CascoBay SwimRun
What is it? - Big in Europe and just now catching on in the USA is the swimrun format . Essentially adventure racing as two person teams in coastal area's with many legs of swimming and running over challenging terrain.... The CascoBay was announced as the first SwimRun in the US but I believe they held one in California prior. Regardless there is now one scheduled for North Carolina and another in California.... Some links with info provided below....
Ottillo - http://otilloswimrun.com/
Casco Bay Race- https://runsignup.com/Race/CascoBayIslandsSwimRun/Page-30
Why? - Why Not... This is a very convenient race for us and we have lots of experience in Casco Bay Maine having participated in the Peaks Island to Portland 2.4 mile swim for the last 5 years in a row... Seemed like a no brainer...Saw it announced last year... Asked Heather to be my partner... She never says NO :-)....They were accepting applications via merit and lottery... We applied for both and were selected on the second lottery... Apparently there was a waiting list to get in after that... And Team "Ottomatic" was born... although we unofficially changed our name to "Tethered to Heather"
This Course - 14 miles - Was 18 legs total (19 if you wanna count getting out of the water at the and the 3-400yds over a beach up some stairs to the finish line).... 9 runs totaling 10 miles and , 9 swims totaling 4 miles.... The runs varied from a few hundred yards to 3.2 miles in length and covered paved roads, dirt roads, grass trails, wooded trails, beach sand , and beach rock bouldering (2 sections of .5 mile and .25 of very slow going over bouldery beaches)... The water was cold Maine ocean water in the low 60's , over the course of the day you get tides in both directions, currents, swells typical of ocean swimming.... Distances of the swims varied from 350yds to 1750yds... Getting in and out of the water varied from easy sandy beach entry/exit to difficult slimy seaweed covered rocks mixed with barnacle covered rocks with waves pushing you around...There were 6 aid stations set up over the course of the 7 islands which provided Hammer gels, EAS drink, water and redbull at some.
Mandatory Gear- wetsuit , map , compass , whistle , pressure bandage , tether , new wave swim buoy and GPS tracker both provided by the race.
Optional Gear- paddles, pull bouy's, fins etc.... basically anything goes but what ever you start with you are supposed to finish with.
Our Choices- cut some old wetsuits into shorties just above knee's and elbows, bought a spool of 3/16 bungy on amazon to make 2 belts and one tether , 2 carabiners to clip tether to belts , additional race belts with small stretch pockets, paddles and PB's , knee high compression socks and sneakers... goggles, cap , lots of glide...
Saturday - packet pick up, visual gear check and inspection, and then the athlete briefing- being an inaugural race and new to us format, did not want to miss.... Took about 2.5hrs at the Holiday Inn Portland Maine...
Sunday- up at 4:10am , ate in the car on the way to the Portland Ferry Terminal to catch the 5:45 Ferry to our starting point on Chebegue Island.. The 7am start was delayed 30 min due to fog... They had us gear up on the ferry , when we were all ready, we off loaded onto the ferry platform as a staging area, maybe 10-20min standing around waiting with few updates on an intercom and then a huge blast from ferry whistle to start the day....The course was really designed well starting with a 1.8 mile easy run for the mass start, this spread us out a little bit, the first swim was nice easy entry and exit on sand , the second run was on a mowed grass trail , second swim another sandy entrance exit, and then they got progressively difficult with some of the terrain described above, very slow bouldering on shore, very slow entry and exit on some seaweed rocks etc, trail running, mud etc, some of the runs even went by some old WW2 bunkers and thru some tunnels in Ft. Scrammel .... Each swim was unique in trying to figure out the current/tide push while sighting to the next island... With a steady flow of people ahead and behind you could judge that rather quickly... Navigating the running portions were equally easy with only a few times not having other competitors or marking visible so we never needed our maps or compass.... Since Heather was the "less fast" athlete on our team I lead the swims and she lead the runs... Having practicing the swim tethered and getting in and out of the water maybe 10 times prior to race day this went very smooth... Our goals were to not get injured, have fun, and finish... Mission accomplished.... The runs were hot , specially as the fog burned off and the temps rose, imagine running in a wetsuit, even a shorty, with a swim cap on, high of the day was 90 but I dont think we saw anything above 80ish ... The water was cold , I specially felt it on our longest swim which was a 42 min 1750yd section.... We each stumbled or fell down a few times on some of the seaweed and rocks, I ran Heather into a lobster buoy and into a mooring ball when I judged the current/tide incorrectly while sighting and chose the wrong side of those objects.... We did have to stop at the mooring ball and one other time mid swim for me to clear my goggles for sighting... We had some teams playing hopscotch with us right to the very end , they would pass us on the run, we would pass them on the swim , the very last run we had 3 teams go by us and we regained those spots on the last swim... Post race food was a Lobster Bake with Vegetarian and other options available... Ferry back from the finish line on Peaks Island to Portland Maine runs almost every hr and is only a 15 min ride....
Results- TeamCategories were Men , Women, and Co-Ed... Team Ottomatic #58 finished in 5hrs , 67th out of 118 starting teams , 23rd out of 42 starting Co-Ed teams... The overall winning team was a Co-ed coming in at 3:30 and the last finishing team was 6:42... The 3 DNF's listed simply did not meet the one cut-off imposed due to permit timing and boat traffic....
http://www.millenniumrunning.com/results-casco-bay-swimrun/18819#/results::1471285842174
Misc.... Highly recommend this race... Very well designed and run , specially for the inaugural event.... Unique and fun... Below are our files from the day... Since you can't fully customize 18 legs on a garmin watch yet , I wore a 920 in swim mode and Heather wore the 910 in run mode....Unfortunately I tested both of those prior, running in swim mode and swimming in run mode... You would think GPS is GPS but not so, they both measure accurately when set to the right activity but didnt even come close to recording the correct distances in the other activity... garmin must have some algorithms. Since I was able to record every section of the swim via lap function I came up with 7048yds swim in 2:25 which is 4 miles and exactly what they told us it was.... Not really being able to calculate the run distances via my files I am going by the 10 miles they gave us having taken us 2:35 so almost an even amount of each activity for us.... Fun maps anyway....
https://connect.garmin.com/modern/activity/1303712480
https://connect.garmin.com/modern/activity/1303910834
Comments
That race looks really fun. To be able to complete it with Heather makes it even more fun. Great job to both of you.
just went over to SlowTwitch & see that the event is top on the front page -http://www.slowtwitch.com/Lifestyle/The_2016_SwimRun_USA_Casco_Bay_5950.html
Very cool. Congrats to you both. When they announced the NC race, I was ready to jump at it. But it lands the weekend after IMNC, and I'll be in Napa desperately trying to bank some SAU's. Next year I may have to try it. The course is just north of Winston-Salem, about 2 hours' drive from Charlotte. Here's the description:
Run 1: Green Heron Ale House to Hanging Rock Lake - 4.5 miles
Swim 1: Hanging Rock Lake - 500 meters (aid station / check point)
Run 2: Northern lake trail - 0.3 miles
Swim 2: Cut across bay - 25 meters
Run 3: Traverse water fall - 0.2 miles
Swim 3: Hanging Rock Lake - 500 meters (aid station / check point)
Run 4: Northern lake trail - 0.3 miles
Swim 4: Cut across bay - 25 meters
Run 5: Traverse water fall and continue to Moore's Wall (w 642 steps) - 1.7 miles (small aid station / check point)
Run 6: Traverse of Moore's Wall and descent to lake - 2.2 miles
Swim 5: Hanging Rock Lake - 500 meters (aid station / check point)
Run 7: Northern lake trail - 0.3 miles
Swim 6: Cut across bay - 25 meters
Run 8: Traverse water fall - 0.2 miles
Swim 7: Hanging Rock Lake - 500 meters (aid station / check point)
Run 9: Northern lake trail - 0.3 miles
Swim 8: Cut across bay - 25 meters
Run 10: Traverse water fall and descend to Dan River - 4.7 miles
Swim 9: Rock walls to Green Heron Ale House - 800 meters
Run 11: Stairs to finish - 50 yards
Total running: 14.7 miles Total swimming 2,900 meters
cool. ideas for me and wifey to do.
compression socks for the warmth ?
do most of these types of races allow fins ?
Wow, that sounds like a great way to have fun while building fitness. Build your own Adventure!
@Robin- compression socks to protect against poison ivy , provide socks for the shoes, and yes for me I'm sure provided some warmth....Fins are allowed and I did see 2 teams with them... keep in mind you had to run 9 legs carrying them... putting them on and off for the run...
@All- forgot to mention how fried my left shoulder was after 4 miles of swimming with paddles... right shoulder was fine... probably a further indication of incorrect stroke on my left side arm as I breath to right which was highlighted by Mike and David in the Swim Thread and gets worse when tired even when concentrating on it the entire time so as not to injure it...