The Greenridge Adventure Challenge

Three weeks post-Untamed, and I had done little except read, read, and read some more for grad school. So it was with a fair degree of excitement that I met up with friends Ann Lombardi and Tim Mundon from GOALS for a twelve hour race in the panhandle of Maryland. We don’t normally race together, but the rest of the team was either unavailable, coming off the 48 hour Equinox Traverse, or set to race the Krista Griesacker this weekend. I was eager to get one more race in in between Untamed and the Adidas Terrex in Scotland next month, and Ann and Tim were available and eager to race.

Ready to! All pics thanks to Tim Mundon

So, we rendezvoused in Cumberland Maryland for the Greenridge Adventure Challenge, which was in its second edition after a successful short course last summer. This year’s course was set for twelve hours, the weather was humid, and the day began with some light rain before giving way to overcast, temperate skies. Ideal considering it could have been 95 degrees and sunny. The only thing was the hills. Big, big hills rolled on for a solid hour as I drove in that afternoon before, hilly unlike any I had really seen in eight previous races this year.

A bit of hills along the Potomac

Kevin and Hutch put on a fabulous race that was composed of six separate sections. After spending an hour with the maps, we started on a short foot section, several miles of trekking and trail running for three points on the way to the boats. The pace started out hard, and while we fell behind a bit on the first two checkpoints on some minor nav decisions, we picked up some places on a long stretch of trail running where Tim set a strong pace all the way to the TA. As we came into the boats we found ourselves alongside the three other teams that would be our primary competition for the rest of the race: a strong team from the Rev3 gang, our friends from Cumberland/ARMD, and good friend Scott Pleban and his teammate Jill, racing as Extreme Prestige Worldwide.

After bagging the first paddle point by foot, we set off down the river in third place, though we made up some serious ground by rolling the dice and portaging across a spit of land to the boat take out. We rolled into the TA in first place, having leap-frogged Extreme Prestige and ARMD who quickly appeared from the river. After a short bike ride through what turned out to be a rather long and dark tunnel, we emerged at another transition where we dropped our bikes for a foot loop on the hills above the Potomac. After I botched an initial nav decision, losing us fifteen or so minutes, we got ourselves on track and moved well through the rest of the section, running trails and trekking steep, cliffed-out slopes to nab a series of seven or eight checkpoints before heading back to our bikes.

Emerging from the tunnel

Highlight of the first foot loop: a hard to access checkpoint near an old rail tunnel

Here the course got interesting as there was a series of bike points and a second foot section at the far end of the map. Teams could collect whatever bike points they wanted on the way to the second loop and could then get more bike points on the way back to the finish after the trek. We felt good about our route plan, and made good time on the way to the second foot section, though I personally felt terrible any time we started climbing, and was there climbing. I’m not kidding when I say there were more challenging hills in this twelve hour course than in this year’s edition of Untamed New England (at least on the bike). Ann was a rockstar, bombing up hills as Tim and I struggled (unsuccessfully) to keep up. While ARMD had disappeared and Extreme Prestige had pulled ahead, we kept leap frogging with Rev3 throughout the section.

We finally arrived at the TA for the second foot section to learn that we were 10 minutes behind Rev3 and about half an hour behind ARMD who was clearly having a stellar day. We were feeling a bit low and started off a bit slow before hitting a groove and picking off the remaining checkpoints, catching up to Rev3 in the process. The woods were wide open for quick travel, and we found ourselves navigating narrow footpaths along rushing creeks, once again making a loop of the six points before arriving back at the TA.

Turns out we didn't need to cross the shaky bridge, but it was a cool pic.

At this point we had approximately three hours left to get back. ARMD was far enough ahead that we didn’t see any hope in catching them, and we knew Rev3 was moving better than we were. With minimal navigation on the way back, we elected to skip our first point, choosing instead to make sure we got the lone point worth two points, rolling the dice a bit and assuming we would not be able to clear everything. Our only hope would rest on one of the teams ahead of us (Rev3 left transition shortly before we did) to make an error or miss the cutoff.

On the way to the two point checkpoint

The remainder of the race passed by quickly as we rode the high ridge line in the state forest. We emerged at a high pass, punching the two point control before setting off down the ridge, bagging the final controls on the way to the finish. Upon arriving at the finish we plotted three bonus points and decided to set off for one or two with the 15 minutes we had left.

Unfortunately, we chose the wrong one, getting bogged down in a thicket of thorns, and losing half our time fighting through the thicket only to find everybody struggling to find what turned out to be a slightly misplotted point. Had we gone for any of the other points, we would have found at least one of them. That said, as we emerged from the thicket, we ran into Rev3, and after learning they had indeed successfully cleared the course, we decided to call it a day and head out since bonus point would not help us.

Heading for the final thorny bonus point

As it turned out, while we maximized our points by dropping the one point (and we would likely not have cleared the course had we tried) ARMD and Rev3 cleared the whole course, taking the top two slots in the premier division. ARMD found two of the bonus points for the win, while Extreme Prestige found all three to win the race overall. As always, it was a blast racing with two friends for the first time, and I can only hope that my sluggish legs feel better next month in Scotland. The five day Sting in Stirling will be my tenth race of the season, the most I have raced by the end of the summer, and here’s hoping a couple weeks of leisurely hiking and wandering in the Scottish highlands will be the right mix of final preparation and recovery before we toe the line with our teammates in Stirling.