Bull of Africa
Mazda Salomon notch 2nd
Lisa de Speville / 29.06.2005
Walking up to Jones, Mazda’s navigator John Collins said laughing, “Geezzz… I was just so disappointed to see you up there�. Collins was referring to the top of Cornelskop, the highest point in the Richtersveld. Mazda had left the previous two checkpoints nearly an hour ahead of Merrell and expected to hit the summit first. To their surprise, Merrell were at the top, sitting down resting and eating. Believing Mazda to have come and gone they were resigned to 2nd place.
The two teams discussed the possible routes down from the summit to the jeep track below, which would take them through to the final transition. Merrell left first, taking the agreed option. Mazda hung behind, scrutinizing their map. “If we were going to win, to beat Merrell, we had to find an alternate route,� said Collins. In a finish-line conversation with Merrel’s Jeff Mitchell, Mazda’s John Jacoby said that if they’d come down behind Merrell they probably wouldn’t have been able to keep up as Merrell ran the whole way – over 15km – to the transition. And, this was after 500km!
Mazda’s route choice was unfortunately a bad one. They were cliffed out in an area that our radio communications man, Chris Istead, who flew over the area described as “nearly impossible. Any team that goes through there won’t come out for hours�. His observation rang true.
Nonetheless, Mazda Salomon made it out, onto their bikes and across the finish line. They chased hard and had me glued to my radio since Tuesday night as I waited for incoming news of their cat-and-mouse progress through the Richtersveld. Mazda Salomon, good racing. Well done.
ENDS
SleepMonsters
