XPD Race and AR Conference
Talk, Talk, But Not Pack, Pack
Rob Howard / 08.12.2006
The programme of clinics was non-stop all day, the first day even finishing after midnight, a long haul for those who only arrived off the plane from Brazil or the US in the morning. The second day was more hands-on, with ropes practice and mapping software demonstrations and this was followed by today’s conference.
This too was a full programme with many speakers and some meaty topics to discuss. After an explanation of the Portuguese AR setup, now run under their national orienteering federation, came a look at race formats around the world, which lead into a discussion on how to attract more women into AR that could have gone on all day.
Next came ‘a racers perspective’ from the national champion here, Pedro Pedrosa, and from Guntars Mankus of Latvia and Marco Ponteri of Italy, who described how he had completed failed to get AR started in Italy … but he’s not given up! Marco has been racing since the early Raid Gauloises, the lone Italian in international racing. He does have an Italian team here under the name ‘Mediterranea Adventure Team’, and Guntars is on the joint Latvian/Estonian team, Raid LV.
Other contributors included Paul Romero of Team Sole and Petri Forsman, who is also racing with SOLE this time around. However, he arrived late without all his bags which had been lost by an airline, including his kit and a new bike.
The afternoon’s conference topics included a look at AR and the media, and ‘Safety and Responsibility’. Both Romero and Forsman emphasised the prime responsibility for the team lay with the team, and Romero presented an outline for an internationally agreed mandatory kit list for all expedition races ... which got lots of feedback. All agreed carrying a 20m rope or a first aid kit was pointless without knowing what to do with them should an emergency occur! There were some very gruesome photos shown by Lairo Campello who has worked on many races in Brazil as a medic. (If I ever go to Brazil I’ll wear gloves in the jungle and make sure no spiders bite me. The effects can be very nasty!)
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