|
Sign Up
|
2007 SONAR Race Re-Cap
Late April in Southwestern Pennsylvania is always a weather gamble. Last year the opening race of the Grass Roots Season was wet and cold which caused a limited turnout for the event. Not so this year! With temperatures soaring over 70 degrees, and nary a cloud in the sky, the SONAR saw close to 60 racers come out to see what Grass Roots had to offer them. The SONAR started with the Grass Roots trademark prologue. Typically reserved for the paddle portion of the race, this “dry” venue took advantage of the Nemacolin Adventure Center’s ropes course and climbing wall. The ropes course would be completed at twenty feet above the ground and would be a timed event. The time that the team received on this event would be added to their overall race time for a “Total time” which would determine the winners. The ropes course was used as a prologue— with a five minute interval between teams—to avoid the bottleneck that would occur if it had been used in the race itself. However, the time that it would take for all teams to complete (over two hours) was taken into consideration so GRR added the climbing wall to keep participants active while waiting their turn on the ropes course. The climbing wall was dubbed “Climb for Time” and gave racers two minutes to collect time bonuses dispersed within their climbing route. The higher a climber got up the wall the higher the time bonuses. These bonuses would be added to the ropes course time for a “Total Prologue” time, and often resulted in a negative number—meaning the fast teams would start the race at a time “advantage”. The excitement seemed to center at the climbing wall where the overall skill level appeared quite high as competitors made short work of the 50 foot wall. The wall consisted of three separate lanes with the most technical at lane 1 and least technical at lane 3. Lanes 1 and 2 had overhangs to be negotiated and lane 1 had the smallest handholds. Lanes 1 and 3 were used for the co-ed teams—where the women were quite successful at retrieving all of their bonuses while the men were getting beat by the overhang. Lanes 2 and 3 were used by the women and, again, the overhang was posing a threat. Kristin Eddy of Team A-List finally cracked the combination and snuck over the obstacle and managed to secure all her bonuses while teammate Deb Opalesky scampered up and down her lane in just over a minute. Team A-List secured 8:30 in time bonuses—the most of any team. Team Nemacolin came close as Sarah Kossan—also on the 2 wall—scampered to the top, securing the first and third bonuses, and caught the second bonus hiding behind the overhang on her way down. She and her teammate, Betsy Monroe, secured 8 minutes in bonuses and set a new standard for strategy on the 2 wall. When the all male teams hit the wall it looked like a repeat of the co-ed teams. The all male teams had lanes 1 and 2—both very challenging—and continued to struggle on the 1 wall. Three teams were clearly comprised of climbers—Scorematters, Batty Boys, and Discipline Problem—and it was an inspiration to watch as both climbers on each team solved their prospective puzzles and worked their way to the top for all of their bonuses. On the ropes course climbers An-Jey Su and Tom Prigg of ”Discipline Problem” set a scorching pace of 3 minutes and 16 seconds—fastest overall. Hot on their heels was co-ed team “Blaze”—comprised of John Ralston and Chris Valentine —scoring an amazing 3 minutes and 28 seconds before John finally succumbed to a stomach virus and had to drop from the race. Two all male teams— “2Humble 2Win” and Team Hartle”—followed closely behind at 3:58 and 3:59 respectively. At 6:30 sharp the actual race started by sending competitors—en masse—off on a 2.5 mile run. In a cloud of dust they headed straight downhill following Nose Dive—one of the steeper ski slopes at Nemacolin—to the bottom where they “snuck” into the woods via a very small opening. Here racers “bottlenecked” as they jockeyed for position before getting dumped onto a well established trail—heading back uphill. Now it was time for the “runners” to move to the front and enjoy a moment in the spotlight. The course continued winding its way uphill as it headed back to TA and the first of the “hazards” racers would face—“Spiders and Bats”. Here one teammate had to wear a blindfold and was the bat. Bats could not touch the spider web that lay 20 inches off the ground before them and covered a150 square foot area. The other teammate—the spider—could not touch the ground, had to maintain physical contact with the bat, and could see and direct the bat as to where to step to avoid the web. If the bat touched the web he had to stop forward progress until another racer passed, or—if none were present—the officials told the bat to proceed. After many variations were attempted, teams resorted to the bat carrying the spider on his or her back—a feat which proved very difficult after running almost 2 miles uphill. Once teams cleared the first hazard they were off to transition to their bikes for a 10 mile ride. The bike course started downhill again but turned quickly into the woods for a difficult muddy descent that would define the rest of the ride. Mud became the operative word and this seemingly short 10 mile ride turned into a test of tenacity and patience. The first section of trail was beautiful but steep enough that most riders were forced to dismount and walk uphill. The downhill section to follow was quite ride-able—as were the next 2-3 miles—but as racers entered the Hummer trails of Arden Estates they were greeted with more steep climbs and deep unforgiving mud. Darkness also approached and paces slowed dramatically After leaving Arden, and being treated to a very short section on the PGA golf course, riders soon found themselves in more of the dreaded Hummer trails. This time it was the area known as “Crater” and darkness was in full swing. Now racers found it virtually impossible to avoid the mud and those who were unable to stay on their bikes were up to their ankles pushing their bikes through the thick “goo”. Some found it a challenge to rise above, while others were just plain annoyed. Fortunately this section was barely more than a mile—even if it didn’t seem so—and racers were soon headed back to TA, following much of the same trail they came out on. This, of course, meant riding all the way back up to the top of the ski hill for the next event—night-time navigation. At TA, racers transitioned back into their running gear and completed the next “hazard”. This was a “bouldering test” that required one teammate at a time to climb approximately 9 feet up the climbing wall to a posted 5 sentence, 10 line statement. The entire statement had to be memorized and transferred to a supplied note card and approved before the team could continue. No talking or writing could occur in the marked “hazard” area, requiring teams to climb, memorize a section, down-climb, whisper to their teammate or write down what was remembered, and repeat. On average this took at least 10 climbs up and down the wall. Once the verse was correctly re-written the team could continue on to the navigation course. The navigation course was a bearing only exercise comprised of two courses—red and blue. Teams were alternated between the two colors to avoid the “follow the leader” syndrome. Each course had 10 points and covered 1.1 miles and was of equal difficulty. The clue sheet that had the bearings was “coded”—meaning that the teams had to solve simple (or not so simple) math problems to find out the bearings for the course. Once solved it was up to the team to follow the bearing for the stated distance and then locate the orienteering punch at the stated clue area. Distances between points were short enough that a team that missed its intended target could go back to their last known point and start over. All in all this was a great learning exercise and everyone walked away with a better knowledge of compass use. After all of the running, riding, climbing, and navigating, the first team across the finish line was team #2 The Snot Rockets—comprised of Scott Angove and Brandon Kellogg—in an uncontested “Total Time” of 2 hours and 50 minutes and 5 seconds. Second across the finish line was team #12 Discipline Problem—An-Jey Su and Tom Prigg—finishing in 3:15:35 “Total time”. Hot on their heels were the first co-eds #24 Team Spang—Tim and Edna Spang—finishing less than 2 minutes back with a time of 3:18:10. And the first all female team was Team A-List—Kristin Eddy and Deb Opalesky—from Reston, Va. finishing in 3:34:45. For all their efforts, racers were greeted at the finish line with a bon-fire, hot dogs, and cold beverages. Thanks to all who raced and to all of those who came out to watch and/or help. Looking forward—in a very big way—to the next Grass Roots Race! Overall (Categories: Male-Male blue, Co-ed green, Female-Female pink)
Co-Ed (green)
Female-Female (pink)
Male-Male (blue)
Points
|
All rights reserved. Copyright 2007.