The Rat Race NEWCASTLE Urban Adventure Race
Testing Times on the Tyne
Pyro / 09.09.2008
Gathering in Gateshead\'s Baltic Square, between and ‘The BALTIC Centre for Contemporary Art’ and alongside the \'Blinking Eye\' (the Gateshead Millennium Bridge), the racers were immediately immersed in the recent history of the cities in an area which has seen major cultural development and investment over the past few years. This culture would also play a part in the race, showing the enthusiastic Rats the best parts of the twin cities either side of the Tyne.
Wrong-footed from the Off
Having been given their route books at 9.30am, teams marked up their maps for the day, becoming more nervous as the full scale of the course was revealed. But, in true Rat Race style, there would still be at least one mystery involved: As the 11 o\'clock start gun went off, the racers first grabbed the sealed envelope which contained the location of their very first checkpoint. The teams quickly ripped open the envelopes and immediately queried their maps and guidance. The early instructions had stated that the Prologue loop would be to the south in Gateshead, but the checkpoint location they were given was to the north, along the Newcastle quayside.
Even more confusion was added when they dashed across the Gateshead Millennium Bridge as a group, and then promptly split, some to the left, some to the right, aiming for two separate checkpoints. At their first location, they found a code letter and the location of the next checkpoint in the loop. Following this took them to the next location and code, and so on and so on, with teams being sent on different but equal courses, and created maximum dispersal and confusion. (Common in Scandanavian orienteering this technique is called ‘gaffeling’). This eventually gave them 10 letters, which they then used to access the Bike pen. Those who failed to collect all the code letters could not access their bikes until 11:40, giving them an immediate disadvantage.
The first Adventure loop headed out east along the streets and cycle ways near the River Tyne, picking up a couple of checkpoints on the way to the first activity at Rising Sun Country Park, site of the former Rising Sun Colliery. Here the racers had to complete a short MTB-O section before continuing east to the coast. Not every team would have it easy on the way though: Victoria Checkley was unfortunate enough to damage her bike before even reaching the MTB-O, and ran back to the Race Village, successfully managing to charm the gentlemen at the G4 Challenge stall into lending her the MTB they had for their display, although one of the guys did remark that \"it was a shame this wasn\'t last week. Since it was only for display I took the decent forks off the bike over the week and replaced them with a cheaper set\".
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