Ace Race One Day Series - Bracknell
A Swinley Sprint Finish
Jim Godden – Team Sleepmonsters/Inov-8 / 14.07.2009
The second of the 1 day Ace Races took place in Swinley Forest near Bracknell. At the race briefing, Scott mentioned that some areas were out of bounds due to filming of the next Harry Potter film having just finished in the forest – Harry seems to be getting involved in AR in both North and South races! There was the usual mix of seasoned racers and as with previous Ace Races there was a high number of first timers – begging the question – do most only do one race never to return!
Thankfully, it was cooler that the first race in the series, but there was also a threat of heavy showers, bringing to mind a previous event in the forest competing in dramatic thunderstorms.
When the race started at 11am, as usual it was a mad rush to get to the front, but we kept our pace to a reasonable level, knowing we still had 3-4 hours of racing ahead of us. Our main competitors, Team Boosh and Tea and Medals ended up in front of us after the first run, but we knew that it would be easy to make navigation errors, as not all paths were marked on the map, and with many paths looking the same.
At the transition we completed out first ‘challenge’, completing a small course carrying a bike but without touching it – ropes were supplied. Then it was on the bikes for the first bike leg. With me towing and Eddie navigating to his usual high standard, we kept up a good speed and, after completing another challenge of a blindfold trail, came back to transition with only a handful of bikes already present.
So, back to the running, and a slightly shorter run leg than the first, with another challenge of getting a ball to stop in the middle of a board. During this stage we realised that we hadn’t seen anyone for ages, so it was down to Eddie to be certain of his navigation – it’s always disconcerting when everyone else seems to have disappeared.
We returned to transition to find I had a puncture, and during a quick swap of inner tubes, Team Boosh got ahead of us. Thus followed a game of cat and mouse, with us either close together and sometimes making the same mistakes, or far apart yet getting to the checkpoints at roughly the same time. We also completed the final challenge – a bike ride or carry through a river. In the end it all came down to the final 1km back and we finished approx ½ a minute ahead of them to take 1st place team.
So the final results were as follows;
1st Solo Male and 1st overall – Paul Pickering
1st Solo Female and 9th overall – Carol Yarrow
1st Male Pair and 4th overall – Team Barry, Tim Marsters and Dan Doherty
1st Mixed Team and 7th overall – Sleepmonsters/Inov-8, Jim Godden, Eddie Winthorpe and Fiona Paterson See All Event Posts
