We finally decided to give that ATV trail a try, and sure enough, found CP8. Well, after that, we'd had enough of those dang trails, and wanted some cooler conditions, so we opted to go canoing.

We got back to MTA1, and decided to take our bikes with us, for fear that we may not have time to pick them back up later. We jumped into the canoes and got CP1 & 2 without issue. On the way to CP2, we noticed a canoe pulled out way too early. The team had decided to run a jeep road to CP2. We saw them at CP2 trying to figure out how to get across the 30ft wide river, but they were dead set on looking for a bridge...we punched the checkpoint and headed for CP3. There were quite a few hidden rocks on the way from CP2 to CP3 and hit one pretty good. Thought we were going to flip for sure, but we managed to stay upright. We had incorrectly mapped CP3, but had planned on pulling out of the river and bushwhacking to it to save some paddling time. We just happened to pull out where CP3 should have been plotted and got the checkpoint. After that it was up to the dam for CP4. We got that checkpoint around 5pm. The only CPs we had left involved portaging the dam, or getting back on mountain bikes. We didn't think we had time to do either and still make it back by the 7pm cutoff, so we paddled back to the finish. We came in around 5:45pm, got showers, a couple of subs and pizza and were nice and fresh by the time Josh & Joanna came in. It would have been nice to have some of those orienteering points to go out for at the end, but there were none left. Live and learn.

I feel a little bad about my performance in this race, but with the 12-18 hr "Howl at the Moon" race in 2 weeks, I didn't want to kill myself.

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