World Rogaine Championship

Yay for rogaines!  We've been doing these for quite a few years, sometimes traveling long distances and planning our summers for them.  The concept is great - a giant map with a bunch of checkpoints, you decide which ones to aim for, which order, what route, etc.  It's accessible to all levels, and with 24 hours to work with, it can be as low or high stress as you make it.  Plus it's wonderful for exploring new places.

So when the 2020 World Rogaine Championship got delayed for 3 years, we moved it forward on our calendar and made sure to be there.

Two years ago we did a similar event based out of Northstar, and we covered quite a bit of ground while mainly walking.  This year we thought we might mix in a bit of running here and there, whatever John's legs would allow.  I also came in with a goal of seeing new things, so we picked out a couple areas of the map we hadn't been to before to focus on.

[Most of the photos below are courtesy of Orienteering USA and Ron Birks]

Looking forward to spending the next 24 hours with my favorite human:

Picking up maps on Saturday morning:

Getting into Tug-E to figure out where we might want to go (on the map, not in the truck):

Ron stopped by briefly to chat and take our picture, as we got acquainted with the map:

Once we had a plan in place, John wandered around and took some pictures of other teams and their maps.  He was particularly interested in the number of pins people were using, and their systems for route planning:

Soon it was time to gather at the skating rink down at the ski village - I love that we got to use the rink for various events during the festival:

Another team showing off the huge map, half as tall as a person:

Time to go -- OK, scatter!

A bunch of teams starting up the ski slope:

We opted instead for the northeast corner first.  It was new to us and it included a large flat field that seemed like would be easier in daylight:

We made a beeline to #21, the checkpoint that was required in order to cross highway 267.

Team Bones, possibly on the road going in that direction:

For our first loop we intended to hit the high points (higher point values and also the tops of the hills, not coincidentally), starting with #97 and moving counterclockwise.  We left a couple checkpoints alone that were in the middle of the loop and would have required a lot of extra climbing.  From #91 we could see the large boulder field across the way and were glad we had opted out of #61.

There was a bit of bushwhacking and scrambling and steep climbing up to #108 but it was worth it.  Not just for the 100-pointer, but also an excellent view.  The highlight of #103 was John's perfect nav, picking our way across many rocks to walk right up to it - nice!

We saw a few other teams in the Lake Ella area, with everyone doing things in whatever order made the most sense to them.  We hit another 90-pointer and then did a little downclimb to cross the big dam.  Love the variety on this course.

After running out and back to #71, we approached our first water stop.  Hey, it's Ron!  Hi Ron!  He was out taking pictures of teams, super cool.

We rarely carry a phone or camera on these things (it's a lot of hours for pointless extra weight), so it's nice when someone else captures a photo of us "in action".  In this case, each of us scanning the electronic punch machine at the same time:

We filled up our water bladders and headed south across the big field for a couple 30-pointers.  Originally we were going to start back to the hash house (the start/finish) from there, but it looked like we had enough daylight to grab a couple more on the way.  So we climbed up to #51 and 47 before finding #32.  OK, now it's time to finish this loop.

We took trails back to cross the highway and punch #21 again.  Another team also coming back across toward the resort:

Still with available daylight, we jumped up the little hill for #27 and then traversed over to #30.  I struggled a bit in here, I think because my eyes aren't great in low light (dusk but not yet dark enough for flashlights) and I thrashed a bit in the vegetation.  I've got an ongoing leg cramp issue that popped up in here, thankfully that's the only time I recall it being a problem over the 24 hours.

Friends and family were watching us online, and Danny sent a few screenshots later.  The purple circles are the checkpoints and the orange markers are various teams.  The only hiccup was that the software marked any team that came into the hash house as "finished" even though many went back out on the course, messing up the real-time ranking and scoring (but not the official results).  I assume that will get corrected in the future.

Must have been a fun event to track and try to figure out!

A bit of street nav, one more checkpoint, and we were back at the hash house for some grub.  It was dark when we got there, but this is what it looked like a couple hours earlier:

It's always pleasant to get some real food (and be able to digest it - not usually the case for me in an ultrarunning event).  We tried to keep an eye on the clock and not fart around too much but still ended up leaving later than planned.  Ah well, at least we were still having fun!

Then John forgot his map in the truck... and I insisted that he go back and get it, even though we were partway up the ski slope when he noticed.  That was silly on both counts.  I took the opportunity to clean out my shoes.  When I looked up I saw two little bright eyes staring at me.  A fox!  It seemed puzzled at my presence, finally deciding to leave.  John, I'm sorry I made you go back for the map, but at least I got to see a fox!

Continuing on, we were aiming for the checkpoints up in the ski mountains.  We had skipped this area last time because it seemed to make sense to go around them instead.  Why not do something different and head up the hill?  There were several high-value points up there, the nav looked mostly straightforward, and we chose to do it at night when it wasn't hot/sunny/exposed.  The views at night were pretty neat too.

It was little weird going through an art installation (I think?) or maybe a kid's play area (I can't remember) in the dark.  Eventually we found the network of bike trails and followed those upward through the sand.  Teams weren't allowed on these trails during the day when there might be bikes coming downhill, another reason to do this at night.

#89 was a tad tricky and happily our pace counting got us there without issue.  More climbing - how the heck do people bike down some of these things?  Giant boulders and big drops, that would be a "nope!" for me.  Finally we were up high, gathering checkpoints as we went from one peak to another and enjoying the nighttime navigation.

Similar to last time, John led the way on all the off-trail trekking and I took over on the trails.  We pulled each other along in that manner, using our respective strengths and otherwise just trying to hang on.  Sometimes we make an effective team.

After #96 it was a long downhill to a road.  We were close to a campground but one that didn't have water available.  Another good thing about doing this area at night is that we didn't need as much water.  It might have been a tough stretch on a hot day.

We had a good climb and solid nav over to #107, our southernmost checkpoint.  I had wanted to do a loop around to some 70's and 80's (and maybe another 100-pointer) but we were moving slower than expected at this point and didn't want to get caught too far away when dawn rolled around.  Our timing and route planning certainly could have been better (skipping earlier low points for some of these instead), nothing we were stressing about.  Still having a good time, that's all that matters.

Oh, but first we had to downclimb from #107.  Going straight north worked... until we reached the drop onto the road.  It was a steep little thing, created by the road cut.  I wasn't thrilled about it but John helped me manage.  While we were figuring out this minor puzzle, a team went by below us.  Hello there, nothing to see here!

I got there eventually and we avoided having to backtrack, excellent.  We headed on down toward #76, found an unmapped (new-looking) trail along the way, solved that mystery, and continued to the checkpoint.

Just a road run up to our next water stop.  I believe it was starting to get light out somewhere in here.

Team Vignette, collecting points as we went along (another screenshot from Danny):

We snagged #84 on our way toward our last 100-pointer.  Hey, I remember this area from last time.  Follow me John, I got this!

Except I didn't "got this".  We were merrily running the trails, up and down and around, recognizing the terrain.  When we reached the spot where I thought the checkpoint should be, we couldn't find it.  And things didn't match up quite right.  It took a few minutes before I realized "crap!"  I had taken us too far west to a different hilltop and rocky/cliff area.  Son of a ...

That's what I get for assuming I know what I'm doing.  We had been doublechecking each other the whole time and avoiding major errors until this point.  Sunday morning is prime time for turning off our brains and making mistakes.

So back we went.  Several apologies later, we found #104, back on track.

We did better over to #95, locating a faint trail and picking out a decent way across a vegetated creek.  Then because we could (and it makes us laugh), we climbed onto a dangling ski lift chair for a snack.  Such a lovely seat, swinging in the shade and enjoying some food.  We're 2 for 2 in ski chair snacks here!  This is the one time I wish we had a camera on us.

Moving on.  There were more tiny reentrants near #60 than expected but we kept going forward until we found the right one.  Now to figure out our "exit strategy".

Back on the road, we managed a solid walk/jog around to the ski resort area.  Plenty of time for several more checkpoints, let's do this.  We collected 3 more as we dropped down to #44.  Then climbed back up toward the finish line.

Mary and Eric - we have seen them a few times at these events:

The spiral of overlapping team markers as everyone converged on the finish line, too funny:

And we're back!

Thank you John, that was awesome!  Always great to run all over the hills and dales with you:

Thank you Nav-X and all the clubs that put on these events.  We had a fabulous time, wouldn't have missed it.

We heard at the awards ceremony that the next one will be in 2025 in Spain - sounds like a plan!