Orion Health Godzone Adventure Race
Team Seagate Take Convincing Lead
News Release / 10.04.2012
New Zealand’s leading adventure race team, Seagate, led by Nathan Fa'avae with Sophie Hart, Chris Forne and Trevor Voyce are blitzing the field on day two of the Orion Health GODZone Adventure taking place in Fiordland. The team opened up a convincing one hour lead over the rest of the field on the overnight trek on the Dunton and Livingston mountains arriving at the Mavora Lakes checkpoint at 8.37am.
They had been battling for pole position all night with Team Subway led by Richard Ussher and including Elina Ussher, Braden Currie and Sam Clark who were only minutes behind them as they entered the trek stage. Nathan Fa'avae told a delighted audience of race crew and media how they managed to outwit the team in the middle of the night.
“Subway was hanging on to us like a pack of Australian Leeches and we knew we had to try and shake them. About 2km before navigating our way up CP5 we sprinted ahead for a few minutes on the track, turned off our headlamps and then dived into some bushes and rolled around on the ground abit while Subway ran on by. It was really quite funny,” said Nathan.
The Seagate team looked reasonably fresh as they transitioned onto their bikes and headed out on a day long ride along the Oreti River before heading into another overnight trek on the Eyre Mountains. They admitted to having had just 5 minutes sleep since race start early on Monday morning.
Race director Adam Fairmaid said the battle between the two teams has been epic from the start of the adventure.
“Team Seagate and Subway stamped their mark on the course quite early and put a lot of pressure on each other trying to see what each other had. – It’s been interesting to watch them push each other and I think Subway set out to try and rattle Seagate but Nathan and his teammates pulled out a strategic race tactic which has now given them a good break on the field.”
Other teams making good time into day two of the race include Team One Square Meal of Sia Svendsen, Ian Edmond, Stuart Lynch and Ross Rotherham who also passed Subway overnight and came in this morning in second place. Australian Team Braveheart.com is in third place and racing well.
The rest of the field is spread out over the course and the distance between these teams is expected to widen significantly today as the leads push hard to make it through on the full course.
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