The Bull of Africa
As day one comes to an end...
René Taljaard; Photo: Wouter Kingma / 09.08.2008
The race began with a 10km trail run at the Katberg Golf Estate, which doubled as a transition area for the next leg of the race – a 20 km mountain bike ride to the Katrivier Dam. Team uge.cyanosis finished the trail run first (in just two hours and eighteen minutes), with Buff Coolmax and USN following close behind.
At the Katrivier Dam, teams exchanged their bikes for new Fluid sit-on-top kayaks and set out on a 20km paddling session to locate five of the seven checkpoints that were spread out around the dam. Buff Coolmax was the first team to finish this leg, and get back on their bikes for a steep ride to Hogsback up Mitchell’s Pass. The Spanish team kept their lead for most of this leg, with McCain Adventure Addicts, Lafuma, Bjurfors Adventure Racing, USN, and uge.cyanosis hot on their heels.
Once a race official has punched their passports at the checkpoint in Hogsback, teams must prepare themselves for a 15-hour hike to Thomas River – a trek that the front teams are tackling at night.
According to SportsTrack’s GPS coordinates at 12:22am, uge.cyanosis, McCain Adventure Addicts and Lafuma have a strong lead – it is estimated that they are approximately four hours ahead of the other teams. Word has it that it was uge.cyanosis’s Nicholas Mulder who decided to abandon the beaten track, and in so doing, cut a shorter route over the mountain.
There is already a considerable gap between the front teams, who have travelled as much as 80km today, and the teams at the back, who have only managed around 30km.
Even with superior GPS technology, and the snippets of news that can be picked up here and there, there is no way of knowing exactly what the situation is out there, or what the teams are going through right now. All we really know is that it is cold and dark, and that there are athletes out here who have covered a lot of ground and conquered some tough obstacles today.
SleepMonsters
