Tales from TA5

Anne-Marie Dunhill / 12.11.2014

After concluding a “we will not tank” pact, our media car headed up to TA5 which was a three hours drive away from San Jose de Minas on a muddy track riddled with potholes.  TA 5 is located in Meridiano and we passed sugarcane fields and extensive banana crops on the steep hills.

Middle to back teams have been coming in off the trek and waiting out their penalty in the village church that is serving as the transition area. The church absolutely reeks with that unique smell of four days of adventure racing, the pews have been pushed to the side and racers are sprawled out next to the alter sleeping.

Heading out further uphill on a track, we went to CP 15 that was in front of a tiny school. Team France-Vaucluse Adventure Lafuma came through and they searched inside the school grounds for the CP with the school children looking on and giggling and laughing.  The checkpoint it was actually just a photo to be taken in front of the school sign.  We came across the team later in the afternoon when Jerome was lying face up on his back  like a stranded beetle in the middle of the track, waiting for the rest of his teammates.

Team Columbia-Idrd Bogota Humana said that they had spent six hours looking for CP14 so they were really tired but in good spirits. Across the dirt track from the school there was a tiny wooden shop built in to a hut and they hobbled over and bought milk and bananas.

Ecuadorian team Terra Aventura Fybeca-Discover also came through and after taking their group picture to prove that they’d been to the CP, they went over to the wooden shop and stocked up on food as well as emptying their trash. Sanne from Denmark is racing with them; she wrote a wonderful piece for SleepMonsters prior to the race start on her adventures acclimatizing with her team. She said sarcastically, “We love mud! Sheesh, I’ve never seen this much mud in my life and I’m from Denmark!”

Her teammate Felipe added that they had spent most of the night in the freezing cold looking for CP14 and when they simply couldn’t find it, they put up their tent in an old abandoned house and slept. Felipe went on to say, “This is crazy, ten hours ago we were fighting hypothermia and now we’re worried about dehydration!” (We are now in the cloud forest).

The internet connection in Meridiano is in the church refectory and the priest is currently filming a video of us working. The heavens have opened up once again and it is raining hard; mud and more mud.

You can follow the race live at http://live.huairasinchi.com/

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