Posted on 05/13/08 8:41 PM| by Team Kagome
Team Kagome headed out to Whidbey Island last weekend for the 15 hour BEAST race. This race was changed to a stage format after some last minute permit issues. To allow for more navigation practice and due to scheduling conflicts, Roger and Jared were on one team and Dave and Jen were on another. Roger and Jared blasted through the first leg (a 4-5hr bike and run course) with one of the fastest times. We then spent the evening putting in some “bonus” training miles that werenot part of the race, just to get more time on our feet. We wandered around for 3-4 hours after the first leg. This meant only 30-45 minutes of sleep before the kayak leg the next morning.  We did’nt have a fast boat, so our hope was only to not give up too much time. We put in a solid effort and managed to only lose 10 minutes to the top team in the ~20km paddle course.
The last leg was another bike/run course that started in a “chase” format based on cumulative time up to that point. Roger and Jared were in 2nd place, 10 minutes behind the 1st place team. This meant they started 10 minutes after the first place team. The segment began with a beautiful run on the beach and we closed the gap on the 1st place team by the time we finished the run. The bike leg was fairly casual as we shared navigation with the 1st place team and all rolled into the finish for a 1st place tie. We were pleased with the result given that we had assumed this would just be a training race, but once you get in the mix it is hard to slow down.
