Discussion: Costa Rica Adventure Race

Starts today at 7 a.m.
Live Race HQ

APers Getawaystix, Slice and Gratuitous are racing on Team Tecnu. Anyone else?

APer Cocopuffs is their fourth teammate.

And they're in the lead after CP6!

Leaderboard is way behind but this morning's GPS tracker shows Tecnu leading by several hours over Bones. Tecnu has finished the long paddle and started the important 148 km mountain bike leg with plenty of daylight ahead.

For those on Facebook, there are updates from the team manager.
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Tecnu-Extreme-Advent...

Latest post from less than an hour ago is:
"So... looks like the night was good to us. The race website is down, but from what information I could get, Tecnu has never let off the hammer, Bob's navigation has been spot on, and the race has spread WAY out. We are off the water and onto the decisive 100 mile mt. Bike section,and Bones is the only one behind us on the previous kayak leg,and estimating how long it took us, I will say we have a conservative 3+ hour lead over Bones, and a substantially larger lead over 3rd. We should hammer the mt. Bike leg, and stretch that lead out. Bones is tough on the bike,and will NOT be easily shaken, but we could NOT have had a better 24 hours of racing. It has gone as planned,and we are excited to see the team firing on all cylinders. With alot of legs ahead of us that play to our strengths, this is looking amazing, but want to remind race fans that we have 3 days of racing left,and anything can happen. But it does appear that all the hard work we've been doing is paying off with perhaps the making of something real special. Not very many teams open a 3 hour gap the 1st day of a World Class race, so even I have tempered excitement watching it unfold."

While I'm interfering with your work day...

In case you missed it, here is the course flyover video to put things in context.

And Sleepmonsters has been posting race reports too.

nearly 4 hr lead for Tecnu last I heard from down there

Lead is approaching 5 hrs based on current tracking locations. After the 138 km bike section, there's a mandatory 4-hour rest at a lodge with bed and hot springs available! Looks like Tecnu should have the advantage of taking their rest while it's dark. Sunset is around 6 p.m. and sunrise is around 5:30 a.m.

Btw the time zone is 2 hours earlier than Toronto time if you're watching the trackers.

Pretty impressive lead considering they are only 28 or so hours into the race.

About half that lead came from the 72K trek, which took them just under 13 hrs. Good work, BobTheNavigator!

damn!! I don't want to work at all... I wonder if my patients would mind if I had them hold up my iPad while I worked?!!!

D

:) That ought to work!

After dark on Day 2, Tecnu has a 7.5 hour lead over Bones. It looks like the biking has been slow - there are lots of mountains on that map! They've been out there for about 15 hours and still have some riding to do before mid-camp. It'll be dark for 7 more hours so they still have a chance to enjoy some or all of their mandatory rest in the dark. Since we don't know where the intermediate CPs are, we can't guess what the rest of the bike leg will be like but as they move northwest of Lake Arenal, the terrain becomes less mountainous.

Team Bones is in 2nd place with a good lead on the 3rd place team Adventure Addicts Buff. They'll be biking all night and resting in the daytime. Several teams are still wrapping up the long trek that preceded the long paddle that preceded the long mountain bike leg (!). Must be tough for organizers with teams spreading out so far so quickly.

Mountain biking from Monteverde to Arenal might actually be faster than driving it. :) Those roads are brutal but that's what makes that area so special and remote.

True! I've biked around Arenal but I can't imagine biking around Monteverde.

Tecnu arrived at the lodge at 6:05 a.m. (8:05 a.m. Ontario time) after 22 hours of biking. They'll have their rest period in the daylight then they'll be out again at 10:05 a.m. 2nd place Bones' tracker hasn't broadcast for a few hours but at that time, they were 11 hours behind Tecnu. Now that it's light, the final section of biking could go more quickly for them than it did for Tecnu. At the back of the pack, there are still 2 teams plugging away on the long trek.

Good lord... an average of what.. ~6.5km/hr... eeck!

I was looking at some of the tracker points yesterday and I had to verify that they were biking because the times and distances looked like trekking speed... must be some TOUGH riding... finally made me stop wishing I was there! :-)

..or bike pushing...

It is just me, or does it look like Bones is going over the southern edge of the Miravalles Volcano instead of around? I wonder if they found some ultra secret goat path? could be interesting to see how that turns out.

looks to me like if you take out the long tracking segments when the spots were not working that they 'could' have taken the same routes... I'll defer my final answer until Bash tells me what I really think is happening (happened) :-)

Tecnu hit the road again after exactly 4 hours of mandatory stoppage. The first 4 hours or so of this next trek are on roads, so likely jogging in the 30C heat. Meanwhile, Bones should have reached the end of the bike by now, but are shown inexplicably stopped on the road about 5km from the rest area - they've been there over 1 hour. No idea why. North Face is riding along about 2+ hours behind Bones, Buff about 1.5 hours behind them, and Grupo Orosi-Costa Rica Spirit is less than 2 hours behind Buff.
Once teams get going again, tecnu's lead will be on the order of 11 hours or so.

FB, I agree with you. The North Face and Adventure Addicts Buff seem to be heading the same place so there's probably a CP near that volcano. We don't have any tracking info for Tecnu in that area so they probably went that way too.

From the Tecnu team manager on Facebook half an hour ago:

"Here's whats coming next for Tecnu adventure racing. Currently we have a huge lead of at least 9-10 hours over Team Bones from the U.S. They are sleeping, we are half-way through the 50km trek to CP 29, where we do a bunch of different short disciplines. We will do a short inner-tube section, then ride horseback for 4 miles, before getting back on our bikes for the last biking section. Then we will white-water raft a long section, then kayak to the finish line as hopefully victors of this race. Teams working SOO well together, so proud of them."

Bones and North Face are both at the mandatory rest stop, 8 and 10 hours behind Tecnu. Tecnu's Spot is down now but they have probably finished the trek and are doing all the fun bits at CP29.

In the dark - oh well.

Sleepmonsters has posted a few reports translated into rather lyrical-sounding English.

http://sleepmonsters.com/racereport.php?race_id=94...

"The first hours of this Tuesday were the right time for Tecnu team to bring their best to light, and made it possible to surpass obstacles faced while trekking from Paquera to Thiel Port."

"The experience, expertise, and mainly an enviable physical resistance, have been key factors for this team to take the lead in this adventure race, and hold the first position."

"The Mexican team La Costeña Salomón became the first team in abandoning the Costa Rica Adventure Race 2012. All this, after informing the organization that the detrimental physical and mental condition experienced by its members was stronger than their desire to continue in the competition."

Who among us has not reached that point?

I seriously cannot concentrate at work! Following the GPS map tracking like a hawk, and Tecnu is doing amazing!

Following their 4-hour mandatory rest, 3rd place team The North Face withdrew from the race tonight due to a knee injury. :(

Tecnu arrived to do the waterfall rappel at 5:12 p.m., then did the canyoning section. An hour ago, they were preparing to go into the rainforest canopy. This is all from Twitter and Quick Updates since the tracking map and leader board aren't working for me at the moment.

Btw after these events, the racers who log on AP tell me they enjoy reading these discussions to see what information we had, what guesses we were making, whether we were trash talking about them while they were out of the country, etc. ;) So don't just lurk - jump in!

I bet Tecnu would be even faster if Gratuitous would have stopped eating so many cookies and gotten rid of those love handles.

No kidding! Look at his food diary a week after ARWC last November.
http://www.ar.attackpoint.org/viewlog.jsp/user_642...

"an undislosed amount of snickerdoodles"
"Dognut X 3"

Yet... it seems to be working for him.

From the team manager on Facebook just now:

"Going to bed with Tecnu with a commanding lead. We are on our bikes, with team Bones on their feet trekking, trying to nav a section in the night that we did during the day. Tough! North Face who was in 3rd has pulled out due to an injury. We hope their team-mate is well. When the sun rises we should be on our final day, headed towards an incredible victory... winning an entry into the 2012 AR World Championships in France. "

love handles are really just reserve fuel tanks for when you can't keep anything down :-)

Tecnu - still out in front by a large margin - is done the trekking and has trekked back to the rest stop and picked up their bikes. They are on what should be a fairly quick bike to the rafting put-in. Bones look like they've finished the "out" loop of the trek and starting on the fun stuff: canopy tour, ropes, tubing, horseback riding.

With the unfortunate withdrawal of North Face and Bones' slow trek there is now a decent battle brewing for 2nd-5th spots. Buff looks like they've made up ground on Bones and they have Grupo Orosi-Costa Rica Spirit nipping at their heels with Selva Kailash close enough behind to pounce on any mistakes

Just a few
happy tourists having fun in Costa Rica. Although Bob apparently is possessed...

At the end of the trek Tecnu's lead has ballooned to over 13 hours over Bones, with Buff a further 1 hour back.
Thanks for the photo - they look disgustingly un-exhausted.

Cool - those look like real smiles!

It's not often I see a pic on my computer that 'smacks' me with a distinct (day three) smell!! Awesome!
:-)

From the team manager 6 minutes ago:

"We are off the bikes, getting ready to go out on a 41 km white-water rafting leg. Mostly flat-water and slow going, but the first section will be downriver and give the team some much needed rest. Our lead has grown overnight and is estimated to be over 13 hours over Bones,and 14 over Buff. Team's killing it. Long day paddling with a short island trek thrown in there for fun, but the team's off their feet for the best part of today, so let loose them cowbells. Let's bring Tecnu home to victory. Paddle hard guys!"

I believe Mari from Bones is strong on the bike. They should be able to put some time into the teams challenging from behind.

I'm not sure if there's a treasure trove of race photos somewhere that I'm not finding but the short Wild Racers videos show off some of the spectacular terrain. The APers on team Tecnu are featured in several video and voice clips. http://arworldseries.com/arwsportal/default.aspx?a...

Bash I have a treasure trove of photos in my inbox -- the Tico plan to post updates and content to their site fell apart on them so they emailed to me in hopes I can post for them. Too bad I was up in the Maine mountains the last couple days!

I will get pics up this evening, unless somebody else beats me to it.

Yahoo! I don't think you can ever say it's "too bad" that you're spending time in the Maine mountains. Such a beautiful area and less than 2 months till Untamed NE! :)

Check your ca.inter.net email, Barb, I sent you some low-res ones while I have internet. You can almost feel the humidity in some of those shots. Maybe you can get them online somewhere for the public?

More tonight . . . .

Any ideas how to get updates about other teams - like Agrocontrol - Agricenter (#6) or Orosi Sprint?

Bash - I sent you an email (I have it from the WT last year), I have a public photo album I can use for the pic's on smugmug if you don't have one.

I'm on it, Grant - thanks! And thanks to Osteo too!

Zoli, we're figuring out our info from a variety of sources - GPS tracks including the very useful route history feature, online course details, leaderboard times, Sleepmonsters reports, Twitter, Live Race HQ quick updates and the Tecnu Facebook page. Other than the Facebook page, you can obtain info on all teams through those sources. It takes some detective work to figure out what's going on, and we've been focusing on the racers we know in real life. It would be awesome to get updates on other teams here if someone has time to do the digging.

Thanks Bash, this is exactly what I try to do, even during meetings ;-)
shame that the official site is down, but seems that it was updated lately.
Regarding the Tecnu team - don't think that anybody thought that there will be such a huge difference. Great work and super result, as one who knows the sites where those teams compete

:) It gets a bit addictive.

Here are low-res versions of the pics Grant sent me. All of them are copyright Arturo Yong and I will try to remember to replace this with a link to official, higher-res race photos when they are available.

https://picasaweb.google.com/BarbJCampbell/CostaRi...

Just for the record, Zoli, the site isn't "down" they're just not updating it with content. There's a big difference (esp to one of the guys who does the programming...) :)

Zoli, there were a couple of times when I thought parts of the site were down but it seems that I'd corrupted something with all my refreshes. Everything has always worked fine when I've gone back to the original link.
http://arworldseries.com/arwsportal/default.aspx?a...

It seems that when my laptops' cash memory is full, the only solution to refresh the site is to turn of my laptop. So these days I'm turning it off very frequently. I'm not a software guy so for me "down" means that is not usable for me (as a mech. eng.) Yes, it is addictive, to follow up this way an amazing race and an even more amazing performance.

Photos posted to http://arworldseries.com/arwsportal/PhotosMain.asp...

The sun has set and Tecnu has just started the final section - 38 km of kayaking, 21 km trek and 50 km of kayaking, finishing in Puntarenas. Looks like they should be done tomorrow morning, then we can watch the more suspenseful race for the other top 5 places!

ahh.. pictures!! thanks Bash and Untamed! I can see what I will be doing later this evening! maybe I'll eat copious amounts of junk food just for them while going through them!! what was it? Snickerdoodles?!!!

If Bob ever reads this I'd be very interested to know just what he was preparing to do to those peaches (I think they"re peaches) on day three.. :-)

Tecnu is out in the bay less than an hour from the final short island trek. Bones is on the bikes and are currently 13.5 hours back. Buff and Selva Kailash are close to getting on the bikes (<1hr).
The weather is the only x-factor at this point, with a chance of t-showers for the Puntarenas area.

From the race:
"This afternoon, after 81 hours and 35 minutes, team Grupo Orosi Costa Rica withdrawn the race, before PC29. They are good but very sab for the situation."

Tough break, as they were having a strong race, in it with a shot for 3rd. Nice race muchachos.

Looks like Bob is whistling a tune to the fruit. Could be orange, peach or mango. Bob, please clarify when you wake up.

Tecnu's SPOT has been quiet for the past hour but depending on where the island CP(s) are, Tecnu could be trekking now. The course description says it's a 21 km trek where they'll visit the highest peak of the island. Google maps shows the highest peak as 200 m, which should definitely be within their capabilities! ;) The difficulty depends on whether they have trails to follow. It'll be interesting to hear how much bushwhacking they did in the race. The Costa Rican forest gets kinda thick - not to mention full of poisonous snakes and stuff.

Just as I posted, Tecnu's SPOT updated. They are trekking now.

Looks like they stopped for a nap at around 8 p.m. in a settled area - maybe a CP? Their last broadcast showed them in the same place for about 90 minutes so far. Makes sense - no need to rush. Looking at their route history, it appears that they made incredibly good time between 6:30 and 7:30 p.m. - first kayaking, then running.

At 10 p.m., Tecnu is nearing the peak of the island. It's all downhill from here, hehe.

To your question Barb, from talking with teams at previous editions of this race, there is hardly any off-trail travel because the jungle is too dense and dangerous to bushwhack through. I don't know if that's the case this year, or not, but the reputation is trail navigation for the duration of the event.

Looks like they are back down to the beach towards the west end of the island... unless they decide to do another lap of the island I expect they'll be paddling "home" soon!! :-)

Google maps has some cool pics on the island (some posted by Mntn bikers)... gives a good idea of what they are racing in... and why you would want to stick to trails if they are available (which it appears they are)

Phew re the bushwhacking! When we were there, biologists were always telling us about some plant or animal that could injure, poison or kill us. In one of the videos, you can hear a racer talking about a stinging plant.

Tecnu is still on the island this morning. Looks like they may have stopped for 2-3 hours in the night. They are on the move now and heading back to their kayaks. There's a 90% chance of rain with thunderstorms this afternoon so I'd like to see them on the water soon so they can be off before it gets nasty!

Six hours ago, their team manager posted that they had a 14.5 hour lead over Bones and a 16 hour lead over Adventure Addicts Buff.

Day 4 photos are up now, showing the adventure activities. http://arworldseries.com/arwsportal/PhotosMain.asp...

Looks like Tecnu has stopped for a break at the same place they stopped at 8 p.m. last night. It's in a settled area - maybe a CP or even (if they're lucky) a place where they can get food. They should be back on the water soon. Thundershowers are in the forecast from 1 p.m. till mid-evening. :(

Hmm, there's new SPOT info and I take that back. They didn't stop this morning - not sure why there was a data point indicating them at the same location an hour later but it is gone now. They are now in their boats moving east in a channel in the island, heading toward open water and Puntarenas. I guess they must have portaged part of the way to this channel last night? It doesn't look like they would have had time to paddle all the way around. Was anyone watching while they did it?

Tecnu looks to be done touring the island and are heading for the SE shore to start the final paddle to the finish/win. Selva has passed Bones on the rafting section and are over 15 hours behind Tecnu's pace. Buff's Spot hasn't uttered a peep since yesterday afternoon, so no idea where they are but likely mixing it up in the battle for 2nd.

Yup, Bash is right and it looks like they're paddling out into the bay via a river.

LosDobos, did you see how they got to this point last night?

It looks like they paddled south via a smaller river along the north shore last night before starting the trek.

Sounds reasonable. They were lightning fast from 6:30-7:30 p.m. so the route couldn't have been too tough. No intermediate history to show it, unfortunately.

Their team manager has confirmed that they got sleep last night and planned their final paddle to take advantage of the tide.

At last some company for Tecnu - first time since the race started! Short course teams Merrell Denmark and Agrocontrol-Agricenter should be in sight behind them on the water.

No sign of Buff's SPOT track but they were in 3rd the last time the leaderboard was updated. Selva Kailash's SPOT wasn't working and apparently got fixed at the whitewater raft/sea kayak TA (CP38). You'd think that if Buff were there, their SPOT would start working again too - but that's just speculation.

Selva Kailash was last shown at CP38 from 7-8 a.m. (15 hours behind Tecnu) and Bones was shown there from 8:30-9:30, which isn't that long ago. Those are the most recent tracks so they could still be there but Selva Kailash has likely started kayaking by now.

Tecnu looked like they were clipping along on the water at 7-8 kmph then they appeared to slow right down before losing signal?... or maybe it's just me?!...

Yahoo! Their latest SPOT track shows them about 15K from the finish right now.

Selva Kailash has a 90-minute lead on Bones but they're sticking closer to shore rather than heading straight across to the island. I wonder if the thunderstorms are looking imminent. Current weather is still shown as partly cloudy. Still no sign of Buff's tracker.

A rare leaderboard update! Adventure Addicts Buff arrived at CP38 (whitewater raft/kayak TA) about 40 minutes before Selva Kailash. So it's a good battle for 2nd through 4th places. Too bad we can't see Buff's SPOT track!

Cool! Tecnu should be done by 1:30 local time I think? Time for a quick nap before happy hour! What could be better than winning the race just ahead of a storm and then having a beer in comfort and watching the storm through the pub window!!??
Should be a fun battle for those next spots, especially if it storms!!

Selva Kailash is crossing to the island now so maybe we'll see the route through the island to that central TA.

Just imagine how great Tecnu must be feeling with Puntarenas in sight! What an incredible performance.

Actually, Selva Kailash is entering the river from the east side of the island. Not what we were thinking Tecnu did.

Bones is heading the same way as Selva Kailash. Bobby, what did you guys do to get to that CP so fast?!? I suspect some portaging.

ARWC Costa Rica - The race for 2nd is on! Bones had a slow rafting leg and has dropped to 4th. Selvia's over 2 hours ahead of them starting the kayaking, and Buff has moved into 2nd, albeit only 40 minutes up on Selvia.

6 km left to paddle for Tecnu...

What is Selva Kailash doing so far east? Is there a low tide or strong current at the mouth of that river?

Finished!!!! :)))

And now we can watch the far more exciting race among the other top teams. :)

Way to go Getawaystix, Gratuitous, Slice and Cocopuffs - 4 Attackpointers headed to the AR World Champs in France. A well-deserved victory! :)

From Tecnu's team manager:

"We have officially been announced as winners of the 2012 5 day Costa Rica expedition race minutes ago. Unbelievable race guys. We are sooo proud of you and the race you ran. Incredible performance, and utter destruction of the rest of the field. Enjoy this victory, heal up, then lets get after it. France and the World Championships in September awaits!"

looks like they may have taken the island trek out for the following teams, unless the receeding tide forces them way out and around?!

CONGRATS to TECNU!!

I wondered that too. Not enough phone signal this evening to see the SPOT tracks. If so, that's a tough break for teams that could have moved up on the island trek - but understandable on the organizers' part.

Very impressive win for team Tecnu. Congrats! Should be a great finish for the remaining contending teams.

woohoo!! Congrats Bob and the rest of the Team, you guys did amazing!!

From Tecnu team manager:

"Been talking to Kyle and recapping the race, here are some of the highlights. "Epic course. True Adventure. Tons and tons and tone and tons and tons of snakes and spiders. Did I mention tons? Killed a coral snake, kill or be killed. Only real nav error was on the long mt.bike ride to cp 22. marco was a stud and carried the mandatory gear all the way. I got heat exhaustion on the long trek, team carried my gear, towed me, took me awhile to recover, but by nightfall I was 80%, then soon leading the charge up the hill. Winning is sick. We used the sail on the rafting section and crushed it. Course and organization was awesome. Going to be a great World Championships next year. Team's health is great. Everyone held up well, had fun, laughed our asses off. Got sick, couldn't pee, felt like I had to, but was too dehydrated. Recovered and was 100% and leading the charge again." Great stuff Kyle. Recover well. France is waiting bud. Sleep well tonight team, party rock Tecnu style tomorrow."

From Tecnu team manager (although not adjusted on the leaderboard yet):

"Buff got disqualified for not using a mandatory trekking section on one of the treks moving Selva/Kailash to 2nd and Bones up to 3rd place."

Great Tecnu finish line photo - not sure if non-Facebookers can see it.

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10150765366...

And FB guessed right - only Tecnu had to do the island trek. The teams behind got short-coursed. So their winning margin was about 4 hours (after Buff's DQ) but their lead on the full course was around 16 hours at the island. Awesome - really excited for you guys! :))

Nice "Wild Racers" finish line video of a very happy Team Tecnu.
http://vimeo.com/41181570

Hey guys, as Bash mentioned, it's really fun/interesting to read what everyone thought was happening. Here are a few gaps I can fill in:
-those were some mandarin oranges in syrup being annihilated FB...
-we did some off-trail travel a few times, ~1k on the first island trek (Day1), ~3k down a canyon after the waterfall rappel & ~3k on the final Island trek up to the high point & back down. Being off-trail was sketchy & we're now covered in rashes etc. from the plants, although we only ever saw snakes while on trails, roads, or in the canyons.
-there was a mangrove channel at the north end of Chira Island leading us into the final trek section, we got there 2hrs after high tide, which was lucky, since at low tide you can't get through. Bash, it was similar to channels in the Everglades.
-Definitely enjoyed some beers at a pub overlooking the Gulf after the finish with Pongo and Antonio (the RD's), very sweet tasting indeed, but maybe still not as good as after hockey FB.....
-it turns out the final Chira Island trek was cancelled for all the teams (including us), but there was some miscommunication b/w our team & the RD at the Raft to kayak TA (I'll leave this for Slice to explain.:)). We wasted close to 2 hours looking for CP's (orienteering flags) on the island that weren't there and apparently could have lost the race if we wasted any more time out there...yikes!

Overall the team raced really well together a vast improvement over Ecuador. Full race report to follow......

Thanks to everyone for the well wishes and encouragement.

Hey guys, as Bash mentioned, it's really fun/interesting to read what everyone thought was happening. Here are a few gaps I can fill in:
-those were some mandarin oranges in syrup being annihilated FB...
-we did some off-trail travel a few times, ~1k on the first island trek (Day1), ~3k down a canyon after the waterfall rappel & ~3k on the final Island trek up to the high point & back down. Being off-trail was sketchy & we're now covered in rashes etc. from the plants, although we only ever saw snakes while on trails, roads, or in the canyons.
-there was a mangrove channel at the north end of Chira Island leading us into the final trek section, we got there 2hrs after high tide, which was lucky, since at low tide you can't get through. Bash, it was similar to channels in the Everglades.
-Definitely enjoyed some beers at a pub overlooking the Gulf after the finish with Pongo and Antonio (the RD's), very sweet tasting indeed, but maybe still not as good as after hockey FB.....
-it turns out the final Chira Island trek was cancelled for all the teams (including us), but there was some miscommunication b/w our team & the RD at the Raft to kayak TA (I'll leave this for Slice to explain.:)). We wasted close to 2 hours looking for CP's (orienteering flags) on the island that weren't there and apparently could have lost the race if we wasted any more time out there...yikes!

Overall the team raced really well together a vast improvement over Ecuador. Full race report to follow......

Thanks to everyone for the well wishes and encouragement.

Oh NO!! (Re the island trek.) Although I'm sure you all enjoyed the chance to get in some extra training... ;)

Big congrats to you all. Safe journeys home.

Those late course change 'miscomunications' make me CRINGE!! When your pushing the limits and every last bit of energy and focus is on "the plan" and "the finish" I think the paramount obligation of the RD(s) is to make certain that THE TEAM UNDERSTANDS the change. It's never fair to put that burden on one or even two members who may be 'spacing out' at the time or otherwise preoccupied.

Can't wait to hear Slice's report

I remember a race where the team captain had to sign something to confirm that he/she knew about and understood an upcoming course change. I agree with FB - in a race with such high stakes, organizers need to do more if they change the rules on the fly.

Agreed, any course chnages need to be in writing at a TA, or CP and need to be signed-off by the team captain. It wasn't Slice's fault, the RD was more concerned that we not show up before 10am the next day so the media could all be present. He wanted us to sleep on a beach somewhere........kinda funny, but understandable considering they did a great job with the media as the event was covered in all the major newspapers and on television.

And you (I, we) should have a team rule (mantra even) that any changes told to any team members by any race staff requires a quick team meeting to make sure everyone understands EXACTLY what the change is and what repercussions it might have on your strategy

... tough to go back and ask for clarification in the middle of your next trek when Dave snaps out of a funk and pipes up "oh yeah, they cancelled the ??? but we still have to go to the CP before... or after... or, hmmn, what day is today and where's our fifth teammate?!?!" :-)

Congrats to COCOPUFFS, KYLE, LISA and BOB!!

Sorry, its GRATUITUOUS, SLICEGETAWAYSTIX and COCOPUFFS. YEAH, CONGRATS!!

Big congrats on a great race all!
Sorry to hear about the rashes from the plants. How ironic... Isn't there a cream for that? I think I've heard of one... ;)

:))

Gratuitous of Tecnu has posted his race report. A few excerpts I liked:
"Huge crocodiles"
"Huge boa constrictor"
"canyon trek with a ton of snakes"