Death March 2019

I'm running a little late on this race report, but this was not a typical race for me. It took me a couple days to digest what all happened and then I was just busy and didn't get back to this. So, now it is even a little later than what is should have been, so I am sure I will miss some highlights. This year for the Death March I teamed up with the bearded wonder, Bushong. The plan was to get all the check points and see how we could finish. This remained our plan for the day even after Brian announced some changes to the race. He has upped the cemetery count to 18. There are still 5 mandatory check points, 3 known ahead of time and 2 pulled at the start. But, the big change this year was he also pulled out 2 dead cemeteries. This means they are not worth any time bonus and depending on what is drawn our route could change quite a lot. Let me start by saying that when I made my original route plan for all 18 check points, it was going to be about a 84 mile day. So, I was in for a pretty long ride. I was hoping that what dead cemeteries pulled would be ones that would help make the route a lot shorter.

Since I was the navigator and there were several new check points, I made a trip up to the area a little before the race. I rode out to a couple of the new check points and the one that I didn't really like at all was Cain. It was pretty far out there and just an out and back. It seemed like it took me forever to get there. I thought about this cemetery the whole week leading up to the race. I was really dreading the trip out there. Race morning I was really hoping that this cemetery would get drawn for a dead cemetery.

The week leading up to the race it was saying it was going to be very cold. But in typical Indiana weather fashion, it changed before the weekend and was going to be a little warmer, but there was a chance of rain. The rain looked like it would be a little more in the afternoon, so I was hoping we would be lucky and get most of the route done before it started raining. Either way, I figured I would be alright and I was hoping it would not rain too hard.

Race morning seemed colder than it was supposed to be. I am used to this by now because for some reason the horse camp always seems colder than anywhere else in the area. I got there early enough and checked in. I then started getting ready, but as usual I was struggling with what to wear. I made my decisions that I thought would be good and headed to the start line. I was cold, but that is the way it should be. You don't want to start warm or you will be too hot very soon.

The new mandatory check points were pulls and the anticipated dead cemeteries were then pulled. Unfortunately the dead check points really didn't save a lot of mileage. So, this was the first sign of a long day ahead. I didn't think that the loop distance really would not change more than 5 miles. Shortly after I put my map away, it was time to start. We took off and headed north. My overall loop was clock-wise, but I was going to pick up the check points east of 446 before making the rest of the loop. We were rolling along pretty good at this point. I saw a couple other teams more than once and could not help wonder if I didn't pick the correct route. Too late to worry about that now. Time to keep riding.

Heading to Allen's Creek we missed the left turn that I had planned on taking. I don't think this was a huge deal since I was thinking that the direction we were going was not really that much longer than the other way. First mistake, but it could have been worse. The trip out there took a little longer than I thought it would, but we made a quick stop and turned around. A short time later we were cruising down Tower Ridge road. We then made the cold trip up to the top of the Fire Tower, but as you can tell by the picture below, the view was really not that good. A couple quick pictures and down we went. At one point I kind of missed a step and almost slid down several steps, but somehow I didn't go more than a couple steps and caught myself.

We were rolling along pretty good at this point. Heading to Robinson and still feeling good. There were several other teams around this area. Not sure that really means anything in this kind of race, but it always makes you feel like you may be on the right path. We made a pretty quick stop at the check point and headed over to the rest stop. I grabbed some stuff to eat and topped off the bottle. As we were leaving I made my second mistake of the day. I even knew better, but for some reason we went left. As we were cruising down the road I told Jeff that this next section was going to be a shit show. So, I knew this section of road would be really bad, but for some reason it never crossed my mind to just go back out to Tower Ridge road and go around the low lying area.

So, this section of road was now my second bad decision of the day. It was the shortest way, but not the best way with how the weather had been. I figured there would be section that would be pretty muddy. I was thinking to myself that worse case we would have to walk our way through some of it. Boy was I completely wrong!! We came up to a section of road that was completely flooded. For a split second I thought about what to do. For some reason I felt like it would not be too bad and we started riding it. Eventually we had to get off the side of the road and walk. This was not too bad for a little while until we ended up being on the left side of the road and we needed to be on the right.

Doh! So, I walked back a little way and looked for a good place to cross. I figured I could just ride across the road to the other side and then walk from there. It may have been a pretty good idea, but my execution was not the greatest. I got on the bike and started to go, but immediately started to fall over and plunged my foot in to the water. Now my foot is cold! I got back on the bike and started going. I was just riding down the road for a little bit, but as I was riding I was also breaking ice on the surface. The ice started to get thicker and I was worried about tearing something up, so I got off the road and on to the right shoulder to start walking.

Once we got back on to the road and rolling we headed toward Fleetwood. At this check point we stopped to let the water out of our shoes and wring our socks out. This really helped and my foot was feeling a lot better. We then took off toward Combs road. When we were on this part it started to rain some. It was not too bad, but we were getting wet for some of the time. We then made it out to the Elkinsville memorial sign. It was time for a rain jacket since the rain would come and go. We were not there long and headed toward Story. This section was going to be a little more road than some of the previous sections. We were still moving pretty good and not feeling too bad.

We made the short trip to Story and then headed down 135. The rain really picked up for some of this part and either the wind was stronger or just the simple fact we were moving faster since we were one the road made this part colder. This was a fairly long section of road, but I was well aware of this from my pre-ride. We finally made the stop at the corner where the old store used to be. I wanted to stop for a second there. Got a bite to eat and then headed out toward Cain. In hindsight, this is where I made my 3rd bad choice of the day. More on that a little later.

This section of road seemed twice as long as my pre-ride. The wind was blowing hard and at times the rain was really coming down. We were both very cold and doing everything we could to just keep moving. I am not really sure how long this stretch of road took. I was in another place at this point. I could not feel my hands or feet. Parts of me were very wet, the head wind felt way too strong and the miles just inched along. There was at least one cruel point where you had to roll right on by a cemetery because it was not one of the real check points. What seemed like for ever we finally rolled up to the intersection that looked familiar. We found the sign and went to take a picture. This is where things got a lot more difficult than they should have been. It took me at least 3 complete different times to try and take our picture. I was really struggling to get us in the shot and get the button pushed. I was even trying to just use the down volume button because everything was wet and 2 of those tries were just trying to push the button.

This is where it was determined we needed to do something. If I can't even take the picture, how the heck are we going to make it to the rest of the check points. We regretfully decided that it was time to pull the plug. So we quit the race. But wait! We are currently at the Cain check point and about as far away from the car as you can be. So, as we rolled along I was trying to make my brain work and figure out what was the absolute shortest way back to the car. I was not thinking the clearest, I could not feel my left had or either foot. We just kept rolling along and thankfully I knew where we were for most of the time. There was a point I thought I needed to turn the wrong way, but thankfully it was clear enough to do it correctly. The rain was pouring on and off, thunder and lightning was everywhere. It was not clear that I was going to make it back.

As we rolled along it was even more of a slap in the face as we would pass check points and just keep going. In reality, I knew that if we were headed straight to the car then we would not get 2 of the mandatory check points so nothing we did that day really mattered for a finishing result. Eventually we turned the corner and crossed the bridge and finished. It turns out that we were just over 20 miles away from the car when we were at Cain. I can't even explain how miserable I was for this section of road. Bushong even told me that he wished I would get struck by lightning so he could warm himself by my burning body! It was that bad! If the shady guy with a white van that said candy on the side would have asked us if we wanted a ride, we would have gladly taken it.

When we finally got back to the lot we both got in our cars and turned the heat on and just sat there shivering. I am not sure how long I sat there, but eventually I could kind of dry myself off and change clothes. I had a real hard time doing some things like buttoning my pants. I could not feel several of my fingers and they just didn't work correctly. We then went inside to eat and warm up. We sat there shaking uncontrollably and tried to eat. Jeff was drinking hot water. He didn't take the time to make hot chocolate he just wanted something warm. For the day we ended up riding 73 miles. More than the overall winning team and we still missed several check points.

After the wards and stuff several people were leaving. It was decided that I was going to sleep in the Jeep that night. It was a little too early to go to sleep at this time so I headed to Trail Head Pizza and got more to eat. I hung our there trying to warm myself up a little more and start to feel normal. Then I found a pull off camping spot and settled down for the night. As I was getting my stuff ready I could tell it was a lot warmer. The weather app said it as 50 degrees and way warmer than the rest of the day. What a crazy day.

I ended up sleeping way better than I thought I would and slept longer than expected. Since it was a little later, I decided I might as well climb the fire tower again and try to stretch my legs out. It was a little windy at the top, but the view was a lot better than the previous view we had in the race. I didn't really stick around long and headed back down and toward home. This race goes down to one of the hardest rides I have ever done. This was truly a death march for us. There were several times that we were not sure if we would make it back or not. With no one really having service at the start finish, we could not call for someone to pick us up either. I am not sure I could have dialed the phone either.

So, I am a couple weeks after this race and I still have moments where I don't have all the feeling in 1 or 2 fingers. They are a lot better than they were for the first week or so, but I keep having moments where they feel weird. I am really hoping that I didn't do any permanent damage. There are a lot of what if moments for this ride. I really think if I would have gone the other way we would have been able to finish even if we didn't get all the check points. I also think that I really should have known at the old store that we were not going to make all the check points. If we would have just skipped Cain, I am sure we could have gotten the last 2 mandatory check points and probably a couple more. Either of those would have ended with something other than a DNF. I would rather it had not ended that way, but I am at peace with our decision to pull the plug. Maybe next year we can do better.