After some hectic last minute landowner approvals the Legend was on, then the race was on us to get the message out and the entries in. Teams were quick to respond and before we knew we had 11 teams raring to go. Unfortunately 2 last minutes teams could not make things happen. A big thank you to the teams that came and supported the last YstervARk..
11 teams competed and it was absolutely great to have all 11 teams finish between 12 and 18 hours, a first for YstervARk series – maybe we are getting soft and made the course too easy. What was quite amazing was that there were quite a number of first time adventure racers – well done !!!
The actual times and positions were the following (excluding any time penalties which did not affect the results). The splits will be available soon.
1 PS Hawkstone 12h 35m
2 Uncharted 13h 26m
3 Xhale 13h 31m
4 Olympus 14h 00m
5 Lickety Split 16h 05m
6 Stealth 17h 15m
7 Last Minute Novices 18h 45m
8 COSTUS 18h 54m
9 Lava 19h 05m
10 BAMF 19h 31m
11 Tshwane AR Club 19h 35m
Teams started arriving at Aasvoelkrans (south of Rustenburg) from mid afternoon, unfortunately we could not stay and welcome them as a final route check had to be done and Checkpoints set up. Arriving back at camp just before 8pm for registration a village had mushroomed up with a lots of activity, sorting, packing, re-packing, fixing bikes, preparing food……looked like a farmers market on a Saturday morning.
The race started at 11pm with a short scramble to spread the teams a little followed by a 45km mtb of “UNDULATING” dirt road and a lovely jeep track trough the flowering Cosmos which I doubt received much admiration in the dark. First transition sent the teams hiking only to discover it was a 30m abseil into Weltevreden caves, followed by a 3km hike inside a network of caves to find 8 checkpoints. The cave was kept as a surprise and thoroughly enjoyed by all teams who quickly adapted to this different style of navigating. it was a great surprise that no-one mentioned the bats – amazing little creatures, during our 3 hour trip in the caves we were not touched by one although we stood amongst a swarm of them. Novice team COSTUS arrived quite some time after the other teams at T1 after having to contend with 6 punctures, but took off with such positive spirit that I was not surprised to see them catching a couple of other teams.
Then it was another 50km mtb back to Olifantsnek dam, up to now there was a constant change in the first 3 positions with teams Uncharted, PS Hawkstone and Xhale chasing each other and Olympus breathing down their necks. The dam saw a 1km portage and a 7km paddle. Now there was an interesting choice to either swim 200m to start the hike or walk around to the other side, this is where team Hawkstone made their break by doing the swim put them nearly 1 hour ahead of the other teams. The 20km hike was a steep climb up the mountain, over a plateau with some awesome views and down a sheer rock face gully by means of a chain ladder.
Team Hawkstone exiting from Fairy cave (the only crawl in the caves) and coming down the chain ladder
A special thanks to Clint for masterminding and architecting the 4 events in the YstervARk series for the unrelenting enthusiasm and monstrous effort in making it such a huge success in putting the adventure back in adventure racing. It is going to be a tough one to match theYstervARk.
Thanks to Clint and Course Director Nicol for an finding the location, architecting the course, laying out such an awesome route, placing checkpoints and doing the maps.
Thanks to Daleen for organising the financials
Thanks to Leon Smit of www.outdoorfreedom.co.za for the GREAT prizes
Thanks to Brendan – DeltaV for sponsoring Tshwane AR club’s entry ( a new rule has been added that a newbie must form part of the team)
Thanks to Mandy for organising the marshals but unfotunately falling ill, for oupa Gert taking the brunt of the marshalling (lobbing up a backpack with tent, sleeping bag, food, water up the chainladder), Clint and Nicol for assisting where needed.
Thanks to Spirit of Adventure for running the abseiling, providing access to Olifantsnek dam, hiking route and watching over Transition 2
Thanks to Weltevreden Caves for making the caves exclusively available to us for the event
Thanks to Johannesburg Hiking Club for access down the mountain via the chain ladder
Thanks to Aasvoelkrans Nature Resort for accommodating our special requests
Thanks to our ER24 for medical standby
Thanks to Erik our photographer – I am sure we are going to see some great pictures soon, I saw him going some interesting places with his camera. For the awesome pics see http://www.adventurephotos.co.za/index.php many thanks Eric
