2010 Wild Wonderful 24
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Contents |
2010 Wild Wonderful 24 Info
- Odyssey Wild Wonderful 24HR AR
- Date: May 29th-30th
- Location: New River Gorge, WV
- Event Details: 24 hours, 70-80 miles
- Event Description:
- The Odyssey Wild Wonderful 24 will take place in the New River Gorge. Teams of 1, 2, 3 & 4 will trek with map and compass, ride mountain bikes up, over and around the Gorge, and whitewater raft!!! Racers will get to have a bit of class V fun as part of the Wild Wonderful 24.
- Event Points Category:
- USARA National Qualifier, USARA Point Series Day Race + 10 pt bonus
- Checkpoint Tracker Adventure-length Race
- Team Registered: Josh, Joanna, Ben, Kent (recruit)
Format:
- 24 Hour. Mandatory CPs with optional CPs interspersed throughout.
2010 Wild Wonderful 24 Pictures
| 2010 Wild Wonderful 24 | |||
Ben Josh Preparing Bikes |
Team Paddling |
Team Leaving TA |
Team On Foot |
Team Trekking Up Road |
Ben Punching CP |
Ben Trekking |
Josh Taking Ben's Water |
Ben Getting Passport |
Transitioning To Bikes |
Joanna in TA |
Kent Hanging Out |
Ben Checking In |
Ben Josh TA |
Joanna Fixing Feet |
Ben Josh Working Maps |
Team Working on Maps |
Ben Turning In Passport |
Ben Turning In Passport Finish |
Congrats At Finish |
Josh Trakkers Congrats |
Josh Trakkers Hugs |
Ben Portrait |
Joanna Portrait |
Josh Portrait |
Team Portrait |
2010 Wild Wonderful 24 Maps
2010 Wild Wonderful 24 Website
2010 Wild Wonderful 24 Results
- Placed 2nd in 4-person co-ed division (2nd overall).
- Results
2010 Wild Wonderful 24 Reviews
Josh's Take
This was my first time going head-to-head for the overall win at any race. Upon learning that Berlin Bike had pulled out, we were determined to give it a good shot, as we knew we had a good chance. Trakkers fought for it as well, and though we covered more of the course than any other team out there, we lost a mid-race time trial that awarded the fastest team in each division with 2 extra optional checkpoints, which turned the tide for Trakkers after we managed and hour lead on them.
The race started with an epic paddle through the New River Gorge and then a trek out. We rushed the trek and came out around 5th. After that it was a bike, where we were surprised to be picking up time on Trakkers, the lead team. As we made our way toward the next trekking section, we, Calleva, and Trakkers all hit the CP at the same time. This was exciting, as we knew we were in the lead pack finally.
They left the TA first, and we bided our time, preparing our next transition and entering the trek 4-6 minutes after the others. We immediately caught Calleva, taking a short cut trail to get to the first CP. Then we passed Trakkers on the trail. We weren't quite sure what they were doing searching a reentrant, later found out that they had stopped short of the CP and lost time searching the area. We were in and out and put nearly an hour on the competition, as we were hauling on the trek sections.
Biking back to the TA, it was time for the bike time trial. We decided to just treat it as any other part of the course, as we are not particularly strong on single track, and so we knew we were giving a couple of CPs away going into it. Joanna's chain broke on the trail, which ended up being a 20 minute fix due to some extended difficulty. Yay chain tool. Trakkers managed it in 40 minutes faster than us, picking up most of what we had gained on them AND acquiring 2 optional CPs for being the fastest team in the elite division to run it.
After the time trial, we turned to another trek. We leaned heavily on our trekking speed and a newly discovered camp-song knowledge base that Joanna has to get us through the duldrum wee-hours, and managed to catch up by attaining 2 additional optional checkpoints on the rogaine trek. Knowing that this would still disadvantage (we'd now be tied in optional checkpoints and our 20 minute lead dissolved if they were to only get mandatory CPs on the trek), it would be a catch-up game on the bike. Sure enough, we were 11 minutes behind them coming out of the TA and onto the final bike section. Knowing we were tied on optionals and hoping the bike time trial had taken the strength out of their legs (they were sufficiently faster than us on biking sections), we might be able to catch them. We did within the first checkpoint, but at that point they turned it on.
We made a tactical mistake in thinking that they had been in the 1st wave of rafts on the water (giving us a 5 minute advantage), and so we worked hard to keep them within sight on the way back to the TA. However, our assumption was incorrect. We were literally racing head to head to the finish. With a 1 minute difference between us, Trakkers took the victory and we took 2nd.
It was awesome to race for the lead like that and something I hope everyone who wants it will be able to experience.
Ben's Take
Let me just start off by saying what a beautiful area, I couldn’t help wanting to stop and just look around during the race. We loaded up and got on the road before 9am and had a smooth trip watching race videos and stopping at “The Castle” for lunch. We got the Ace camp around 6pm picked u[p maps and headed up to set up our tents just before the rain started. After plotting and talking some strategy we headed down to the pre-race meeting then back up for some dinner packing and sleep. The camp ground was just a big mass campsite field but had really nice showers unfortunately there was a camp of 20 Plus girls in a camp who decided to sing around the camp fire…. I’ll let someone else fill that in but I’m still mad that this meant or race theme song was Celine Dion.
Paddle:
Race start was in three waves with one person on each boat doing a shot run and swim to the raft. Josh got video of the paddle which should be cool and we paddled hard but had a guide who, I think out of habit eddied us out on a few rapids which caused us to battle it out with another raft that stayed in the current.
First Trek:
Up and across the gorge to CP2 (which we almost walked right by) then on up the “trail that was new and did not show up on any maps” to CP3. We chose a path that hiked us along the grade instead of climbing first and then hiking along the top which ended up taking a little longer as Team Trakkers took the other route and beat us up there by about 13min. No major hang ups but some great overlook views and on to CP6, OCP7, and CP8/bike TA. While we were in the TA we heard a bike tire pop from the heat which made us all nervous and feel bad for that bikes owner.
First Bike:
We filled up on water at a climbing camp who seemed confused by us : ) then basically followed the maps on Rd to CP9 then on to the Fayetteville trail to CP10 and CP 11, before biking on up the long trail to CP12 and the next Trek TA. Great trail and we were able to move fast beating Trakkers to CP12 by a few minutes.
Second Trek:
Team Trakkers and the second Caleva team got out of the TA before us but we caught them quickly with some Great Nav by Josh and this was where we pulled ahead putting at least 30min in to both teams even with spending 20+ min looking at every telephone pole in the area to get CP 15A before getting back to the bikes and kicking it back to the Ace camp.
Second Bike:
We loaded up and bombed down towards the Ace camp along the very muddy trial I think we had one or 2 CP’s on the way and missed one turn which we had to save by taking the “black water Trail” I’ll just say no imagination to that name it fit!! We got to the TA at about 9:00pm for a refuel and prep to take on the 13 mile time trial. I think we had an hour lead on Trakkers at this point.
Mt. Bike TT:
I’ll first say this was a very well designed Mt. bike trial but I had a harder time than usual with all the rocks in the dark with everything being wet, (I was laughing at myself getting hung up on little rocks or walking over sections I would normally ride… I think Josh was laughing at me too) Joanna busted a chain with I tried to save the link before just pulling it out so that cost us a good 20+ min. lesson there just shorten the chain right away or use a quick link and keep the chain the same size (I’ll be added a few of these to my gear bag). So the TT was set up so that the fastest team in each division was given 2 optional CP’s. The trouble with the course was that there were a few spots that if you were not paying attention to the directions or the mileage (confuse miles with Kilometers) you could cut the TT short by mistake. One spot in particular put you back on the road right in front of the Camp with the Arrows pointing you around the corner which is where the Rd to the finish was as well. I don’t think any Elite teams would make this mistake but it’s never good for there to be a possibility. You knew you were done when you saw the “FINISH” sign and came out right across from where the Trail started for the TT, we finished just 0ver 3hrs and Trakkers finished in just over 2 hours so they made up the hour we had put in them!! HERE WE GO.
Final Trek:
We saw Trakkers come and it was only 20min after us so we could only assume they won the TT and the 2 CP’s. We knew we needed the two mandatory plus at least two optional CP’s to tie so aside from a quick correction Josh put us in the area for the mandatory and two of the optional so then we had to make the call to get one more…… unfortunately we had not been given the final bike points yet so we did not know how close the two mandatory points were so we called it safe and headed in to the TA. Trakkers had just gotten back and had only gotten the two mandatory trek point which meant we were tied up on CP’s.
Final Bike/Finish:
They got on their bike first (we should have been faster to Transition at this point knowing it was going to come down to time) however they took the long way around and we met them at the rd to the first Bike so we made up 10min just there… bike to the radio Tower write down the code and blast down the hill after Trakkers. Unfortunately we had shown them the fast way up so they knew to take that down and we saw them again on the way to the last mandatory Bike CP they stopped to early on the trail and we went past them but needed to go another 200ft so they went then went by us and we punch the CP about 20 seconds after them. We still thought they had been in the first wave and thus would need to finish over 5min in front of us because there was not enough time to go out and back for any more points. we pushed our bikes up the hill keeping them in sight until we got the a ride-able section and then hammered as hard as we could up the rest of the trial and rd to the finish arriving less than a Min. behind them only to find out they had been in the second wave with us. We thought about taking a swing at getting another bike point but decided we could risk second place if we didn’t get back in time.
Sum it up with "Roses" and "Thorns":
Roses to the Team everyone worked together and made it fun, roses God for the beauty we got to enjoy, roses to the bag midget thorns to the unmanned TT, roses to "cocaine", roses to the navigation, roses to the breakfast, thorns to the blisters and stinging nettles, Huge roses to LL for letting Josh race
Joanna's Take
Kent's Take
I was really looking forward to this race as I had always wanted to raft the New River. I appreciate the team for letting me jump in. It was a great experience in a beautiful area.
The New River was everything I expected, though some of the beauty was lost with my head being buried in Ben's back paddling all the way. Glad we didn't opt for the wet suit. It was actually much warmer than our local rivers. We owe a thanks to "Swish" from Calleva for putting us in the lead of our wave after the prologue. We battled all the way through the paddle holding the lead most of the way, only to catch an eddy after the last rapid and lose the race to the beach to a team that stayed in the downstream "V". Quick transition and we were out on the trek.
We made good time heading out towards TA3. Here I learned about the understatement of the RD's CP clues. He made the CP sound trailside, but when we hit our timed backstop on the CP we were several hundred feet below the CP. We climbed straight up out of the gorge to a couple of houses that helped to put us on the map. We almost hit it spot on. With the help of some neighbors and a walk down a guys driveway, we punched it and left. Tricky making us go through private property like that. The rest of the first track was very straight forward, with one small bobble on the last mandatory CP that was quickly overcome.
Quick TA and on the bikes. Nav was very straight forward, but I was starting to bonk, fighting a low-grade fever that had blown through the rest of my family earlier in the week. I had to grab a towline from Josh to keep up on a couple of the hills, namely the climb from the gorge to the Fayetteville trail. I am a proud man, and I had to swallow alot right there. When I dropped the line getting on the trail, I vowed not to touch the towline again, or die trying. I got a second wind and battled through. Josh remembered the turns through this part from a previous race, which helped us close the time gap. After the long bike south on old road grade trails, we punched just ahead of Calleva and Trakkers, virtually a dead heat heading on to the next trek.
Josh had the local map Odyssey gave racers for this section and led us flawlessly through the trek. All the CP's were trailside so it was simple until the last CP, a piece of surveyors tape on a telephone pole. It took us a while to find (with the help of a friendly fellow on his back porch). We headed back up the hill to the bikes to find we have put some time on the field.
The bike back to Ace was straightforward and quick. We did miss one turn forcing us to go through a mud pit, the Black Water Trail. We were offered some comic relief when Ben keeled over in a mud pit. Unfortunately, we were too tired to laugh. We made it to the TA with a significant lead going into the time trial. This section worried us the whole race, as we knew Trakkers were stronger on the bike and would likely get two bonus CPs for the time trial. Personally, this was the most enjoyable part of the race. Super fast single track at night is the next best thing to skiing trees. We made a pretty good showing except for a broken chain on Joanna's bike. This set us back 20 minutes. We knew with this setback we would really have to go for it on the next trek.
We transitioned back to foot and took off. We had lost most of our lead over Trakkers with our time trial issues. We knew our strength was nav, so we figured we had a chance to make up the 2 bonus CPs that Trakkers picked up. We came to the first CP by happening up on the correct trail that turned out to be very faint from the main road with its regrading. From this point we picked up the next mandatory CP and 2 optionals. We skipped the last CP to make sure we had enough time to finish the mandatory bike route. In retrospect, this is where we missed our window of opportunity. But at the time we did not know the bike route, so we had to play it safe.
We transitioned back to the bike for the final time a few minutes behind Trakkers. It turned out the 2 last mandatory bike points were close to finish, and the optionals were too far to get to. Our lot was cast; to win, we would have to catch and pass Trakkers. We punched the last CP at the same time, so it was a race to the finish. We thought that they started in the wave of rafts before us, so we would have a few minutes to play with. Not true, they started with us. But, it didn't have matter, in the end they had a little more in the tank than us. They finished less than a minute ahead of us.
I was very satisfied with our strategy and race. We were the only team to get any optionals on the final 2 sections. We knew the rules and played to our strengths, as did Trakkers. On this day on this bike heavy course, their plan was a minute better than ours. C'est la vie.
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