In typical Army fashion our hurry up and wait mode had us sitting around watching the stragglers change clothes, try to heat something for dinner, relax and unwind before Night Navigation began. These were the back of the middle of the pack competitors. The cut off time had come and gone, the race directors made the choice to let all athletes compete, as that is what they had paid big bucks for and most of them had traveled some distance to get there. I had sympathy for them as that is where I normally would be in a "normal" race. This 30 hour, multiple specialty, endurance type event suited me. We were in the lead pack, setting standards, enjoying ourselves.
It was getting to be time to load the bus and head out to start our night time event. The shivers had left , or at least they had become controllable. They were handing out maps with our different targets to find, most of us turned on our headlamps trying to come up with a strategy for the night. There were 14 targets in total. Spread out over about 10 miles. Time limit, 6 hours. Each team had one of 4 different maps that located 7 different targets that could be found. We opted for picking only 5, all on the most direct route back to BV. We also noticed a cross country short cut that would / could potentially cut off about a half mile. We were ready.
Three, Two, One. we were off.
We speed walked our way to the front of the lead group. When Jack said now, at his 250 pace count, we cut off from the group and hit the woods. I kept my compass out and headed off in at the proper heading. Jack was sort of following but kept veering off to the right, the south, following his inner compass. One last yell, "Jack, over here" and we came out on the road a couple hundred yards ahead of the rest of the lead group. Our gamble paid off, sort of. I don; think they knew we were ahead of them, as we kept our headlights on low and had no back lights. We jogged a bit to get even farther ahead. This was my territory, I knew this road and these hills better than anyone else in the race. I believed I could get us in and out before they knew we where there. I screwed up. I kept checking the map, looking for the spot where I needed to head in a westerly direction. I missed it by a quarter of a mile. On the map I knew I had to look for the spot between the lily pond and the neck of the lake that fed the lily pond. In the dark and with my tri-focaled eyes, I missed the turn off on the map. In my defense it was partially covered by the 'bubble' surrounding target number 2, but no excuse I blew it. Rather than back track we opted to just head in a south westerly direction hoping to intercept the target right where we knew it to be. Yeah Right. Good Luck. Traveling in the dark climbing up and down boulders and rocks, weaving in and out of trees, losing count of how many paces we traveled, we were lucky we didn't end up in the lake ourselves. We knew we were fairly close when we started seeing other head lamps searching the same area we believed held the target. Climb up, scramble down, over there, check that, what about there... nothing. Forty five minutes of search and we had nothing. But then again neither did anybody else. Teams were giving up on this target. other teams were joining in on the hunt. At an hour we decided to fold our hand and try for better luck on the next target. I was headed over to Jacks location, sweeping my handheld light ahead of me when There. What was that?
I swept it past again, making sure not to move an inch. A dull green glow just ahead no more than 50 to 100 yards ahead.
"Jack you see that?"
"Where?"
"Right there, follow my light"
We were on to something. No sudden moves, No yelling just walk ahead and find the target, pack up the brick and give up like we had no business being there to begin with...No one else the wiser.
Oh yeah, at each target as well as marking the target on our card we had to find and carry out a matching brick, stenciled with that target number. An added bonus for playing these reindeer games...
After spending 90 minutes searching for this one brick we decided to cut our losses and skip the next target, trying to gain lost ground and by finding the next three, settle for the fastest time finding four. (This turned out to be a factor in the "Lone Survivor Run the following morning....) We jogged, speed walked our way past a few teams on our way to the next marked location. Again we sped right on past the appropriate contour marking and had to back track again. But this one was a bit easier to find. It only took us 30 minutes. We believed there were only a couple teams ahead of us and they were not ones that we were worried about. Not that we were worried about any one team, but these were teams that had skipped these targets and were mainly interested in getting back with the bare minimum . We had bigger plans.
We loaded our booty in my pack this time and hit the trail again. We fast waked past 3 more teams, maybe the same teams we past earlier, who know. In the dark on a new moon night everybody looks the same. Except for that one team that had reflective striping everywhere.. But they were not our concern. We needed to be at the next target, 2 miles away, before the next team got there. We continued up SlickRock Road, actually more of a jeep trail than a road, but a well defined trail none the less. We left the river right where the map said we should, continued on for another half a mile, all up hill, and found the Emigrant Trail turnoff just a few meters beyond where it should have been, according to the map. Right at this junction of Jeep Trail and single track trail is where the next target would be located. I headed north on the trail, keeping my eyes peeled for a green glow stick marking the target. Nothing. Again we went too far. Heading back in a ESE direction we spotted the target a hundred meters ahead. Angling off, over rock and stump and downed tree we were on a direct path to intercept the target. But Lo, just there were a couple other teams, not the ones we passed we found out..., but other teams nonetheless. Thats alright. This was our third brick. We already knew where the fourth one was. We were golden. Grab the brick, hand carry it, make a show of knowing what we were doing. Head back to base.
But Wait. Something wasn't right. Jack was lagging. I was the one waiting for Jack now. I think we had just found Jacks limit. Right around 19 - 20 hours. It was my turn to be the hero. I had been munching on GORP and Clif Bars all night. I still had some in my pocket. Here drink some of this diluted 5 hour energy water, eat a few nuts. "S'alright, I'm better. Not so dizzy anymore. Lets go."
We were off at a fast shamble again. Looking for the correct barbed wire fence to cut behind, then the dry creek bed, who knew that all dry creek beds look the same at 0200... Head East for 25 paces and bazinga there it is. Marker #1 just like we left it 7 hours ago. Four bricks less than4 hours in to the challenge, only a mile back to the check in tent and we would have about 4 hours of rest before we needed to be up for the final challenge of the event. We arrived at the check in tent. They asked how we did. We each dropped our hand carried bricks on the table. The staff was pleased. we met the minimum. We could go. But wait, what was this? Oh we just so happened to have another brick apiece. We were the first team to arrive with 4 bricks. YES. Now off to find our resting location in the dark. But wait. "You need to go see Kent at that tent and get he will inform you of the next step." What??? It's 2:30 in the morning, we've been busting our hump for the last 2 hours to get here faster than anyone else. We had nothing left in our tank. Or so we thought.
Were we in for a surprise? Ya I think so. So was the rest of the competitor field.
More to come on OPT surprise Challenge.
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