xc62701
Well-Known Member
Yesterday Shar0se and I competed in an Adventure race in PA called the Edge Adventure Race. This was the first time for me as I'm familiar with the XC and Endurance game but not the Adventure stuff. I knew going into it that it was going to be a cool day with 5 miles of running/orienteering, 10 miles of biking, and 5 miles of canoeing that awaited us. Little did I know that it started off with a wheelbarrow race. Not a short one either. Probably 30 - 40 yards uphill and then back downhill. Crazy!
Next we ran to grab our passport which would tell us the order of the remainder of the race. 1st up was the bike. This was cool but was hard to get a flow going since we had to stop so often and punch our card at the checkpoints and orienteer on the bike. We did it pretty solidly with no mechanicals and one REALLY hard to find checkpoint and then we moved on to the run.
The run was good since we already had a bit of knowledge about the park layout and we hauled and did our checkpoints pretty quickly. The race directors were a little sadistic in the fact that some of the checkpoints were made so you had to run through thorns or cross rivers to get to them. The run was solid and then the canoe leg started.
The canoe leg was cool but first you had to run about a mile to the canoe launch with your paddles and life jacket. Then you had to carry the canoe and drop it in and go get your checkpoints. Some were right on the waters edge - others we had to run up onto the shore to get them. Once that was over we did a little bushwacking to save time and get back to camp to start the final event - team challenges.
The challenges were pretty simple but a little unfair. The first was the buddy carry. I had to carry sharon across a part of a field about 40 feet and back piggy back style. And then it was her turn to carry me. With a little argument over the fairness of a 100 lb girl carrying a 170 lb guy she threw me on her back and got the job done! Then we had to crawl over a cargo net, do a little tightrope balancing and crawl under a bunch of ropes and run back to the start finish for the end.
We had 6 hours to complete the event and we finished in 3:57 with all checkpoints completed. It was a blast. 5th in our division of 13 or so and 30th overall of 103 teams. If you're looking for just a fun and interesting event this style may be the ticket. It's like a big adult scavenger hunt. Pretty cool...
Next we ran to grab our passport which would tell us the order of the remainder of the race. 1st up was the bike. This was cool but was hard to get a flow going since we had to stop so often and punch our card at the checkpoints and orienteer on the bike. We did it pretty solidly with no mechanicals and one REALLY hard to find checkpoint and then we moved on to the run.
The run was good since we already had a bit of knowledge about the park layout and we hauled and did our checkpoints pretty quickly. The race directors were a little sadistic in the fact that some of the checkpoints were made so you had to run through thorns or cross rivers to get to them. The run was solid and then the canoe leg started.
The canoe leg was cool but first you had to run about a mile to the canoe launch with your paddles and life jacket. Then you had to carry the canoe and drop it in and go get your checkpoints. Some were right on the waters edge - others we had to run up onto the shore to get them. Once that was over we did a little bushwacking to save time and get back to camp to start the final event - team challenges.
The challenges were pretty simple but a little unfair. The first was the buddy carry. I had to carry sharon across a part of a field about 40 feet and back piggy back style. And then it was her turn to carry me. With a little argument over the fairness of a 100 lb girl carrying a 170 lb guy she threw me on her back and got the job done! Then we had to crawl over a cargo net, do a little tightrope balancing and crawl under a bunch of ropes and run back to the start finish for the end.
We had 6 hours to complete the event and we finished in 3:57 with all checkpoints completed. It was a blast. 5th in our division of 13 or so and 30th overall of 103 teams. If you're looking for just a fun and interesting event this style may be the ticket. It's like a big adult scavenger hunt. Pretty cool...
