Don't Get Lost

Race Summary

Race Date	January 21, 2017
Race Stats	3:06:02. 215pts. 11/13
Format	Most checkpoints in alloted time
Would do again?	Yes

I heard about this race from my uptown run shop Running Free in Markham. I'm generally interested in trying out new race formats...well new things in general and this race seemed rather compelling. The Snowshoe Raid Adventure Run is a 3-hour event where you are required to find as many checkpoints within the area of play as possible. Each checkpoint has a difficulty rating, with an associated number of points (i.e. beginner checkpoints are 25 points, and backcountry are 150 points). The race focuses primarily on orienteering skills (as well as fitness), so you're only given an elevation map with the location of where each checkpoint is located. In the 'field of play' there are no markers or boundaries other than the standard trail markets (e.g. bruce trail) so it is actually possible to get lost if you're not paying attention to where you are at all times. The difficulty is definitely compounded when you start to search for advanced markers, where you need to know when to break off-trail, find the market, then make your way back onto a trail. You are required to stay in pairs unless you are in the matrix zone where you can go off individually but must exit the matrix together.

The concept of the race sounds pretty fun, and I managed to convince my friend Abhi to be my partner for the race. The race was held at Blue Mountain and thanks to Anna and her dad, we got to Blue Mountain by 9 am. The race started at 10:30 am, but as soon as we checked-in we got access to the map, so we had more time to plan our route.

The placement of the checkpoints kind of inferred a giant loop, which we thought 'we can do that'; it was unbelievable how wrong we were. The start of the race essentially started with a straight run up Blue Mountain. With roughly 200m gain over 1km with snowshoes, it was a rough way to start. The weather conditions were pretty good in terms of running (very little wind, crisp air), but it was the snow conditions that kind of messed things up for us. We were warned that the conditions were such that we would regret not wearing snowshoes, but we would also regret wearing them. Throughout the race, we ran through snow, slush, ice, mud, and streams.

Finding most of the checkpoints was straightforward; I could see when other people broke off the trail and with map and compass find most checkpoints relatively quickly. The only one that was really hard to find was one that was deep in the forest and described as 'Valley/Stream'. Coming from a cliffside, I imagined it would have been easy to find, but everything looked like a valley, and with the warm weather, everything looked like a stream. The trail we were on earlier wasn't the easiest to figure out when to break off either so we got lost for a bit =/.

We tried to make up time by skipping out on some of the checkpoints we wanted and went straight back to the start line. But the hill we had to climb, we now had to descend and that was probably the sketchiest thing I've done in a while. With our snowshoes, we had some traction on the ice/snow, so we were pretty much barrelling down the mountain as fast as we could, holding onto trees trying to not face-plant. But we saw people sliding down on their asses down a good portion of the hill and some people simply crashing into other people. It was kind of chaotic, but fun.

Despite this though, we survived with no injuries and managed to hit 7 checkpoints, for a total of 425, which I thought was pretty good for our first time. Unfortunately, we came in just over the 3hr limit, and due to their penalty system (-30pt/min), we ended up losing almost half of our points. In the end, we ended up with a total of 215, placing us 11th in the men's group.

This race kind of opened up a new series of races aptly named Adventure Racing Ontario. They have multi-sport races in the more back country style where you combine mountain biking, kayaking and trail running. I'm looking forward to trying one of these out if I can find a team nutty enough to join me.