Raid Aran

An Adventure Just Getting to the Starting Line.

Anne-Marie Dunhill / 02.07.2015

The second edition of the Raid Aran adventure race kicked off this morning in the Val d’Aran mountains of Spain. Teams arrived yesterday in the camping of Lès (5km from the border with France) and attended the race briefing in the city hall that started at 21:00.

It was a hot, stuffy briefing as there has been a heat wave in Southern Europe and even in the mountains the temperatures have remained high; it was 30° at 22:00. Racers were briefed in Spanish and French and the lone Dutch team kitted out in bright orange asked questions afterwards in English. Fifteen of the twenty-four teams racing in the elite category are French and there are some excellent French adventure racers here, including several very strong navigators. Listening the race briefing it quickly became clear that strategy is going to be very important in this race as there are mandatory and optional checkpoints.

The RaidAran race began this morning in the village of Salardù. Not once had the temperatures descended below 27° overnight so it was a restless one for all. The race start was delayed for an unusual reason; a team had been stopped by the Spanish police en route from the camping in Lès to the race start. There were five people in the three person crew van of the all women team Les Belettes and when the police stopped them they had to pay a 200€ fine on the spot and the vehicle was searched. The three adventure racers hitchhiked to the race start without their gear and their stressed crew dealt with the police.

With seconds to spare, the support van screeched to a halt at the start line in Salardù, the extremely stressed Les Belettes grabbed their backpacks from the back of the van and took their place under the race arch; not an ideal start by any stretch of the imagination!

The first section of the race was an orienteering one, using an aerial map to find six checkpoints around the village of Salardù. After a quick, sweaty transition in the village parking lot, teams took off on a mountain biking section that will take them high into the mountains where there are several lakes.

Studying the maps, it is clear that teams will be dealing with a lot of elevation gain; at one point they will go up to almost 3,000m and in this heat hydration will be even more crucial than it normally is.  The support crews have an easier option today as they wait for their teams; they have been given free access to the village pool so they will be working on their tans whilst their teams sweat it out racing today.