Indonesian Digital News Archive

The more things change in the world of adventure racing, the more they stay the same. A decade ago a team called Seagate, led by Kiwi captain Nathan Fa'avae, dominated the sport, earning multiple world championships. With a premature retirement behind Fa'avae and a new Team Seagate are back at the top of the rankings, winning the 2012 AR World Championship at the Raid in France last week.

Fa'avae was joined by teammates Chris Forne, Sophie Hart and Trevor Voyce in claiming victory on a course that featured some of the most rugged and beautiful backcountry in all of Europe. The course featured high altitude treks, plenty of climbing, challenging mountain biking and good paddling sections. It all made for a fantastic experience for the new champs and the other teams involved.

Seagate managed to complete the course in a total time of 125 hours, 40 minutes. For those new to the sport of adventure racing, that means the competed for more than five days straight, taking only brief rests here and their. They managed to outlast defending champs Thule Adventure Team, who claimed second place with a time of 129 hours, 17 minutes. Team Silva claimed third place with a total time of 130 hours, 8 minutes. Many of the other teams were still coming across the finish line over the weekend, several days behind the winners.

That'll wrap up another great season for the AR World Series. There are still a few good races to come this year, but already teams are starting to look forward to competing in 2013, when the world championship will be held in Costa Rica.

Congratulations to the new champs and to everyone who competed in this great event.

The Adventure Racing World Championships are set to get underway tomorrow in France, where 65 of the top teams, representing 30 countries, will take to the starting line for this expedition length race. Over the next eight days, those teams will battle it out on a tough 520km (323 mile) course designed to test their endurance and skill and push these endurance athletes to their absolute limits.

This year's ARWC is being hosted by the Raid In France and features a course that runs through the L'Argentiére-la-Bessé region of the Alps. The route includes more than 20,000 meters (65,616 ft) of total climbing, with more than half of the race taking place above 2000 meters (6561 ft). The coed teams of four will be put to the test as they trek, mountain bike, paddle and navigate their way across one of the more spectacular landscapes in all of Europe.

Today the teams will have a final briefing and run a short prologue ahead of the official start of the race tomorrow at 6AM local time. They'll then have up to eight days to complete the entire course, although the faster teams such as the defending champs Team Thule and the Kiwi squad of Seagate, are expected to finish in around five days.

Once the event gets underway the race will have a live leaderboard and GPS tracking of the teams. As of this writing neither of those are active just yet. When they do go online you'll be able to follow the action at www.live.raidinfrance.com.

Good luck to all of the teams and especially so to my friends who are competing this week. Race hard, be safe and have fun!