Mad Dash Splash!

Well, despite my reservations, we survived the Madison Mad Dash. Let's just say it's been a long, lazy winter, but we began training again early this spring and it paid off. We finished the Mad Dash, our first race of the season, in eleven hours. It was a twelve hour cutoff, and the best team finished in about 6 1/2 hours. Obviously, we knew that was out of the question for us, but we aimed to finish. And finish we did, despite all the odds.

Team check-in - 4:45 to 5:30 AM. Start time - 6:00AM.
We arrived at Olin Park, along the shores of Lake Monona, around 5:00 to a chilly temperature of about 45 degrees. Thankfully, we had all dressed in layers and knew that it was supposed to eventually warm up to about 70 sometime during the race, but at 5:00 in the morning, 45 is pretty cold. Anyway, after team unpacking and double-checking of gear, start time was upon us. Shortly before 6:00, all 23 teams huddled around Leo for last minute rules and instructions to suddenly be given the starting gun, and everyone ran off in different directions. Since it was a three person, co-ed race, there were three marked points around the start with a different map at each point. Each team member was to run to one of these locations to retrieve a map and regather at the starting line. Chad ran the shortest distance to retrieve our large, topo map of the Madison area, Code ran the farthest (thanks again Code!) to retrieve our more detailed map of the city with all of the bikeways mapped out (this proved a necessity, seeing how Madison has over 100 miles of bike paths), and I ran a short sprint to retrieve our passport down by the lakeshore. Our passport had our UTM coordinates for all of the checkpoints, so once I got back to Chad, we started plotting the points on the topo map he had. After Code returned from his 2-3 mile run to the bike map, we were pretty much on our way. Unfortunately, we were at the back of the pack at this time - second to last!

From the start, we had a three mile run/hike with all of our paddling gear to CP 1, where we were to retrieve our canoe. We reached the CP at the same time as the final team, but we got off into the water first and headed out onto Lake Wingra in what I still believe was the wobbliest canoe on the face of the Earth. Lake Wingra is a fairly small lake, and we could see the path that the teams ahead of us were taking to CP 2 and then CP 3 around the lake. It was a pretty windy day, though, and the only direction we could seem to paddle in was to the dead center of the lake. One of the optional gear items was a third seat for the canoe, so we brought along our trusy stool that works great as a third seat. About 1 1/2 minutes into our paddle, though, I think we all realized what a bad idea this was. The height I was sitting at in the canoe totally threw off our balance, and Chad's 6'4" height in the back was only making matters worse. Our canoe was a freaking weeble-wobble. After about 5 minutes of sea sickness, Chad says, "Cort, I think you might want to get off your seat and just kneel on the floor." I reply, "No, I'm fine!" but in reality, I'm thinking, "Yeah, that might be a good idea." Thirty seconds later, Chad readjusts in the back, which sends me off kilter on my stool, and the next thing I remember thinking is "Oh my God! We are NOT going in the lake!!!" SPLASH! After a Wisconsin spring thaw, the temperature of lake water is slightly above freezing. We hit the water, and instantly none of us could talk. Our teeth were chattering, we were freaking out, and our canoe was sinking. We had finally put the adventure into our adventure racing. The final team was right behind us, and when they reached us they were totally friendly. They asked if we wanted them to call for help, but our stubborn heads say "No, we should be OK." STUPID! After attempting to swim a good 100-200 yards with a sinking canoe, two fisherman came and rescued us. They tied our canoe to their boat and towed us in. All I remember of this is Code laughing hysterically. I swear, he's got one sick sense of humor. After getting back to shore and becoming nearly hypotermic, two race volunteers generously offered us a towel and dry shirts. Thanks again! That's the only thing that got me back into that boat. After about ten miserable minutes on land (temperature about 50 degrees) and me thinking that my teammates were NEVER getting me back into the boat from hell, we were paddling to CP 4. I have to say, though, without our third seat, which is now sitting at the bottom of Lake Wingra, we had much better balance, and the rest of the paddling section was a piece of cake.