Terra Incognita
The fat lady has sung
Jon Brooke / 31.05.2004
For the leaders who were feeling fresh after a day resting at CP 24, today’s 30 k.m. kayaking, canyoning and abseiling section was a high speed dash to the finish. For the last teams on the course, who had only benefited from around 2 hours sleep at CP 24 it was a bit more of a struggle, the canyoning in particular involved jumping from boulder to boulder for over a kilometer and for those disorientated by lack of sleep it was a struggle. An the way there was a hugely impressive abseil when the teams entered a cave in the side of the canyon only to emerge a hundred meters or so downstream half way up a huge rock wall above a beautiful stepped waterfall. There were also short sections where the teams could proceed only by swimming.
In the end Osiguranje Zagreb probably even increased their lead a little, though the final precise timings were not available æat the prizegiving. They had previously entered Terra Incognita three times and had come 3rd and 2nd before with one DNF in between. This year the team was strengthened by having Maciek Olesinski from Polish team Helmann Salomon as a guest member alongside team captain Elvir Suliæ (F), Darja Bostijanèiæ and Florijan Tomc and were popular winners, especially with the local press who were covering the event.
The second place team was also Croatian. Adria Lada had entered the event only a week ago having never raced together before, but they did have impressive credentials. Two of the team members are world class kayakers, unbeaten in Croatia in recent years in K2 and Sanda Å arco is one of the best women mountain bikers in the country. The team surprised everyone with their performance on the trekking sections where they were also strong, in fact Maciek Olisenski of Osiguranje admitted freely that they were physically stronger, but probably lost out on the first spot by making navigational errors.
In third place were the vastly experienced line up of eVent Endure from the UK and Finland. They were the pre-race favourites but in the end found that the race probably did not ideally suit them. Iiro Kakko pointed out several times on the way round that the race was actually more like a stage race, whereas their strengths were more in real non-stop war of attrition with less opportunity for sleep.
Perhaps the most surprising result of the race was the fourth place by the all woman team of Clight Salomon Atenah. After an unremarkable start they slowly made their way back up the field, gaining time on most of the trekking and biking sections with one excellent piece of navigation gaining them perhaps an hour on the other top teams on the long trek. Usually they race with three women and one man where the rules specify a mixed team, but here the rule was one female member which meant they could enter the all-woman line up.
All of the teams will have their own stories to tell but the general feeling seems to be that even with a few logistical changes and holdups during the race, it has still been a great event for the racers with an impressively varied range of terrain - from arid offshore islands to the snow of Mt Dinara, through bombed out villages and down scenic rivers. Watch out next year for the next edition of Terra Incognita Croatia.
SleepMonsters
