Polaris Challenge

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Wheels Across Wiltshire

Jon Forsyth / 30.03.2006

After a spending ages thinking about taking part in the Polaris Challenge again I finally sent my entry form off and the rest was a start line story. The normal excuse of ‘it’s miles away’ didn’t wash as I live only 20 miles away and it was a good event as any to enter. My training consisted 2 Dynamic Adventure races and a dose of the flu 2 weeks before hand. (Mental note do more training!). I spent the week before trying to get my gear down to a sensible weight, leaving out all the heavy stuff and trying to go light!

I turned up the Saturday to receive my map and dibber and to sign my life away. I steered away from the Plantfear boys selling all that lovely Rab gear (cheap) to go to Wilfs instead, a cup of tea and sausage buttie was the healthy start I needed instead.

After plotting the campsite and trying to get to grips with my imaginary route I then realised I couldn’t find the start from the campsite, it’s a good job the organisers are helpful! Once I got to the handout section everyone was given a score sheet telling them which checkpoints were active and what they were worth. Oh well, so much for all my planning!! The new plan was now to try to get about 100 points then get to the campsite with in a 7 hour time limit.

Once I’d been riding round the Wiltshire countryside for about 2 hours I found the mud had a strange attraction to my bike and me. Up and down hills for a bit longer, stopping at the garage to take on a water stop. A big thanks, to the guy who gave me the litre of water. Watered and fuelled up off I went to bag more points.

Then it started to rain.

Then I got my first puncture.See All Event Posts