Spring Challenge 2009

Once again, I took place in the all women adventure race named the Spring Challenge. The race format requires a team of three women to race together at all times, with no more than 50 meters distance between any team member. This year I took part with a different team from last year, hoping to do better! My team mates were Rose and Michelle, who are also my work colleagues. Our team motto: To be finished before dark! For last year’s blog article, click here: http://phandcr.blogspot.com/2008_10_01_archive.html
Having participated in the same event last year, in Kaikoura, when a very cold southerly change took us by surprise, we felt that this year we were much better prepared when it came to equipment. A couple of waterproof coats were purchased in the lead up to this year’s event, we all made sure we had warm and waterproof gloves and plenty of thermals would be carried by us all.
Training wise, we found it hard to train together due to holidays (Rose went away to America for 2 weeks in August, and of course I was over in the UK/Holland for a month in June/July). However, we felt that with working out in the gym, coupled with weekly runs up a hill, mountain bike rides in Bottle Lake Forest as well as taking part in three Night Nav races we would be well trained to start the event. Unfortunately I was only able to join in the weekly hill run twice, as I cracked a few ribs during a hockey game. Only 7 weeks out from the Spring Challenge – I was so angry as I really wanted to do well and was just about to up my training :-( Instead, I had to take it easy in the gym for quite a few weeks, which was incredibly frustrating.

The weather forecast for the race day a few days before the event did not sound too promising, and with snow warnings for the Lewis Pass it looked like it would even be problematic just trying to get to St Arnauds.
My challenge actually started on Friday, the day before race day, as I was going to be driving all the way to Murchison (where we were staying), and I was very nervous about having to drive over the Lewis Pass. Luckily Rose and Michelle were very good passengers, and the route to Murchison is an easy one (not that many main roads in the South Island – it is hard to get lost).
Fortunately, the weather gods were kind and the drive from Christchurch to St Arnauds on Friday was quite uneventful. We stopped for lunch at Maruia Falls, which was just a normal river until the 1929 earthquake (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shenandoah_Highway). Although this is not far from Murchison, by now, after over 3 hours of driving we wanted to stretch our legs, as well as admiring some of the beautiful scenery that we had been driving through.
Rose and I got very excited once we very near our accommodation, as we really wanted to see the pet farm animals that were part of the complex we were staying at. So as soon as we had checked in, unloaded the car and stocked the fridge we went in search of the animals. That did not take very long, as they were right outside the chalet!
A few hours later our support crew, the boys (Pete, Ally – Rose’s fiancée and Paul – Michelle’s fiancée) arrived. We left Ally and Paul to cook our dinner, while Pete drove us to St Arnaud for our raft and race briefing. At the race briefing we were handed a map as well as race notes. The course was going to be 36km in distance and we would be climbing up to a height of 1200m. During the event we would be rafting, mountain biking and hiking. Armed with that information we went back to our accommodation to plan our expected routes as well as time guidelines for our support crew.
Next was packing our transition bags. We would be transitioning twice, which is the place to take on more water and food as well as more/less clothing. We needed to make sure we had our spare gear readily available, in case it was needed. This got our nerves going and sleep did not come easily that night.


This is how our support crew prepared for the following day:
Saturday morning arrived, and we were ready to race. The sun was out – but we did not want to get a false sense of security as this was exactly how the race in Kaikoura started the year previous! We got to the start line with plenty of time which was needed as the first challenge of the day presented itself there and then: How can one ever quickly get into a wetsuit? Once that ordeal was over with, we wandered over to the allocated raft, and met our raft guide and raft team mates (in this event the rafts are shared by two teams). After putting on our lifejackets and getting our positions sorted we strolled over to the start line. Just after 10am the start signal was given and a few hundred women all sprinted to their raft, eager to be the first on the water. That is where the journey began. A few kms were spent paddling across the beautifully serene lake Rotoiti, before reaching the Buller River. The water levels were very low, which made our rafting trip a physically hard one. We had to get out of our raft so many times, to try and dislodge it from yet again another rock, that we stopped counting after 20 times. What should have been an exhilarating trip down the Buller became a tediously hard one. But after 2 and a half hours we finally saw our support crew! Unfortunately we then had to carry our very heavy raft up on the riverbank before we could run into transition and change into our biking gear. Our support crew was fantastic and helped us transition very quickly and within no time we were on our bikes and started a 4km journey to Checkpoint 1. From there we had to hike up a steep track to Checkpoint 2, find our way to Checkpoint 3 and then a run back down to Checkpoint 1. We got back on our bikes and cycled a few more hills, including such a steep and rutted track that even Michelle with a 50 pound bet attached would not conquer. But as the saying goes, what goes up must go down, so our efforts were rewarded with a quite technical downhill section with only one mishap when Rose fell off her bike in slow motion. Within no time at all we were at Transition 2.

We took on more food and water and set off for the last leg of the event. We hiked along a path that went alongside the Buller River, the same river that we had rafted down that morning. We had to do a bit of orienteering to find Checkpoint 5. We did not find this straight away but did not want to give up as missing a checkpoint would add 3 hours to our total time. An incentive enough to keep trying! Once we found CP5 we were well and truly on the home stretch. We could see the finish but knew we were still a couple of kms away. We wanted to save up a sprint to finish with, so we power walked all the way till we exited the forest and were out in the open. Just as we started to push out what we thought was a sprint to the finish line, Michelle twisted her ankle on a rock. However, she still managed to run, and all three of us were sporting huge smiles as we crossed the finish line. Total time: 8.24.21.
The weather throughout the day was great, and the newly acquired waterproof coats are still unused! In actual fact, we are all sporting sun kissed faces, as the sun was out the whole day!

Sunday morning, before the prize giving, us townies spent some time feeding the animals (although ham pizzas did not go to the pigs), petting as well as running away from them! As it turns out, Michelle has torn a ligament in her ankle, and perhaps even a hairline fracture. This might have actually happened very early on in the race, during on the many times we had to get out of the raft to drag it across yet again another rock. However, the adrenaline that the Spring Challenge gives you kept her going till the end. Great stuff!