Team Cyanosis; Two Big Races in Two Weekends
Team Cyanosis / 29.03.2015
Two weeks and two long distance races in the mountains of South Africa ...
Team Cyanosis have just completed back to back weekends of adventure racing in two seperate parts of the country. The first weekend saw the full team of Hilary Pitchford-Bruss, Clinton Mackintosh, Nathan Thompson and Nicholas Mulder competing in the Kinetic Double Moon race in the Northern Drakensberg region over 200km.
It was a fast-paced race, despite the mountainous terrain, with Team Cyanosis racing tooth and nail against fellow Gauteng based Team Jabberwock. There were constant changes in discipline from mountain hikes, to single-track mountain biking and river and flat water kayaking in the areas surrounding Mont-Aux-Sources Hotel, All Out Adentures, the Mweni Valley and Woodstock Dam.
Over a period of 27 hours, the two teams were never seperated by more than 15 minutes, creating immense pressures and adrenaline spikes for team members on both teams, with frequent route choices in the navigation seperating them from view. The weather played it's part as well, throwing down one or two short rain and hail storms over the 31 racing teams. Unfortunately for Cyanosis, it was Jabberwock who came through victors at the end as they pulled away from Cyanosis half-way through the last 50km bike leg.
The second place finish was a dissapointment for the team, who had targeted a win for the race. Valuable lessons have been learnt however from this experience and it will now be up to Cyanosis to ensure they race better and stronger in future. Team Jabberwock are to be praised for lifting their game to a new level, racing superbly and taking a deserved win. It's now up to Cyanosis again to step up to the plate!
The following weekend saw Nicholas Mulder and Clinton Mackintosh driving down to the Witteberge of the Eastern Cape for the Non-Stop Wartrail Challenge. This is a 275km race for teams of two in the Lady Grey, Wartrail and Aliwal North regions. It runs parallel to the Wartrail Challenge itself, which takes place in 3 stages over 3 days, comprising of a 61km mountain run, a 152km mountain bike and a 62km kayak down the Orange River. The team had a support crew made up of Nathan (resting his legs for Two Oceans) and team biokineticist, Chris Nel.
The team started with the 60km mountain run between Lady Grey and Balloch Farm (a.k.a. the first half of the Salomon Skyrun) just after 7am on Sunday. Careful planning was needed to decide at what time the team would start so as to avoid the darkzone on Monday morning, as teams may not start paddling the 3rd and final leg down the Orange River until proper daylight shortly after 6am. The team factored in a 10-hour run over the Witteberge and a 12 hour mountain bike given that heavy rains had fallen on the Saturday, creating a potential mud nightmare. On the postive side, the downpours would at least raise the level of the Orange river slightly, speeding up the kayaking and hopefully hiding some of the infamous sandbanks.
Clinton and Nicholas were thankfully greeted by superb weather conditions on the day, overcast weather but with no rain and 20'C temperatures; in other words ideal running conditions. Taking advantage of the good weather the pair made good time and were well ahead of their target pace at all the checkpoints along the mountain run, arriving at Balloch Farm in 8h52, a few minutes faster than the winning athlete on the staged event the day before.
The team spent a quick 30 minutes in the transition wolfing down food and rehydrating before setting out on their bikes with an hour of daylight left. The GPS-marked mountain bike route has changed once again from previous years, now taking in various Wartrail and New England farms on the south side of the Witteberge. This makes it even hillier and this year's route featured 5 off-track sections which the organisers thankfully mowed. It made for tough riding, particularly at night, and even included a couple of bike portages.
Despite this, the course proved to be superb, full of challenging and interesting terrain. The dry conditions had dried the course out nicely, with hardly any mud to be found. A big thanks must go to Nathan and Chris who drove and supported the pair at each of the 5 support points along the route!
Cyanosis made it into Mdlokovana Village on a mountain overlooking the Orange River at about 4.30am after 11 hours of riding. This was once again an hour faster than anticipated, but after a quick breakfast provided by the organisers and a bit of time changing and getting the boat ready, there was no time to sleep before the pair were heading down to the River, joining the Wartrail stage racers on their 3rd and final day of racing for the 6am paddle start.
The river was running at about 140 cumecs, a nice forgiving level with few rapids. Despite this, the team took a 'wake-up' swim at the first set of waves, but then settled down for the remainder of the paddle, covering the 62km in 4h47.
The heavens opened during the paddle, making up for the previous dry day as the paddlers encountered sporadic downpours. This last leg was tough after consecutive mountain run and biking sections through the night, and although paddlers were already wet from the rapids before the downpours started, it always makes it mentally tougher! A final time of 27h47 gave Cyanosis a clear win in the Non-Stop event, defending their title from last year. The team was thrilled with this result which saw Nicholas and Clinton racing strongly and effectively over the full distance, a nice rebound after the previous week's dissapointment.
The full team now heads into a recovery and final peaking phase before Expedition Africa in Swaziland in June in 10 weeks time. This is a World Series race and will feature some of the best teams from around the world. Currently there are 23 teams entered, 11 from overseas countries. Cyanosis will be aiming on improving it's current World Ranking of 22nd, hopefully to somewhere in the mid-teens as the team hasn't maxed out on its number of events counting in the rankings as yet.
The team are looking forward to returning to Swaziland, where Cyanosis had a long romance with the Swazi Xtreme adventure race, winning 4 of the races in the mid and late-2000s. Tough navigation, mountainous terrain, cold nights and superb Swazi hospitality are all the aspects that Cyanosis are looking forward to!
Team Cyanosis is proud to have the following brands supporting them:
- First Ascent outdoor apparel, Salomon adventure footwear, Petzl headlamps and Foodstate vitamins and supplements.
- Specialized bikes and accessories, Concept Cyclery in Fourways and Melrose Arch, Form & Fitness Sport Supplements, BOS Ice Tea and Race Food (Real Food, Serious Energy).
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