[Bill Fletcher]

[Lisa R]

Meh..we had to go to places that I don't even go!...meh!

[Neal Radford]

Hey Bill,

Toby would have to bus folks a LONG way to remove Lisa's advantage...Allatona & Pine Log are her playgrounds and she does have pet names for some areas...I was hoping we'd go by the "pig heads on sticks" but sadly we didn't...yes, that name is literal

I did slow her down & I wore out Bo by getting him to carry all the mandatory stuff and my water bottle on the first section...he is a good guy! Like I said earlier..."I did what I could for you guys!"

Overmountain is neutral territory...I know you guys will be HUNGRY!

Cheers,
Neal

[Lisa R]

Nah, the pig heads on sticks are at the start of the private property super-dooper trail that takes you up to the top of the mountain WITHOUT PUSHING YOUR BIKE! Sadly, we didn't go there

[kiwiracer]

thought i might weight in an give Team Hairy Scary version of the 24hrs in the oven.. better known as Goldrush.

Yeah the run on the pavement 'bout killed my calves... kept saying to Kylie... and this is why we do AR so we dont have to run on pavement. i totally understand with utility pole being down n' all but that would have made an interesting obstacle to nav around at least we would have seen it, not like the yellow jacket stings we are all itching about now at various places on our body.

We made it to the yellow river and had to put on our PFD too early as we and Snickers has to swim across the river. rest of the nav to YMCA was pretty straight forward. Lisa no worries on clearing the spiders for you. Did any one see that HUGE tree that literally looked like it had just come down.

We got to the inlet across from YMCA and donned our PFD's and swam across and heaps of time. got there right as Endurventure was leaving.

the night paddle was pretty uneventful and fun to try and pick your way around the lake. We were pulling into macedonia as Lisa, Neal & Bo were swimming. Yeah Neal that was me that called out to you.

We screwed up on the swim, and ended up... well we werent at the boat ramp. Finally made it to the boat ramp then up to the TA for food etc where we left there in 4th place were 2nd before the nav goof on the swim.

Hit the trek/swim points pretty easily. did get tired of swimming, tore my feet up something bad. got out of the water to hit cottage road way point around dawn. then got back in the water after short trek to swim across the main channel.

we were with BD and Squirrels at that point trading places. Squirrels did get ahead of us. Did see some interesting goings on, on the top of a certain pontoon/party boat with some interaction going on between 2 people on the top deck. Did anyone else see that. It was a little early in the morning for my eyes to be seeing that.

Then swam/trekked and complained our way up stamp/boston creek catching up with BD and squirrels. And saving Tim's @ss from Squirrels as he left his shoe floating in water and was by this point 100 meters ahead of it.

Hit Boston creek pretty easily. Saw a snake, we got a little jumpy. and were cruzing with several teams to walk thru the fields of dreams (dreaming of where the heck the CP 12 was. then followed some trail, then another and yet another. only to be nailed by yellow jackets, and have all of us scatter. finally found 13 on a 'old dirt road' hmmmmm dont remember seeing a lot of dirt on that road at the beginning. by now we were with BD and John (solo) and just trying to get to the road. we finally got there and saw the exodus of people walking the same way.

by then we thought we were 3rd/4th as we knew Squirrels were ahead of us, but only by a little. We were hearing stories or teams getting plucked or told to buggar off the 1st part of the trek/swim section. As were moving to Pine Log. We started doing the math on how long do we have in here. Time mgmt was what screwed us last year on this race and Dwight, Kylie and I had a goal this year of amongst other things... THAT NOT HAPPENING AGAIN!!!.

We TA'd @ Pine log and left there by 2.15 alrady agreeing that we needed to be out of there and on the road to Macedonia (not biking out of P/L)by 5.15pm. therefore this determined what we could get. 15 etc was immediately blown off b/c of memories from last year and looking at the terrain. that baseball sized gravel...is not cool to bike on. So we went for a little circuit of 18-19-20 and 21 and wer eon the road to 22/TA/Canoes by 5pm. we were happy. the heat was brutal. and had no shame in walking some of those hills. We hiked into 20 and it was there when were went in. Just after lisa etc.

When we went into P/L we took our running shoes. for the opportunity to change to run into some CP's we never used them... well never used them @ P/L but looking back it brought a smile to our face when we got to Macedonia and heard the news. we would be able to run to A & B in running shoes. YES!!!!

Made the paddle pretty easily and then set out to get B 1st. Yes Neal you ow us. But i know you are good for your word... you are a Kiwi brother so you have to be. if could snap my fingers it would be "Speights Old Dark", but anything dark will be fine.

After B, trotted back to finish line to relax and eat, drink and be merry.

Thanks to Dwight & Kylie... awesome team mates as always. Kylie we didnt need to pull out the jokes in the night, save them for next time.
Thanks for working with us and us with you Chris for a while. it was fun.

Tough race!!! and the heat was brutal, i walk outside now and think $hit are you serious, we were out in this.

Having raced Odyessy One day last weekend for 24hours set me up well. But now, really buggered.

Watch out for the Hairy Scary!!!
_________________
Paul Humphreys

Kia Kaha
Be Strong

[Neal Radford]

[Bohicawill]

I will post my thoughts later on but I am replying to Kiwi Racer and the fun that was going on, on top of the pontoon. Your eyes were not decieving you as we saw that as well. Very interesting early morning sight. Even more crazy was the 15 people (some say around 14 y/o) that were either oblivous to what was going on upstairs. But hey it sort of the theme as later on that day at boston creek we were hiking up the hill and ran across a discarded porn mag. Hmmm There is one thing I learned about georgia. They got lots of love to give.
_________________
Save the Dramma for ya Mamma

[Hogan's Hero]

I am seeking a sponsorship for Desitin. For those of you who don't know that is a fantastic diaper rash ointment !!! It saved my ... life.

I could have sworn that I ran, biked, and canoed in this race. But my crotch said that I rode a horse for 24 hours in a wet diaper, how weird. Not that I would wish that on my worst enemy but it did make me feel a little better at the finish line to see a whole bunch of folks walking around like cowboys. Oh the pain and agony, I wouldn't trade it for anything.

Fantastic race and wonderful volunteers. Really couldn't have asked for a better weekend. Sorry Corbitt for the meltdown on the bike section but chaffing, 95 degrees, and hellacious climbs make for short tempers. Can't wait for next year!

Thanks,
Drew

[zerb1855]

YES! Not 24hrs after swearing off Day-length races and he's back in the game!

[jmpatrick]

Let me start by saying I decided to do the race as a solo due to the fact that my usual teammates wouldn't touch it (because of the heat and the swim!)

Now to the race:

HELLO, PEOPLE!
How can you call this a 24 hour race? This should've been advertised as a 48 hr race. I started racing at 8pm Friday night. Planned and plotted for 3 hours. I took to Benadryl and i think i fell asleep by about 1:30 and woke up before 6am Sat morning with a big knot in my gut. I know a couple of people said they slept well, but come on, how many people really got a good night's sleep on friday night?

On Saturday morning I started organizing my gear thinking I could get a nap in when my adrenaline rush wore off. It never did and I started the race with less than 5 hrs sleep from the night before. However, my sleep deprivation didn't really factor into the race.

I am not going to get into most of my race as it was long and boring, but i will point out a few things that happened:

1) map cases hold water really well

2) in the middle of the night the wing blade paddle stroke sounded like children laughing (don't ask - i don't think i was hallucinating)

3)breakfast in TA2 was tuna salad, ensure and sugar-free redbull

4)i think i saw larry the cable guy before i got to CP4, but he couldn't tell me where the checkpoint was

5)boston creek sucks

6)my new specialized 29er handles really well when i ride from the road to the ditch on white road....then i woke up, sat down and pulled out the cell phone. i was giving it an effort to make it from 14 to the finish, but the heat and sleep dep. caught up to me. (thanks dale burke for checking on me before i left 14...thanks, buddy -- i should've never left from the pine log parking lot

7)i was totally amazed by how teams take care of solo racers...the number of RAs and racers that said something to me, or offered me something was incredible. i have to admit i was really nervous about the solo part, but was relieved as soon as i got to the starting line....

john wellens (i sat next to you on the long bus ride to the start), you are correct...the team aspect of this sport is HUGE! i knew that before, but it became ever so clear during this race....watching other teams work together and taking care of each other was cool.

thanks for a great race toby! next year try keeping the damn thing to 24 hours!

[jsvanpel]

[Rbreddin75]

I just digitized the distances (of course this is plan distances, doesn't take elevation gain/loss into consideration...)

Start to Cherokee YMCA - 10.9mi
Cherokee YMCA to Macedonia Cemetery - 13.8mi
Macedonia Cemetery to Group Shelter to Pine Log (course A) - 14.8mi
Pine Log Bike section - varies per team, I think we only got CP18, then we left - 2mi
Pine Log to Macedonia Cemetery - 9.4mi
Final Canoe from Macedonia Cemetery to Redtop Ramp - 1.2mi
Final Trek from Red Top Boat Ramp to Group Shelter (we didn't go after AorB) - 2.3mi

total of 54 miles for our team
_________________
I'm Crappin' you NEGATIVE...

[pedalgrinder]

With my map wheel I had estimated a distance of 18.9 miles for paddling with the original course plan. When it got changed I hadn't gone back to measure again, but I estimated 15 miles, so that was pretty close.

If I had more time before we had to get to the bus I would have kept writing in predicted distances for each leg of the race, but as it was Jim K and I only made it to the bus with about 30 seconds to spare. That was crazy close.

John Patrick - Sure, I remember you. You're right about the race really starting when you get your maps. From that moment on your brain is on overdrive to plan, prepare, plot, organize, strategize, etc.
_________________
John Wellens

[RonSanders]

[zerb1855]

Distances sound right to me... I could've sworn, though, that I'd swam 6 miles by the end of the race!!

Our distances came out in totals as:
Swim: 3 1/4
Trek/Coasteer: 24 1/2
Bike: 17 1/2
Canoe: 12 1/2

Total of around 58 miles. 58 hard miles.