ITERA - Presented by Open Adventure
The First Finishers
Rob Howard / 15.08.2014
A small crowd of family, friends and supporters had gathered Raold Dahl Plas for the finish of ITERA, the first expedition race in Wales of over a decade. The race was also a World Series event and a qualifier for the World Championships in Ecuador in November, and the first two teams to cross the line were both from the U.K.
Fittingly it was Team adidas TERREX who were first across the line. They have lead from start to finish (even in the prologue) and are the winners by a big margin. They may have slowed down a little on the final ride down the Taff Trail into Cardiff, but stayed well out in front and crossed the line to win at 16.30 on a sunny Friday evening.
The have won both previous Open Adventure expedition races and now claim a free place in the world final which starts in Quito and will include a crossing of the equator, and of both Andes and the Amazon basin. Even so that race will have to go some beat the ITERA race in Wales which team captain Nick Gracie said was the best he’s done. That is quite a statement as he’s competed in exotic locations all over the world, including a dozen world championships.
“It was a beautifully put together course,” he said. “The finish was unusual as we moved into a more and more urban environment. It was quite strange, but good to finish in the capital after a journey through Wales and all its landscapes. I don’t think anyone could have put together a better course than Tom Gibbs, it all linked up so well and I hope the visiting teams all enjoyed the special places we saw, like Hay on Wye and Conwy, and so many others.”
The team of Gracie, Sally Ozanne, Chris Hope and Kim Collison had not raced together before, but were all equally competitive. “We raced well the first 3 days.” said Gracie. “We were really on it, quick in transition and raced to a good plan.” It was a plan that worked and will prepare the team well for their race in Ecuador.
After a great battle with SWECO of Sweden and Wahalla from S. America it was Haglofs Silva UK who were second across the line. Overnight, and with Chris Near suffering from a knee problem, the team had been passed by their rivals and had settled for 4th place. “We didn’t think we could race them to the finish,” said Lucy Spain, “but then, after walking slowly down the hill we saw that both teams were at the caving section. After that we had a new lease of life and raced well to the finish.”
The team looked even more wrecked than adidas TERREX and shuffled across the line with weary smiles. “That was the hardest ever as we had only 4 hours sleep for the whole race,” said Bruce Duncan. “It was harder than Patagonia, that was hard physically but you got more sleep – this one just pushed us to the limit.”
The third team to finish were the first international racers, Team Odyssey of the USA, who are a short course team. They’ve raced more strongly towards the end of the week after Mark Lattanzi had a bug for the first few days. “Once I felt better we could go get some checkpoints,” he said, “but it was late in the day to be competitive so all we can do is finish fast and early.”
Jennifer Moos said, “I thought the whole race was fantastic. We had such great mountain biking and paddling, even though the wind affected that. Same for the trekking but we seemed to do all our treks at night which wasn’t so good for seeing the country. The mountain biking area today was amazing, but I couldn’t pick a favourite place out of all those we’ve been to.”
“I heard some teams complain about dragging the kayaks across the estuary, and it was really hard, but it’s all part of adventure racing. You never know what will happen and you deal with it and make the best of it – that’s what its’ all about. We had some rough weather, but you can’t do anything about it so why worry about it.
“I have to say the race really has its stuff together. Whatever happened with the weather and course changes they coped with it. Bikes, bags and boxes usually go missing in those situations, but they were always where they should have been. We kept seeing the same marshals all the time and they were all so amazing.”
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