Team Green Paw Adventure Sports

Team Green Paw Finishes 7th at Adventure Racing Nationals

Fri, 28 Oct 2011 12:19:05 -0400

On October 21st, 2011, Team Green Paw Adventure Sports finished 7th place in the Elite Coed division at Checkpoint Tracker Adventure Racing Championship which took place in Land Between the Lakes, Kentucky. Below is a short montage of video we took while out on the course.

Checkpoint Tracker National Championship Adventure Race starts Friday, Oct 21st.

Wed, 19 Oct 2011 19:38:52 -0400

This Friday/Saturday, Oct 21-22, Team Green Paw Adventure Sports will be competing in the 2011 Checkpoint Tracker North American Adventure Racing Championship 30-hour race. Tim, Anna, Erik, and JJ will make up the 4-person coed elite team for this race.

The race is going to be extremely competitive with 65 of the top teams in the country racing. The race starts at 7am on Friday morning and the cutoff is 1pm on Saturday afternoon. It will take place at Land Between the Lakes in the western part of Kentucky.

You can follow us (Green Paw Adventure Sports, team #25), and the rest of the field on the race website.
Go to: www.checkpointtracker.com while the race is in progress for live coverage including a race overview, live blog, leaderboard, course maps, gps tracking, photos, and more (we will be wearing a tracking device so you should be able to see on a map online where we are in relation to other teams). Coverage begins when the race starts at 7am Central Time on Friday morning.

Additionally, you can follow our pre and post race updates on facebook, twitter, and here on our website:

www.facebook.com/teamgreenpaw
@teamgreenpaw
www.teamgreenpaw.com

Can't wait to tell you about it when it's done!

Video of Tim and Anna at Florida Orienteering event at Moss Park

Sat, 15 Oct 2011 21:25:18 -0400

We had fun putting together a short video of our orienteering outing at Moss Park on October 8th, 2011. Thanks to Jerry from Florida Orienteering for following us around with his camera and providing all the video clips.

Green Paw Wins Pangea Nocturnal 12-hour Adventure Race

Fri, 19 Aug 2011 21:15:49 -0400

The Pangea Adventure Racing 12-hour Nocturnal Adventure Race was this past weekend in Saint Cloud, Florida. The race had a start time of 6pm on Saturday, so it was a treat for us to actually get a good night’s sleep before a race. Anna, JJ, and I left Miami around 11:30am (after a couple brief hang ups with some malfunctioning bike brakes and gears). Check-in for the race was at 3:30pm, when we got our maps and instructions for the first half of the race. Those of us who had raced in this park before knew that we would spend the next 12 hours soaking wet with mud, swamp, and sweat. We joked about how there would be water on the bike leg and water on the run leg; everywhere except for the paddle (referring to 2 years ago when we pulled our boats through the swamps, yet spent much of the race biking and running through knee-deep water). This year would prove to be more of the same.
The race started at 6pm, and we took off quickly on our bikes. We passed a “road closed sign” to the right, and took the next right as the map indicated… one turn too soon. Like lemmings filled with the adrenaline of a fast-paced race start, the rest of the teams followed us down the dead-end driveway… oops :) We quickly regrouped and pushed the pace to get out front to take the lead – this time down the right road. We were on our bikes for a little over an hour, picking up a few check points (CP’s) and passing by a few snakes en route to the first paddle section of the race. We chose not to carry our kayak paddles like we normally do, as the paddle did not look long. Based on past experience, we figured the paddle would be wrought with sharp turns, hidden stumps, logs, giant spiders, and waterways too narrow to fit kayak paddles.
We first paddled east 500 meters, using the provided canoe paddles, to CP6, and as per the instructions, beached our boat and took 2 quick bearings to find CPs 7 and 8 in the swamp. Team Florida Xtreme II was just arriving as we climbed back into our boat. We then paddled back past the start to find CPs 4 and 5 along the tight winding creek. We returned to the Boat TA in first place and completed the boat slalom course; a timed paddle challenge around two buoys after which the team with the fastest time would win a prize. We ended up with the 3rd fastest paddle time on the slalom course; congrats to Odyssey for the fastest time of the day and FLX/Utility Mutants for the second fastest split here.
Next we transitioned to a foot section with 5 CPs. We approached the CP’s in numerical order here donning our Light and Motion lights around CP10 as it started to get dark. We continued to follow the familiar orange blazes marking the Florida Trail up to CP 11, occasionally stopping to search around when we would lose sight of the trail in the dark. It’s times like this that having JJ in the front looking for orange blazes and orange flags might not be the best idea, as he’s partially color blind to orange and similar colors :) Not realizing that there was apparently an unmarked trail leading from CP11 (which was up a tree in a hunting stand) to the road to the West, we backtracked on the Florida Trail and bushwhacked through thick palmettos at the narrowest crossing we could find. We lost some time (and skin off our legs) making this route choice. CP 12 was about 400 meters from the road in the middle of a cypress dome, which made for a fun bushwhack up the center of a small creek. We used a rough baring and Anna pace counted the distance as we followed the main water channel until we landed perfectly in the middle of the cypress swamp, spotting the point only meters away. We finished the first foot section in a little under 2 hours and were ready for the last bike section before returning to the main TA.
As we made our way on bikes, there was a nice dry road to CP 14. We took a short, 8 minute/500 meter detour down a bumpy mud-pit of a road before realizing it was in the wrong direction and backtracked to the right road.
We arrived back at the Main TA around 11:30pm, completing the elite section of the course. We knew in advance that we next had to undertake the 5-hour course the Sport-length teams would be starting soon. When we received the map, there were 4 sections that could be completed in any order: bike, foot, paddle, and zip line. We were not allowed to start the zip line until 1:15am, so we decided to get on the water first to avoid the traffic of the sport teams who would start their race at 1am. After carrying the canoe a short distance to the creek, we got in and headed south to find CPs 6, 7, and 8. After about 2 minutes of paddling there was a “CRASH,” and a scream from the back of the boat. Anna’s canoe seat had broken and fallen to the floor of the canoe, nearly putting a hole in the bottom of the boat. With no time to go back for another canoe, we continued on as Anna kneeled on the floor of the boat, steering from the back, but not being able to see where we were going. I did my best to shout out the turns in the creek, which was equally as tight and windy as the earlier paddle, with lots of downed trees and huge spiders hanging across the river... not the most enjoyable paddle, but an adventure none-the-less. Finding the CPs was not a problem, as they were all along the creek channel, but getting back was another issue entirely. Every direction seemed to look the same, and finding our way back the way we had come was difficult in the maze of cypress trees and swamp. After a turning around a couple times, we arrived back and headed up to CP9 in the boat. We had some trouble with this one, as the creek petered out into a marsh, and finding the point seemed to take a little bit of guesswork. After about 15 minutes of slugging around in knee-deep water, Anna spotted the point almost right next to where we had left the boat! We quickly jumped on our bikes to get CP10, which was also along the river. JJ ran ahead once we spotted the point hanging over the center of the creek, but also spotted an alligator in the water near the CP. After some shouting and splashing, he got up the courage to get in the water and punch the checkpoint... he likely would have punched the alligator as well, had he come across it :).
We arrived back at the Main TA right around 1:15am, seeing all the sport teams head out on the course as we made our way back in. Knowing the sport teams would not yet be on the zip line, we decided to head there next. As per the rules, the clock would start when we got our zip-line punch card, and we would not be able to continue on the rest of the course until 1 hour from when we started the zip line (to make it even for any team that might later need to wait in line for the zip line). We made our way along the path by the light of the full moon and could see the glow sticks that the park employees were wearing as they waited for us overhead. After some quick instructions, we climbed up the tower in our harnesses to the first zip. There were three in total, with the final line being 700+ feet at around 20 miles per hour! It was an amazing feeling gliding through the trees under the full moon light. When we returned to the TA, we used the remaining 30 minutes to our advantage; getting in the car (and away from the swarms of giant mosquitos), turning on the AC, eating pizza, drinking smoothies, and determining our route for the remaining run and bike sections.
We ran next, picking up the CPs in a counter-clockwise order, and went the same direction on the final bike section of the race, without any hang-ups. With a time of 10 hours and 19 minutes, we finished the course in first place. In true Pangea style, the race was well-organized, with challenging navigation, route choice, and adventurous terrain. As usual, it was great to see so many of our friends out racing! With our busy schedules, stopping to say hello along the trail is some of the only socializing we get to do. Congrats to all the racers who took on this course!
A huge thank you to Pangea Adventure Racing and all the volunteers who helped make this race a success. When we sign up for a Pangea event, we always know that it will be a top-notch, well-designed, vetted course with a great mix of disciplines.
Additionally, most of the photos you see on this page and on the photo section of our website from this race were taken by Mauricio Jara, a dear friend who has many adventures of his own while photographing the races. I had sent Mauricio a message on facebook only hours earlier and by 5pm he had driven up from Miami and was there at the ready, camera in hand, tracking and photographing teams through the night in the bugs and rain for the next 12 hours :) Thanks Mauricio!
We would also like to thank our sponsors: Light and Motion, Numa Sport Optics, Intrepid Map Board, Power Grips, and Treasure Coast Cycle Werks. You can find out more about these companies and there products on our SPONSOR page.
Lastly, thanks to Anna and JJ. The three of us had a really great race, and I couldn’t do it without Anna’s pace-counting and relentless need to go faster, and JJ’s speed and willingness to go grab checkpoints, even when there are gators in the water nearby. Can’t wait for the next one!
See you outdoors! - Tim

Green Paw Wins Odyssey One-Day Adventure Race

Mon, 25 Jul 2011 17:33:59 -0400

It’s been two years since Team Green Paw raced an event put on by Odyssey Adventure Racing, and hopefully next time it won’t be as long between Odyssey races. Anna, Jason, JJ, and I all raced the Odyssey One-Day Adventure Race back in 2009, and were back this past weekend to do the same race, now in it’s 22nd year. In 2009, we finished the race in 2nd place overall behind team WEDALI. This year the extreme temperatures would test every team up to the finish.
We all arrived at the host location of Wilderness Adventure at Eagle Landing (about an hour from Roanoke) on Friday afternoon, and checked in around 5pm to get our maps and instructions for the race. After several hours of plotting points, determining our route, and measuring distances, we got to bed around midnight with our alarm clocks set for 3:45am, as the race would start at 4:30am.
The race started on bikes, and we quickly climbed over 2,300 vertical feet to reach the first couple CPs. The bike up this mountain was long and steep, but the sunrise we saw from the top of the ridge made it all worth it. After hours of climbing we were in third place. With long climbs up come fast downhills, and we topped out at 60km/hour on our bikes as we descended some steep hills en route to our next transition area.
At the first TA we dropped off our bikes and proceeded on foot through the woods for roughly 15km to the canoes with a checkpoint in-between. There were no roads or trails marked on the maps for much of this section, and we probably lost some time here bushwacking through the woods, as a few teams caught up to us around CP5. Once we got to a marked road, we picked up the pace and ran it in to the canoes, where we quickly transitioned to the boats, now in 2nd place. It was a welcome sight to see Jason’s fiancé Lea-Ann here at this transition area and throughout the course cheering us on and taking pictures of the team. More of her pictures from this race can be viewed on this website HERE.
The paddle was about 20 miles downstream on the James River. Although the water was low, there were still some fun sections of class 1 and 2 rapids. About halfway through the paddle we pulled up on shore with the canoes and took a quick swim in the river to cool us down. Although the forecast for the day was over 100 degrees, it was luckily overcast and we did our best to stay hydrated.
It was just starting to thunder and lightning as we pulled up to the boat take out at CP7. We transitioned quickly as it started to rain and we ran the 5k up to CP8/22 to start the long orienteering section. This section was the highlight of the course for us, as it featured 13 remote orienteering points that could be obtained in any order on foot and required advanced navigation skills (see map below).

We chose to attack the points in a general counter-clockwise direction (21, 17, 15, 14, 11, 19, 10, 9, 20, 16, 12, 18, 13, 22), and our only hiccup was going one ridge past 21 on the first point. After that we ran right to the other points, which were all placed accurately and took us through some amazing terrain. Anna kept great track of both the pace count and the elevation so we knew right where we were throughout this section, and she helped keep my navigating on track. Jason was really starting to feel the effects of the 100+ degree heat during this long foot section, and JJ really lent a hand by carrying most of the gear that Jason had in his backpack. JJ’s pack must have been 4 times heavier than the rest of ours! Some highlights of this section were CP10, which was under a land bridge formed by large rocks near the river, and CP9, which was located just inside a huge cave. It felt about 30 degrees cooler in the cave and there was mist steaming out of the entrance! We managed to get to CP20 before we needed to put our Light and Motion headlamps on to light the way. Around CP16 Jason noticed something on the ridge, and as we went to check it out, it was a graveyard with tombstones dating back to the 1800’s. It was honestly kind of spooky to come across this in the middle of nowhere in the dark... later we heard some strange noises, and JJ suggested it was coming from the graveyard :) CP16 to CP12 was a good navigational challenge, so we took our time here to make sure we nailed it on the first attempt. This was a top-notch adventure racing orienteering section that required you to keep track of your pace count, be mindful of the elevation (we use an altimeter watch), and have a keen ability to read and interpret contours (in two interval sets: 20ft on the south half and 40ft on the north half). We worked well as a team and when we exited this section, we were told that we were the first team to clear it and were now in first place. We found out later that we were the only team to get all the CPs on this section.
From there, we hopped back on our bikes, which they had transported there for us, and rode about 40k back to the pavilion where we started, getting an optional CP along the way. By the time we got back it was around 2:30am and we had one final foot orienteering section with 6 CPs. This section was deceptively hard, as we had both a trail map and a topo map, but not much similarity between the two to cross-reference. Some of the points were on trails, while others were off any marked trail, on contour features. What also made for quite a challenge was that one trail marked on the map (green) was not actually out there anymore, as was later confirmed by Ronny, the race director. We spent much more time on this section than we would have liked to, including my sitting on the ground in agony for a couple minutes waiting for the burn to fade from a patch of stinging nettles I had walked through, but did end up getting all the CPs and being the only team to clear the course in a total time of 26 hour and 26 minutes. It is our second out-of-state win of season, and we’re now getting excited for Nationals in October.
We would like to thank Odyssey Adventure Racing and all of the volunteers for putting on an excellent race. We will definitely be back in the future to do more Odyssey events. We would also like to thank our sponsors, including Light and Motion, Numa Sport Optics, Intrepid Map Board, Power Grips, and Treasure Coast Cycle Werks. You can find out more about these companies and there products on our SPONSOR page.
We would also like to let you know that Green Paw Adventure Sports is putting on a 13-18 hour adventure-length nighttime adventure race in South Florida on October 8th that will be part of the Checkpoint Tracker Series. The Green Paw Growl race is 2 weeks before CPT Nationals, and is one of your last chances to earn series points before the North American Championship.
Lastly, thanks as always to my teammates. I’m so lucky to get to spend days at a time in the woods with my wife and two of my best friends. Can’t wait for the next one!
See you outdoors! - Tim