Adventure Racing World Championships 2013, Costa Rica

Enduro

The ARWC started yesterday out in Costa Rica. About 60 or so teams are racing. There is one Irish team out there called "Get No Sleep", and there are 3 occassional boardsies on the team (all the lads).

It's expected the winners will take about 6 days to finish, but its impossible to predict accurately given the nature of the terrain they are racing in (jungle, mangrove swamps, white water rivers, tidal bays, high altiitude trekking etc etc).

Good luck to Get No Sleep. All the teams can be tracked live here. The lads will be happy to complete the course (which would be a big achievement given the past history of this particular race). At the front of the field team Seagate from New Zealand, the defending world champions, would be most people's pick to win. Plenty of other good teams (and former world champs) are there to win too. It would be good to see the British teams do well too, of which Addidas Terrex/Prunesco look the strongest and could well be in the hunt for a podium finish.

mdlb

Don't see their tracker on the course???

Enduro

Yeah, it looks like their tracker is dead. It's showing them as still on the start line. grrrrrr! Usually the race organisers will know this and get it sorted at the next available opportunity. We should still see their check-in times at the major transitions/CPs hopefully.

shotgunmcos

Jesus the distances per section and the terrain to boot... Jesus... I guess it is the ARWC but ... Jesus :eek:

Ironman... Pah

shotgunmcos

Get No Sleep through the first MTB stage in a bit over 20 hours

nerraw1111

shotgunmcos wrote: »

Get No Sleep through the first MTB stage in a bit over 20 hours

That's some "first stage." Amazing event.

Enduro

Good to see "Get No Sleep" have a working tracker again. Think they're sleeping in transition right now. They seem to be racing very well and are in amongst much more experienced teams on the leaderboard. Good performance from them. Hopefully they can keep it up.

No big surprises up front at the moment either, with Seagate (Kiwis) and Axa (French/Swedish) battling it out at the head of the field, and Silva (Swedish) not too far behind. They've been the best teams in the world for the last few years.

From the reports it sounds like one tough race. Definitely going to be more of an adventure than a speed event!

Oryx

I just had a look at the route, my jaw is on the floor.

shotgunmcos

Seagate back to second. Thule got the jump on them when they got stuck in mud. A lot of teams will have to spend the night in the swamp with the Crocs while the lead teams do the 2km 90kmh zip line, in the dark :eek: Get No Sleep still there about a third of the way through the first trek.

The reports are worth the read! EPIC stuff

Enduro

Yup, it's great to watch. No doubting the epicness of the Mangrove kayaking stage. Man, there were teams all over the place in there. Poor Get No Sleep have yet to start it. I actually hope they decide to shortcut some of it. Axa Addidas, a very good team with typically excellent scandanavian navigation skills got murdered in there. It was very interesting watching all the changes in the top 10. It's a very dynamic race indeed. And we're not even half way yet, with what everyone assumed would be the crux stage (the massive trek, including the highpoint of the race, and journeying through rarely indiginously populated areas) still to come.

Whilst I'd love to be out there racing, this one really looks tough tough tough. All the teams will have to dig very deep indeed.

Enduro

The dot-watching continues....

It still looks like super racing at the front. Thule held onto their lead for a long time, but Seagate grabbed it back on the high altitude climb and look to be building a convincing margin (hard to see them loosing from here, to be honest. They're such an amazing team). Columbia are storming too... looks like they might even catch Thule. The top British team of Addidas-Prunesco look to be coming through the field steadily too since an earlier hiccup of some kind. So much going on.

Get No Sleep appear to have taken a tactical decision to skip a bunch of controls in the mangrove swamp and paddle straight to the next transition. I reckon that was a brilliant decision. Chances are they would have missed the cut-off if they didn't do that, and given the linear nature of the course there are very few opportunities to make those kind of calls. A lot of teams are going to end up being short coursed or eliminated without doubt.

El Director

I had the absolute pleasure of visiting Costa Rica in Aug, lads if you are into your adventure activities then this country is a dream! I loved it! Beautiful rainforests and mountains etc...

mossym

Enduro wrote: »

Get No Sleep appear to have taken a tactical decision to skip a bunch of controls in the mangrove swamp and paddle straight to the next transition. I reckon that was a brilliant decision..

for the unfamiliar, what's the penalty for skipping controls?

Enduro

mossym wrote: »

for the unfamiliar, what's the penalty for skipping controls?

Strictly speaking, they will be unranked. (The rules vary from race to race... some races have great rules in place for dealing with these sort of scenarios).

More than likely the vast majority of teams will have missed controls by the time the race finishes, so most of the field could end up unranked. The organisers will probably rank them in some way, but to be honest it doesn't really matter that much. The teams will more than likely have the prriorty of experiencing as much of the course as possible (especially the more unusual/fun bits), and will be enjoying racing each other head to head on the ground.

Oryx

Im really curious about the logistics of something like this.
How much time would you get to sleep on a race like that, also I presume they must be self sufficient, what do they eat?

Enduro

Oryx wrote: »

Im really curious about the logistics of something like this.
How much time would you get to sleep on a race like that, also I presume they must be self sufficient, what do they eat?

The teams will have access to gear boxes at transitions. From looking at some of the photos of the races instructions I've seen online I would assume the whole system works like this (And this is pretty standard):

The teams will have been given a long list of mandatory gear on the website in the months leading up to the race, which will be broken down into disciplines. They'll also know if they need to bring their own gear boxes, or if the race will provide them.

A day or two before the race, probably when the teams do their initial registration, they will have been given an overall outline of the course (the number of stages/transitons and a rough estimate of how long they will take), along with a list of what gear boxes will be available at each transition. It looks like in this race the gear boxes were labelled A,B,C etc. Probably one is a kayak gear box, one is a trekking box, one is general box (for food, spare clothes, spare batteries or whatever) etc. Each box will probably have a maximum wieght limit too. So they will be told that at T4 boxes C and D will be available, for example.

One of the most taxing tasks the team then has is to pack their gear boxes so that they will have access to everything they need for each stage. They have to work out wha food to put in themselves, and have everything packed and labelled so it can be easily retrieved when needed (bearing in mind that the whole team could be zombies by that time). Get this wrong and you could be planting a bomb that will go off later in the race itself that will be impossible to recover from. Most teams expend a huge amount of mental energy getting this right, and it will usually take them right up to the deadline for handing in the gear boxes to the race orginisation (often a day or 2 later).

Sometimes when you work out the logistics you figure out that you will need to move gear from one box to another in the middle of the race at a transition, and have to make sure that this is noted and emphasised so it actually happens (again everyone could be zombied in that transition).

So what they eat needs to fit into the gearboxes, and not blow weight limits. After that its personal choice. Variety is key. From experience, the more real food the better. But of course the food needs to be varied, energy dense, and survive for up to 8 days in a gear box in tropical heat. A lot of it will have to be locally bought too, unless you want to spend hundreds of Euros on excess baggage fees getting it to the race.

If a team passes a shop/cafe en-route, and the timing is right (particularly in the latter part of the race) they'll often take advantage of the opportunity. Again, real food works best, so these are big opportunities. Race organisers usually try and keep routes as far from civilisation as possible, so normally these opportunities are rare. (and the team will need to be carrying local currency too of course).

Sleep strategy is a huge part of overall race strategy. All sorts of theories abound on what is best. In general for a race like this most teams would sleep for 2-3 hours every 24 hour day. But you might have noticed that the top teams can push that harder. Thule seemed to only take one sub 2 hour sleep before their mandatory 4 hour stop at the mid race transition (which would have been a definite strategy). Seagate took one or two more sleeps. If you're too sleep deprived you move slower and potentially start to make more mistakes. So its a balancing act. Slower teams generally sleep more. But more than 4 hours per day would be considered luxurious and basically wasting time.

Sleep deprivation is the thing I find hardest in AR. It's a particular issue for the navigator(s) on a team, as they need to be thinking clearly pretty much all the time. The good teams will protect their navigator and unload him/her of all unneccesay burdens as a consequence.

woody1

the active channel are constantly repeating the one from portugal from a few years ago, only an hour programme so it doesnt really give a full picture of what the competitors are going thru but it was good all the same

on youtube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U46v6du9WM8

Oryx

Thanks Enduro, that is a fascinating insight. You think about the physical parts of such a challenge, but it is all about logistical preparation too. I can see how getting that wrong could destroy an otherwise competitive team.

mossym

Oryx wrote: »

Thanks Enduro, that is a fascinating insight. You think about the physical parts of such a challenge, but it is all about logistical preparation too. I can see how getting that wrong could destroy an otherwise competitive team.

is someones interest getting piqued?

Oryx

mossym wrote: »

is someones interest getting piqued?

Physically incapbable but god yeah, Id love to attempt something like that. It sounds like an amazing thing to do.

Enduro

Well then why not target something like the beast of Ballyhoura here. It's a good intro to the (real) sport of AR. I somehow doubt that you're physically incapable!

shotgunmcos

A good "intro" indeed Oryx

The chirripo trekking stage is bleedin epic. 2.5 back to back marathons after that massive mangrove maze :eek: And the conditions are super cloudy up there in them 3.5k+ peaks :eek: I can just about get my head around understanding what a stage must be like. The race as a whole is something else. Even madder reading about the mistakes these professional teams are making I'm reading a short book about primal quest in Utah at the moment. These AR folk are seriously fit, seriously tough and mad as a bag of cats!

shotgunmcos

Get no sleep are making good progress. Just a couple of hours left on the long bike stage then onto the trek. Great race up front. Thule holding off Seagate. Just an hour between them with Columbia Vidaraid closing on them both

shotgunmcos

Thought I saw get no sleep out on the trek but now back at the start of it I guess I did check it at about 2am after arriving in from a party so I could have been seeing things!
Seagate were charging away last night too but seem to have made a very costly mistake on the paddle. Thule now in the driving seat. Colombia not far off Seagate now either. While this seems to be the podium for now, what order Teams could be taking naps,temporarily changing the order. No telling how together or zombified the teams are after 5 days of constant racing. The 156km MTB stage will decide it. Can't for life of me work out where team #46 are off to either

shotgunmcos

Short clip of the leaders Thule on the rafting stage. Already 6 gruelling days of constant racing done with a few naps. Now 5.5 hours of pure teamwork and concentration on rapids Just a 65km river paddle, short trek, 156km mountain bike and another whitewater raft stage for competitors to look forward to after it :eek:
http://www.breathemag.ca/flashblog/2013/12/08/video-thule-rafting/

shotgunmcos

Whoa Seagate out!! Thule nearly out of sight now, Columbia for second but... Super 5 way battle for the last podium spot!!

http://www.breathemag.ca/flashblog/2013/12/08/fight-for-4th-become-battle-for-podium/

EDIT: I was wondering what team #46 were up to earlier but now I'm concerned for the Irish team including some boardies. Team #47 , Get No Sleep, where the hell are you going???!!!

Enduro

Crap tablet keyboard here so will be brief. I think get no sleep are being ferried by the race organisation, probably to the rafting start. Teams were were offered that option to skip the big trek apparently, obviously at the cost of going unranked. Get no sleep are already unranked so they are picking and choosing which parts of the course they can complete.

Unbelievable stuff up front. Unbelievable rare to see seagate having to withdraw.

groovyg

Its unbelievable to see Seagate come this far and now out of the race with trench foot according to the ARWC Fb page. There are still a good few teams out on the trek, considering it took the top teams over 36hours and more to get through it, its gonna be a long hike for some of those teams still out there.

shotgunmcos

Enduro wrote: »

Crap tablet keyboard here so will be brief. I think get no sleep are being ferried by the race organisation, probably to the rafting start. Teams were were offered that option to skip the big trek apparently, obviously at the cost of going unranked. Get no sleep are already unranked so they are picking and choosing which parts of the course they can complete.

Unbelievable stuff up front. Unbelievable rare to see seagate having to withdraw.

Looks like you are spot on as usual! They skipped both long trek and subsequent cycle. I'm sure they will be mad for the rafting now.

Just when it looked like Thule were away Columbia are gaining and the chase gang are moving. Thule had better bike splits but no guessing what shape they are in. Any mistake on the long cycle and Adidas Terrex et al could make it interesting!

Enduro

Thule looking good for the win. Their tracker hasn't updated in a while, but they are still motoring apparently. It'd be interesting to know if they have been informed that Seagate are out. Columbia are the revelation of the race. They've really stepped up a level. And a cracking race going on behind for 3rd. Anyone could emerge. Love seeing two of my original team-mates from the ARWC last year in the mix (2 of the Brazillians on BMS).

Rules for participation in the ARWC itself are changing next year so that teams have to be nationality based. Next year 3 of the 4 racers have to be the same nationality, and the following year it will be all 4. The interesting thing about that is that rules out Thule as currently constituted (and their winning combination from 2 years ago) from participating!

Peterx

A retrograde rule change.
Teams should be allowed get the best talent they can muster.
On the other it will possibly make for closer racing?