Dover Raid
MUT runners attempt an adventure race
Looking around the bus, on the way to the start area of the Dover Raid Adventure Race, I began to feel nervous. I have learned my way around mountain and ultra races, but I felt woefully underprepared for the next six hours in the snow and rain when I saw how the other teams were equipped.
“You were so excited about this race. Why do you look so nervous now?”, Emily asked. I glanced at the team a few seats in front of us, sporting adventure backpacks—complete with rain tarps—plastic sleeves for the maps, and serious rain gear. The team across the aisle had a clipboard and were taking notes as they quietly discussed the challenge ahead. As I overheard other conversations, I caught a few orienteering terms that I could only guess at. “Jesus…” I muttered, as I looked at our own rag-tag crew.
My team, the Steam Donkeys, looked like were outfitted for a typical long run—albiet with tights and gloves for the winter weather outside. It was a rainy, early December morning in eastern New Hampshire, and this was the first adventure race for any of us. Lars, Emily and I decided to represent the Donkeys at this thing—and in the spirit of our departed friend Chad—approached it as a chance to just have some fun. We’d planned to just dive in and give it a try—if things got miserable, we could easily bail and hang out at the pub. We came prepared the best we could for a bunch of mountain/trail/ultra (MUT) runners: with lightweight ultra-running hydration packs, running rain jackets, trail running shoes, and compass/whistle combos pilfered from emergency kits found in Lars’ cars. (The rules stated that each racer was required to carry a compass and whistle.)
The Dover Raid was billed as an “urban” adventure race that was perfect for people new to the sport. Unlike typical adventure races, this one only featured travel by foot, (rather than peddling or paddling too), and had a number of checkpoints in the actual city, in addition to the checkpoints out in the bush. The website warned:
While this is an “urban adventure race” don’t take it lightly. You will certainly be in the woods a good bit. In 2012, most competitors spent significant time on trails or off-trails in the forests around Dover, so this is barely an “urban” adventure race.
Apprehensive at the Start
Shortly after the Donkeys arrived at the pub where the race was to begin, (yes, the race was based out of a pub, complete with beer at the finish!), the course was revealed to the teams. We were given six maps, printed on waterproof paper, that showed us the 47 checkpoints that made up the course. We would have six hours to bag as many checkpoints as we could. Each checkpoint was worth a point, and our score would be the sum of checkpoints punched on our team’s passport. We had to return to the pub by 5PM—for each minute past 5, a point would be subtracted from our score. Most of this we knew beforehand, but as the race director was going over the rules, we learned something new: we would be bused out to the start area, a 15–20 minute drive away.
We had thought the pub would be the start and finish, and planned on keeping supplies in our car so we would not have to carry extra shoes, and changes of clothes with us. I was only carrying an extra pair of gloves, water and some food — all of which were in a hydration pack that was not waterproof. We weren’t prepared to be bused out to the farthest checkpoint on the map to begin the race. This is what worried me while riding on the bus. Even if we did decide to bail early on, we’d still have to get back to the pub, which was god knows how many miles away—through snow, slush and rain.
But, as Emily reminded me, I was very excited up until this bus ride. She was the one who had been apprehensive, not knowing exactly what she was getting into. But, as we tried to make a plan, she was all smiles. That helped melt my worries. I thought of Chad, and decided that this was exactly how he would have wanted it—diving in, in less than ideal conditions, with a smile. So, as the bus pulled into the parking lot of the start area, I got off the bus and yelled, “Yeah buddy!”, and left my doubts behind. We were gonna do this. Lars and Emily beamed at me, and I felt reassured, because I was with my amazing friends. This wasn’t going to be six hours of running hard, alone, and in my own head, like my first 50K. It wasn’t going to be like Bear Brook, where I ran most of the race with Lars, but still on my own. This was going to be a team adventure, with the people I really wanted to be with when things got tough.
Adventure Time!
We began the race in the parking lot of a recreational area, complete with picnic tables and a kiosk listing off descriptions of the trails around a little hill. We’d already used up 26 minutes of our precious 6 hours getting bussed out, so the race director sent us off without much fanfare. Some teams scattered left, some right. The heavy rain from earlier in the day was just about finished at this point, and the temperature was not terribly cold at 35 degrees F or so.
As we rode over on the bus, we tried to come up with a plan. We’d decided on taking the two checkpoints on the hill first, and maybe skipping number 10—out of the way and to the north-west. Going with the idea of taking it easy, we’d identified checkpoints that we could skip, as we traced through the maps. I think we were all feeling a bit nervous and unprepared, because when you looked at what we considered skipping, you were left with the most direct route back to the car.
But, that all changed once we started taking checkpoints. The first two were pretty easy to find, though off the trail a bit. There were so many racers zipping back-and-forth in the recreation area, that when we got close to a checkpoint, we could follow the tracks in the snow to bag it. This gave us a little confidence boost, and we decided to zoom out and take number 10, even though it was out of the way. It was a great decision by the race organizers to put a cluster of checkpoints together like this at the start. You could follow the marked trails to within a couple hundred feet of them, and therefore not have to begin the race by bush-whacking your way around with map and compass.
As we made our way through the checkpoints of map A, we fell into natural team roles. Emily became the navigator, consulting the map at each checkpoint to determine our next course of action. Lars would run in quickly and punch the passport when we’d spy a white and orange checkpoint marker. I would act as a team cheerleader, hooting and hollering along the way. When there was a question of how to proceed next, we’d all put our heads together around the map and make the decision as a group. It was so much fun figuring out where to go next, that we ended up taking all of the checkpoints we’d planned on skipping. The next major obstacle would be crossing the stream.
The Epic Tree Bridge
We were delighted to find the race organizers themselves gathered under a pavilion at checkpoint 18, with hot coffee for the racers! It was a welcome treat after coming out of the wet and cold woods, and renewed our resolve to keep taking as many checkpoints as possible. Looking at the map, we could see checkpoint 18 was a sort of a hub with checkpoints with 19, 20, and 21 spoking out around it, and then a long string of checkpoints on the other side of the river.
After bagging 19, 20 and 21, we knew that in order to get the next checkpoint, we’d have to cross the river over a tree bridge that the cluesheet warned us was “a sturdy river crossing—but a bit sketchy ☺”. We really wanted to get across, because the next five checkpoints were along the river on the other side, as you can see in the detail of the map below.
Emily told us on the bus that crossing a river by climbing over a log was something that she really did not like to do. Particularly in December. We all agreed that if it looked too crazy when we got there, we would skip it and come up with another plan. In the end, it would be her call. As we crossed the corn field and entered the woods near the river, our jaws dropped open when we saw the tree bridge.
I had pictured the tree bridge as a small, fallen tree, crossing say, a ten-foot span of water. What actually lay before us was a massive tree, spanning at least 20 feet of deep water! There was a queue of racers on this side of the river, contemplating whether they even wanted to attempt a crossing or not. “So this is what they meant by sketchy…” I muttered. I was afraid to even look at Emily, but when I did, she indicated that even though she was terrified, she would attempt to cross.
It seemed that everyone on the tree had a different technique for traversing it. When I stepped out, I immediately wished I had brought my microspikes with me. For the first six feet or so, I stayed upright, but when I got out over the water, I dropped to a sitting position and straddled the log. Everyone on the tree was taking their time, so my ass and hands got really cold as I waited to scoot forward the next few feet and stop and wait for the line to move again. The last five feet of the crossing presented the biggest challenge: a broken limb that jutted up two feet or so, pointing straight up. It was directly in my path, so I executed a sort of spin maneuver while sitting to get around it. The racers on the shore were impressed with my technique. When I made it to the opposite shore, I was amazed to see Emily stand up and step over the broken limb! I was too scared to do that myself. Lars was not far behind, and gracefully made it to shore without incident.
We’ve gone how far?
We were so chilled after the river crossing, we had to run pretty hard to warm up. We were all soaked by this point, and I was having trouble getting warm again. Cold and wet, we bagged the next five checkpoints without too much trouble. We had to cross the river again at one point, but it was nothing compared to the epic tree-bridge. When we moved onto the checkpoints on the west topographic map, (3rd map in the progression), we found ourselves out of the bush and onto roads, fields, and an old railroad line. We were able to do a lot more running out in the open, and the distance between checkpoints grew much greater. This was when we realized that we were getting tired.
After running on the roads to take checkpoints 30–32, we jumped on a rail-trail to get checkpoints 33–35 along the river. I glanced down at my GPS watch and saw that we’d covered 11 miles so far. We had been so focused on navigating, and constantly planning our next move, that there had been no time to feel tired. These long, flat stretches of running on the roads and rail-trail reminded us that we’d covered some ground. My legs were pretty darn tired. I decided not to mention how far we had come. I simply switched into cheerleader mode as we pounded out the miles on the rail trail, trying to keep the steam in the donkeys. We were all looking forward to getting back into the city and changing into dry clothes at the car.
We’d covered about 14 miles by the time we got back to the car. Of the checkpoints left to bag, there were some that were scattered around the city, some in small areas to the south that we had aerial photographs of, and some checkpoints within the city itself. We were unsure if we’d stop for the day then, or continue on. We’d decide after we got changed up and re-collected.
I put on new socks and shoes and felt waaaaay better. I ran across the street and bought a hot coffee while Lars made a plan for bagging some checkpoints in the city that were close at hand. Emily said she could press on if we stayed in the city, so we headed out with about an hour and twenty minutes left before the 5PM cutoff. We each took huge gulps of the coffee and entered the city streets with smiles.
The street map was void of names. Surprisingly, this was harder for us to follow than the orienteering maps were in the woods. Go figure. We’re trail runners, right? I guess the woods is our natural home. We decided to go for 53–57, leaving 51 and 52 for on our way back, if we had time. When we got to 57, we realized we were close to one of the checkpoints surrounding the city, number 37, at the ball field. It was starting to get dark, so we came to a consensus to bag 37 and head back to the pub and call it a day. Finding the ball field would be a breeze, right?
Re-Entrant?
Each checkpoint had a corresponding clue on the cluesheet. After circling the entire baseball field twice without finding the checkpoint, I asked Lars to remind us, again, what the clue was. “Re-entrant.”, he said. No one had any idea what that meant. Another checkpoint had had the same clue, but thinking back, I could not pick out how the term had applied to it either. It was getting darker by the minute, so we gave up, and followed some footprints through the snow into the woods that would act as a shortcut back to the street.
Halfway back to the road, the footprints veered off down a steep embankment. I asked the Donkeys to hold up for a second, and ran down quickly to investigate. I thought the path would dead-end, because it looked like only one or two sets of footprints had gone that way. We’d seen signs of false starts for checkpoints like this all over the course that day. Just as I was about to chalk it up as such, I spotted the orange and white marker in the failing light! “FOUND IT!” I screamed. “YEAH BUDDY!” I heard Emily shout back. We all began cheering and hollering. Lars ran down and punched the passport. We were done. Time to head to the pub.
We made it back with 20 minutes to spare. As I headed into the men’s room to change into dry clothes, I mentioned the final “re-entrant” grab at the ball field to the race director. I told him we were all clueless as to the meaning of the term. “Oh yeah, that is a pretty orienteering-specific term.” he said. “It’s a U shape on the contour lines indicating a gully. It re-enters the rest of the lines.” No wonder we couldn’t find it at first.
After changing into dry street clothes, I was glad to tuck into the awesome food the race organizers had arranged. There was veggie pizza and super delicious veggie stromboli. We were in a pub, so the beer selection was great, and we each got a free beer ticket! The Steam Donkeys gathered at a table and recounted the adventures of the day. We had taken 32 of the 47 total check points, and covered over 18 miles out on the course. A few teams and solo racers cleared the course, (took all checkpoints), but only one did so in under the time limit. A racer sitting at our table cleared the entire course on his own, but came in 4 minutes late.
The race was so much fun that I will try another one, for sure. The Donkeys are already eyeing the North Country Endurance Challenge. The fine folks at Untamed Adventure Racing have created a perfect intro to adventure racing with the Dover Raid. Seriously people—it only cost us $35 each to enter the race, which is a steal! We even walked away with some free goodies from the shawag pile! We’ll be there next time.
Notes:
— Result can be found here (17th out of 40)
—Take a look at the GPS track here on Strava
—Profits from the race went to Chad’s family via the Chad Denning Family Fund
