The Wilderness ARC
Time and Tide
Rob Howard / 31.05.2006
On Wednesday morning the hub of the race is the village of Stontian, where the combined TA5 and 7 is set up on grassy fields at the side of Loch Sunnart. Though its only a small village Strontian is a central point in this remote area and has a shop/post office/garage and a visitor centre. With Event Scotland and World Series flags flying, and banners and tents set up, the transition is easy to spot for the teams coming in off the ride around Argour. They can see the flags, a huge Mountain Hardwear dome tent used as a medical facility, and the canoe trailers across the waters of the loch as they ride in along the road. Most of the teams are still on the way to transition 5, and mid morning there were a group of 5 teams gathered at TA4 and getting ready to start the ride. These included Spartans and Spirit of Adventure who are both now unranked. Spartans missed CP11 and then spent 90 minutes searching for CP13, got quite lost and when they reached a road were taken to TA4.
Spirit of Adventure were taken there by vehicle last night, and when they restarted on the ride, Katherine Poole decided to stick with the car and will meet the team again at T5. The Italian team also had navigational problems and missed CP11, but Race Director Phil Humphreys has given them a 1 hour penalty. “Technically they should be unranked,� he said, “but they spent 90 minutes looking for it and are at the back of the race anyway, so a penalty is sufficient.�
The teams coming into TA5 are taking into account the tidal conditions when deciding whether to sleep there and for how long, and their stops are shuffling positions on the leader board. Superfeet came into and out of transition while Accelerate slept, so they moved up a place. They also heard the news the Swedish team PS Communications were the first to withdraw from the race. (Moving Superfeet into 3rd.)See All Event Posts
