Who is Racing at the AR World Champs in Brazil?

Press Release / 11.11.2015

­Thirty two intrepid teams are making their way to Corumba in the Pantanal region of Brazil for ARWC2015.  It’s the smallest entry to a World Championships for a long time, which is a pity as the race promises a challenge unlike any the teams will have seen before.  So, which are the teams up for this challenge?

The facts are that the 32 teams have racers from 15 nationalities, and these teams come from 5 continents, so it’s a full house from around the world. There will be 12 Brazilian teams on the start line, with more Brazilian racers, some in teams expected to finish in the top 5, plus there are teams from Uraguay and Colombia (but sadly none for Chile/Argentina or Ecuador, all strong AR nations in S. America.)

The defending champions Seagate (NZ) are there for what is likely to be Nathan Fa’avae’s last ARWC, as are the #1 ranked team Columbia Vidaraid, racing as Columbia Oncosec as they have a new sponsor for this race.  

Seagate have the same impressively successful team of Fa’avae, Forne, Hart & Lynch and that consistency is part of their strength, while Columbia Oncosec have a slightly new line-up with Brazilian racer Tessa Roorda replacing Barbara Bonfim for this race.  Roorda joined the team in their ill fated trip to the Alaska Expedition Race earlier this year, which finished with a crevasse rescue early in the race, and the team were disappointed with their finish at Raid in France, so they are looking to enjoy the adventure and finish well to close out the year.

There are a few other team names which have changed new with team sponsors and some different team line ups too. The elite racer pack is always shuffling due to injury, work, personality clashes and new blood coming in.

One team under a new name are Godzone Adventure Team (formerly Team adidas TERREX of the UK), who will have the experienced pair of Nick Gracie and Warren Bates (both in their 10th  ARWC and former winners in 2009) along with Sarah Fairmaid and Guilherme Pahl of Brazil. Pahl raced with Gracie when they won the Raid Gurani in Paraguay this year – a race which started and finished on the Paraguay River, which they’ll get to explore more of in Brazil.

Raid in France winners 400 Raidlight are now Raidlight Naturex and have Nicolas Moreau replacing Adrien Lhermet this time. Other World series winners from 2015 are Mountain Designs (Australia), Tecnu (USA), Merrell Adventure Addicts (RSA) and the two Swedish teams SAFAT (Swedish Armed Forces) and Haglofs Silva.  All will be planning to feature at the sharp end of the race and have a huge amount of race experience between them.

Haglofs Silva, and Josefina Wikberg in particular, will be aiming to break a run of bad luck after Wikberg crashed out of the last two ARWC races forcing the team to withdraw. Up to that point the team had always been a top 3 finisher and never quite managed a win, but their victory over Seagate at Raid Gallaecia earlier this year will encourage them to believe they can turn things around.

Merrell Adventure Addicts will relish the paddling and Tecnu have a consistent team, which broke into the top 3 of the World Rankings recently after two World Series wins this year (Alaska and Cowboy Tough). Both SAFAT and also Peak Performance will aim to keep up the impressive Swedish record in top level racing, while Mountain Designs will be flying the flag for Australia – the venue for next year’s World Champs.

Despite all the uncertainty of a big expedition race it is rare to see the established teams upset, but the standard of teams racing around the world has steadily increased in recent years and there is now a pack of strong and very experienced teams pushing for top 10 or even top 5 places.

Eastern Europe has several strong teams, including Fenix Multisport led by Pavel Paloncy and Blackhill Opavanet, both from the Czech Republic, plus the Estonian ACE Adventure team.  This team includes brothers Silver and Rain Eensaar who will relish the navigation as former rogaining world champions.

Silver commented, “We have a lot of bogs with lakes in Estonia, but of-course not so vast as Pantanal - our whole country would fit in that swamp! The terrain should suit us well in respect of difficult navigation and not so much elevation gain, but the fact is  we don’t know much about the course and the conditions we are facing. It will definitely be hot for us coming from late autumn temperatures in north Europe and there will be a lot of unknown bugs, animals and reptiles. The amount of paddling in both kayaks and packrafts is intimidating.

We have been racing a fair bit now and also followed the big tropical races to learn something so we hope to do a smart race and get to finish line on the full course. The best result so far for an Estonian team is 16th from Scotland 2007 - our aim is to top that result. We will arrive to Corumba 4-5 days before start and hope to get used to the heat and moisture and also do some final training in conditions similar to race. All international teams in the race are strong (we don’t know much about Brazilian teams) so it will be a tough fierce race.”

Another strong U.S. team are Yogaslackers who broke into the top 10 of the rankings at the last update and also highly ranked are R’ADYS Team Switzerland (11th) and both are very regular expedition and World Series competitors. That’s not to overlook the S. American teams, which I don’t know so much about, but the top Brazilian teams will want to do well (as they did the last time the World Champs was in Brazil), and the Uruguayan and Colombian teams are also strong and experienced.

It should be a highly competitive World Championship race, one which will favour strong paddlers, good (and adaptable) navigators, and in the end it will be the strongest, smartest and most together team which will cross the line first – same as it always is.  That’s why the teams travel to all around the world to take part in expedition racing – it’s the ultimate team sport. 

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