100M / 100K Courses & Operations

There’s a lot going on in this section, so grab a beer and enjoy your consumption…  You’ll see narrative description of the courses, then some visual presentation — created by our talented C2M Vet Jakob Hermann and his buddies at Google — followed by more narrative related to how the game plan should/may play out.  Press on, Adventurers!!

In conjunction with or as substitute for the below, having your own Tom Harrison map of the Sespe Wilderness should prove priceless to your own sanity… And if you come for some pre-event running in PMSP, get Harrison’s for that area, too.  Get ‘em both from Zombierunner!!

The simple explanation – Nordhoff Ridge behind Ojai serves as the spine off which seven different trails spider. The 100M’ers will do them all; the 100K’ers will avoid two of them. Since we start on the eastward end of the Ridge, you’ll first capture those trails, and work your way back west to finish with Pratt/Cozy Dell and Gridley trails before making your way back across the Ridge and down Horn Canyon to Thacher/Home/Finish. Elsewhere in the program is the spreadsheet indicating in-sequence mileage between aid stations. Cross-reference the spreadsheet with the Google map of the course (an updated one to be provided as soon as our digital cartographic geeks can figure it out), and you’ll have a good picture of what you’ll be finding out there.

By prose, for 100M’ers, Start at Thacher, climb Horn Cyn to Sisar Road; take Sisar Road down to Sisar Cyn A/S; climb back up then access White Ledge trail to Lion Canyon A/S, with short out ‘n back diversion to top of Topa; down Lion Cyn to Rose Valley A/S; climb back up to Lion Cyn A/S; down White Ledge to Sisar Road, then up to Ridge Junction A/S; across Ridge Road then down chip seal road to Rose Valley; back up chip seal to Ridge Road, then down Howard Creek trail to Howard Creek A/S at the road; back up Howard Creek to Ridge then down to Gridley Top A/S; up towards Nordhoff Peak then down Pratt/Cozy Dell trails to Cozy Dell A/S on Hwy 33; back up Cozy Dell/Pratt trails to Gridley Top; down Gridley Trail to Gridley Bottom A/S; back up to Gridley Top; then across the Ridge and down Horn Canyon Trail to the Finish. For 100K’ers, you’ll climb up Horn, then turn left toward Ridge Junction A/S, and now follow the same course as the 100M’ers. Tiring just to read about it, huh?

The Maps below:  The 100M course entails 14 different presentations, and the full 100K course , 10.  Because the 100M & 100K courses share the same trails after Ridge Junction, then below you’ll see only the 1st section of the 100K to Ridge Junction, after which 100K readers should follow from 100M Section 6 map.  That’s pretty clear, isn’t it, eh? eh? eh?

Below, inserted inside the 100M flow, is 100K Section 1, so both groups can be shown to reach Ridge Junction A/S, after which the game’s the same lamely in the frame…

Isn’t it time for that 2nd beer?  Ya ain’t done yet…  Keep going, Sport!

Course Markings

Reflective tape will be your primary course markings, and generally placed only near areas of confusion / trail turns, with none on long stretches where there’s no place else to go but cross country across the wilderness. The tape will be combination of orange survey tape and silvery reflective tape (as one might see in a field of grape vines, to keep pesky birds away).

Crew

Crew can only meet you off-Ridge, though no crews will be allowed at Sisar A/S. Even if you have someone who’s willing to find their way to the Ridge, they’re not invited, and will be cause for your disqualification should they somehow just happen to appear and give indication of supporting you. As the event progresses and more and more people appear almost simultaneously at the Aid Stations, priority for space and movement will be given to A/S volunteers and the runners they’re assisting. If you have the luxury of a crew, please insure you and they take care of you in space that doesn’t impede the normal A/S operation. Depending on how many crews are in operation, parking at Gridley Bottom, Cozy Dell, Howard Creek and Rose Valley may be tightly controlled. So if you’re bringing a crew, you have responsibility for educating them about both the above protocol and good manners when dealing with Volunteers who are looking at a bigger picture than your own personal agenda.

Drop Bags

Accessible only at the off-Ridge A/S’s. Your bags must be at the S/F NLT than 4PM on Friday (all 100M’ers and early start 100K’ers) or 10AM Saturday (for later 100K start groups only, but then only for Howard Creek, Cozy Dell and Gridley Bottom A/S’s), else you’ll just have to camel for yourself the rest of the weekend. With potential not insignificant variations between off- and on-Ridge temperatures, suggest you plan at least to carry a suitable windbreaker for those time periods when the swing between middle of the night and sun-warming daylight is the most prominent. The on-Ridge stations do not plan to cater to shivering bodies – they’ll be intent on keeping themselves warm (you’re moving, they won’t be) so they can best serve you. Robbing them of their own heat because you didn’t plan well enough for your own will only jeopardize good support for all runners. You’ll mark your bags for these stations: Sisar Cyn, Rose Valley, Howard Creek, Cozy Dell and Gridley Bottom.

How small/big should your drop bag be?  If you’re packing a “normal” size carry-on luggage item, that’s way too much — bring a crew if you’re that high maintenance!  Something closer to a kid’s school backpack (and yes, for what some of those kids lug around, their spinal docs will be wealthy for decades) ought to be a good target.  Too, make it too small (4″x4″x4″) and it likely could get lost in the shuffle.

Weather

60 years of recorded data for Ojai yield averages of about 70F as high, 41F as low for the month of March. On the ridge, the highs can feel warmer, the colds actually much cooler. If we have reasonable precipitation this winter, snow on Topa may linger. In normal years – try finding one recently – winter rains have dissipated by March. Heck, since this is a full moon ultra, we’re banking on clear skies so the moon can help you navigate at night…

Plan B for CaCa Weather

You’ll want to pay attention to this one, cuz if you don’t, and you show up to start the event under poor weather conditions, your ignorance of how we approach foul weather can only improve your chances of bagging the whole game earlier than expected…

For starters, if rain and high streams precede the event, we may even shift the Start/Finish to elsewhere in Ojai. We’ve done it before for C4P, so this won’t be a “new” experience. Just hope that fires don’t totally dork things up…

Reaching our on-ridge aid stations by 4 wheel drive vehicles can only be accomplished using the one and only road to the top, out of the Rose Valley campground. The road is steep (you’ll find out just how much during the event) and its composition especially fragile (for vehicular travel) when recently rained upon. Almost every year after winter has reasonably departed, a ranger crew levels out the ruts, displaces the larger rocks/boulders, and attends to other erosion. If the rangers tell us the road isn’t suitable for vehicles, we don’t go up the road. If we don’t go up the road, much of our planned support for you diminishes greatly, which then shifts emphasis for your well-being to just the off-ridge aid stations.

How are we planning for the worst? For starters, we’re tagging each weekend starting 2/14 for a chance to use vehicles to at least load in the fluids. And we can hope that sometime in advance of that weekend, and continuing through to C2M, the rangers will have suitable conditions to clear the road for our vehicles. Secondly, and glad that we have many able-bodied volunteers, we’ll likely re-distribute some people, so that those who can reach the ridge using their own leg and back strength, can carry in bare minimum supplies and treats (that does not include blankets to warm your weary souls…) to get you on your way to a more bountiful station off-ridge. The second tactic is fairly under our control; the first is not.

Should we not get fluids to the top before the event, because of persistent wet weather preventing use of the road to the ridge, you should plan to do this: (1) use a hydration system (we once called those “water bottles”) that will allow you to motor between 11 and 18 miles (100M’ers) or 11 and 14 miles (100K’ers). There are a couple natural water sources out there, and we’ll let you know where those are, but for planning purposes, those won’t serve as regular, accessible water. (2) use a fuel containment system (aka “pack”) to carry whatever solids and drugs you’d likely need to cover those same distances, and under differing conditions – coolness of night, warmth under the daylight sun. And regardless of having fully-stocked on-ridge stations, your clothing needs for a potentially big swing in temperatures off- and on-ridge may dictate more room in your FCS (“pack”) for such comfort. (3) if you love the adventure that risk offers you, and you elect to minimize your preparation under either (1) or (2) above, and you drift into an on-ridge station with even a slight indication of stress and whineyhood, we’ll likely just pat you on your popo and nudge you out of the station towards homebase, for we surely don’t want you out on the ridge putting our volunteers and the event at risk just to satisfy your personal thrills for danger.

Check the C2M website, certainly not later than a few days before C2M, to get the latest news on how weather may impact the week’s/weekend’s frivolity…