The World Adventure Racing Championships (XPD Australia)

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Team adidas TERREX in Tasmania

Team adidas TERREX / 17.11.2011

From the UK it’s hard to go much further away than Tasmania, and after 2 days of traveling it certainly felt like the end of the earth, that was until enroute to Race HQ in Burnie, we drove through the town of Ulverstone on the River Leven. Both names being the same as Tom’s local town and river back home!

After a few days sorting kit, getting registered, packing kit and marking maps we were on the start line on the sea front in Burnie and ready for the off.

The race started with a sea paddle along the Bass Strait to the fantastically named town of Penguin. Each team had one rigid sit on top kayak and an inflatable kayak. With the crosswinds the inflatables were struggling to hold their line constantly wanting to turn into the wind.

Apart from Team Seagate all the teams were closely packed, with ourselves in 17th place, a quick transition saw us up to 12th and storming up the hill behind Penguin to the Shooting. Here we went past the local school, where all the kids lined the road and cheered us on – a fantastic atmosphere. Nick “One Shot� Gracie duly dispatched the Clay shooting with his first shot catching the rest of us out with his fast shooting.

The next stage was a foot stage through the bush-laden hills of the Mount Dial Range. We kept up a good pace and chose some nice lines pulling us up to 4th by transition, followed by a short bike ride to the Gunns Plains Caves – all into a headwind, it was harder than expected.

The Caves were timed out, and only took 30 minutes to navigate round the magnificent formations, giving us a further 30 minutes to reorganize and eat before the next stage, a 50km bike where we lost a few places to other teams due to a mechanical.

At the end of this stage we were back on our feet and onto the first long leg, the 60km trek over Black Bluff to Lake Mackintosh. Here we were into the first night and as we passed over the highest point on the course, the weather was decidedly wintery. We were glad of our warm kit. Once over the high point, we followed various paths and tracks, increasingly smaller in nature to lead to the abseil into the Vale River. Due to water flow levels, the abseil was canceled, but we still had to negotiate a very cold canyon and bushwhack 8km downstream to the rafts.See All Event Posts