Swimrun Orcas 2021 race report
I've done a lot of races since then, but the next race I fell completely in love with based purely on photos was Swimrun Orcas. I've not spent much time in the Pacific Northwest, and the photos made it look like my idea of running paradise. Forests of tall trees and green moss and loamy trails and dappled sunlight. I needed to do this race. Fortunately Trista felt exactly the same way, and after Rockman was postponed again, it became my main focus for 2021.
It played to our strengths in a couple ways: likely to be cold weather, and definitely cold water, and played against our strengths in other ways: Trista hates uphill, I'm not great at fast downhill. And the course goes up and down two mountains. It's also a running-heavy course, and we shine more on swim-heavy courses. But we didn't sign up to win. We signed up to celebrate Trista's birthday weekend in grand style! 20 miles of running, 3.5 miles of swimming, up and down two mountains for 6100 feet of elevation gain!
The day before a race, we normally have a couple shakeout workouts on our schedule. Short swim, short run. We reached out to a few of the people we knew would be at this race, to see if they wanted to hook up for a little course recon, and the Low Tide Boyz asked if we wanted to keep it fairly small, or open it up to a larger potential group. I said it sounded like a great opportunity for community, so using their platform and Odyssey's, we put the word out into the world, not knowing what to expect. And so many people showed up! It was really great. We met a ton of new swimrunners (new to us and also many new to swimrun!), we checked out parts of the course, and we had coffee and pastries ready at the end for recovery. A huge success, and I'm so glad it came together so well.
The weather for the shakeout, and our drive up to the top of Mt Constitution, was beautiful. Pure sun, blue skies, mid 60s. Great for a short run and swim and view. Not as great for a very long, difficult swimrun. Fortunately the swimrun gods smiled down on us, and raceday promised to be in the low to mid 50s and raining all day! Perfect swimrun weather.
And perfect weather to finally try out our Ark Orno X! With air temps in the 50s and water temps in the 50s to mid 60s, a warm suit sounded perfect. (Spoiler: it was. It was the perfect suit for Orcas.)
The night before the race, we talked about doing a pre-race warmup. It was going to be cold. Standing around before the race would be cold. It made sense to warm up. We met up race morning in plenty of time to do a warmup. And then.. we didn't. We somehow just stood around in the cold and killed time by doing nothing. That's how we do!
And then we were off!
The first run was just over a mile, all road. The only significant road running in the race, really. It wound around the resort, and pretty immediately went uphill. Which meant we pretty immediately walked. This was our warmup, and we definitely didn't want to waste a bunch of energy "running" up hills at the same pace we'd be walking up them. So we walked the ups, ran the flats and downs, and watched everyone else pull away from us, chatting happily with them as they did.
My watch told me we did an 11:19 for our first mile, and I commented that that would probably be the fastest mile we did in the race. And it turned out that was absolutely true, by a LARGE margin.
More ups and downs, and then we wound our way back to where we started for our first swim!
The first swim was the only ocean swim, and we knew it was going to be short but very cold. I forgot it would be salty. How do I always forget that?
We had a solid transition, which is always nice when there's a lot of spectators, including Matt, who had rented a bike and was riding around the course spectating!, and then into the cold water for a little ~250 yard bay swim.
It was shockingly uneventful. I was hoping to see jellyfish, since we'd seen them the day before, and allegedly they were there, but I was staring hard at Trista's feet, so I didn't lose them, and the water was very dark, and so I saw nothing interesting.
The swim felt great. It was cold, but it didn't really feel like the mid-to-low(?) 50s that it allegedly might have been? It DID feel insanely buoyant. I felt like I was just skimming across the surface of the water. I guess it's been since Casco that I last did an ocean swim? Fun!
And Trista did an amazing job of leading through what could have been a big mess. We were at the back, so it wasn't as congested as it might have been, but it was a fairly narrow space to swim through, and we had no problems at all like we did in the first swim at Mackinac.
And then out of the water, back onto land for run 2! 0.9 miles! More uphill!
I tried to tell a funny story about colonoscopies, but it really didn't go over well. I'm evidently significantly less funny when you're walking up an unrunnable hill. Good to know.
Things flattened out a bit, and were chatting and enjoying the pretty wooded area, when we saw a thing you never want to see: people running back toward you. I mean, sometimes it's because there's an out and back. But there was no out and back here.
And then there were several minutes of chaos. The people in front of us had gotten to the cliff jump, which was at the end of run 4, not the end of run 2. Clearly this was not the right way. But this is the way the arrows and flags had pointed. This wasn't a case of people blindly following the people at the front as they did it wrong. So it was VERY confusing. We had to turn around, because the cliff was not the right direction, but when we got to the fork, the signs all said this was the right way. Fortunately some faster folks ran even further back until they found someone who informed them that the signs had been tampered with. Oh, hurray. Evidently this bit basically everyone in the ass, adding some amount of distance to run 2. For us it took it from 0.9 to 1.3 miles. We didn't really care, because we were so far at the back, it just meant a couple extra minutes of fun (and confusion) on the course. But it did make us curious how it was still pointing the wrong way when so many people had gone by it before us.
Anyway, when we took the RIGHT fork (the right direction was the correct direction), the swim entrance was just right there! Tada!
Swim 2 was a relatively short swim in Cascade Lake. It was cold, but probably mid 60s, and we'd done a swim in this lake the day before, so we knew what to expect.
We'd been at the back of the pack for run 1, and then kinda gotten in a cluster of other folks when everyone got turned around in run 2, and by the time we exited swim 2, we were much closer to the middle of the pack. Trista took off across that lake, and we ended up passing a ton of teams by the time we got out of the water. This was a theme in this race. People would pass us on the run, then we'd pass them back on the swim. If it had been a swim-heavier race, or the runs hadn't been so very steep, we might have done a lot better in this race! As it was, though, we leap frogged with a lot of folks.
Not gonna lie, I swim with a big grin on my face when my partner dominates other teams in the swim.
Then a 0.75 mile run and an 850 yard swim, neither of which I remember at all! You'd figure I'd remember a swim that long, but you'd be wrong! I should really write these race reports right after the race, instead of vacationing for a week and then trying to remember anything.
And then run 4! A short little 0.35 mile run ending in.. a cliff jump! And while there was a way to skip the cliff jump and descend down to the water less dramatically, clearly we were in for cliff jump. We decided to keep our buoy between our legs, keep paddles on hands, hold goggles to face with one bepaddled hand, and hope for the best. And it was perfect! No buoy lost, no goggles lost. We recovered the tether quickly (we untethered for the jump) and started swimming!
Just kidding. As we started swimming, I realized the force of the entry into the water had pushed the leg of my wetsuit up, and I was about to lose my re-usable cup which was shoved up into the legband. So I tugged the tether to get Trista to stop, and then had to do some gymnastics to shove the cup back in without the buoy going completely out of control. At which I failed, and the tether ended up wrapped around me, which meant I had to do a nice barrel roll several times, crocodile-style. Trista just sat there staring and laughing at me. But THEN we were on our way across Cascade Lake for swim 4!
(Quick editorial note here: Trista and I ended up pre-friending Lindsay and Lydia, Team Bellevue Brew Crew, after some facebook advice chats and gear lending/promising. We finally got to meet them the day before the race and become for-real friends, and also met their fabulous crew, Meghan and Justin. It just so happened that we were nearly the same pace the whole day as Lindsay and Lydia, who I nicknamed Team Lydindsay, because we never call people by their real team names, and since Meghan and Justin were EVERYWHERE on the course supporting their girls, they were also everywhere for us! They cheered for us every time we went by like we were their own athletes, and were just generally fabulous. AND Meghan caught some great photos of us, which she sent me to include here! My race report is so much better for her stellar photos!)
(Also one time Meghan and Justin cheered for us SO LOUDLY before we even saw them, in a place where there was nobody else, and hadn't been anyone for a long time, that Trista nearly had a heart attack, and actually grabbed her heart with one hand and my arm with the other like a storybook fainting heroine. It was one of my favorite parts of the race. Anyway, back to the race!)
Basically the same swim we'd done as our shakeout swim the day before, straight across the lake to the aid station.
And there was Matt! Always a boost to see him, and know that nobody has squished him and his bike with their car.
Trista: 😜
We headed out at the same time, a race to the top of Mt Constitution! My money was absolutely on him, and that was BEFORE I knew what we were in for running up the mountain. (Sorry, "running" up the mountain.)
Sorry, getting a little ahead of myself here. Matt began his journey on the road up to the top of Mt Constitution. We weren't quite there yet, on paper.
The next 2.5 mile run, though, was all uphill. We'd done part of this run as our shakeout the day before, and so we knew how completely beautiful it was. This was the start of the truly otherworldly part of the course. I'm not sure which fantasy novel/movie it was out of, but it would not have been surprising to see elves or fawns (OR LUCK DRAGONS) lurking in amongst the tall trees.
Unfortunately we have no video, because Trista had spent up through swim 4 trying to get her GoPro working properly, and it had just been an exercise in frustration, so finally she gave up and handed it off to Matt when we saw him at Cascade Lake.
That magical run took us all the way to Mountain Lake, second lake of the day, even colder than Cascade Lake!
900ish yards down the middle of the lake, with a brief stop in the middle where Trista asked if she was going the right way. It was super confusing, because our goal buoy was pretty far away, straight in front of us, but we swam by ANOTHER buoy on our left, up on the shore. This was our FUTURE buoy, and to be ignored for now.
Our goal was a tiny little island in the middle of the lake, which we got out on and ran a stunning 130 feet. I say ran, but with the sketchy water exit, island navigation, and sketchy water entrance, evidently we maintained a solid 56:14 pace for these 2 minutes.
We'll have another one of these tiny island jaunts coming up, and they were a super fun way to break up the runs and swims, and keep things interesting.
From the island, just a little 50 meter swim to shore, and then.. THEN.. the fun really began.
Run 7 was 4.5 miles, and involved running up to the top of Mt Constitution.
I knew we'd be running up a mountain, but it's one thing to know that, and another thing entirely to actually do it. Turns out, mountains are steep! And long!
This 4.5 mile run (which was 4.88 miles for us) took us 1:36 to get through. It was not fast. We ran when it was runnable, but other than a fairly flat section partway up, it was mostly unrunnable. Some parts were steep enough that you were fairly doubled over.
That being said.. it was amazing. The trails on Orcas are just immaculate. It's like someone took a trail zamboni out and cleaned up all the debris and downed branches and rocks. The trail is soft and loamy and pleasant. It ranges from single track to double track. It's almost always incredibly obvious where the trail goes. When it's not obvious, that's because it's a super tight switchback going straight up. The trees are enormous and plentiful. Many sections were just completely a world of green, as everything, trees, rocks, ground, was covered in thick green moss. Just beautiful. It was lightly raining (I mean, it may have been heavily raining, but only a light rain got through the canopy down to us), and it was cool, and even though we were climbing a mountain, it was never warm enough to want to cab down (take our wetsuits off down to our waist). We did take off our goggles and paddles and hung those from our waist.
One of the neatest/weirdest/freakiest parts was the fog. Sometimes it was perfectly clear and we could see through the trees for miles. Sometimes it got a little foggy and hard to see. And sometimes a thick bank of fog would descend over us, and we could only see directly around us. The world was just a blurry white smear of tree-shapes. And then the sun would come out a tiny bit, but not dissipate the fog, and the fog would glow white and beautiful through the tall, thin trees.
The fog also meant that when we were running on the switchbacks on the side of the mountain, the few times we came out of the trees and had a view down the mountain, we looked like we were running above the clouds. We'd look down and there was just.. white. Nothing. We could have been running above more trees, or a lake, or an ocean, or a fiery pit of lava. There was just a sea of white fog beneath us.
I said it looked like it had been eaten by The Nothing. And then I sang the Neverending Story theme song to Trista. I am a goddamn delight, as a swimrun partner.
So. Very. 80s.
So this part was hard as hell, but also amazing and wonderful. We were mostly alone out there, but every once in a while another team would pass us, and often because it was so loamy and foggy, we'd have no idea they were there until they were RIGHT behind us. Freaky!
Trista and I aren't great at maps and directions. (This isn't a 'we got lost' story, don't worry.) I had looked at the map many times, but clearly based on not knowing how run 2 had gone wrong or how to fix it, I hadn't really retained more than just a general shape. I also never looked at a map with an elevation profile, which became abundantly clear during this run. I figured it was 2.25 miles of running up to the top of the mountain, then 2.25 miles back down. As we got to mile 3 of running up the mountain, and we were still going up, I realized my assumption was clearly wrong.
Ultimately it was about 3.3ish miles for us to get up to the top of Mt Constitution. And we were SO happy to be done with that. Ignoring, of course, that we still had one more mountain to go.
Yay, conquered Mt Constitution! We didn't bother to glance over at the scenic overlook as we went by, since (a) it wasn't on the course, exactly, and we didn't need to add any distance, and (b) we knew it was too foggy to see anything at all. Good thing we'd gotten such a great view in the clear weather the day before.
Down to the very welcome aid station and a little break. Unfortunately no Matt, and we had no idea whether he'd already been there and given up, because it had taken us so long, or whether he hadn't gotten there yet. Not a great feeling, with all the rain and fog and traffic, to not know if my husband and his bike were okay, but there wasn't much we could do to rectify that, so I put it out of my mind. We had a nice chat with Sarah about how Mel and Andy were doing (she had no idea, because she hadn't seen them, and wasn't sure where they were; we were fairly sure unless something had gone very wrong, they were NOT behind us), and drank a lot of water and PH. Probably ate a gel.
And then it was time to start the descent!
And what a descent it was.
It had taken us 3.3ish miles and 1:11 to go up Mt Constitution. It took us 1.5 miles and ~24 minutes to go back down.
It was pure switchbacks, and they were STEEP. I could practically hear my quads weeping as we barreled down those switchbacks as fast as I could go. I tried not to hold Trista back as much as possible. The good news is these were not technical at all. The trail continued to be very clear and kind, so it was only my short legs and a healthy fear of falling to our death that kept us from going faster.
I offered to untether and let Trista do her thing, and I'd just hang as close as I could, but she wanted to stay with me. She pulled ahead at one point for a minute, then dropped back behind me and said she wanted me to go a pace I was comfortable. It wasn't worth injury if I got outside my realm of capability. So I just tried to push myself as hard as I could without letting my legs get out from under me, and we flew down Mt Constitution.
Which brings us to (evidently) swim 7, and a brand new lake! Twin Lakes was our third and final new lake, and again, as promised, the coldest. It should be noted that after all these words I've written about the race, we're still only halfway through the race, legs-wise. That wasn't a great feeling, when considering how tired we already were.
But this part was fast and fun. Short, cold swim across one of the lakes, 0.15 mile run to the next lake, and then an even shorter swim across that lake! I don't remember much about this section, honestly, other than I deliberately drank some water from the lake while swimming. I never do that, because I live in Texas, and open water here is super gross and deadly, but I figured this water was about as drinkable as any water I'd ever swim in (even though it was dark and somewhat debris-y in places, from the rain), so why not enjoy. It was cold and delicious.
And then the second of 2 4.5 mile mountain uppy-downys! This time we were tackling Mt Pickett, about which I knew even less than Mt Constitution.
Turns out Pickett is fairly similar to Constitution, except less consistently uphill, and somehow even more isolated! Same magical fantasy world. Same fog. Same steep climbs.
Trista did get a little cross with it because its magical, beautiful, perfect trails were too wide. Yes, she reprimanded Pickett for its trails not being single-track enough.
It only took us 1:21 to navigate this 4.5 mile section. So much faster than Constitution! (Ha.) It went consistently and painfully up for about 1.5 miles, then was a little all over the place. It would descend, and we'd think "Yay, done!" and then it would go up again, then down, up, etc.
There was a very appreciated aid station just plopped down in the middle of nowhere on Pickett. It was great to get some water (and maybe I ate a sandwich square there? I ate it somewhere, why not here?), and be reminded that other humans still existed, and we weren't just running feral in an unpopulated post-apocalyptic world. We did see a person wrapped in a space blanket at the aid station, who seemed to be getting ride back due to hypothermia. Hate to see that.
Eventually Pickett settled down a bit, and we hooked the requisite right turn to stay on course, rather than continuing straight into the Pit of Despair. Although how cool would it be to say you accidentally ran into the Pit of Despair during the race? Not cool enough to actually do it, turns out.
After several hours with very little human interaction, we suddenly got a flurry of socialization! First the ever-present-and-amazing Meghan and Justin, right at the turn along the Mountain Lake shoreline! Then Mel and Andy! (I mean, we knew Mel wasn't behind us, turns out she was waaaay ahead of us.) Then our favorite Low Tide Boyz! We got a warm, friendly greeting from Chris, who was leading, and then a brief glance up from Chipper. Trista and I demanded, and received, high fives from both of them, but clearly Chipper was NOT into it. We definitely didn't want that to mean that Chipper wasn't having a good race, but we ALSO didn't want it to mean that Chipper really didn't like us, and this is how we finally found out. (Turns out he wasn't having a good race at that moment. Listen to their Orcas race report here!)
Clearly, though, even if he wasn't having a great time at that moment, they were kicking some ass out there. We figured that had to be the 3.75 mile run 13 they were on, and we still had many swims and runs before we got to that point!
In fact, Trista periodically asked me to detail what we had left, as we neared the end (I had it written on my paddle), and while it was exciting as it got ever shorter, I'd end up listing it out, and we'd say "Yay! That's not much left! Only... probably 2 hours!" And that wasn't really an exaggeration. This was a long race, y'all.
Back into Mountain Lake again for swim 9. This time across the lake the short way, and exiting at the buoy we'd seen off to our left in swim 5! It all makes sense now!
This swim exit was a little chaotic. It had Meghan and Justin, cheering and taking photos! It had MATT and his bike, still alive, singing happy birthday to Trista as we emerged from the water! It had a LADDER to emerge from the water, which is rare! It had the tether getting snagged under the ladder as Trista got to the top and I tried to start my way up! It had us trying to untangle the tether without dragging Trista back into the water or maiming either of us, while pictures were taken and happy birthday was sung! It was just.. a lot all at once.
But it was so great to see Matt and know he was okay. Evidently he got to the top of Constitution right after we left! Dammit. But he did eventually find the volunteer who could confirm to him that we had already come through, so he knew we were okay, and headed back down. He hung out with us as we hit the aid station, and poured Trista some Birthday Coke.
Then 3/4 mile up the shore of Mountain Lake (away from the finish line, it should be noted), and another series of super short swims and runs, with bonus tiny island, bringing us to run 13! Of 14! Which was so exciting, except ohmygod, run 13 was 3.75 miles. That's a lot at the end of a race this long.
We knew where we were, though, as we ran back through the section where we'd seen Mel and the LTBz, and then back along the little stream we'd run next to for run 5. Again, this part was really beautiful, with lots of bridges (we like bridges) and the sound of the water burbling. We got to run by, but unfortunately not through, Cascade Falls, and it was beautiful, as well. For as interminably long and slow as this 3.75 mile run was, it also seemed to go by fairly quickly. It helps that we shed a lot of the elevation we'd accumulated over the course of this run. Which my quads already didn't love. Which promised a lot of DOMS in my future.
And then one! more! swim! Which would have maybe been more exciting if it were like Lake James, where the last swim is like 50 yards, but this one was ~800 yards. Fortunately we like swimming, and were still enjoying it!
I gotta brag on Trista's swimming here. She hadn't felt good about her swimming at Mackinac. Just never felt right. And honestly I was able to stay on her feet without strain at Mack. Not so here at Orcas. I was able to stay with her, but from the beginning, I had to work for it. No cruising in her draft. I mentioned that to her somewhere in the mountains, and told her I thought that she was swimming incredibly strong today, though of course it was always possible that I was just having a terrible swimming day. But given how many people we were passing on the swims, I was pretty sure she was kicking ass. Looking at data afterward, most of our swims were between a 1:38 and 1:45 pace, which.. I only hit 1:30 paces in the POOL when I'm doing something short and sprinty, so in open water with shoes on, it's unheard of for me. So, confirmed: Trista dominated the swims at Orcas. Cold water and a good swim day. Of course, once I told her that, she said she was gonna celebrate by taking it easier on the rest of the swims. Ha.
One last cruise across Cascade Lake.. with bonus Marcus at the swim exit! With his camera! Dammit, that means I gotta buckle down and be serious. Trista will expect game faces if we're on video. I know how this goes.
Didn't quite manage a flawless exit on the slippery rocks, but fairly low on the Team Shitshow Shitshow-meter! We took off running for our last mile, and Trista was focused and speedy and even though it was only a mile, I thought "Uhoh, this is a pretty aggressive pace, given how I feel right now."
Fortunately that only lasted until the camera shut off, and then we were back to "we're exhausted at the end of a race" pace! Whew.
The last mile started relatively uneventful, then was needlessly cruel. That terrible, super-steep uphill we'd climbed in run 2 was now a terrible, super-steep downhill that would have been tough on functional quads, and was just a wall of pain on the quads I'd spent all day torturing. We winced our way carefully down, back to the road to the resort.
In the last mile, we discussed the execution of the Orcas 2021 Finish Line Shenanigans, until we exited the woods onto the road. Then there were people up ahead, cheering for us, and pointing out which way to go to get to the finish line.
Trista: Are those people wearing hats? Are those.. party hats? What did you do, Amy?!
What I'd done is carried a giant stack of party hats with me from Austin, and given them to Matt that morning. His instructions were to take them to the finish line and get Marcus to force people to put them on when we got there. And they had executed this plan perfectly.
Trista said she was tearing up, which would have made me tear up, if I hadn't had such a huge grin on my face. It was so fun running past all the people with party hats cheering for Trista's birthday. Getting cheered at by people hanging out the windows at the LTBz PartyHus. Celebrating an incredibly tough and painful but beautiful and rewarding race.
And then once we crossed the finish line, we celebrated by flopping down on the ground for a little breakdancing. As one does.
In the end, it took us just over 8 hours to complete the race, which is honestly right about what we were expecting. We were the 4th place female long course team, 8 minutes behind 3rd, which was surprising, given how much we walked and how many mountains we climbed. Unfortunately that broke Trista's streak of being on the podium of every swimrun she's done in 2021, but hopefully she won't break up with me because of that.
Overall, this was the prettiest swimrun I've done so far, and the prettiest place I've ever run. It was exactly what I was expecting and hoping it would be, and even though it was hard as hell, and running up mountains is a very dumb idea, I would and will absolutely go back and do it again.
So glad to read about your adventures. I hope to run in the fog and trees and moss next year!! (Love the notion of pre-friending fellow swim runners). You Adorkables are super swimrun ambasaadors.
ReplyDeleteAmy and Trista, you are amazing! Again!
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