GODzone Adventure - Chapter 4

Back in Wanaka

Rob Howard / 01.03.2015

Teams will be arriving at race HQ in Wanaka, which also serves as TA4, throughout the day. They have only been gone for the weekend, but they’ve already covered a lot of ground and the gear checks here last Friday must seem like a very distant memory now!

HQ is set up in the Upper Clutha Rugby Club pavilion and teams cycle in along the Damper Bay Track from Glendu Bay to arrive at a small gazebo tent set up in the car park.  This had been set up so they can mark, laminate and study the maps which they receive here, but it was flapping about in the rising wind and has had to be taken down.

All the available tables have now been pressed into use and teams are  spreading their maps out inside the pavilion. All the teams have to stop for a mandatory 5 minute time out during which the race is recording a short video with them. (You can see these on the live race website.) They can stay for a maximum of two hours if they want, and some are running out of time. A few are also heading into town to get some hot food.

I found Team DAR Dingle of Ireland and the University of Aukland team working side by side in the tent this morning.  Cas Bullard of DAR Dingle was lying down with her legs raised and her head resting on her backpack, which didn’t work out too well as she was lying on the mouthpiece of her bladder and her clothes were wet when she sat up.

“I’ve now found out what Spear Grass and sand flies are,” she said, “big time!  We are going OK, though some of the river crossings were scary.  One was up to my chest and although we were two teams together arm in arm, we all tumbled and headed downstream.”

Edward Lawley of University of Aukland, who was slathering his feet with Gurney Goo beside her commented, “We decided not to cross, we just thought it was too high and camped out for a few hours but it didn’t drop and we walked upstream a ways before crossing.”

His team are probably in their last Godzone as they are all coming to the end of their University courses and Lawley said they are having a good race.  “We’ve stuck to our plan to get some good sleep and feel pretty good,” he said. “

Bullard rejoined the conversation to say, “We’ve not slept at all unfortunately. These guys keep sleeping then catching us. They are like Ninjas! I think we’ll have to get some hot food in town and sleep a bit here.  It’s not ideal to sleep in the day, but if we don’t I think we’ll crash big time.”

While these teams were busy another arrived and asked, “Can two team members go to the shops and two stay here? The answer was a firm NO as during the race the team must stay within 100m of each other at all times.  The alternate suggestion was to check out and ride to the kebab shop with their maps, then work on them there!

[Latest course news is that teams 55, 33 who were well off route on the Albert Burn trek have been heli-lifted back onto the correct route and are unranked, but Team 22 who were also off route refused assistance. The are now going back the right way!]

You can follow the race live at http://godzoneadventure.com/

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