From 4LPH41337.com

Contents 1 Siege On Fort Yargo Map 2 Siege On Fort Yargo Website 3 Siege On Fort Yargo Results 4 Siege On Fort Yargo Reviews 4.1 Josh's Take 4.2 Jack's Take

Siege On Fort Yargo Map

Siege On Fort Yargo Website

http://siegeyargo.trailblazerar.com/

Siege On Fort Yargo Results

Final Results

Siege On Fort Yargo Reviews

Josh's Take

Though I had a ball at this race last year, I was not planning on doing it again this year, as the team was representing at the Special Operations Adventure Race in Highlands, NC. However, I got lucky as team Beer Run had lost their third after they were registered and so I was invited to race with them. Beer Run consisted of two guys who hadn't raced together before--Tom and Danny--and myself. Tom had done 3-5 sprint races and was in good shape and Danny was an AR virgin. We had trained a couple of times together before the race, getting a feel for navigation and seating arrangements in the canoe--and foster a rivalry between our team and team CTRL 4LPH4 D3L3T3, the team Jack and my brother-in-law formed for the race. The plan then was for Tom to do the majority of the navigation, and let me confirm his plan when time permitted.

Race overview:

1. split swim 800m/run 2k
2. canoe
3. bike
4. trek (optional 400m swim in the middle)
5. portage

In the canoe, bike, and trek legs there were optional CPs that could be attained. There was a 5 hour cutoff, so time management came into play. Our pre-race strategy, that we adhered to for the race, was to get 1 canoe optional CP, 1 bike optional CP, and as 3-5 trek optional CPs, as time permitted.

The race started with teams splitting up to thin out the crowd--Tom elected to swim ~800m while Danny and I retrieved CP1-3. Race staff put out multiple CP punches in the early section and had different teams retrieving them in different order so that reduced race start bottlenecks handily. Danny and I took out pretty hard (staying within top 10 teams going our direction) in order to avoid any bottleneck but when we saw that race staff had placed 4 CP punches at CP1, we realized there weren't going to be any and slowed down betting that we'd beat the swimmers even though the RD gave them a head start on the trekkers. Sure enough, we arrived 5 minutes or so before Tom came out of the water, in the end of the 1st quarter of the field. Good swim!

From there we took off on the canoes, electing to get an optional canoe point on the way. Though we were the 2nd team to go for the point, we were 10th or so to leave due to overshooting it and by the time we backtracked and found it a stream of teams were coming in straight to it. This was where we had our first run-in with Jack and them. We shoved off about 30 seconds ahead of them--they made up a 3 minute deficit from the swim!

We raced to the next CP, unfortunately our 15' Old Town canoe was no match for the 17' Grumman that CTRL 4LPH4 D3L3T3 were using, and we had to paddle our hardest to stay ahead. Further, our boat's bottom was...er...warped and was very difficult to control and it appeared to be magnetized towards other folks boats. I know of at least 4 teams that we became glued to despite our efforts to steer clear (yes, we were team 142!  :( ). Well, at the next canoe CP (?CP6?), there was a V of canoes lined up to punch it. In the heat of the competition, Jack's team rammed right up into the middle of it to get ahead of us. Well, to counter that move, we tried to pit maneuver their canoe. Fortunately for them the water there was shallow and Vince, the other person on their team, jumped out of the boat and punched the CP, to everyone's dismay. The road off 45 seconds ahead of us!!!

Fueled by that slight, we punched as soon as we could in the midst of the crowd, and headed off to pursue them back to the canoe take-out. We slowly caught them then as they were catching some water breaks overtook them. They were 10' or so behind us drafting when they attempted to overtake us. I was sitting in the back of the canoe and dug deep to fling as much water back at the bow of their boat as possible. It worked and we kept them at bay, actually pulling away by about a minute when we arrived at the canoe take-out. We transitioned as quickly as we could, spending no more than a minute there to gather everything except the canoe to take back to the bike TA (canoe take-out and bike-TA were about 400m apart). We figured the more we take now, the less we have to carry later when we were tired.

Next was the bike leg. We transitioned as quickly as we could here, taking 3 or so minutes to suit up, and then we left. This was our weakest leg, as the heat started getting to Danny. We accidentally did a loop and rode by CP8 twice, which was a 5 minute or so navigation error, but it was enough to shake our confidence that we were still ahead of Jack's team. Aside from that, Tom's navigation on the bike was flawless. The pipeline ride was fun but before that the heat was starting to take its toll. We had a little excitement at one of the optional bike points when we were heading down from it as teams were coming opposite of us confused about the correct direction of the bike trail. There was a lot of shouting, "YOUR GOING THE WRONG WAY!!!" by both camps, but I was 100% positive we were going correctly, and was re-enforced by the group of bikes waiting at the bottom of the trail for those that opted to hike up (since teams weren't supposed to bike up from that direction). The bike was tough on Danny as his strengths were the trek and paddle, but he kept staying tough and moving forward. I assured him as best as I could that we were doing great and as long as he was moving forward we were making other teams pass us on the go. Sure enough, we passed plenty of teams that were taking breaks on the side of the trail or searching for a CP in the wrong area, while we were never passed without making the other teams work for it--thanks to Tom's nav work and Danny's persistence. Overall, I think we probably maintained our place on the bike, but primarily due to teams electing to get more optional bike points.

We were the 3rd or so team to come off of the bike. The first thing I asked Holly, who was spectating, was where CTRL 4LPH4 D3L3T3 were. She pointed out the obvious number of bikes that were in the TA, and I realized that we must be way in front on the trek. This was a huge encouragement, because it meant we'd stayed ahead of the stud teams that were getting all of the optionals--a good indicator that we were doing well on time management. We transitioned in 5-8 minutes and left to get the trek points. Danny was in good spirits that the bike part was over! During the entire trek, we maintained an 800 meter lead on what was about 4-5 teams behind us. We also joined up with the princesses of the all-girls team Outspokin' Bikes, giving them a hard time with our jokes all the while. Lisa wasn't having any of it, she was pretty focused on the top spot. We used the towing system a couple of times when we needed it, but mostly stuck to racing efficiently--hiking uphills and running flats and downs. We got several of the optionals and made a nav mistake overshooting the one right before the swim. I feared it would allow the following pack to catch us but it didn't. We reached the swim, got our gear on, and swam across, exiting the water as the chase dogs were entering it. We saw this as a psychological advantage, since there were 4 optional checkpoints ahead of us and the finish.

We cleared 2 of the remaining optional CPs in good time but disaster struck. Danny's stomach was giving up to the heat. He was puking pretty badly and then went to dry-heaving. This occurred several times but we worked through it. The pressure was on as the pursuing teams were gaining on us and we wanted to stay out of visual distance of them to prevent them from closing the gap easily. His morale was pretty low but he tried to stay upbeat and he definitely was a trooper. After getting the final 2 optional his spirits were returning but he wasn't out of the woods yet--he had one more dry-heaving session where he was on the ground unable to breath for a good minute or so!

At this point, 5-6 teams sprung from the woods and were getting their canoes for the final portage to the finish. We rallied hard, knowing that 300 meters was all that kept us from the end. Tom shouldered the canoe by himself, while I carried the PFDs and Danny's pack. With less weight and only a small distance to go, Danny started running and we started passing teams on our way to the finish. 1...2...3...4...5...6, we were on fire! Knowing that some of those teams had probably gotten the same number of CPs as us, we knew that passing them was likely sliding up our final place. We dumped the canoe and sprinted up the hill to the finish with 15 minutes or so to spare.

Tom did a fantastic job navigating, Danny was extremely tough and had a great (albeit painful) first adventure race, and I enjoyed the excitement of the race and executing our pre-race strategy perfectly. We were elated to find out that we finished 5th out of the all-male teams, something that we were not expecting at all!

Jack's Take

Should have written this sooner, while memory was fresh, but I'll give it a shot.

The race started with one member of the team swimming and the other 2 picking up 3 checkpoints (CPs) on foot. Vince volunteered to do the swim the night before, when it was called a "short swim." He figured since his daughter is on a swim team, he was the obvious choice. It turned out to be about a 1/4 mile or more, according to Vince's estimations. We were just hoping to get to the canoe transition area (TA) before he did. We'll, we had about a mile and a half run, which we could have probably walked, as it took about 25 minutes to do the swim. I believe all of the team's trekking members beat their swimmer.

Vince came in and was pretty tired from the swim. It would have been hard for any of us, as we don't train for swimming (not normally part of the races we've done--at least not at this distance). We got in the canoe and gave Vince a little break, but his adrenaline kicked in, and he was paddling well. Vince jumped out at the first canoe CP near the dam and got that one fairly quickly. We paddled over to the optional checkpoint on the way to the next mandatory canoe CP. Vince jumped out and went after that CP, refusing to take the map. Luckily, he found it with no issues. Then it was over the the last mandatory canoe CP, where we encountered a glob of canoes in the shape of a "V" waiting to punch. We saw Josh's team making a "S" path to the CP, and in the heat of trying to get ahead of Josh's team, we rammed right up into the "V". Vince jumped off the front of the boat for the punch. An all female team, cursing us, demanded we punch their card to, and we obliged. Then we were off for the "canoe-to-bike" TA, ahead of Josh's team. Well, they managed to catch us, as I kept demanding the team "Drink!", as I knew the heat would be getting to us on the bike/trek later. We decided against the last optional CP on canoe, as Vince and Will had had enough paddling, and we questioned the value of the time it would take to get that one extra optional CP. Arriving at the canoe take-out a few minutes after Josh's team, we dropped the canoe and carried the paddles & life jackets back to the main TA, so we wouldn't have to carry them later. No navigational errors on canoe.

We spent a little extra time at the TA refilling drink bladders, changing shoes, and getting dry socks. Off on bikes. We knew we'd have some issues here, as Will hadn't had alot of training time on the bike. This actually worked to our advantage, as it was easier to navigate when riding a bit slower. The navigation was really quite easy. Our only mistake was dropping our bikes (with everyone else's) for the optional CP that was up on th top of the map and looked to be about 2000ft off trail. Turns out, there was a nice forest service road all the way to the CP, so it would have saved us alot of time to have stayed on our bikes. Oh, well, looks like everyone else was also on foot. Further along, we encountered a team whose female member had wrecked pretty bad. We weren't sure of her condition, so we offered help. The guys were wanting to call out for help, but she protested. Other teams were hassling us to clear the trail (great sportsmanship, guys). We decided she was okay, but only shaken up a bit, so we continued on. We made it back to the main TA with no other issues. No navigational errors on bike.

We transitioned to the trekking leg, refilling drink bladders, and carabining life jackets to our packs for the possible "optional swim" that they'd told us could save us some time. We jogged over across the bridge to get to the pipeline on the other side of the lake. Vince's legs were starting to cramp up at about this point in the race (maybe earlier, but he was not complaining until now). We picked up the first checkpoint at the old fort, then down the pipeline and got the next checkpoint on the first powerline path. We were neck and neck with another team (wearing grey jerseys), who chose to take the bike trail over to the next CP on the next powerline path. We took a few more steps to get back to the pipeline, down the pipeline, and back down the next powerline for the next optional CP. We saw the grey team coming out of the curvy bike path after we'd already punched the optional CP. This gave us confidence in our navigational choice. So much confidence that as we jogged down the pipeline and into the woods next to the lake for the next mandatory CP, that we missed a turn and ended up on the dam...resulting in 1/4-1/2 mile alternate route back to the CP. We jogged and walked as needed in attempt to let Vince recover. We got across the dam and to the last CP before the swim. From the map, it looked like about a 1000 ft swim. I think it took us about 15 minutes to get across the lake (mostly back-stroking). Will was the first one out of the water. About twenty feet from the shore, my calf cramped up, so I just let it dangle and kept swimming with only my arms. The cramp subsided, and about a minute later, Vince was back on solid ground. I think he was regretting that he volunteered for the first swim, but the water felt good and helped cool us down.

We debated picking up the optional CPs on the trekking section of this side of the lake and agreed we could pick up the one optional CP by the beach. As we approached the canoe pick-up, I thought we could get 2 more optional CPs up near the cemetery, but I thought we may have to bury Vince there, if we attempted it. His calf was severely cramped, as I pushed him down the road, not giving him a break. We only had 15 minutes to get back to the finish line, so we chose to skip it.

Will and I picked up the canoe and managed to pass a few teams on the way to the finish. We dropped the canoe and crossed the finish line with 8 minutes to spare. I was quite proud to hear that we were only behind Josh's team by one CP. Later, we found out that we'd finished 9th place in the all-male division (out of about 45 all-male teams).

This is a great race for beginners looking to try out the sport. I can honestly say that I used my compass only once during the whole event, and that was only to figure out where the road was for the team with the injured female. All checkpoints were easily found using only terrain features. I think next year, I'll try to convince my teenagers to do this race.

Discuss This Article