Track the Race Online

There will be GPS tracking of all the teams and regular updates throughout the race, so you can follow the Desert Winds Adventure Race at Lake MEad online this weekend. We're team #10. 

Posted by Michelle Kelly on 5/6/08 8 P

New Sponsor - Miox

I am happy to announce that we have a new sponsor on board for this year. Miox, the maker of the MSR Miox Purifier Pen, has sent us a couple of Purifier Pens to use for our water filtration needs during racing and training. We'd like to thank them for this generous offer and plan to put them to use. We'll post a review up here soon after we've had a chance to try them out in the field.

Posted by Tommy Kelly on 5/4/08 8 P

Desert Winds Race Quickly Approaching

The team is getting ready for the Desert Winds 24+ Hour Adventure Race near Las Vegas on May 10. In preparation, the team is spending lots of time hiking and running, kayaking and canyoneering. The race will not have mountain biking in it (for which Michelle is very thankful for after so much sand and pea gravel riding in last year's race). The picture above is a view of the course.

The race is a Checkpoint Tracker Series Event and a USARA National Championship Qualifier. The race directors are billing it as "An Expedition Race in a Weekend." We hear therer are about 60 racers from all over the country coming out for this race. It's definitely a must do race if you live in the Southwest.

Posted by Michelle Kelly on 4/30/08 8 P

Tour of the Tucson Mountains

This past weekend Michelle and Tommy participated in the Tour of the Tucson Mountains on Sunday, April 27, in Marana, AZ. Windy conditions made for an interesting 71-mile ride around the mountains west of Tucson.

Michelle and Tommy finished the course in 3:24 to earn a "gold" finishers medal. I'll add a link to pictures from the race as soon as they're posted.

While we were out playing on our bikes, Bryan was out doing his field test, trying to get into the Central Arizona Mountain Rescue Association. I hear he smoked the test.

Posted by Michelle Kelly on 4/26/08 8 P

Canyoneering in Salome

The last two weekend's we've been out Canyoneering at Salome Canyon just North of Lake Roosevelt about 2 1/2 hours outside Phoenix. The trip on the 6th was Tommy, Michelle, Bryan, and Cody and the trip on the 12th was Bryan, Tommy, and Bruce of 360 Adventures on a guiding trip for a group of seven clients. It was Tommy's first time as a Canyoneering Guide and Bryan's first guiding volunteer trip with 360.

Everyone had a great time on both trips and the flow was just right to rappel down the center of the waterfall on the second trip. The link below is to pictures from the first trip.

http://picasaweb.google.com/team.redenergy/SalomeCanyon

The Canyon starts to tighten.

Bryan in the depths.

The waterfall into the Jug. First trip we rappelled of the overhanging rock on the left. On the second trip the waterfall was flowing a little less making a rap down the slot possible.

Canyon exit and hike out to the right.

Posted by Tommy Kelly on 4/17/08 8 P

Group Hike 4.8.08

A few months ago, Michelle started an after work Hiking Group for Women that slowly turned into a Coed group and then a regular Tuesday thing. See below for next Tuesday's hike.

Hi everyone!

Posted by Tommy Kelly on 4/3/08 8 P

2008 Denver Post Ride the Rockies

Michelle and I just found out a few weeks ago that we got into the 2008 Denver Post Ride the Rockies this June. It's a 7 day, 6 stage road cycling event covering 435 miles through the heart of the Rocky Mountains in Colorado. 2000 lucky cyclists are chosen by a lottery system. The event starts in Durango and finishes in Breckenridge averaging 50-80 miles a day and thousands of feet of climbing a day. Check it out at www.ridetherockies.com

Posted by Tommy Kelly on 4/2/08 8 P

MS 150 Ride

The MS150 Ride was this past weekend in Florence, Arizona. 102 miles on Saturday and about 53 on Sunday. Perfect weather, decent roads and a great cause. I really enjoyed myself and found my first road Century to be easier than I thought. The last 25 miles was the toughest due to the slight incline for 12 miles and then when I made the u-turn to come downhill, there was a 25-mph headwind that kept the ride challenging to the end!

Thank you to everyone for your generous support and encouraging words. Multiple Sclerosis is such a debilitating disease and I'm proud to be a part of something that raises awareness and funding to support those with MS.

Professional photographers were at the event, and they captured a good one of me at the finish.

Posted by Michelle Kelly on 4/1/08 8 P

24 Hours in the Old Pueblo

For living in the desert, we've had a very wet winter, which makes for some interesting races. In December it rained 3 inches in 24 hours - 12 hours of which Bryan and I raced our mountain bikes at McDowell in the Dawn to Dusk Race, and then, over President's Day weekend, we thought we were going to be riding in SNOW in Tucson!

Okay, so let me start at the beginning... 24 Hours in the Old Pueblo is a 24-hour mountain bike race in the beautiful desert north of Tucson at 4000 ft elevation. Tommy has done the event the past two years - the first year on a 4-man team and last year as a solo. Both years were cold, cloudy at times and very windy at times. This year, would be my first 24 HITOP, taking it on in the duo female divison with a friend (and adventure racing competitor),  Jane Larkindale from Tucson, who races with ARC.

So, going into this race, which for many is just a mountain biking event, as a duo was a little daunting to me. I've done several duo 12-hour races and a 24-hour race as a 4-person team, but it's a different level of committment and pace as a duo team for 24 hours. So my plan was to do as many laps as I could at a decent pace and taking turns riding the full 24 hours.

So, Wednesday and Thursday night prior to the race found Tommy being the wonderful bike mechanic adjusting and fine tuning our bikes and me cooking/baking food for the race - pancakes, pasta, cookies and banana bread, and then both of us packing up our camping gear and all the clothes we'd need for riding. The packing was 95% done when we went to bed Thursday night, however when we got the call from our friend Eddie, who was already down at "24 Hour Town" (the camping site of the race) on Friday morning that it was snowing, we had to add a few more warm things to our bags.

Once on the road headed south, it started sprinkle in Phoenix and as we headed south the clouds got more ominous looking. By the time we got to the dirt road that leads to the race start and 24 Hour Town the rain was coming down steady. The road, which is normally a well-graded dirt road that allows travel at 45-55 mph was a muddy bog that we drove, and sometimes slid, down at 15-20 mph. It was a long 10+ miles...

We found our friends in "town" and proceeded to set up camp just 30 yards from "the rock," a rock slab decent at the end of the race lap that attracts spectators throughout the race. (That's our Maxxis tent - where we had all of our food and gear - with the rock in the background.)

Oh, and I don't think in addition to the continuous rain that I mentioned how cold it was when we got there (about 34 degrees). So we set up our camping tent and our transition tent, checked in, checked out "town" and then huddled around the firepit fire our friends had. Jane and her husband Jim, who was racing as a duo male team, joined us that evening as well. Tommy and I heated up some pre-made pasta for dinner and went to bed fairly early just to get in our sleeping bags and attempt to warm up, just as it started to snow.

Even with very warm slepping bags and a Nalgene bottle full of hot water in our bags, neither one of us stayed warm through the night. When I woke at 3:30 am on nature's call I walked out to find it still snowing and a fine blanket of the white stuff covering everything. Who says it doesn't snow in the desert? When we woke around 7:30 am, this was what we found...

Snow on our tent...

Snow on our Xterra and our bikes on the roof...

  Snow on the hedgehog cactus by our camp site...

and a beautiful view of the mountains with snow there too!

Professional photos can be found of Michelle and Jane here and Tommy here.

To be continued...

Posted by Michelle Kelly on 2/23/08 7 P

McDowell Meltdown

A couple of photos to add to Bryan's report on The MBAA McDowell Meltdown.

Michelle atop the podium in the Sport Women's class sporting her Red Energy jersey.

Bryan looking strong after 40 miles in the saddle.

Posted by Tommy Kelly on 1/26/08 7 P

McDowell Meltdown

On Saturday January 19th 2008 The Mountain Bike Association Of Arizona Kicked off their Race season at the McDowell Mountain Park's Competitive Loops. This Race had a new twist The organizer's were able to convince the park to let them run the race in reverse direction. Two members of Red Energy stepped out of the Adventure Racing realm and gave Mountaing Bike racing a shot.   Michelle handily won the Women's sport class by almost a minute and Bryan finished the Marathon course.

Posted by Bryan Thelen on 1/24/08 7 P

Team Red Energy Ties for 2nd Place - Desert Waves Race Report

The Desert Waves Night Race by Kayak Lake Mead was billed as a race with a 16 hour cutoff starting at 5:00 pm on Saturday and finishing at 9:00 am Sunday morning.  Our team was made up of Michelle Kelly, Bryan Thelen, and myself Tommy Kelly.  Little did we know, we would be thrown for a loop before the race even began. 

We arrived at the kayak drop right when it opened at noon on Saturday and were immediately given some insight to the race.  Druce Finlay told us to stage our kayaks approximately 200 meters off shore by tying them to two buoys he had just placed, and then swim back.  The swim back wasn't too bad and the water was warm, but we wondered how the swim and wet entry into the boats was going to be at the start of the race.

All smiles at the pre-race briefing...

The pre-race meeting got started in the only spot of shade in Bootleg Canyon, approximately 8 miles away and 2000 feet in elevation higher then Lake Mead.  This would be the official Start and Finish of the race.  You could see the excitement in race director Robert Finlay as he briefed the teams on the upcoming race and displayed the prizes for the top three teams in the 3/4 person coed category - AY UP biking lights from Australia.  A nice prize, but with Team SOLE in the race, we all figured we'd be racing for second place.

The race started with a non-competitive mountain bike ride on some of Bootleg Canyon's famed trails with Paul Romero of Team SOLE leading us down to Lake Mead.  About 200 meters from the lake shore we came across Robert's truck and gathered round.  He looked at his watch and casually said, "I've got 5:30, start the race," and in a split second teams were racing down to the shore at top speed.

Team SOLE and others at CP1

We were all pretty much caught off guard and had a chaotic transition from bike gear to swim out to the kayaks and get going.  After getting started in the kayaks, it was off to a small chain of islands about 1/2 mile away for the paddle-n-tie section.  Just like a ride-n-tie, but with one boat and the rest of the team swimming.  We hit the 6 checkpoints and took off to CP2 at Black Island about 4-5 miles away.  We were now in 5th place and would have some work to do.

Red Energy off to CP2 on Black Island...

This is where the new Seda kayaks paid for themselves.  We passed one team on the way to the island and caught another one by the time we got to CP2.  This was Team Diablos de la Noche, little did we know, we would be going back and forth with them pushing each other until the very finish.  This is also where we met mud along the shoreline that you could easily sink into up to your knees and beyond. 

CP3 was just on the other side of the hill from CP2 along the water's edge, so we decided to portage across like the other teams ahead of us.  We actually saw the 2nd place team cresting the hill top as we came into CP2.  The portage was definitely one to remember with a trek through waist high weeds and a climb over a ridgeline made of cobbles.  I was glad our new Seda Tango tandem was 23 pounds lighter then our old kayak, but with the terrain we had to go through, it was still a suffer fest.

After getting the boats over to the over side of the island, we were one of four teams desperately searching for the next checkpoint.  It was starting to get dark and I knew we really had to find it beofre we lost the light.  After rechecking the clue, we found it in just a couple of minutes and took off, now in 2nd place chasing after Team SOLE.

Heading to CP4 was the first time I'd paddled after dark and it was just a matter of taking a compass bearing and 40 minutes later, we hit the island and CP4.  From CP4, we headed to CP5, the location that we started the swim at the beginning of the race.  We had about 6.5 miles to go and were now finally able to get the kayaks up to speed since everyone was feeling good again and covered the distance in just over an hour. 

Coming into the beach area, we could see SOLE's rear tailights flashing as they went down the road, we weren't that far behind; 45 minutes we were told.  As we hit the beach, we were greeted by Team Dart Nuun captain Cyril, who was supporting his girlfriend while getting over an injury.  I think Cyril saw our Nuun logos on our jerseys and all of a sudden started shouting, "come on team nuun, go catch Sole, you can do it, you can catch them" or something like that.  We tried to act like we believed him, but were so busy transitioning I think it got lost.  It still strikes me as one of the funny moments of the race.

So now we're off to bike the road about 6-7 miles, ride-n-tie 1.5 miles and desend a canyon to the swim orienteering section.  Imagine being out at midnight during a full moon, with headlights, decending a canyon you've never been in.  Let's just say that it was pretty cool.  It quickly turned into a slot canyon with chimney downclimbs, drops to negotiate, brush to forge through, sometimes crawling along on our stomachs, and then the sinking mud we got to know earlier in the race.

To be continued...

And now we continue...

We reached the shoreline and found the first of 6 swim checkpoints on a hilltop of the peninsula we hiked out on.  Now it was time for the swim.  We had thought ahead and brought swim fins and and hand fins but it was the first time we've tried swimming with a full pack of 20-25 pounds on our backs.  Not to mention it was now about midnight, but between the full moon and our headlamps, we could see surprisingly well. 

We headed out through the water picking up the Southern most checkpoints first.  We could get these in any order we wanted, so this seemed like a logical choice.  As we came out from the protection of the islands, we were immediately hit by the wind and light waves coming across the lake.  The waves weren't big, but when you're floating like a bobber, any wave is big and can easily wash right over you. 

It was about this time that we started seeing other teams and wondered what went wrong.  We tried to stay positive and kept moving forward toward an island to the North and our last two swim checkpoints.  As we got close to the island, who do we see on the shoreline, Team Diablos de la Noche.  We didn't realize it, but we were both fighting for 2nd place.

After about 20-30 minutes on this island, we realized we swam to far out and were on the wrong island.  Did I mention that it was now about 3:30 in the morning in the middle of a lake?  I guess it's an easy mistake to make.  We had seen a few other teams on the island and decided to slip off it before anyone noticed and head over to the right one to our West.  We got over to the right one pretty quickly, picked up the last two swim checkpoints and headed for land. 

A pretty funny thing happened at this point, as we swam up to a peninsula, we noticed a couple of fishermen on the shore fishing away.  I said hello, but they just looked at me kinda strange.  I guess they didn't expect to see people swimming out of the lake at 4:00 in the morning.  Seemed like a perfectly natural thing to me...

We had one more canyon checkpoint to get on our way back up from the lake and back to where we started the canyon section.  The problem was, which canyon was it?  There were two main canyons heading up from the lake, one to the right and one to the left.  We took the right one feeling like it had to be it.  A few minutes later in the distance we see three headlamps in the left canyon which meant that a team was coming back down.  It must have been the wrong canyon.  That team was our friends Team Diablos de la Noche.  They got in the right canyon and got away from us but we caught up with them at the canyon checkpoint only to lose them again.

We came out of the canyon and headed up the road to pick up our one bike just in time to see the sunrise across the lake.  We were about 600-700 feet above the lake and had a beautiful view. 

We hit the Ride-N-Tie, then back on the bikes and could see the other team in front of us but we couldn't close the gap.  Then all of a sudden they were gone.  It was about this time that I got hit with the sleepmonsters.  I just couldn't stay awake while riding my bike.  Michelle was towing me to help, but I kept nodding off and swerving back and forth.

About 10-15 minutes after losing the other team we we lost them to the optional transition checkpoint. We figured they stopped at the checkpoint where we dropped the kayaks to get more water and drop some weight from their packs.  We knew we were low on water too but took a gamble. Turns out they just got a flat tire and stopped to fix it.

It wasn't long until we saw Team Diablos de la Noche behind us and this was just what I needed to wake me up.  They were strong and pulled ahead of us but missed the turn off to the next checkpoint and we were ahead again as we made our way up to the neighborhoods and up to Bootleg Canyon and a couple of thousand feet of climbing. 

The sun was coming up and it was getting hot in the desert and all of a sudden, we ran out of water.  Nothing to do but push on.  Bootleg Canyon and CP12 was the final checkpoint of the race, but there were 12 additional optional checkpoints to get after that.  We were supposed to get at least 6 of them to finish but had to be finished by 9:00 am.  Two of them were on the way in and we were allowed to pick them up before CP12.  We got one of them on the top of a hill and by this time we were totally depleted from the heat and lack of water.  We looked down and there was Diablos de la Noche.  They saw us at the checkpoint and decided to skip it, probably out of energy just like us.

We hit CP12, the finish line, about 10 seconds after Diablos de la Noche, but we had one additional CP and then didn't have any and we thought the race was over.  It was 8:00 am and we were all spent, but race director Robert Finlay urged us to push on and get more points until the time cut-off. 

We re-fueled and headed out on foot carrying only water bottles and this is where the confusion came in.  Robert told us we had to be back by 9:00 am.  Diablos de la Noche left a few minutes after us on bikes and I guess were told to be back by 9:30 am since the race started a half hour late.  We got 4 more CP's for a total of 5 and headed out to get our 6th and final one when we turned around halfway to it so that we wouldn't come in after 9:00 am.  Diablos de la Noche came in at about 9:30 am with, I think, 6 CP's to beat us.

With all the confusion about the cutoff time, Robert recognized the added mental stress this put on already fatigued racers and made the decision that us and Diablos de la Noche would officially tie for 2nd place.  It was nice to see a race director recognize a sticky situation and make a decision that I think it was fair to everyone.  Either way, boths team won the AY UP biking lights and all was good!

The Finlay's put on a great race and I'm looking forward to their next one in January 08.  I heard there's going to be some more swimming...

Posted by Tommy Kelly on 7/31/07 8 P