Ecomotion/Pro
Discovering Bahia and Brazil
Nick Gracie / 22.08.2013
While the rest of team adidas TERREX prepare for this weekend’s UK Coast to Coast adventure race, Nick Gracie got a last minute invitation to join an old Brazilian friend at the Ecomotion race in the Bahia region of Brazil. Nick filled in for an injured team mate and join Brasilia Multi Sport team, Brazil’s top team ... here is how it went.
In 4 days I had booked plane tickets and got my kit together and 3 flights later after 30 hours of traveling I had arrived at the luxury 5-star resort of Transamerica Comandatuba. It was set to be a competitive race with a really strong line up of top international teams and all the best teams in Brazil. Current world champions Seagate from New Zealand, the defending Eco-motion champions Columbia Vidaraid team from Spain and AXA adidas from Sweden made it hard to chose a winner.
The race started on the coast with a short paddle and then an epic 65KM coasterring run along rugged cliffs and beautiful white sandy beaches which eventually switched inland into the surrounding hills and this is when the first night drew in and the challenging navigation started. We were using 1:100,000 scale maps with little detail and there was a lot of interpretation of the map required! At the end of the run we had a 3km swim across a lake at night which was fun ... but I was never quite sure what was lurking in the water!
The next stage was a 45KM kayak down a slow moving river with a short portage into the open ocean with a fairly frantic drive to get through the 6 foot surf. The kayak was also split up by a short urban orienteering section in the old colonial town of Ilheus.
At the end of the stage we jumped onto our mountain bikes for some fast riding on the dirt roads which gradually became muddy towards the end of the 75km bike. During the night we had moved into second place ahead of Seagate and about 1 hour behind team Columbia Vidaraid.
We then had the epic 80km trek into the hills and this is where we saw an amazing glimpse into rural Bahia Brazilian life and we were all amazed by the simple life people where living in the bush, but also how amazingly friendly and welcoming everyone was, they were all offering us coffee and bananas. The navigation was tough and the vegetation very aggressive - not a good place for shorts!
We had a mandatory sleep stop for 6 hours during this stage in a small town and managed to find a basic hostel and cheeseburger, which helped to refresh our bodies after nearly 60 hours without sleep. At the end of the stage was a relatively short and fast 80km bike ride through some farming land and also through a great town that had a sound system hooked up to every lamppost – with music blaring the whole town was alive and I assumed it was normal for Brazilian towns but the Brazilians in the team had never seen it before either.
We were greeted at the next transition by crowds of locals and media and after the madness we climbed up into the mountains and into an amazing cave complex which ended in a 60m free hanging jumar to get out.
We moved on in the night and again faced some challenging navigation but we found a way through and got to the next stage which was a brilliant 50km paddle down a river with some class III rapids. At the end of the paddle we transitioned onto bikes for the last time and set off on the 130km ride, Seagate finally got ahead of us a few hours into the ride and although we had been 2nd in the race and ahead of them for 3 days we always thought at some stage they would over take us.
The ride was good in parts but shocking in others with some serious mud and also some mosquitoes and midges thrown in just to add to the challenge. We got through it and ended up on the coast with the final paddle ahead of us – we hoisted our sails with a strong tail win and set off on the 55km paddle to the finish. The last 16km was on the open ocean at night and we just managed to punch through the surf before it got dark. We arrived at the finish line at 8.00pm after 129 hours of racing – we came crashing through the surf to a great reception followed by an all you can eat buffet at the resort.
We had finished 3rd not too far behind the defending Champions Columbia Vidaraid – who have now won 2 years in a row and Seagate in 2nd. We were the only 3 teams to complete the full course.
I would like to thank my awesome team mates Gui and Camilla from Brasilia and Seamus from New Zealand, we had an amazing time and raced really well together and considering we had never raced with each other and we didn’t really know each other it was a great result.
For anyone looking for a well organized, yet challenging and exotic adventure race Eco-motion has it all – Brazilian style!
You can see more about Nick’s regular team (adidas TERREX) on their Facebook Page where this article was first published.
The live race reporting from EcoMotion is at http://blog.ecomotion.com.br/?page_id=3907
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