The morning of the race started out just like the previous year, which I liked. The bike drop was at Cumberland Village Park and then there were shuttle buses transporting people out to the start line on Comox Lake. The weather was mainly blue sky with a few rainy clouds that floated over us just as the race maps were released. However, the rain was short-lived and the blue skies prevailed after about 25 minutes. I set up my kayak, which I rented from Alberni Outpost. It was a very small and light fibreglass boat. After we were given the race map I called my wife and talked the course over with her so that she would know where to send a rescue crew if I never turned up at the finish line…
After the traditional group photo everyone piled into their boats and headed out into the cold waters of Comox Lake. This is always a bit chaotic as everyone is jam packed within a few feet of each other and struggling not to bump boats. After no time at all the horn sounded and we were off racing down the lake. I was pretty happy with my speed. I even kept up with a few people I recognized. However, turning was not easy in my boat. I was used to using a rudder for which this boat did not have. Thus, some of my tighter turns around buoys ended in me yelling "sorry!" as I erratically swung in front of other racers. By the time I hauled my kayak out of the water it had been around 1hr:15mins. Not too bad in my books. |
I raced over to punch the first checkpoint and headed down the beach. Again the course was similar to the year before and started out marked with flagging. We headed up into the deep green forest and followed the beautiful trails around large boulders and trees while skirting alongside cliffs. This spot it always a bottle neck for racers and we ran single file for a time. People were pretty great about seeing that I was solo and letting me pass. It wasn't long before the flagging disappeared and just like that we had to navigate our way back to Cumberland Village Park with a few checkpoints along the way. |
The bike ride this year was pretty interesting. A lot more cross-country rather than the typical up and down. We started off by riding the road to Missing Link and up Buggered Pig, which was challenging with some good uphill sprints. We then popped back onto the road, followed it further up the mountain, and turned right where we would normally turn left for Syke's Bridge. Here we followed a crappy old logging road up even further to a muddy hike-a-bike trail that eventually joined up the dreaded Miner's trail. Needless to say this was not my favourite part of the race and I was sweating pretty good. |
Once we finished our climb we road to Bear Buns and the real fun began. Here I passed a number of people as I flew down the mountain to Teapot and Blue Collar. In previous years after the downhill biking portion the race heads for the finish, but this year things were a little more complicated. At this point we took a number of cross-country trails including: Rail Trail, Entrails, and Crafty Butcher. This brought us to the Trek Stage of the race at around 5hrs. |
The last portion of the race was biking down some old mucky trails back to Cumberland Village Park. This point in the race is always a blur to me. I passed a few people who were vocalizing how much they hated any slight uphill in the trails. It made me laugh a bit to see a couple girls and even a few boys having hissy fits. Hold it together people, we are almost there! I set the cruise control and just kept moving. There was one point in the end where I lost track of where I was, but just followed trails that lead to the sounds of the finish line. When I emerged out of the forest for the final time I was in shock. I had done it! I made it to the finish will all the checkpoints all by myself. I dumped my bike and ran my way through the arch where my family met me with a cold beer and plenty of congratulations. My time was 6hrs51mins, which met my goal of under 7hrs. It was a day for the books. MOMAR you are the best race EVER! |