On Foot into the First Night

Rob Howard / 28.02.2015

Through the afternoon and evening the bulk of the teams were arriving at TA2 at the end of the paddle down the Makarora River.  The heavy rain continued for most of the day and while it made the racers cold it did at least raise the water levels and made the paddle easier as they moved downstream. Towards evening and dusk there were some longer spells of dry weather which perhaps promises a better night.

Approaching the transition the river spread into numerous channels and quite a few teams chose the wrong one which left them with a walk of a good few hundred metres, carrying their canoes across the gravel banks and streams. 

The transition was set up on grassland in the middle of the valley and teams hauled their canoes out of the water to carry them across to their gear boxes, before deflating them and placing them on a trailer. 

Most of the teams I saw there were from the middle of the pack and all were in good spirits and in close competition. A few teams had minor problems; two of the dry bags GB Lakesmultisport were using proved not to be waterproof, and some teams were quite cold. Team Cure Kids were the most affected by the cold and they were all shivering and shaking as they got changed.

Rob Nicol from Cure Kids had been for an embarrassing swim. “I got bad cramp,” he said, “and stretched out, then fell backwards out of the canoe! I was splashing around and it was cold, and Sia (Svendsen) was just laughing at me.”  Svendsen started laughing again. “It was very funny!”

When teams left transition they walked across the gravel flats to start their 56km Alpine Trek up and over the Albert Burn saddle and true to form for the day it was a wet start as they waded the nearest river channel.

The water had been rising steadily during the day and, depending on where they crossed, some teams were waist deep. Soon after they had to cross the main river channel and this had risenfrom calf deep to waist deep and was fast flowing so the race had set up a crossing. A rope was rigged across the river and teams could pull themselves over on a raft.  It was perhaps not necessary for some of the teams, but the slower teams may well arrive in the dark and the river could keep rising.

Once across the teams had the first real route choice of the race between a 400m climb up and over a hill, or a bush bash scramble along the riverside to get around it. Most seemed to take the second option, including race leaders Seagate.

Going into the first night of the race the leading teams have traversed around the northern shores of Lake Wanaka and made their way up the Albert Burn towards the saddle. However, Race Director Warren Bates says the track they are following stops well before the saddle leaving teams with a lengthy trek across rough and very steep terrain, which they will be making in the dark.

(At the time of writing Team Swordfox have caught Seagate to share the lead.)

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

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