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Spring Break Oh Eight
posted Saturday, March 22, 2008 by Team Eastern Mountain Sports @ 12:19 AM -
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What better way to celebrate the arrival of Spring and the end of the longest, coldest, snowiest winter the northeast has seen for years than to hop on a plane with two of your girlfriends and head to Mexico for a week of sun, fun, and suffering. Hmmm... I'm starting to think we might have gotten part of this equation wrong. All the spring break brochures that I remember never showed the revelers wearing heavy packs, using duct tape to patch up blisters or pulling cactus thorns out of each others derrieres by headlamp. I think I need a new travel agent.
Adventure racing has some tough chicks, and Jenny Johnson and Melissa Coombes are two of the toughest I know. And two of the nicest. Nearly two years ago we started bouncing around the idea to form an all female team that could truly go head to head with all of the competition. They loved the idea, but the challenge would prove to finding the right race to give this a go. Then Baja Traversia announced that in 2008 they would not only be hosting an all-female division, but would offer the women prize money and a chance to win an entry into the Adventure Racing World Championships. Finally, a race to take this seriously! I dialed up Jenny and Mel and got a big "hell yeah" out of both of them. Eastern Mountain Sports Team eXXtreme was born.
Jenny Johnson is the little star of Bethlehem; New Hampshire that is. A few years ago she saw a poster in a store window for a crazy three-day race that was to be held in northern Vermont called the Jay Challenge. It featured a 26 mile paddle race on day one, a marathon distance (26.2 mile) trail race on day two and a 65 mile mountain bike race on day three. Most competitors would sign up to do just one day of racing as just on was enough to whoop your butt, but those deranged enough would sign up for all three days. Oh, and as for the distances, well Dan, the crazy French Canadian race director, started out doing well with the paddle race, but probably started drinking as he calculated the other distances and using some long forgotten fur trapper/trader conversion rate to get from kilometers to miles he actually ended up with a 31 mile trail race and a 72 mile bike ride of pure pain. People came, the raced, they complained, Dan smiled. He knew he was on to something and a legend was born. But back to Jenny Johnson looking at this poster in a store window... she turned to her friend and declared that she was going to do it. Her friend laughed. You see, Jenny had never done anything like this. She had always loved experiencing the outdoors, was a kayak guide and was always up for trying something crazy, but she this was fresh territory. When Jenny showed up at the race, nobody knew who she was. That made it all the more frustrating for the other women when she won. Oh yeah, she beat most of the boys, too. Sheâ??s the kind of person you would love to hate, if only you could. Fresh faced and always laughing, she is incredibly humble, upbeat and down to earth. After winning the Jay Challenge year after year, Jenny was eventually lured by top adventure racing teams, including world champions Team Nike, to join them. But despite reaching the pinnacle in the sport, Jenny has never forgotten her friends and continues to race with them whenever she can.
Melissa Coombes was first introduced to me through Vytenis, one of Team Eastern Mountain Sportsâ??s top navigators. A top orienteer, he and Melissa had met while attending Annapolis and he taught her the fine art of map and compass work. She was a natural and they built on this by building a successful adventure race team for the American Legion. As a top navigator, Melissa quickly became one of the most sought after racers in the country, but she is no slouch as an athlete either with first place wins in bicycle races and off-road triathlons. She has led her teams to multiple adventure race wins, too, and even finished first overall once as a solo competitor against a full field including top national teams. She gets an A+ in "Plays well with others" as even other teams canâ??t help but notice how supportive she is to her teammates on the race course. Melissa balances all of this training and racing with her other life as a knighthawk helicopter pilot, running missions in the Persian Gulf or doing tsunami relief in Sumatra. Do you think she'll be just a little frustrated to not be behind the controls during the baja car section of this race? Always one to have fun, Melissa showed up at the USARA 2006 national championships wearing a full-on Foxxy Cleopatra afro wig.
As for me, these women are going to crush me. My strategy is to keep them laughing and to replace the sports drink they normally use with a little mojito. Perhaps they won't notice?
As I write this, I am on the plane to San Diego with Jenny Johnson. When we arrive, Mel and her parents, Mary and Graham, will pick us up. They were kind enough to drive down all the way from Oregon just to do support for us this race! Mary has been a huge help with the logistics, securing a great house for us to stay in near the start line in San Felipe and taking care of a million other details. The mother of Scott Cole, a fellow adventure racing fiend from the northeast, happens to have a house in San Diego that she won't be using, so she has kindly lent it to us this evening and for the night after we return from Mexico. Adventure racers comprise such a great community and with so many other things to worry about, it's nice to have some things fall so nicely into place.
After a BBQ hosted by friends of Mel (she used to be stationed in San Diego), we will get some sleep and then head to San Felipe tomorrow morning. It's not a long drive, but with the border crossing and slow travel, which I am told could include stops by local police, it will take a good part of the day. We'll have gear check, check out the paddleboards and then enjoy a pre-race party here we get to exchange shirts with the field of International racers. Sunday morning at the pre-race meeting we will get last minute instruction and finally, our maps. Even though the gun won't go off for several hours, the race will have really begun. Map work is critical and based on what we know about the course, we will need to carefully organize our gear.
The race begins at on Monday morning and while we don't know all the details of the course, we have been told to expect, besides the typical mountain bike, kayaking and trekking sections, paddle boarding and a baja car rally section. We won't drive the vehicles, but will have to navigate the for the drivers as they tear across the Peninsula in the wild style Baja is famous for. At some point we will navigate our way through what are described as stunning canyons, a maze of rocks and brush. Winding our way through this puzzle with our ropes, harnesses and ascending gear we will eventually reach the top of the ridge that runs through the Peninsula and finally begin our descent towards the Pacific.
Please follow along with the race at http://www.bajatravesia.com/ and check back for a race report from me later CheckPointZerohttp://www.checkpointzero.com/
Cheers!
Jennifer Shultis
Captain, Eastern Mountain Sports Team eXXtreme
Adventure racing has some tough chicks, and Jenny Johnson and Melissa Coombes are two of the toughest I know. And two of the nicest. Nearly two years ago we started bouncing around the idea to form an all female team that could truly go head to head with all of the competition. They loved the idea, but the challenge would prove to finding the right race to give this a go. Then Baja Traversia announced that in 2008 they would not only be hosting an all-female division, but would offer the women prize money and a chance to win an entry into the Adventure Racing World Championships. Finally, a race to take this seriously! I dialed up Jenny and Mel and got a big "hell yeah" out of both of them. Eastern Mountain Sports Team eXXtreme was born.
Jenny Johnson is the little star of Bethlehem; New Hampshire that is. A few years ago she saw a poster in a store window for a crazy three-day race that was to be held in northern Vermont called the Jay Challenge. It featured a 26 mile paddle race on day one, a marathon distance (26.2 mile) trail race on day two and a 65 mile mountain bike race on day three. Most competitors would sign up to do just one day of racing as just on was enough to whoop your butt, but those deranged enough would sign up for all three days. Oh, and as for the distances, well Dan, the crazy French Canadian race director, started out doing well with the paddle race, but probably started drinking as he calculated the other distances and using some long forgotten fur trapper/trader conversion rate to get from kilometers to miles he actually ended up with a 31 mile trail race and a 72 mile bike ride of pure pain. People came, the raced, they complained, Dan smiled. He knew he was on to something and a legend was born. But back to Jenny Johnson looking at this poster in a store window... she turned to her friend and declared that she was going to do it. Her friend laughed. You see, Jenny had never done anything like this. She had always loved experiencing the outdoors, was a kayak guide and was always up for trying something crazy, but she this was fresh territory. When Jenny showed up at the race, nobody knew who she was. That made it all the more frustrating for the other women when she won. Oh yeah, she beat most of the boys, too. Sheâ??s the kind of person you would love to hate, if only you could. Fresh faced and always laughing, she is incredibly humble, upbeat and down to earth. After winning the Jay Challenge year after year, Jenny was eventually lured by top adventure racing teams, including world champions Team Nike, to join them. But despite reaching the pinnacle in the sport, Jenny has never forgotten her friends and continues to race with them whenever she can.
Melissa Coombes was first introduced to me through Vytenis, one of Team Eastern Mountain Sportsâ??s top navigators. A top orienteer, he and Melissa had met while attending Annapolis and he taught her the fine art of map and compass work. She was a natural and they built on this by building a successful adventure race team for the American Legion. As a top navigator, Melissa quickly became one of the most sought after racers in the country, but she is no slouch as an athlete either with first place wins in bicycle races and off-road triathlons. She has led her teams to multiple adventure race wins, too, and even finished first overall once as a solo competitor against a full field including top national teams. She gets an A+ in "Plays well with others" as even other teams canâ??t help but notice how supportive she is to her teammates on the race course. Melissa balances all of this training and racing with her other life as a knighthawk helicopter pilot, running missions in the Persian Gulf or doing tsunami relief in Sumatra. Do you think she'll be just a little frustrated to not be behind the controls during the baja car section of this race? Always one to have fun, Melissa showed up at the USARA 2006 national championships wearing a full-on Foxxy Cleopatra afro wig.
As for me, these women are going to crush me. My strategy is to keep them laughing and to replace the sports drink they normally use with a little mojito. Perhaps they won't notice?
As I write this, I am on the plane to San Diego with Jenny Johnson. When we arrive, Mel and her parents, Mary and Graham, will pick us up. They were kind enough to drive down all the way from Oregon just to do support for us this race! Mary has been a huge help with the logistics, securing a great house for us to stay in near the start line in San Felipe and taking care of a million other details. The mother of Scott Cole, a fellow adventure racing fiend from the northeast, happens to have a house in San Diego that she won't be using, so she has kindly lent it to us this evening and for the night after we return from Mexico. Adventure racers comprise such a great community and with so many other things to worry about, it's nice to have some things fall so nicely into place.
After a BBQ hosted by friends of Mel (she used to be stationed in San Diego), we will get some sleep and then head to San Felipe tomorrow morning. It's not a long drive, but with the border crossing and slow travel, which I am told could include stops by local police, it will take a good part of the day. We'll have gear check, check out the paddleboards and then enjoy a pre-race party here we get to exchange shirts with the field of International racers. Sunday morning at the pre-race meeting we will get last minute instruction and finally, our maps. Even though the gun won't go off for several hours, the race will have really begun. Map work is critical and based on what we know about the course, we will need to carefully organize our gear.
The race begins at on Monday morning and while we don't know all the details of the course, we have been told to expect, besides the typical mountain bike, kayaking and trekking sections, paddle boarding and a baja car rally section. We won't drive the vehicles, but will have to navigate the for the drivers as they tear across the Peninsula in the wild style Baja is famous for. At some point we will navigate our way through what are described as stunning canyons, a maze of rocks and brush. Winding our way through this puzzle with our ropes, harnesses and ascending gear we will eventually reach the top of the ridge that runs through the Peninsula and finally begin our descent towards the Pacific.
Please follow along with the race at http://www.bajatravesia.com/ and check back for a race report from me later CheckPointZerohttp://www.checkpointzero.com/
Cheers!
Jennifer Shultis
Captain, Eastern Mountain Sports Team eXXtreme
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