The most heartbreaking race of the year. June 24-25, 2010 - The AuSable River Canoe Marathon.
The 120-mile AuSable Canoe Marathon is the longest non-stop canoe race in North America. The race starts at 9:00PM, yes that's 9:00 at night, and goes all night long. It begins with a run, carrying your boat down the street before getting into the narrow, winding, shallow river. John Hazel was my partner, a strong Michigan paddler. On Thursday before the race, we sprinted for pole position. Our sprint time was atrocious but we didn't care, neither John nor I are runners, so we knew we would not be running fast in the stampede down the street to get in the water.
I went out to Michigan several weeks early and John and I practiced the course a lot. We were slow but steady. In our many practice runs we barely made our cut-off times, but we made them and we were happy. We also practiced night paddling several times. We were tentative at first, I suppose everyone is, but after a short time we got used to it and were able to paddle at race pace in the dark. Call me crazy, it won't be the first time, but it was actually pretty exhilarating to careen through the darkness, narrowly avoiding or, let's face it, sometimes crashing into strainers, logs, stumps, and other hazards in the river.
John, being a genuine rocket scientist by trade, devised a fancy light for us to use that I could turn on and off with just a touch of my paddle blade. We practiced all the short cuts, and so many paddlers came out to help us and show us the way. Jeff Rankinen, our own PACK member, gave us extremely valuable help in using our GPS to its fullest potential. Everyone was so anxious to help us, and we are so thankful for their support, experience, and time.
On the night of the Marathon I knew there would be spectators. I even knew that there would be upwards of 10,000 spectators at the start line. I did not know the volume that 10,000 screaming spectators could create. When the gun went off and we headed toward the river in the stampede, the spectators went wild, even for those of us at the extreme back of the pack. They went nuts when we got to the water, well after the other teams had gone, cheering for us just as loudly and enthusiastically as the lead teams. Our names were on the sides of the boats and spectators screamed for us by name as we went by.
All night long we paddled, and all night long spectators lined the shores of the AuSable river, shining their flashlights out at water level to catch names and numbers on the boats, each of them quite careful not to night blind us with their lights. All night long, at every twist and turn, bonfires burned and people were screaming our names and cheering us on. In the AuSable Marathon, it doesn't matter if you are first or last, and we were darn close to last all night, first or last the Michigan spectators treat you as a celebrity. This is the Daytona 500 of canoe racing and John and I were thrilled to be a part of it.
We negotiated obstacles, took short cuts like a pro thanks to Jeff's help with our GPS, and paddled our hearts out. We had the world's best crew, feeding us, hydrating us, and telling us we could do it every chance they got. This has to be the world's toughest spectator and crew race, up all night following their teams down the river. The full moon made the water sparkle, John and I came together as a team, we stayed energetic and were unwavering in our strokes, adrenaline was our friend.
The Mio Dam is about 49 miles into the 120-mile race and is a crucial cut-off. You have 7 hours to get there, 4:00AM is the cut-off time. As we were coming across the Mio dam pond, alone in the dark, damp, and cold, we heard a man's booming voice echo out slowly, loudly, and clearly, "You - have - three - and - a - half - minutes."
We laid on a sprint and gave it everything we had to cross the pond. Given the distance between us and the bright lights of the dam, we did not know if we had enough time to make it. As we pulled up to the dam, 100 spectators were screaming, our crew was yelling, and the race officials were urgently telling us to get ourselves and the boat up onto the dam. Your time does not stop until you, your boat, and your paddles are out of the water and on the big stone dam.
I was struggling to get out of the boat while holding my paddle, our crew was yelling over and over again, "Just throw your paddle, just throw your paddle!" I threw it and watched it skittle down the dam. I crawled out of the boat on my knees and as John and I pulled the boat up on land, the crowd went absolutely wild. We made it - with just two minutes and one second to spare!
Not a large margin for sure, but we made the Mio cut. We knew we had the rest of the race. Many don't make Mio, but those who do then make the whole Marathon, even if they only make the cut by seconds. We had researched results back 10 years and everyone, and I mean everyone, who makes Mio makes the race, barring any injury or illness. The crowd was ecstatic, our crew was beyond thrilled, and John and I were floating on air as we portaged the boat over the dam in the darkness of 4AM. Once back in the water, we knew the rest of the cut-offs were easier. We felt good, we felt strong, and we were well on our way to our first AuSable finish.
And then my left wrist started to hurt. At first it was the kind of hurt that you just think you need to work through. We'd been paddling continuously for 7 hours, we'd just hauled a boat up and over a big dam, it felt like I just had a little kink in there that needed stretched and worked out. As the miles went by, the pain got worse, and every time I pulled on the left I felt an electrical spark inside my hand and wrist. My middle two fingers started to tingle, then they went numb. My index finger started to go numb. My hand did not want to curl around the paddle and stay there, my grip was weakening with each stroke. The electrical shock feeling got bigger, running down into my forearm.
I stopped paddling for a moment to shake out my hand. The boat did not slow down, it was clear I was not pulling any water. And then on the next "hut" I grabbed the paddle with my left hand and it felt like I'd grabbed an electric fence. The shock was very jolting and went up my forearm and into my elbow. I actually jumped from the shock. I kept telling myself that pain is temporary, pride is forever, but this simply was not a pain that I could work through, it was getting worse as the minutes went by. Sadly, merely an hour after making the crucial Mio cut, with tears streaming down my face in the cool mist of the early morning light, my voice wavering from pain, disappointment, and heartbreak, I had to say, "John, I need to get out." Several hours later I was at the University of Michigan Hospital Emergency Room in Ann Arbor having a soft cast put on a swollen wrist with a diagnosis of a severely compressed median nerve.
The nice thing about trying AuSable this year is that no one had any expectations whatsoever of me. What's a confirmed kayaker doing in a 120 mile canoe race anyway? Well, as a breast cancer survivor, my attitude is that I'd rather try something and fail than not try at all. It's the act of trying that's so very important to me.
Although I knew I had the endurance to finish 120 miles (from 187 paddling training hours before AuSable), I had only spent 6 weeks in a canoe amounting to only 57 novice canoe hours. John and I were a "double zero" meaning that neither of us had done the Marathon before. We had barely made our cut-off times during practices. The odds were completely against us making the Mio time cut. But we made Mio. Despite my injury and the devastation that we could not finish, the entire Marathon experience was truly amazing and utterly thrilling. And I can't wait until next year.
It was a good day (and night).