RAIDARAN-LLEIDA PIRINEUS

Race Briefing and Heat for the International Teams

Anne-Marie Dunhill / 19.07.2016

­The third edition of the Raid Aran starts July 20th in the town of Vielha, Catalonia Spain. This year the race is hosting the Adventure Racing European Championships (AREC) and there are 30 teams registered this year. Teams started to arrive yesterday and the race briefing took place at 17:00 in a local hall; the briefing was in Spanish and English. Temperatures have been sweltering hot, around °38 in the late afternoon.

After the maps were distributed and the race director, Xavi Rodriguez, talked the teams through the course, there was an extended period of questions, especially about the dark zone.  Once the briefing was finished, teams began to plastify their maps and set up their bikes.  The race will start at 09:00 tomorrow morning so if the heat allows it, teams should get a proper nights sleep.

Speaking to Christian Ericsson, team captain of SAFAT (Swedish Armed Forces Adventure team) after the briefing, he explained that his team was looking to race strong and use each section as a learning experience. Another squad of this Swedish team has just finished the Cameco Cowboy Tough race in the USA in third place so Christian, Jonas, Marten and Cecilia will be a team to watch as they take on the rugged Spanish Pyrenees.  According to team manager Jan-Henrik Bäck,  “Team captain Christian Ericsson has four years of AR experience, he’s calm guy who always finds the positive in each situation. Cecilia Jessen, a former triathlete, World Champ 2015 in long distance, is a real dieselmachine. Mårten Svensson is our ‘sherpa’ who also has some years experience on national basis and finally Jonas Andersson is a very experienced navigator.”

Another well known Swedish team, Thule, is racing here as well and veteran adventure racer Martin Flinta has put together a strong team with Clas Björling, Rickard Norlin and Simone Meir.  Prior to the race they clearly announced their intentions-to win the race, earning an entry into the Adventure Racing World Championships to be held in Australia this year.

There are several Czech teams here and another strong team to watch will be the Czech  Fenix Multipsort. Pavel Paloncy said that they are here to better their results from their performance last year in the AREC in the Beast of Ballyhoura.  Paloncy stated, “We were beaten last year by the weather on the last night. Here there are a lot of unknowns but it’s a beautiful area. I’ve been here before but every time I discover something different. It’s difficult to estimate our timings, for example there is a 50km mountain biking section with a 3,000m elevation gain. Will we be able to bike that or will it be a hike and bike? Whatever happens, we’re happy to be here!”  Pavel has had a prolific racing season so far this year, competing in the Patagonian Expedition Race and the Cape Wrath Ultra, among many others.

Keep an eye out as well for Salomon-Suunto AR Team with the ARES founder Marek Navràtil.

If we often joke in adventure racing that one of the main challenges is simply getting to the event, the Estonian team ACE adventure team just upped the ante on that! They flew in via Turkey and were in the Istanbul airport shortly after the attempted coup d’état.  The Polish team AR Team Polska had an easier time of it, merely driving 24hours straight to the starting line.

Among the other teams on the list there are three French teams, a Canadian team, a British team, a Columbian team, a Finnish team and a plethora of Spanish teams. After the recent Brexit, geopolitics is a touchy subject but it must be noted that the race is taking place in the Catalunyia region of Spain and there is a very strong push for independence in this region.  At this moment, it is still part of Spain and as such, in these reports Spanish teams will be cited as such, in the hopes of skittering around that minefield.

The 2016 edition of the Raid Aran has all of the makings of an exciting couple of days adventure racing and we’ll know who the European Champions are on Saturday morning when the first team is due to cross the finish line.