Red Ants at Diamond Dash
“Waar rook is, daar is ook vuur”. This was the first clue sending us scrambling up the koppie on the first 4km dash. With no map and no marked route this leg was chaotic as we searched for the clues.
“Waar rook is, daar is ook vuur”. This was the first clue sending us scrambling up the koppie on the first 4km dash. With no map and no marked route this leg was chaotic as we searched for the clues.
Being a guest to Team LAVA for this race, and joined by a legend to the sport, Lisa de Speville, I feel obliged to say a few words…”WOW, what a race!
Although adventure racing is a multidiscipine sport, swimming is rarely included; well, not a swim of any significant distance. Sure, you see adventure racers in YouTube videos swimming – but they’re probably swimming less than 200m – with their backpacks – to cross a small dam or river.
Aside from wilderness navigation, the other element that makes this sport of adventure racing what it is is the unknown, where successful teams and participants are those able to adapt to situations and conditions as they arise.
The thought of paddling in the middle of night, in the middle of winter did not exactly *warm *me up to the prospect of doing this race. But Hardy’s promise of ‘old school adventure racing’ reminded a very race-rusty Team A2A that this is exactly the crazy kind of thing that Mr Darron Raw would dream up for Swazi X.
Despite its small size and publicity this Ystervark and Hooona Tand took us through some spectacular places and provided a sustained challenge both on the river and in the mountains. It matched if not exceeded my experience on much bigger races.
South African adventurers are accomplished; many of their achievements are documented as World firsts and records. Our adventurers have traversed and circumnavigated countries and continents; they’ve rowed across oceans; scaled mountains; cycled extraordinary distances and descended rivers.
A team of South African adventurers will be embarking on the journey of a lifetime as they set out to climb and paraglide from the top of the highest mountain on each of the seven continents. If successful, the team will be the first to paraglide from all seven peaks.
Well, where do I start? This race took our breath away; both literally and figuratively! Nicky, Gert and I had not raced together since Singletrack Africa AR in September 2007. This was Team Red Ants first 100km + race since then, and we would most certainly be up against it with the quality of the field…
In the very dead of night on Tuesday June 29th Trevor Ball and Ugene Nel crested the Du Toits Kloof Pass and started the last 10 km descent down through the Hawekwas forest to be the first riders to the finish of the 2010 Freedom Challenge non-stop mountain bike race