Baja Travesia 2008
Day 3: DART-nuun show what professionals they are...
Jacqueline Windh / 26.03.2008
Day 3, 9 amDART-nuun\'s Cyril, Jen and Aaron are showing what pure professionals they are. Even in the depths of a huge navigational error that cost them many hours, as well as their spot at the front of the pack, they simply dealt with it, worked together, and as Jen has told me in the past \"Just make sure you keep moving forward, always forward.\"
We last saw these guys at the top of the Sierra last night, working out how to get back on track. Their buddies from DART-nuun/NW Kayak made it to CP12 at 7:15 pm - which Cyril, Jen and and Aaron only arrived to more than four hours later. But since then they have been moving, always forward, unfazed, knowing that anything can happen in adventure racing.
Yoga Slackers continue moving quickly, having suffered the same navigational woes as the two lead teams. Kayak Lake Mead are also putting in a really strong performance, currently in fourth place about 6 hours behind DART-nuun, and chased by Dancing Pandas, Dirty Avocados, and ExtremeSports.dk. Dancing Pandas are the only team that seems not to have had trouble in locating that elusive CP12 - they were 4 hours in transit from CP11, having done that section in pure darkness (compared to the 7.5 and 12 hours the two DART teams took). ExtremeSports.dk took 14 hours for this same section - I\'m sure hoping that means that they stopped for a good sleep!
News from further back is that the canyon trek has taken a lot out of all teams. Equinox and El Rey Azul are at the back of the pack and expected to arrive in to CP10 any moment (after 36 hours ascending the canyon, including two very cold nights!).
Sounds like there were a lot of navigational problems in the canyons. Yoga Slackers Jason told me that they realized that they had gone up the wrong canyon - rather than backtracking, they went straight up the sidewall and rappeled down into the right one. Behind them, ExtremeSports.dk saw what was going on ahead... Rick Barraff told me that stopped and debated for 45 minutes about what to do, and eventually followed the Yoga Slackers up and over the side. I have not talked to the teams further back, but I suspect many of them made a similar error, and that is why progress in the canyon has been so slow.
Feed the Machine has quit, but are helping team Lucky out as gear donors - for more details of what\'s going on here, check out Karen\'s blog on the www.bajatravesia.com site.See All Event Posts
