I seem to be going through partners like they're going out of fashion. Whangamata was a chance to race with my Bestie Rochelle. She's an Ironman, although she says it was in a previous life, we all know it means she's tough. She says she has a baby and two kids and doesn't do any training, but we know it means she's tough. She says Ironman was in her early 20s, pre kids. Tough! ;)
Anyway, she doesn't really ride a bike........... apparently we pretty much put her off that by taking her on a National Downhill a decade or so ago?????????? So she's on my spare bike for the day. I'm a bit disappointed to hear the race has rules about collecting checkpoints in order, particularly as I hear this AFTER I've come up with a cunning nav plan to keep us out of congestion. With that plan out of the window, Rochelle and I find ourselves arriving late to the Start line, from the opposite direction, and by default find ourselves leading the pack from the gun! :) Just where I like to be. Rochelle copes admirably with the MTB section although later admits she was terrified - we skip a checkpoint early to get away from the crowds and to ease the pressure a little. From here we're in front and don't really look back. We're amongst a few teams as we head onto the trek, and spot a bit of cheating going on - we waste AGES on one checkpoint and eventually give up. (gutted as we just didn't range far enough from the trail - &&**&!)
As we head through the forestry roads and up into the hills, the Nav is falling into place nicely, although there are a few which I feel 'lucky' to pick up as I say "I don't think it's here but I'll check just in case" and find the CP. I'm not sure if my nav is a bit off, or the mapping is......... but I seem to be 'reading' the course setter pretty well anyway, so I'll take it as a bonus.
At the top of the hills we hit a mystery activity 'treasure hunt' with clues to follow. Except the marshall has only just arrived and the clues aren't out yet. So, we help to put out the clues in exchange for the treasure and the points. Some discussion about how hard to hide the CP for following teams ends up with Karma biting me on the bum as I fall on a punga log and send a whole lot of spikes into the palm of my hand! All the CPs on roads we are flying through. Well, I feel like I'm flying, as I'm a plodder trying to keep up with a talented runner! We have mismatched strengths with me on the bike, and Rochelle on foot, so I know it's a matter of pushing myself to keep going on the trek as I'll be able to rest a little on the bike where she's not so comfortable. I don't want to know just how fast she could have run that trek. I may have dawdled on some of the nav decisions just to give my poor legs and lungs a break. She'll never know!!!!!!
We head down a trail and make the tough call to back ourselves and go cross country to try and intercept the creek below and work up it to the CP. The map doesn't quite match the land allocation of forest to open land, and my compass work lets us down a bit as we hit the creek, scramble up it for a few hundred metres and realise we're not sure where we are so have to bush bash out to the trail and head back to find the taped bush bash. We weren't far off, maybe 50m where we hit the stream, in hindsight I didn't (know how to) take off the 20 something degrees for magnetic north?? Anyway, we probably haven't wasted much time on running the whole way around. We're also having a great time, and the adventure of heading off trail is in the spirit of how we feel at the time. You can never regret that decision to be tough chicks, away from the crowd, jumping down banks and walking across rotten logs over creeks. Unless the log breaks, which I was pretty worried it might do.......
We stop for a mystery challenge and balance coins on oranges floating in buckets? Really? Turns out my teammate is pretty good at this. I'll have to add it to my training regime....... (yes, I know, I don't have one, but I always mean to.........)
Tearing down the final downhill before transition, Chelle hits a culvert and pops a tyre. (Really? The only time I've ever managed to do that was when Mike and I were trying to bunny hop the railway tracks for the kids railway by the Hamilton Lake!) I'm a bit disappointed I'm not more of a speed demon, but am coordinated enough to ride my bike and pull the flatty bike beside me while Chelle runs the last 500m as punishment. Except it's not punishment and she can probably run as fast as I ride anyway so maybe next time we just won't give her a bike at all..........
Out of the trek and back onto the bikes for the final leg. This is the more technical MTB so we've left plenty of time to make sure Chelle is able to walk anything she's not wanting to ride, especially after 4+ hours and some fatigued legs. It turns out she's more than man enough for the challenge, and although I get the chance to make some short nav stops at the bottom of hills while she follows me down more sedately, we're definitely not wasting any time.
We have plenty of time for the mud run at the end, which I'm presuming will be in the estuary as it's unmarked on the map, so we've allowed a significant amount of time for it. It turns out it's just a muddy bog hole within 300m of the finish line, just enough stagnant water to make sure all our cuts and scrapes are nicely septic.
We finish well under the six hours, with one missed CP on the first bike, and a few on an the trek. It's always a bit gutting to finish early but without max checkpoints, as it gives others the chance to go slower but still win on points. However the course setters later commented that after their first race was too hard, they'd over compensated and made this event a little easy.
At the end of the day, we saw some great terrain in an area of Whangamata which I'd never been to before, and had a great excuse for a girls weekend. It was a fairly comfortable race, without too much physical or navigational stress. I still need to get some compass skills sorted, but I'm pleased with making the transition to a new course setter fairly quickly.
Bonus is Rochelle attending prizegiving the following day and finding we're first women's pair, and high in the standings overall. This teammate is a keeper. :)
