FAYETTEVILLE — Competitors in the 13th annual Captain Thurmond’s Challenge found the new layout of the course through the New River Gorge bold and audacious Saturday. And, at times, a bit confusing. But Howard Tidwell of Knoxville, Tenn., emerged from the ironman event as the individual winner, completing the course in 3 hours, 24 minutes and 15 seconds.

“I feel like there are some really good bikers out there — I think a lot of them took a wrong turn — I’m not a good biker,” Tidwell said. “My goal coming in here was to survive the bike. I’ve kayaked a lot because I wanted to do good in the kayak and the run. I think I got an advantage when all the bikers took the wrong turn.”

Tidwell still had a bit of a home-course advantage — he used to live in the Fayetteville area.

“I did the first one when they had it,” he said. “I came back for this one.”

Tidwell found the whole course very challenging.

“The run is just a grunt and that was OK,” he said. “I borrowed a really fast boat from a friend of mine and that helped me. You needed a fast boat today because the water was so low. What made it extra tough is it being a Saturday there was a lot of raft traffic out there. There’s all these rafts and you have to pick a straight line through them.”

The team winner was the Redneck Kayak Club of Max Riggs, Nick Simpson and Nick Lucento. Each member competed in a different segment, the 11-mile bike segment, the 8-mile watercraft leg or the 8-mile run.

The relay squad was fourth overall as Riggs completed the cycling portion of the event and handed off to Simpson.

“It was fun,” Riggs said. “I’m just glad that we won.”

The team held its position in fourth overall as Simpson completed the watercraft leg and turned things over to Lucento for the final 8-mile run.

“It was very long and painful,” Simpson said. “I couldn’t feel my arms by the end of it.”

Lucento picked his way through the field and crossed the line with an overall team time of 3 hours, 20 minutes and 49 seconds.

“It’s the hardest course I’ve ever run,” Lucento said. “I had to basically gut it out. I didn’t know where to go, so I was questioning the turns I made and all kinds of stuff. I just started passing people. I had to finish. I couldn’t let the other team members down.”

Despite the slight problems with the new course layout, the organizers were pleased.

“It’s going great,” event coordinator Adam Stephens said. “There were a lot of just different surprises and things. We’re working out a lot of the bugs with this new race format. We had to work out some different logistical issues. We still had a couple during the race, which caused some problems, but in the end, I think everyone had a really great time. It was a good experience, which is the best of things, and a lot of really nice people showed up.”

The Upshur Three was the second relay squad in with a time of 3:32:31.

John Webber of the Upshur Three won the bike segment, completing it in one hour, 17 minutes.

“It was a nice challenging section,” the Buckhannon resident said. “Fun trails. They were cleared out very well. One spot, there was a little bit of indecision about which way to go. Some people had some trouble with that. I luckily knew which way to go and that seemed to work out well for me.”

Morgantown’s Nori Onishi continued to hold the top spot for the Upshur Three through the kayak segment, finishing with a time of 1:02:28.

“It was very stressful, due to the fact that I was number one in the race,” he said. “If I got passed, it would be shameful. I was paddling as fast as possible.

The final leg fell to Buckhannon’s Rachel Webber.

“I had to run up out of the gorge,” she said. “The first four miles were very difficult and I had to do a lot of walking and running. After that, it became pretty fun. Just a lot of up-and-down rolling hills.

“They got to go downriver and mountain bike downhill and I had that run up out of the gorge, so yeah, I had the hardest part.”

Oak Hill’s Emily Chaney won the women’s solo title and finished 14th overall with a time of 4:07:38.

“I did a relay last year,” she said. “This is the first time doing it by myself.

“It was a new challenge. I can do it all, except for maybe the river part, but I did all right.”

Chaney was pleased with her overall performance on the rugged course layout.

“I’m really happy actually,” she said. “I couldn’t believe that I won. Everybody was really good and it was a lot of fun.”

The event began with 45 individuals or relay teams competing. Forty completed the course this year. Stephens is already working out the bugs and preparing for next year’s event.

“My first time being in charge of this, which is a very established race, so there’s already a high bar set for it, I’ve just tried to keep it at the quality that it has been,” he said. “I had to learn what I had to learn in my first year doing this.”

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