Swazi Extreme AR 2006

Event: Swazi Extreme Sport
Location : Swaziland
Distance : 120 KM
Date : 28 to 30 April 2006
Team : Bloed en OMO
Members : Abel and Rossouw van der Merwe




Some observations and lessons learnt on the Swazi Extreme :

Pre-Start
As this was to be our first proper (or SERI US) Adventure Race I slept badly in the weeks prior to the event. My main concern being whether my son, Rossouw (aged 15), had the mettle to get his old man back home safely. Had I known what lay ahead I would probably not have slept at all or sent his mother in my place.

Lesson 1 : An Adventure Race is not a visit to Disney Land. You are on your own boet.

We studied Darron’s estimates for the various stages and concluded, based on prior experience with various endurance races (running and MTB) that we could be home in Pretoria by Saturday evening. We eventually finished at two o’clock on Sunday afternoon having only slept twice for three hours and wasted less than four hours at transitions.

Lesson 2 : Darron is an optimist not a pessimist.

To the fellow competitor who informed me after the event that “we wondered at the start what you guys were doing here?” I want to say “there were several occasions that asked myself the same question!”.

Nevertheless my youthful vigour and Rossouw’s wisdom prevailed and we finished ahead of prize giving.

Leg 1 : Hike, swim, kloofing:
In the final 10 minutes to the start team Bloed and OMO searched for indemnity forms instead of the studying the instructions. Fortunately the start resulted in complete chaos with teams running around like headless chickens – which was just as well as this gave us some time to read the instructions and to find out how a compass doesn’t work.

Thanks to cooperation from team Wherever we made it to T1 still full of enthusiasm.

I did however have thoughts about a big stick and Darron Raw’s skull the sixth time I washed the sand and stones from my shoes - which had been ever so carefully kept dry during the dam swim - whilst searching for the CP at a “conspicuous point” on the island.

Lesson 3 : There is a good reason why Darron does not show his face during a race.

A related observation is that not once did Darron provide unnecessary clues or advice that would have made life on the trail so much more straightforward.

Lesson 4 : Darron is a consistent @#$%

Leg 2 : Bike
Started with a murderous uphill that would have done a Sabi or Barberton MTB classic proud. Decided to take the high road (left fork) after CP7. Major mistake. The road turned into an erosion ditch that eventually disappeared. Some serious contour line navigation and remorse followed. Ended up puncturing a supposedly unpuncturable “Stans” tyre on a pathless downhill.

Lesson 5 : Don’t trust man-made features on a map

Lesson 6 : It takes practice to convert map contour lines into a navigable 3-D model.

The 400 m “mine dump” drop of the last 2 kms was a bit of a bore– mainly because I walked most of it. One of the more endearing memories of this trip was Rossouw’s patient look as he waited every two hundred meters for Pa to catch up.




Leg 3 : Hike and kloofing
This was the epic part of the journey during which my prevailing fear was that one of us be taken by a rapid in the dark.

Still in a racing mood we made it to the Mzimnana kloof (CP 10 and 11) just as darkness fell. Decided to struggle up along the river and missed the more obvious path along the barbed wire fence. Took almost an hour to find CP10 – the @#%@ bicycle light was hanging behind the CP board on the other side of the fence.

Took another two hours to find CP11. Partly because we were repeatedly thwarted by ranging torrents, slime covered boulders or thick bush – but mainly because we expected CP11 too soon.

On the positive side – I shall long remember the beauty and roar of the many rapids and falls.

The massive granite boulders and slabs seemed to ask : “we’ll still be here tomorrow, will you “?

Temporarily joined up with various other teams during this phase (Elephant Coast ?, Innit fo da money and Sola 5) with whom we had a picnic snack at CP11.

Lesson 7 : You have seldom progressed as far as you think you have.

Made another tactical blunder by deciding to head back to the Ngwempisi and navigate it to CP13 rather to follow the twinkling lights of the other teams up and over the kloof to CP 12.

It was only later - around midnight – when the mountain sides loomed ever steeper in the dark that the full significance of the map contour lines came home to us. I suddenly also remembered reference to a “Ngwempisi Gorge” in one of the tourist brochures.

Decided to sleep at the base of the wooden foot bridge and re-evaluate our options with a clearer mind.

Lesson 8 : A concrete slab can sleep softer than a Sealy Posturepedic.

Several (many) 200 km teams passed by in the night so we decided that it can’t be too difficult to continue up river and got going again at 3 am. Hours later, at daybreak, it was clear that there were no more paths to be found in the bush and that the only options were to either assail seemingly impossible boulders or to cross to the other side.

For those who did not choose this route : You missed out! The Ngwempisi is a seriously beautiful if threatening river – well worth returning to as a leisurely hiker.

Anyway, at this stage we were also beginning to wonder if we had not passed CP13 in the dark - we convinced ourselves that the terrain we could see had a 90% match with what the map seemed to indicate for a point beyond CP13.

Lesson 9 : Repeat of lessons 6 and 7

Lesson 10 : If what you see does not match 100% with where you think you are on the map then you are not where you think you are. Simple!

Fortunately we at this point caught up with Team Singletrack Africa who kindly demonstrated that the boulders were indeed surmountable (a first experience at this level for us) and that CP13 was still almost two hours onward. Thanks guys.

At this point the camels back was broken – and so was mine. Reaching CP14 and T5 was a straightforward (up, up and up with a tennis ball sized twisted ankle) slog until 3 pm.

Leg 4: MTB
A quick snooze and foot rub (self inflicted – our seconds having some silly idea that one man does not rub another’s feet) later we departed T5 an hour before sunset without a care in the world. We had decided that the competition was over and that we were going to have a good sleep at T6 before going for a gentle row on the canal in the morning.

Kadung!. The jeep track to CP17 turned out to be a highway and the sun was setting fast.

Recovery step 1 : Verify that we were indeed in the right place.
Recovery step 2 : Look for the big stick.
Recovery step 3 : Think positive and realise that the solution lies at OP4.

High point of Leg 4 : Rossouw making the brilliant deduction after CP 17 that we could short cut to the east and meet up with the new highway at the base of Nqabaneni and not have to return all the way up to OP4 or to follow the vehicle tracks north west to get to the UNISWA road.

Low point of Leg 4 : Getting to within a few kms of T6 and not being able to find it as map imperfections (and our refusal to believe the compass) had led us to believe that we were one turn off further on than we actually were. The worst was seeing all the cycle tracks and not being able to believe them.

Lesson 11 : Repeat of Lessons 7 and 10.

Lesson 12 : The compass does not lie.

On eventually arriving at T6 we realised we were carnivores and raided our second’s braai and forgot about the carbo loading nonsense.

Leg 5 : Scramble, abseil
After a short sleep we decided not to wait for daylight and pushed on.

Lesson 13 : Its easier to do your first real abseil in the pitch dark.




Legs 6 and 7 : MTB, Hike and paddle
Met up with Sola 5 for the hike and to rapidly lose them as their superior rowing skills came to the fore.

Were most grateful to discover that Darron did not allow the paddle leg to be an anti-climax.

Rossouw and I had to almost four hours to learn how synchronise our rowing, stop hitting the sides and to re-establish father-son protocol whilst deciding between going around, over or under a multitude of obstacles.

Lesson 14 : It is not easy to steer an ARK – especially if the team has two inexperienced captains.

The bloated dog corpse in the canal was a nice Deliverance touch but the high point was definitely safely passing under a low bridge flat on my back whilst nests of wasps bristled inches from my face.

Finish
Many thanks to Darron and the many other people who made this a memorable event.

Thanks also to McCain for the chips – I must explain that my son learnt his eating habits at boarding school and that I merely followed his example so that he would not feel too embarrassed.

Lastly thanks to Isabelle van Hoegaerden for the great photographs of what was quite frankly an emotional finish for us.

See you next year – unless my team mate discovers that chicks are more fun than Adventure Racing.