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Latest reports from the Girls on the Ground ...

lynne.oxenham@nzblood.co.nz (LyyneO for Karyn and Annie) — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 14:42:34 +0000

Messages from Karyn (Orionhealth.com support crew)

Message 1

Things are running a little later than pre race guestimates.

We were expecting the top teams through here at 4 am and are still waiting at 12.30! Hopefully they arrive soon as the cut off for the kayak start is 3.30 and they will be very light on food.

I understand that the website tracking has been a bit off. Orionhealth.com and Nike are pretty close with a slight advantage possibly with Nike. Apparently cp17 had two indistinct tracks from it, Nike took one ond Orionhealth.com the other, both had problems getting out of there.

It was pretty cold last night so the hot food was moved forward to the end of the mtb, unfortunatly there was none
left by the time Orionhealth.com came through or for the Assistance Area 2 (A2) as it was originally planned for. However, the media report they are still looking good and moving well.

The Kiwi team racing, Nga Rakau, caught up with a few hours sleep leaving A2 at 11.30. Things seem to be going as planned for them. No other kiwis have been sighted that I have heard.

Message 2

Well after a flying transition Orionheath.com left A2 a few mins before Nike and with 2 hours to get on the water. The entire stage sounded a bit of a nightmare though all teams have been having the same issues.

They will make the cut off along with Nike and maybe FJS though it means waiting to sleep 'til after the kayak in approx 5 hrs time. They will have to do so on the course - in the open as they opted not to carry
the tents etc and we are not allowed to drop them to them. Still, many of the teams will need to do this and those that miss the cut off will have to walk around.

Latest Blog from Annie (Nga Rakau support crew)

Leaving TA2

We're just about to leave Transition Area 2 (TA2) at the top of the mountain.

Nga Rakau arrived at about 9am, pretty tired, but things going according to plan so far. They slept at the TA for about 1.5 hours, and headed off on the downhill MTB. They're still on track to make the 'white-water' river by 3:30pm, after that teams will have to complete that leg on foot during the dark zone. (Apparently the flow is low and there's not much white water.)

At 12:30pm we're still waiting for Orion to arrive.
At last report from Geoff Hunt, both Nike & Orion had had difficulties after CP17A. There were two indistinct tracks leading out of the valley, they each took a different one. Nike bailed after a while, and headed for the road. At that point Chris thought they were on an out-of-bounds section of road, so they crossed the road under a culvert, and scaled a difficult bluff to avoid the road. That section wasn't in fact out of bounds, and they could have walked straight across it.

Orion by that time had apparently 'disappeared into the bush'.

They have both made it to subsequent checkpoints, but Geoff said that valley was full of long grass and rocks and was particularly difficult going. At this stage both of them have collected all the regular checkpoints and bonus checkpoints. [Lynne - note that Sleepmonsters reports Orionhealth.com have actually missed at least one point which unfortunately we can't confirm as the GPS tracking is not working]

He likes the look of the Czechs who have been through this TA (2) and have started on stage 3. They have collected all of the regular checkpoints and none of the bonus checkpoints.
Team Outdoor Action have a similar strategy, but he said they 'didn't look so good'. And apparently the Poles are another team to look out for.

Hopefully Orion will turn up here soon. We were required to wait here for 1.5 hours after Nga Rakau had left, but we're just about to leave. I don't know how many checkpoints they've actually collected at this stage.

And into Day Two ...

lynne.oxenham@nzblood.co.nz (LynneO for Karyn) — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 21:30:36 +0000

Message from Karyn and the Nga Rakau support crew out on the course ...

We are currently waiting at a checkpoint on the leg 7 mountainbike. Hot soup and portugese meat and bread available for all.

The start today was pretty spectacular from a castle partway up/or down some pretty big hills. The whole trek was very very steep but Orionhealth.com completed it faster than expected by two hours. They arrived 3 mins behind Nike but left before them by the same margin. Both teams last seen biking down the road together. This mountain bike leg is also very high and there's a lot of fog about, pretty cool too though no wind thankfully. It should make for some interesting nav!

Nga Rakau is moving through the course well though opting out of some of the optional check points to allow for some time up their sleeve for later in the course when there is much less choice.

All our kiwis are looking good. No dramas so far, a few bulges were discovered in Wayne's tyre after the first day resulting in a scramble to a bike shop for a new one.

Our teams have also managed to escape the multi activity confusion yesterday where some teams were not given the points as they gathered over the 100 points specified, Nike included. I am not too sure if this ruling will stick as it wasn't particually clear and many achieved their 100 points by chance rather than specific activity choice.

Til next time Karyn, Annie and Son'

Extract from Annie's Race Blog ...

Midway Stage 2

We're now waiting at TA2, high up a mountain. The night is very cold and windy.

We left the cool little town of Fajao about 3 hours ago. There was a checkpoint in the main street, and a room in a building that opened on to the street (as they all do on those narrow cobbled streets) with food and hot soup for the teams.

It's slightly odd with the middle of the field coming through the checkpoints first, but around 7pm Nike arrived, followed 10 minutes later by Orion. Both teams pushing hard, and having collected all the checkpoints and bonuses so far.

At the end of the previous leg (trek leg 6), Nike had arrived first by about 3 minutes from Orion, with Orion transitioning slightly faster to leave about a minute ahead. Orion looked good, and were happy with their route choice and nav on the leg. Lundhags were just running up the road as we left the checkpoint, about 20 minutes behind the other two.

There's still a little confusion over the status of Nike's bonus checkpoint from the first leg of the first stage. They collected 105 points, and were not given the CP, as apparently the requirement was to get exactly 100 points. I don't think any of the teams realised that, and it will no doubt be disputed.

Nga Rakau had left the Fajao checkpoint before we arrived, they were riding up a huge hill on the way out of town as we drove down in to it. All looked happy enough.

We don't expect any teams to turn up here now for several hours.

Part way through the Prologue & Texts from the finish

lynne.oxenham@nzblood.co.nz (LynneO for Karyn) — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 00:20:14 +0000

Well I am sitting on the point at Cabo da roca one of the spectator points on the forts trek.

The multi stage finished with some confusion, despite the Race organizers stating it was not in the spirit of the race many teams chose not to partake in the multi-activity instead opting to go straight to the rollerblading. There was some confusion as to the placement of some of the activities resulting in some back tracking by a lot of the teams. However, eventually all teams made it onto the rollerblade section following the cycleway along the coast into the wind, sand and rain ending in a slight uphill.

Currently Orionhealth.com are on a trek following a pretty windy stretch of coastline. From what I can tell Lundhges are in the lead of those who completed the multi activities, but I have no idea as to who was where after that as I wasn't there to see which of the teams missed this section. Currently Orionhealth.com are 30 mins down on 1st and still not through this checkpoint. Nga Raku are further back after some clip card issues.

Photo courtesy of www.ARWC2009.com

Til next time

Karyn

POST PROLOGUE TEXT FROM WAYNEO - We didn't have a great start with a bit of a random set of activties, but we fought hard and made up some time on the leaders, which was pleasing.

POST PROLOGUE TEXT FROM FIONA McBRYDE (Team Nga Rakau) - Had a bit of a steep learning curve in Stage 1. We didn't realise the first "multi" leg was optional and subsequently ran out of time for the trek and missed 2 Checkoints - Doh! Am planning to be much more careful now and work our way back. We must make a 9pm "gate" on Wednesday so will need to plan our race very carefully. We are in good spirits and looking forward to the challenge and cheering our friends Orion on!

Counting down to the start ...

lynne.oxenham@nzblood.co.nz (LynneO for Karyn) — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 00:19:05 +0000

Well its the day before the prologue.

The teams are doing last minute packing and shopping. Most of the teams have arrived so we have managed to catch up with Aaron Prince (Lundhags), Robbie Preston (Blackheart) and a few of the others that the teams know from previous races. There are a lot of teams racing unsupported and I think it is a definite advantage to be running supported even if a lot of the transitions are only gear drops - it saves a lot of planning time for the teams.

It looks like tomorrow will be based around this area with a lot of shorter stages and activities expected to take up to 8 hours or so. We then travel about 4 hours northish to stay the night in a stadium before starting again monday morning - hopefully with internet access we might be able to book accommodation nearby so we actually get some sleep amongst all the mayhem (all this is pieced from bits we have overheard or gleaned from the race organisers etc but nothing is confirmed until race briefing at 6pm tonight). Although we have most of the gear packed and sorted I think we are in for the long haul as briefing finishes at 9pm then there are 60 maps to sort through and stages to plan. The start tomorrow I believe is around 8 or 9 in the morning.

Overall the weather is looking good. Maybe some rain for Sunday but clearing up later in the week. There were reports of it reaching -5 on the course the other day so all support crews were shopping up on another layer of warmth!

It looks like we should be pretty busy over the race week with limited time between some of the transitions. I will be using Wayne's i-phone sending reports back to Lynne who will be updating the Orion website as well as feeding some info to Sportzhub and Sleep monsters. We will try to keep up to date with how OrionHealth.com, Nga Raku and the other kiwis racing in various teams are going as they progress through the race.

Well happy watching - the teams are appreciating all the messages of support we are forwarding on.

Til next time

Karyn

Off to Portugal

wayne.oxenham@orionhealth.com (Wayne Oxenham) — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 09:03:12 +0000

Only a few days of work left before heading off to Portugal for the World Champs. I've started a gear pile, it's possibly the biggest gear pile I've ever compiled for a race, with portage trolleys, roller blades, climbing gear, wet weather gear, the list just doesn't stop. I hope I can fit it all in a couple of bags. And I hope the airlines will take it easy on us. It's a long trip, so turning up a few days before official race activities begin will be good for some recovery and time to get prepared mentally.

We've managed to snag an interview on Close Up. Anna and I will be filming on Friday afternoon, so hope to give the sport a lift in terms of profile throughout NZ. Not sure if the interview will make the cut, or when it might be aired if it does, but it would be worth keeping an eye on it if you're interested. Don't be alarmed at my new haircut, it'll grow back! By the way Close Up is on TV1, at 7pm, following the 6pm news on week nights. If I find out when it's on I'll post something here, and maybe also on Sportzhub.

Well, better get back to some work before heading off to bed.

Brecon Beacons again

stuartlynch_nz@hotmail.com (Stuart Lynch) — Sat, 17 Oct 2009 01:41:29 +0000

Well the car was getting fixed which scuppered my plans for heading to the lake district for a few days so I looked into the train schedules to see what I could achieve closer to home.

Found that I could get a pretty cheap return ticket to Merthyr Tydvil which is on the edge of the beacons so I loaded up the pack and headed for the hills.

Got a great sunny first day of hiking as I made my way south crossing ridges and valleys before I eventually made it to the steep ridge overlooking Llyn Y Fan Fach (lake) where I camped for the night.

I didin't find time to get gas for the cooker so that meant cold dinner and no hot drinks but being in a populous country has it's advantages. I was making my way back to Merthyr following the peaks and saddles this time. The weather was taking a turn for the worse and I was starting to dream of hot food when out of the mist appeared a takeaway caravan selling just that. One bacon sandwich and hot coffee later I was on my way again and up Pen Y Fan, the highest point in the Brecons. For the 2nd time in a week I found myself at a misty summit in Wales with no view. Still, it had been a great couple of days out in the hills and I just had time to high tail it back down in to Merthyr to catch the late train back to Bristol.

Snowdonia

stuartlynch_nz@hotmail.com (Stuart Lynch) — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 15:58:05 +0000

Last weekend Fi and I took a trip to Betws-y-coed in North Wales. Neil and Karen drove down from Whitehaven to meet us and we had a great couple of days hiking and biking in Snowdonia. We made it up Snowden (highest peak in Wales) via Crib Goch - a very steep and narrow ridge line with what would have been very impressive drops to either side if we could see more than 50 metres or so. At the summit and along with several hundred others there (some of which had caught the train up) we were still stuck in the mist and had no view.

After the crowds of Snowden it was a relief to get off the beaten path as we found another impressive ridge with much fewer people on it that took us back to our hostel.

On Sunday we checked out some of the nearby MTB trails. Wales had fantastic biking although the rocks are sharp as Neil found when he managed to crash and put a good cut in his knee. Not enough to slow him down however and we managed to cram in some more singletrack before it was time to pack up the cars and head for home. And right on cue, the sun came out.

Aosheng Cup First International Cross Country Championship Of Desert Hiking, Xinjiang, China 2009

stuartlynch_nz@hotmail.com (Stuart Lynch) — Sat, 03 Oct 2009 11:28:41 +0000

The Chinese sure like their long titles.

Had an offer after racing at Wulong to stay on another week and do another race. The rest of the Orion team had other comittments but I was able to join with Marcel Hagener and Jacky and Mimi from Lafuma to make a team to compete in this next event.

We really didn't know what we were getting ourselves in to but the Chinese tend to always put on a pretty good show so we went with the flow and found ourselves up in the very north west of China on the start line for a 30km run through the desert.

It was a stark contrast to where we had been just previously. Wulong was all moutains, cliffs and forests. Here there were vast dry plains and sand dunes. Both very different and beautiful in their own way. One advantage Xinjiang had over Wulong was the food. In Wulong we were picking out the noodles and rice and other plain looking food. In Xinjiang we could eat just about everything on offer and it was delicious! The race itself was over fairly quickly, 3 hours of climbing sand dunes and striding down the other sides. By the time 30km was up we had a comfortable lead over the next team and took first place in the event.

That left us a bit of time for looking around town and keeping clear of the riot police (big security presence ahead of China's 60th anniversary) and then it was more buses, planes and sleeping in airports making our way back home again.

Rollerblading

pcbrent@gmail.com (Brent Edwards) — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 19:22:30 +0000

With ARWC not far away I thought it was time to dust off the Rollerblades.

Day 2 update (longer)

f.mcbryde@hotmail.com (Fiona McBryde) — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 10:03:43 +0000

This will be fairly brief as I'm pretty knackered and keen to get some sleep. First up on day two was tubing. 4 tubes, 2 planks, 4 bits of rope, build a raft and paddle it across the Dam. We did pretty well on this, coming in 2nd equal with Toread, a bit behind WinterExtrem5 who had used some cunning and brought hand paddles to help them along. As short run to the bikes and then a ride which seemed to go up and up forever. after the up there was some fairly technical single track along the side of a hill. It was very narrow with a steep drop on one side. Gordon managed to fall of the side early on and tumbled a few times down the hill. Fortunately both Gordon and his bike were undamaged so once he'd climbed back up we were able to carry on although Gordon did seem a bit more cautious after that. We picked up one place that we had lost so were 5th into the next transition. The next stage was a run with a 300m climb and then a very big descent back to the top of the dam. Part of this run was on a road blasted out of the cliff face. Spectacular with a huge vertical drop off the side. The sun also showed itself for the first time and we found ourselves struggling with the heat and the hills. Fortunately we were soon at the dam and off on a kayak stage which would take about 2 1/2 hours. After swapping people a few times to get the combinations right we made good progress and pulled away a little from a couple of teams that had shown up behind us. We were not quite at the rest stop, we had another few hundred metres to climb up some stairs and then more stairs in the tourist cave before finally being able to take a break. We were pretty done in by this stage though, the steep climbs and descents taking their toll on the legs. Salomon ran out of the rest stop just after we arrived which put them about 14 minutes ahead while Toread, WinterExtrem5 and Nike were further in front again. Once our time was up we ran off towards the raft. It was only a 6km downhill run but our legs were toasted and we lost about 4 minutes to the next chasing team who got on the water just after us. Apart from the occasional attack of cramps we rafted really well, pulling ahed of the team behind and as we neared the end of the stage we could see a team in front. It was Salomon and we made a mad dash for the ropes as we tried to catch them before the finish. An abseil back to the river and then back up and over the bridge - we closed in but they held us off by 20 seconds to leave us with 5th for the day and overall. One day remaining. It looks every bit as tough as the first two days. The first few positions are very close while we have a bit of a gap ahead and behind us. Anything can happen though so we're hoping we recover well tonight and look forward to another challenging day tomorrow.