Training Season Begins

It's time for training!

We are quickly approaching the upcoming season with several new sponsors. Our support crew this year includes Shoair / Rock n' Road Cyclery, Crank Brothers, Saris, Feed the Machine, KMC Chains, Nuun, and Sports Multi. Time to hit the mountains hard, meet us on the trails... Typically the luge on Tuesday nights, running the wetlands on mondays, or for long endurance rides and runs on the weekends. Contact us at teamsynergyar@gmail.com

Run and Ride, See you on the trails!

Equinox Mission Hills AR

Check out the organizer's blog below for the Mission Hills Race and check out his website. A great way to get into Adventure Racing!

http://www.baadventures.com/events.html
Blog written by Barrie (event organizer)

We had 37 participants participate in the short course of short run, bike, hike and bike. For some the bike section was longer as some checkpoints locations gave more of a workout. The race started at 10 AM and the short course winner (Devlin Rambo) was done and on his way home by noon. However, most of the contestants did the long course and the first place team of Jacob Bencke and Ramon Escobar finished in 2 hours 44 minutes. Close behind were two solo racers (Garret Bean and Kevin Swartzlander) who had no prior knowledge of Mission Trails. All racers were finished by 3 PM and what was meant to be a race at a different location was now over.

The map used for this race was a Regional Park map with trails only. It had no contours which meant racers had to rely on trail junctions and park signs rather than map features to pick their route. Because of the lack of features the race did not have a lot of route choices, it was instead a ride and run over some of our favorite trails west of the Fortuna hills.

The race started with a dash to their bikes, where the picked up information about the location of CP3 and CP11 (marked on the map above, but not on the racers map). The first valley crossing took them to CP1 and they then rode the Quarry Loop to CP2 and CP3 (for the short course) before heading to the TA. Those electing to do the long course had options to get CP3 and seemed to take all options including coming past the TA, traversing back to the start area and staying on trails, as well as hike-a-bike cross country along a small canyon.

When they got to the TA area racers dropped their bikes and took off on about a 4 mile loop across Suycott Wash and up the trail known affectionately as Cardiac Hill, to CP4. From there they ran along the ridge to the Fortuna Saddle and CP5, before returning to the TA. The course was straightforward and on a day where the weather was in the mid-60’s it was a great time for a run, hike, or struggle up the steps to CP4.

When they left the TA racers headed north along the rim trail to CP6, then down Portobello Ridge to CP7 which led them to a trail along Hwy 52 to CP8. There were various ways from CP8 to the Suycott Wash trail and local knowledge would have given the easiest route, but we assume those not familiar with the area got a good workout taking the main trail as it crested a small saddle leading down upper Suycott to CP9. This is one of the fun single tracks for bikes in the park with a short steep technical start to the trail, then some sweeping manicured curves leading to the lower trail and CP10.

After CP10 the short course headed toward the finish line with a small hill to locate CP11. The long course contestants were able to go fast down to the River crossing, to then turn around and grind back up the same hill after getting their CP11. :( In hindsight this was not a very nice checkpoint to finish the race with, but everyone took it in good cheer :lol: , bemoaning the fact the hill was such a climb, but agreeing that it gave the race some toughness.

Thanks to everyone for finishing, and congratulations to Devlin for making short work of the shorter course, and to Jake and Ramon for finishing first on the long course.

TAHOE BIG BLUE

Solo Performance on this one: Garret Bean made his way up north for this one while several friends came by to check out the event. Unfortunately for the friends, once the racers took off they would not return for near 8 hours. The race started strong, with a quick trip up to the first checkpoint on the bikes. At the first checkpoint, there was an optional orienteering course consisting of 5 points off the beaten path. After nearly half of the race opted out of it, the remaining racers completed it after approximately 45 to 60 minutes. After that it was back on the bikes to the water. A windy day on the lake shortened the course, and the 5 mile kayak through the whitecaps on the lake, proved difficult for many.

Back on the bikes, but because of the difficult kayak and optional orienteering course, racers were spread out all over the place. No one quite had a grasp on their place and who was in front or behind, so people just pushed on. On the way to the main orienteering course, bikers had to ascend what felt like thousands of feet in the thin air to get to some of their checkpoints. Bean's chain broke in two spots, costing him valuable time, but he pushed on to the orienteering course with some catch up to do.

The O course was tough, with hours of bushwhacking and searching for distant checkpoints. Back onto the bikes, and after two flats, Bean was finally moving again. He managed to edge his way in front of a couple more people and then turned in is passport and hoped for the best.

Complimentary beers and massages after the race, cool swag, great people to hang out with, and finding out that he placed second in the solo division and fourth overall made the race well worth the effort and the training.

Gold Rush Adventure Race - Summer Challenge 6 Hour

Another success, Team Baconnaise places third overall and second in division! This race was labeled as a 6 hour race, and the solid performance by Calvin and Bean put them at the finish line at 5:43! The start was an orienteering section through back to the future land (seriously where doc and the DeLorean went back in time). The orienteering involved navigating to checkpoints marked on a map, punching your card, and then punching it to the next checkpoint! It started on a fast clip grabbing checkpoints left and right, but when we found ourselves off the map, we knew we had to make up some time. We started hopping boulders and jumping fences when Calvin shook a fence when preparing to hop it and startled a massive bull unseen through the bushes. This got Calvin moving even faster, and soon Bean and Cal were back on track. After trudging off trail and busting the fastest route we could find we made it back to the bikes in 5th place.

The crew, Josh and Elicia, had all the gear laid out with food and drink ready to go. Where some teams were held up for more than 5 minutes at the transition, J and E had us out of there within a couple minutes. Refuel and Move! We started out on the bike, immediately saw a gnarled dead rattlesnake, to foreshadow how we would feel at the end of this thing. Most riding was on relatively flat fire-trail where Cal can excel, and he did, as he took on the headwind and pulled Bean the majority of the way. A couple wrong turns didn't slow the team down too much as they passed 3 teams along the way and cruised in to the kayak transition just about tied in second.

Again, the crew had all boats, life jackets, and sustenance ready for the kayak leg. Now onto the paddle in second place! We got a good start on the third place team, but with two single kayaks and some time spent grappling for a beverage thrown at mile 3 from the bridge above, we were no match for the faster tandem kayak and 3rd place team. Although close, 4 minutes behind, we weren't able to hold them off at the end.

The race ended with a third place finish, beers with the best crew ever (Judo Josh and Electric Elicia), swimming, and a bbq.

Thanks to the crew and race organizers!
http://www.goldrushar.com/

California Multisport

Team Bacconaise made another appearance at the California Multisport Vail Lake 6/7/09. This race consisted 5-6 mi kayak, 10 mile bike, and 6 miles of trail running!

The kayak was long and after a few minutes of 50 paddlers banging against each other, where it was unclear if people were trying to beat each other off the boats with oars or mistakingly doing it, the packs soon dispersed into one to two hour long tour. After the paddle it was straight to the mountain bike where soaking wet people met a long windy singletrack with sand, ruts, rocks, and wicked downhills. Straight to the run after this, no rest allowed, and the run quickly turned into a trek when we noticed ourselves climbing through thigh deep mud to continue on our trails. Time was made up here as many people were struggling to navigate the steep 25% grade.

Overall, it finished with a cheering crowd 2 hours and 45 min later and a much deserved beer. Bacconaise Bean placed 6th in mens; and the new addition to the team, Katie Frick, finished in 8th for women!

THE FIRST RACE - TEAM BACONNAISE

TEAM BACONNAISE
Originally uploaded by garret.bean

Several friends recently stumbled across this concoction of our number one favorite condiment flavored with our number one favorite food.... something had to be done.

Thus as the signage displays to the right, people were united by one common love and one common interest. This common love for bacon and interest in Adventure Racing yielded the illustrious "Team Baconnaise" The first official race was on! A stellar performance was put on by Danny Arriola, Alex Maffei, and Garret Bean who placed 1st in their division, and second overall out of over 60 teams! And how did they do it, other than the team mom, of course it was the power of Baconnaise!


mmmmmm...... BACON...........