The AR World Championships - Costa Rica
More Details on the Course as Teams Register
Rob Howard / 29.11.2013
Today was the day the Adventure Racing World Championships 2013 started to come together as teams arrived at the Radisson Hotel in San Jose.
The hotel staff had certainly never seen anything like it before and with the mountains of baggage you couldn’t blame the porters if they ran for the hills – luckily for them that is what these new guests plan to do themselves, and they are quite capable of carrying their own bags!
The atmosphere of suppressed excitement meant the hotel was a buzzing all day and there were hugs, handshakes and high fives all around as old friends from races past met up again for another adventure.
One of the busiest gathering points was around the inflated kayak in one of the upper lobbies, where racers were taking it in turns to try it out, adjust seats and backrests and try to attach a variety of sails. If you want to do the web search teams will be racing in the Tributary Tom Cat Tandem. Safe to say the good kayakers are not excited, but not surprised either.
Some of the teams had problems during their travels, the Polish team were delayed for 24 hours at Madrid airport, setting all the preparation plans back, and Marek Navratil of the Czech Salomon Suunto team still had his baggage held in customs. (They were unhappy with some food being in there apparently.) No doubt there were some others suffering similar problems, but hopefully all will be present and correct for the race briefings and opening ceremonies tomorrow.
There is talk of where the race will go exactly and some information has been released, but even tomorrow teams won’t know for sure as the first set of maps will only be released to them at the start, and they won’t be given them for the whole course. Instead they will be released in 3 sets. Teams also know there will be portages, the breakdown of disciplines and distances, and that there will be dark zones during the race. I was told a little more about one of these tonight, and it’s not for the usual reason of safety on the water, it’s because there are so many snakes on that part of the course!
Some more information has been released to the press. The race caravan will have a 6 to 8 hour drive on Monday morning to reach the start on the border with Panama at Sabalito. The start line will be on the border itself, with the gun fired at 14.00 for a ‘Le Mans’ style start, but it will be one with a twist as teams race to their bike boxes and ... well you can guess what happens next. That is going to be entertaining!
The mid-camp for the race, where teams will stop for a 4 hour mandatory break, will be at San Gerado and after this teams will trek up into the Talamanca mountain range crossing the highest point in Costa Rica, the volcanic mountain of Cerro Chirripo at 3,800m.
This will be a long trekking stage where teams will be allowed to pass through restricted areas which are the home of Costa Rica’s small native tribes (they only form 1% of the population). The trails teams will walk on have only been trodden by the tribes and a few park rangers before, and it is only because of Costa Rica’s commitment to the race and to adventure sports at a national level, that exceptional permission has been granted. That permission has come from the native tribes themselves as well, though encounters with teams will be limited as they are said to be very shy.
For the moment that is all the available information, except to say the Race Directors think the lead team will take 6 or 6.5 days to reach the finish. Alexander ‘Pongo’ Baker thinks 6 days and Antonio de la Rosa thinks it will take a bit longer ... but that is only if the winds and tides are good, there is no fog and it does not rain. So maybe it will take even longer for the winners to cover the 815km course.
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