Triangle Adventure Racing Team

Some of the boys travelled to Pisgah for the May 2nd PMBAR race held in Brevard NC.  Covering a wide expanse of the Pisgah National Forest teams of two tackled the singletrack and gravel roads in the area while navigating to a series of checkpoints scattered throughout the forest.  Leading the charge was the duo of Charlie Roberts and Ernie Chilcott finishing on the prestigious “white board” in 21st overall.  More important that their finish time and place was their taking the killer 5th checkpoint.    With only four required, very few teams risk or are willing to tackle the extras that are routinely part of this race.  Dragging into the finish with a mere mortal four checkpoints was Bruce Dale and his teammate Innes Wright in just under 11 hours, also good enough to put triangle-ar on the white board again!   For a couple of lads with a combined age of 90, a not too shabby result.   Clearly race director Eric Weaver put an emphasis on stepping the race up and this years offering proved to be the longest by approximately an hour of anyones recent memory. …..of course you know us endurance addicts have a very short memory when it comes to suffering!  

Some pics of the event:

http://adventureracing.meetup.com/17/photos/

Fellow Adventure Racers please take a minute to fill out the following survey to lend a hand to team member Ernie Chilcott.  I just finished it myself and it requires no personal information and is very quick and easy.  What have you go to lose?

http://www.zoomerang.com/Survey/survey-intro.zgi?p=WEB22934LZ6HLM

Team members Ernie, Charlie and Bruce returned from the 6HR @ Warrior’s Creek mountain bike race posting some solid results.  Charlie and Ernie paired up to compete in the duo male category, placing 8th overall.  Bruce teamed up with local female sport racer Dena Ali to finish 9th in the co-ed duo race pairings.  The course was a combination of rolling switchbacks and short tough leg sapping climbings that never seem to relent.  Team Triangle-AR produced some very solid results given the technical riding involved.   The day finished out with some great food and even better beer from http://www.boonebrewing.com/

Congrats to Triangle-AR team members Brian, Jeff and Charlie for completing the grueling Uwharrie 40 miler on February 7th in Troy NC.  This race is known for it’s February weather and tough elevation.  Brian led the way with a 8HR 30 minute effort, shadowed closely by Charlie at 8HRS 41MIN and Jeff rolling in at 9HRS 30MIN (not too shabby for a beach bum)  Check out the link for more details:

http://www.raceuwharrie.com/

Bruce paired up with fellow RDU-Trailblazer’s Rich Ingersoll and Brian Fowler to tackle the 1st Annual Mandatory Gear AR in Conway SC.  The trio racing together for the first time managed a decent finish with a time of 5:46.  Despite some Navigation errors for two checkpoints, the trios saving grace was some pretty fast riding legs to keep them under the six hour cut-off.  The Six hour race featured 7-8 miles of orienteering, 20 miles of mountain biking and 2-3 miles of black water paddling through the backwoods of coastal SC.  Topping off their race day, Bruce won a Brunton L3 headlamp in the prize drawing and Brian Fowler took home a very nice Salomon AR pack for his efforts. 

Team members Brian and Bruce took sometime out from the regular racing scene to support the local RDU-Trailblazers AR practice series held in early November.  The event took place over the trails and greenways around the Bond Park area of Cary.  With plenty of miles of riding, a dedicated orienteering course and some very special challenges including a lung searing 1 mile opening run leg it made for a great workout and social event.  Thanks to Bob May for setting up the course!! 

Brian and Bruce scored 251 points in maxing out the course with an overall time of 3HRs 03 MIN.  Check out a few team pics from the event:

http://adventureracing.meetup.com/17/photos/478404/

Brian, Bruce and Dale Long travelled to the Uwharrie Trails region of NC in October to compete in the 2nd Annual Gold Nugget AR racing as a three male team in the 12HR version.  Despite some navigation snags the team managed a fourth overall, ranking second among the all male teams with a total of 880 points and elapsed time of 11HRS 45 MIN.  The race consisted of a signficant amount of hike-a-bike, paddling on Badin Lake and a dedicated orienteering course.  Check out the link for pics from the event.

http://adventureracing.meetup.com/17/photos/451934/

Brian, Bruce and Dale Long travelled to the Uwharrie Trails region of NC in October to compete in the 2nd Annual Gold Nugget AR racing as a three male team in the 12HR version.  Despite some navigation snags the team managed a fourth overall, ranking second among the all male teams with a total of 880 points and elapsed time of 11HRS 45 MIN.  The race consisted of a signficant amount of hike-a-bike, paddling on Badin Lake and a dedicated orienteering course.  Check out the link for pics from the event.

http://adventureracing.meetup.com/17/photos/451934/

 Our featured Adventure Racing site of the week features the local rag Endurance.   Part magazine, part newspaper and best of all available free throughout the triangle.  Though it focuses on the triathalon scene, you’ll find mountain biking, trail running and gear tips throughout.  Check it out if you get a chance!

http://www.endurancemag.com/

I Competed in the USA Cycling SE Regional Marathon Championship on Sunday at the USNWC (http://www.usnwc.org/) The trails there are absolutely outstanding and very well maintained…talk about dishing it all up on one venue….tough climbs….brake screeching downhills….fast doublewide sections and rooty/rocky techical drops. If you haven’t been out there to ride/raft/climb you really should try it out. Seeing it in person really gives you a perspective of the work.  To top the day off the race was sponsored by http://www.widmer.com/Default.aspx man that was real good after a hot, dusty ride!!

6 Laps of the 8.5 mile course for a total of 51 miles landed me in 25th overall and 12th in the masters. There were some pretty serious riders there with it being a SE regional so it was interesting tangling with the big dogs and their matching lycra. The course was 90% singletrack with a bit of gravel road near the lap pits.

Laps 1,2 and 3 went by fairly easily with no major issues…lap four I suffered through, lap five I backed off the throttle a bit to recover and then made a push for lap six….I felt like I was in slow motion but was still able to pass four riders. Prettty sore the next day, hands..wrists…back from the beating.

Check out the news story, wish we had this coverage locally for endurance sports:

http://news14.com/content/top_stories/599055/bike-race-highlights-sport-s-growth/Default.aspx

Few Pics from various laps:  http://www.photoreflect.com/pr3/orderpage.aspx?pi=0NR8001E000122&po=0&c=&e=