British Team #38, Helly Hansen Prunesco, Warren Bates, Tom Gibbs, Nick Gracie and Nicola MacLeod won the Adventure Race World Championship in Portugal this morning, having been moving since Sunday! No-one gets that good at navigating and moving on foot, bike, kayak etc without some orienteering. Nick Gracie, for example, planned London Rat Race for the past 3 years and always includes some great orienteering stages. Further info here: http://www.arwc2009.com (website may be suffering under increased traffic today) and http://www.teamhellyhansenuk.com/
Congratulations to all racers - and their support crew James Thurlow and Nicola Wiseman.
Helly Hansen Prunesco win Adventure Race World Championship
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Re: Helly Hansen Prunesco win Adventure Race World Championship
Just like to say what an amazing result this was. At the start of the race most watches would of said that Helly Hansen Prunesco would of put in a realy good race to get into the top 5. As things turned out they were up with the top teams till Wendsday evening when there organisation and clever race stratergy put them into a position where they could start to haul in multiple world champs Nike over the second half of the race. Thigs were all very tight right up untill late on Friday when they established a sufficent lead to get them across the line as champions this morning.
Tom Gibbs is a member of Bok and can be seen at local O events day and night when he is not off racing further afield.
Tom Gibbs is a member of Bok and can be seen at local O events day and night when he is not off racing further afield.
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ifor - brown
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Re: Helly Hansen Prunesco win Adventure Race World Championship
Yes well done to the British team that won.
I really feel for Team Nike / Beaver Creek though, perhaps they didn't have as cunning a strategy as HHP, going for too many checkpoints early on in the race and therefore getting on the back foot and struggling to make the cut offs later on, but it was actually one oversight that lost them the race (and $35 000 prize money). The rules by all accounts were overly convoluted (even for AR!) and towards the end Nike misunderstood and thought they had to make the end of a bike stage by 2am when they only had to start it at 2am. Therefore they missed out a whole trekking section which allowed HHP to take the lead. It also sounded really harsh and weird that people had to be out of transition points by certain times rather than in transition, meaning they couldn't grab any sleep in transition which led to Team Nike at one point grabbing a bit of sleep in a car wash! It shows a bit that yes you have to put in a massive effort to be up with the leading teams in a race like this but in the end there are so many factors that the final result can seem a bit random.
Personally from following this I have to say that the format they had in Scotland a few years ago seemed better in that the teams were basically unsupported and just carried on around a linear course was fairer and easier to follow. But ultimately unpopular since only a few teams finished. But at least it was them against a really tough course rather than battling with rules and gimicks. Apparently last year they even had to re-jig all the results at the end because there was a gimick with the teams sailing together with local fishermen and some of them lost hours because of the boat they were allocated!
When they are giving out so much prizemoney to the winning team and little to 2nd it all seems a bit unjust to me. But I am just a purist and I'm sure none of the actual racers would ever complain since they obviously love the craziness!
I really feel for Team Nike / Beaver Creek though, perhaps they didn't have as cunning a strategy as HHP, going for too many checkpoints early on in the race and therefore getting on the back foot and struggling to make the cut offs later on, but it was actually one oversight that lost them the race (and $35 000 prize money). The rules by all accounts were overly convoluted (even for AR!) and towards the end Nike misunderstood and thought they had to make the end of a bike stage by 2am when they only had to start it at 2am. Therefore they missed out a whole trekking section which allowed HHP to take the lead. It also sounded really harsh and weird that people had to be out of transition points by certain times rather than in transition, meaning they couldn't grab any sleep in transition which led to Team Nike at one point grabbing a bit of sleep in a car wash! It shows a bit that yes you have to put in a massive effort to be up with the leading teams in a race like this but in the end there are so many factors that the final result can seem a bit random.
Personally from following this I have to say that the format they had in Scotland a few years ago seemed better in that the teams were basically unsupported and just carried on around a linear course was fairer and easier to follow. But ultimately unpopular since only a few teams finished. But at least it was them against a really tough course rather than battling with rules and gimicks. Apparently last year they even had to re-jig all the results at the end because there was a gimick with the teams sailing together with local fishermen and some of them lost hours because of the boat they were allocated!
When they are giving out so much prizemoney to the winning team and little to 2nd it all seems a bit unjust to me. But I am just a purist and I'm sure none of the actual racers would ever complain since they obviously love the craziness!
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harry - addict
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