The 2007 Adventure Race World Championship
Through the Small Isles
Rob Howard / 27.05.2007
After a chilly night it was a bright, sunny day for the start of ARWC2007 and from early morning teams were breaking camp and getting ready to start. As teams sorted their equipment Race Director Phil Humphreys went around the tents explaining the penalties from the Prologue the day before – he wasn’t the most welcome of visitors but only Buff Coolmax and SOLE protested against their penalties. There was little time to worry about yesterday however.Once the tents were packed the first port of call was the jetty where the kit boxes were laid out, where everyone collected their kayaking gear. The kayaks themselves were laid out by the main pier and the area was soon a melee of teams packing their boats, dressing, attaching flags and moving down to the water side. Almost inevitably it was a late start as they all tried to get on the water with 5 minutes to go and this was the cause of one unfortunate accident when Barclays Capital hit one of the boats from Team The North Face.
They thought it was holed and hauled it back out of the water to inspect the damage, shouting to race staff to give them some assistance. The press boat I was on left before I saw the outcome but with a whole day of sea paddling ahead any damage is bad news and it was the worst luck on the start line.
With the start rescheduled to 08.20 a rough line formed on the loch by the pier, the arrival of the TV helicopter signalled the start was imminent, and suddenly the team were off in a flurry of paddles. Set against the blue waters of the loch and the castle the bright colours of the kayak fleet were an impressive sight.
From the start teams paddled close inshore, passing under the cliffs of the coastline they ran along yesterday and their first destination was the Isle of Eigg, where there were 2 checkpoints. They could clearly see Eigg in the distance and to their left the horizon was filled by the mountains of the Isle of Skye. See All Event Posts
