Grabbing 'The Bull' by The Horns
Lisa de Speville / 03.05.2005
There are barely two months to go before racers line up for the start of The Bull of Africa, a 500km non-stop expedition adventure race in the mountainous desert environment of South Africa's Northern Cape Province.One of the most recent international additions to The Bull's limited field is Speleo Explorer Salomon from Poland. Victorious at the Bergson Winter Challenge in Poland in early March, one of the 10 World Championship Series qualifying races, they will be challenged by many other teams vying for a podium position at The Bull.
Based on the results from this weekend's Swazi Xtreme, an annual 250km held in Swaziland - an independent Kingdom within South Africa's borders - the final four places allocated to South African teams have been confirmed. Tension Structures, 8848, Century 2000 and Subaru bring the total number of South African entries up to 17.
Race check-in begins on Thursday, 23 June at the Augrabies Falls National Park, near the town of Upington. It is here, within the Park, that the Gariep River (also known as the Orange River) plummets over the granite plateau, dropping a total of 191m into a swirling pool that has been gouged out over thousands of years by the force of the water. The Park, a popular tourist attraction, provides a fitting introduction to the Northern Cape's semi-desert environment and is a suitable base for pre-race proficiency testing.
Returning from another few weeks spent out on the course, race directors Hano and Sonja Otto reported that they saw "fresh leopard tracks all over. There were also many klipspringers [small antelope] and dassies [hyrax/rock rabbit] around, which we don't usually see during the day in summer. The usually sweltering daytime temperatures are much more tolerable now that winter is approaching".
The Otto's have again affirmed that competitors will encounter terrain that will be hard ... very hard on their feet. And, fresh water will be scarce - especially up in the mountains. But they say, "there are fresh water springs literally in the middle-of-nowhere. The Golden Rule in this area is to always fill-up with water."
