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From land to water

Filomena Gomes/Louize Hill/Togumi / 08.12.2007

Day three of the Estoril Portugal XPD Race stated off bright and clear and the sunny weather was a welcome change from the fog and drizzle of yesterday. Stage three ended at Transition Area (AT) 2 at Olhos de Ã?gua (Alcanena). This area was bustling from the crack of dawn, and the whole morning. Most teams stopped here for a while to rest, almost all were clearly exhausted from the 40 km trekking they had completed during the night. This stage had brought the teams from the mountains down to the flood plains of the River Tejo, and the scenery changed dramatically. At AT2 it also became clear that there were changes on the leader board, especially amongst the teams at the end.

There were long gaps between the teams arriving and leaving from AT2. Some of the teams decided to stop along the way to sleep, while others decided to sleep at AT2. The Brazilian athlete José Pupo of team MOTOROLA, who had pulled out yesterday due to exhaustion was “rescued� from the hostel where he had stopped and decided to stay and was brought to AT2 early in the morning. Talking to him, he said he had been unable to keep up with the rest of the Team members, and that he probably hadn’t fully recovered from Ecomotion five weeks ago. He planned to keep on following the race and his team’s progression. However, they decided to quit after the mountain biking section 1 (stage 4). José also stressed how impressed he had been with the race organization and the Portuguese adventure racing format. He considers this to be one of the best he has ever seen, allowing both strong teams and less strong ones to finish the race. Also, it is possible to actually follow the competition since teams are never too isolated.

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