2009 Blast
Race Recap
Wow, what a race! And what RACERS!! First off thank you all very much for entering the Blast and taking a chance on a new race, new location and new race directors. We hope you all had a great time in and around Ludington and we hope you come back to visit, and maybe race again. Congratulations to Todd Henrickson and Geoff Paine for winning the inaugural Hamlin Blast. Thanks to our weather team, we did the beautiful September weekend dance all week, man did that baby stick, like Groundhog Day around here.
And congrats to all the racers who finished their first race, it’s quite an accomplishment to put it all together. The orienteering, biking, paddline and organization and logistics can be a challenge by themselves. We truly owe a debt of gratitude to the Michigan AR community for helping us as we planned the race and for helping spread the word. Thanks again Infiterra, GRAAR, SMAC, Endurance Sports, Paddling.net and the folks at the Millennium Triathlon for letting us use your forums, email lists and calendars. You’ll find links over there on the left to all of those groups.
Teams started at Partridge Pointe at 8 a.m. sharp, not wanting to put all the racers on the roads at the same time and create bottlenecks on the trail we devised a simple skills test. Each team of racers took two cups and were directed to the middle of a field where there were two buckets, the objective was to fill both cups, run back to the start line and the provide race officials with one FULL cup of water. That pretty much did what we wanted to as far as spacing out the teams. From there racers jumped on their bikes and headed for CP1 a few miles away. Navigation was pretty straight foward, from there it was a quick jump to TA1. At TA1 racers switched from the bike to the first canoe leg, heading out on the crystal clear and glass-like Hamlin Lake. From there
racers headed northwest to the area known as Lost Lakes at the Ludington State Park for CP2 on the way to TA2, where they would begin the orienteering section of the race. There were 8 CPs in the woods we call Piney Ridge, some teams got them all, others missed one, and I think we figured that in most cases they didn’t go far enough UP that big re-entrant, that saddle was only about halfway up the ravine. After bagging all the CPs in the woods teams were back in the canoes to get a pair of CPs on the Ludington State Park’s canoe trail, then back to TA1 and the bikes. On the bikes teams headed to CP13
Mostly we didn’t want riders on Jebavy and Angling, hence CP13. Then it was up to Victory Park for two more biking CPs where I nearly smacked a deer coming out after gathering up the CPs later that night. Thank you folks at Ford’s Special Vehicle Team for the work on the Focus SVT brakes and suspension. Nice save. Then it was back to Partridge Pointe and CP16 where racers were supposed to punch in then ride the single track that was beneath their feet. I guess 5-7 hours of racing probably clouded some of the minds. Most of the racers would have jumped back on the road and ridden to the pole barn had I not been there taking pictures. After checking in with all the mandatory CPs, racers then had the option to bag another 2 CPs and 3.5 miles of single track in Dave’s backyard playground. 
After that it was another 6 optional orienteering CPs. Three teams got all 24 CPs, a bunch got 16 to 19 CPs, and I think and hope everyone had fun. We’ve got all your email addresses and we’ll keep you updated on what we’ve got planned for 2010. If you have friends that you think might have done the race send them to the site and have them sign up for the email alerts on the home page. Stop by and say hi if you’re signed up for the Iceman, we’ll have a fairly large post-race shindig at Timber Ridge. We’re in cabins 77 through 80, right by the bathrooms and the finish line.
Article in the Ludington Daily News
BY KEVIN BRACISZESKI - DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER
HAMLIN TWP. — Paul Havens of Jenison was so sore after Saturday’s Hamlin Blast adventure race that it was hard for him to hold his cell phone to his ear while checking home after the event.
Havens and his teammate, Dan Korienek of Grandville, were among 77 racers on 36 teams participating in the event, which included biking, canoeing and orienteering through parts of Hamlin and Victory townships.
It was the canoeing on Hamlin Lake that made Havens’ arms sore.
“I’ve never done one of these and I always wanted to,” he said afterward.
Paddlers make their way to the Ludington State Park for canoe and orienteering CPs.
“The canoeing was brutal,” Korienek added.
Contestants came from far away and nearby for the race, which also included navigation so they could collect points by marking cards with special punches located at designated areas throughout their routes.
“It’s different from a triathlon, you have to be the smartest and the strongest to be first,” Korienek said.
“It was a blast,” he said, adding that Saturday’s warmth and sunshine made the event very enjoyable.
“And the scenery was beautiful,” Korienek added.
He said Havens “suckered” him into coming to Mason County for the weekend to participate in the event.
Havens said he chose Hamlin Blast over a triathlon in Kalamazoo as the event he wanted to participate in during the weekend.
The event
Hamlin Blast sponsors Dave Maclean and Andy Klevorn have participated in about nine adventure races during the past six or seven years, Klevorn said, and decided they would like to host a race in Mason County.
“We always wanted to have a race here and Dave had the time this year to do the lion’s share of the work, so we put on a race,” Klevorn said.
“We’re thrilled … we hope to have 200 racers next year,” he said about the interest the race received.
Maclean was also pleased with the event.
“I think it went great … the weather turned out great and the racers seemed happy and that’s the important thing,” he said.
He heard from racers that the course was tough but fun and that they enjoyed it.
The course was designed for beginners, but Klevorn said people involved with planning other races around the state complimented Maclean for making a course that was challenging and fun.
Race distances differed for the participants, Klevorn said, because they had to choose their own routes to the checkpoints, finding their way with just a map and compass. Some racers might find a path straight to a checkpoint while others might spend more time looking for the flag and card punch.
He estimated the biking portion of the race covered 25 to 30 miles, that participants covered seven miles while orienteering through the woods, and paddled for another five miles.
The course was designed with an eight-hour race in mind and the winning team finished in six hours, 33 minutes.
That team and two others also collected all 24 orienteering points.
It took a lot of work to prepare for the race, including time in the woods and time seeking permits and completing other paperwork.
“I didn’t keep track, and that’s probably a good thing,” Maclean said.
He thinks he’ll bring the event back to Mason County in 2010, and said it will be even more challenging to find another course and receive permission for the event.
“We’ll probably have to go with the federal forest,” Maclean said about next year.
The winners
Todd Henrickson of Ludington and Geoff Paine of Manistee were the winning team for this year’s inaugural event.
“It’s a great venue, we couldn’t have asked for a better venue,” Paine said about the course, adding that it was more fun to paddle through Hamlin Lake’s reeds than to just canoe on open water.
“This area lends itself to this sort of event,” Henrickson said, adding, “We definitely got wet and beat up.”
Paine said it was his second time in an adventure race and it was the first time for Henrickson.
“But I do a lot of mountain biking and I think that helped,” Paine said. “Speed on a bike and knowledge of the area don’t hurt.”
“It’s nice to have something like this in your back yard,” Henrickson added.