Raid the Hammer

This past weekend a few friends (Marie & Angus) and I took part in the Raid the Hammer 25 km Running Adventure Race. Yup, I'm still kinda sore from the whole thing. We had a ton of fun doing it, but we just have to learn how to navigate. Thanks go out to Running Free who awarded our rookie team with the entry to the race.

Below is the race report from the big event.

Race Report
By Roger Hospedales, Team Running Free

Race: Raid the Hammer

Date: Sunday November 12, 2006.

Location: Highland High School, Hamilton, Ontario

Description: 25 km Adventure Run

Sport: Adventure Trail Run

Website: www.dontgetlost.ca

At the 2006 edition of the Raid the Hammer race our team may have done some raiding, but the course surely hammered us in return. Despite that beating, our team had a wonderful experience.

You know it is not a good sign of things to come when you get lost on the way the to an adventure race, but that is how our day started (mapquest sent me in the opposite direction). Our Running Free Team consisted of Angus Kim, Marie McGrath, and myself. Considering that we all had very limited navigation skills, we did fairly well finding all of the early checkpoints fairly easily. On the physical challenge side of things, you will get your fill on this course. The terrain is varied, and there is nothing but climbing, climbing, and more climbing.

We managed to make the first cut-off time of 1 pm, but due to some navigation misadventures, we missed the second cut-off time of 3 pm by just 10 minutes. To be quite honest, we were just about done at that point and welcomed the fact that we were forced to take the short cut back to the finish. Upon finishing the race, we (and all of the teams) picked up some swag (portable chair, carabiner key chain with compass and light) and went indoors to get warm and enjoy some pop and hot pizza. This post-race meal gave us the opportunity to reminisce about the previous hours of “fun”. It was also a nice time to chat with a lot of the other teams we saw out on the course.

With more race experience and maybe a taking a course in navigation we could have done much better on the results side of things but it would not have had much of an impact on changing our overall enjoyment. We did a total of 7 hours of racing, a combination of running, climbing, bushwhacking, mud trekking and walking. While we were hurting near the end of the race, it did not feel like 7 hours had gone by. We enjoyed each other’s company and met a lot of cool people along the way.

I can easily recommend this race to anyone. You can get by without any navigation experience (as our team proved), but if you wish to finish high on the final results it definitely helps to know how to navigate. This event truly is a very challenging, fun and satisfying way to spend a day with a few buddies, no matter what time it takes you to complete it. This was one of the most demanding races I’ve ever experienced and with some improved navigation skills, along with my team mates Marie and Angus (won’t do it without you guys), I look forward to tackling this event again next year.