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| Mountain Designs Wild Women - Terra Nova 2023 |
Well, it was never going to be an
easy race for the Mountain Designs Wild Women, given that 3 out of the 4 team
members were backing up from the recent Wild & Co Legends Expedition
Adventure Race and that we had dragged ‘Aunty Jan’ Leverton out of 24hr race
retirement to join us for this round of the ARWS Oceania Series.
Race HQ was Ulladulla, a
beautiful coastal town about 3hrs south of Sydney, so a great spot for a bit of
a holiday as well, but unfortunately for everyone who had signed up for the
event, the weather forecast for the weekend was not awesome, as rain was
forecast for the event. We had booked a nice cabin at Holiday Haven Ulladulla,
which was just a short walk from the beach, where Kim enjoyed a an early
morning swim in the sea pool by the water! Del and Alina arrived later that
afternoon with their families. The kids played mini golf and entertained
themselves on the jumping pillow, with Dads supervising, while we packed our
boxes.
The logistics plan was released
the week before, so we knew we had 10 legs, 4 Treks, 4 Bikes and 2 paddles, so
it was just a matter of working out how to fit all of the gear into Box A and
our Paddle Bag as they would be the most visited during the event and as a 4
person team, we obviously have more ‘stuff’ than a 2 person team. We planned to
go minimalist and save time at transitions by wearing same shoes for the first
trek, mountain bike, paddle and trek as well as carrying our wet shoes as there
was not enough room in the box for more. The plan was we would not see Box B
until well after midnight, so we made sure we had some spare bike bits and
pieces as well as some extra water and food, as you never know what you are
going to feel like by that point of the race.
To save space in boxes, we packed all of our ‘paddle extras’ in dry bags
in the paddle bags, you know like extra jackets, thermals, gloves and
waterproof pants. With 2 of us coming from Queensland, we just wanted to be
100% prepared for a night out in the cold, especially if it was going to rain.
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| This was our plan.....on paper anyway! |
Saturday was race day and as
predicted the clouds had rolled in overnight and it had rained! We decided to
grab a table indoors at Race HQ to mark up our maps, as we knew we would be
spending the next 24hrs battling the elements. Registration was open and Team
Mountain Designs were issued with 1 as our race number, now that was going to
make us stand out a bit for sure! Jan was keen to have a look at the maps and
soon we were gathered around working perfectly as a team, reading out the
course notes, highlighting important information, marking our course and
writing CP descriptions on the maps. The plan was that Kim and Jan would
navigate on foot and bike and Jan and Alina would navigate on the paddle. Del
was to take on the role of ferret, meaning punching the control card at the
checkpoints…..a perfect role for the youngest of the team. Time flies after map
handout, so in what seemed like just minutes we were listening to the briefing,
submitting our boxes and getting ready to start!
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| Course Notes - we highlighted the important parts! |
Off and racing! Now, as masters,
veterans and super veterans of the sport, it is never easy starting with a
trek, as it just feels like all of the young guns, sprint off at unsustainable
speeds, which we would be silly to try to follow! Well, the speedsters must
have chosen the route opposite us, as we were in the lead of people going to CP
A first! Or was it just that we were number 1 and everyone was following???? Leg
1 was a rogaine style trek with a snorkel. Alina volunteered to swim, so we chose to go
AB, DC (snorkel), then FGH. AB were easy finds on the headland as we sort of
know that area well, but the snorkel was a bit challenging, as the wind had
picked up and visibility was worsening. But with some great teamwork and
awesome swimming by Alina we were out of there reasonably quickly. The tricky
section would be next, as we had planned to coasteer, but another team on their
way back, said you can’t get through, so we did a last-minute route
change…which was not awesome. Turns out you could get through and we went a bit
of a long way around! We did get CPF
after overshooting it just a little and enjoyed the coaster to CPG and made our
way up the stairs to CPH before heading back to HQ to head off on the bikes.
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| Kim and Alina check the map....looking for CP F |
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| Map 1 -Leg 1 - Trek |
At this point it was almost impossible to tell
how we were going, because many of the bikes had left, but the half course had
started 30minutes before. It was not
long before we were feeling the effects of the overnight rain…. yes, as soon as
we were off the paths and onto the trails, we hit the mud, teams were riding frantically
in what was a maze of tracks. So, we
stopped, let everyone go and then just tried to make sense of the map in
relation to what we could see. Now a bike
computer and a compass were our lifesavers here…. for sure. We stopped a bit early to have a look at a
possible spot, but after it was not there, realised we had to keep going
further! Bingo! Kim tried to work out
where to head next, but again the maze of tracks made it difficult. Before too long we realised we were on the
right track and were trying to get away from all of the teams. We found CP 4 and before long were on our way
to Cp 5 at Kings Point. Again there were many teams around and tracks were a
bit dodgy…..meaning they did not quite line up with exactly what was on the
map….but we managed to get in and out of CP 5 pretty quickly, leaving many
teams behind as we made our way to CP 6 and then TA1.
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| Leg 2 MTB - Jan leads the way! |
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| AR Live Coverage / Wild & Co Facebook post |
It was time to paddle, it was not
raining, but it was overcast and a bit windy. So, on with the jackets and off we went. Now,
there were two ways to complete this leg, clockwise or anticlockwise and there
was a potential portage option. We were not 100% confident that we could get
through from the TA, without going through private property…. A big risk, so we
decided on the anticlockwise route – I, N, M, L, K and J. We would have a look at the portage option
when we got to J. We were enjoying the
paddle…. well maybe some might say boat drag (the tide was low and too shallow
to paddle in parts) as it was not raining and we were nailing the CPs. Then we had a lot of trouble at CPK. The description was creek mouth ….. so we
searched and searched…..found a creek line but no CP. There were other teams
now looking as well and no one was having much luck. Kim heads up the creek and bit more and
everyone else spreads out. Then BINGO….. Jan finds the CP hidden in the reeds! Yay… but poor Jan then fell over in the water
and was freezing for the rest of the paddle! We then found
CP J fairly quickly and were looking at portage options….we could see
people standing on the edge of the water and thought….maybe it was a park, so
we paddled over that way and sure enough we had a park to portage through to
the main channel, saving us a fair bit of time.
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| Jan and Kim getting in or out???? After a boat drag! |
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| Alina - this dragging isn't that bad! |
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| Walking the kayaks! Del and Alina |
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| Mountain Designs Wild Women ....will we portage??? |
Now, portaging is never easy and
not much fun, but when you work as a team like the Mountain Designs Wild Women
do, it can be very effective. The Surge
Kayaks are also not too impossible for two people to carry, so we had 3 of us
holding the sides…. Alina in the middle carrying 2, Del and Kim on the outside
and Jan at the back, holding the 2 boats steady. As mentioned……not easy…..but a great strategy
in this instance. After another short
kayak drag, we were back at TA1 and ready for the next leg. It was another coasteer which finished back at
the same TA.
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| The answer was yes....a short one...and this is how it worked! |
We were now onto Leg 4 of the
race and had not touched a box, had a pretty slick transition as we just had to
ditch our paddle gear in the bag and go! There were 4 CPs on this leg to collect in
order and we still had a bit of daylight (still on daylight saving time in
NSW). We enjoyed this trek, it was
another coaster around Dolphin Point and despite a few slippery parts the rock
shelves were rather fast travel. We were back just before dark, but it had
started to rain, so we stopped briefly to put on our rain jackets……little did
we know what mother nature had in store for us next!
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| Ay Ups on ready to trek into the night and warm up after our paddle! |
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| Looking for CP 8 Base of Tree No Flag...ESE of S end of carpark...got that???? |
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| Yep! |
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| Wild&Co AR Live Coverage update during Leg 4 Trek! |
Back at TA 1 we located our Box A
and got ready for the next 3 legs….bike, trek, bike….. and there would be no
box at the trek TA. We calculated that
we would be out there for potentially 8 hours, so not only did we need to pack
shoes, extra wet-weather gear, we also had to carry food for 8hrs or so!
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A typical Transition Area..... action stations!
Again we transitioned quickly and
it was not too long before we were about to enter the MTB park. Now we all love
mountain biking trails, but sometimes in adventure races, the CPs can be really,
really tricky to find - add the fact that it has started to bucket down with
rain and you can barely see more than 2 metres in front of you, we knew we were
in for a bit of a treat….not! We found
the trail head and made our way to CP 12, BINGO got it, so off we go again! Next CP was multitrack Junction 310 degrees…..
well, this one had us stumped for some time! There was a very obvious spot from where it
seemed you would take the bearing, but after about 5 or 6 attempts at pacing
out the 7m and having no luck, we started to get worried. We could see that
others had been there looking too….or were they just animal tracks…..who knows.
Luckily after what seemed to be a very
long time…Del randomly stumbled on the CP, and we slid out of the area onto CP14.
The rules were we had to travel in the direction of the trails, so we marked
the maps for after CP 13, we would do a short bush bash across to the trail
that would lead to CP14….well we almost did a great job, but the trails were so
curvy we found ourselves travelling 180degrees in the wrong direction. Jan was onto it….so we turned and went the
other way…phew! So the description for
CP14 was another multi-track junction, but when we arrived, there was really
only one junction from the track to the road….we had a look around in the area
according to the bearing…..but no CP. Again
it seemed weird, as the centre of the circle seemed to be on more of a track
bend. Again the Wild Women, all spread
out searching around, it was not long until another team came along and they
started looking too. Eventually they
found it and told us that they had, so now we just had to find it too. Mm, think the description was a bit wrong and
should have been 20m 10 degrees of track bend.
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| MTB map made navigation a little easier....but the tracks wiggle more than shown! |
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| Map 2 - we did not spend much time on this map. |
By the way, it was now raining
really - really heavily and we were starting to get a bit cold. We still had CP 15, 16 and 17 to get before
the trek TA. It was actually too wet to
stop, as any attempt to put on dry clothes would have found us drenched even
more….so we just kept moving. The trails
were now almost flooding and as we approached what we thought was the track/creek
junction for CP15, we found a number of teams searching. The tricky part here was that the track had a
gap in it on the map, so we were not sure if the CP was where the track went
from fire trail to single track or elsewhere. So Del and Kim did a bit of a bash along the
edge of the creek…trying not to fall in….and Jan and Alina scouted a bit
further up. Alina had some success, so
we were soon out of there. Yay, back on faster gravel roads again, but the rain
was unrelenting. Luckily CP 16 was
really easy and there was a big massive climb up to CP 17. Now, this was another tricky CP to find….the
description was small clearing below road. Now when you navigated to the bend
in the road, where the clearing was meant to be, there was not really a
clearing to be seen, however as we approached the bend, there was a whole
unmarked road….was this the clearing???? Well we had to go and check it out and
so did a few other teams around us at the same time…BINGO, there it was! The ride into the TA was mostly down hill
which would normally be fun…..but not when you can barely see more than 2m in
front of you because of the rain reflecting on the lights and the fact that the
track now resembled a waterfall….well almost. We eventually hit the better road
and made it to the TA. Think it was now midnight….the planned 2 hour bike had
taken us more like 4 hours.
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| Map 3 - Most of Leg 6 MTB, Leg 7 Trek and Leg 8 MTB |
The rain had not eased, but
luckily the lovely TA officials let us in under their shelter. The ground
underneath us was a mud puddle but at least we could put on dry thermals and
our waterproof pants and feel somewhat dry momentarily. Alina and Del huddled
in one corner helping each other out and with Jan and Kim in the other….when
you are so freezing cold, your fingers do not work too well, so even trying to
zip up a jacket was a challenge. Alina
and Jan marked up the CPs for the trek on the map and then Kim checked them
over, there were only 5 CPs O, P,Q,R and S and on paper less than 4km. We made a plan to go for S then R and see if
we could go up a spur to get Q, P and O in that order. So off we set in the pouring rain to a creek
junction where we found S as we continued along the trail Kim spotted a little
single track that may come in handy, as it could be going up the spur, we wanted
to head up later. On we progressed towards CP R with Del counting steps. We walked past a few big puddles and them came
to the creek pretty much bang on distance, but the CP description seemed weird
as 10m E of track/creek junction would have us on the track. We looked anyway and also up the creek line on
both sides…. nothing. So, we walked on a
bit further until the track changed direction. Again, we had a look in some
potential spots, but now we just felt like we had come too far, so we went back
to the first puddle we found earlier and checked there…. nothing!
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| Leg 8 - Trek CP's (Our route S-R-Q-P-O) |
This was rather frustrating as time was
ticking by and it was wet and we were really cold, not moving very fast. Other teams were now arriving and having no
luck. We headed back to our original
attack point and restarted our step counting…. we just ended up in the same
spot and no flag. We kept walking all
the way to the U turn further up and tried looking on our way back from the
other direction…nothing. We even came
across another team at one point who were trying to tell us exactly how far
they had come…. we asked how do you know? …. They said, “It’s on our Garmin” we
were shocked and said they are not allowed and the response was ‘well we are
just beginners and we need the help”’, our response was “you are cheating and
you should be just using your map and compass” - this is how the sport works. They ignored us and kept going. Now we were extremely frustrated as we had
still not found the CP and as we had been there for well over 1 hour (maybe
2hrs) searching back and forth, we had to make a call to ditch the CP….
something you never ever want to have to do! So, we allowed all the other teams to wander
off ahead of us and we relocated our little track and headed up the spur to the
main track to find the remaining CPs. CP R and Q were high points, so although
a bit rough and rugged and steep to attach and descend from, we had no troubles
finding. There seemed to be a great off-track
spur heading to CP 0 which saved heaps of distance, we found another little
single track and it lead straight to the CP – yay…. now just to get back to the
TA. Well Alina noticed the track kept
going and off we set…downhill. Now, it
seemed to be taking us a bit longer than expected….Jan looked at the compass
and said…”Kim, we are going in completely the wring direction….how did that
happen?” This seemed really weird, so we
were bamboozled…..and the only option was to backtrack to the CP. We realised that the track was not 100% in the
right direction, Kim found the spur we should have followed and set a bearing
to the TA . We arrived shortly after and were ready to get on the bikes.
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| Looking for CP R (for way too long) and our little glitch exiting CP O |
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| Wild&Co Ar Live Coverage Update on the Trek |
It was now well after 3am and
according to our timings we should be paddling by now, but instead we still
have a bike ride, which could take us 4 hours or even more…..were we going to
be able to finish this course before the cut-off??? We had no idea, so all we could do was get out
of there as fast as we could. In
transition as we were getting ready to go, other teams arrived and Kim saw one
guy covered in leeches…..Del mentioned something like, should we check…and Kim
yelled out…no way don’t look, lets go! Leeches are horrible creatures, but if
you just leave them, they suck your blood and fall off happily and you don’t
end up with too much of an itch…..but if you try to kill them or torture them,
they regurgitate stuff back into you and this can get really itchy in a few
days!
The road out of TA 2 was
surprisingly fast, so 8kms or so and we were about to turn off into CP 18,
unfortunately it seemed like we had a tail of followers again….we tried to get
away, but we just could not seem to get a gap. CP 18 was easy to find and everyone behind had
no trouble either. We had a bit of a
climb out, so this was a chance to get a bit of a gap, we did well and by the
time we got near CP 19, there was only one team nearby. We stopped at the track junction, walked 20m
NW of the intersection and again struggled to find the CP. Once again we found ourselves doing a bit of
grid search and re-attacking from a slightly different spot at the junction. Kim’s battery fell off and was stuck in the
bush without light, but it was Del to the rescue and at the same time, she
spotted the CP, as she looked up! BINGO!
We snuck out of there and soon hit the
tar, for a fast ride to CP 20. CP 21 was
a little tricky to find as the track leaving the highway, was obstructed by a
large unmarked road which was about 15m above road level. The last bit of single track as we approached
TA 3 was more like little creeks, so we had to carry bikes for a bit. We arrived at the CP, just as it was starting
to get light and the rain had finally eased!
So, leg 8 was a paddle, there
were 3 CPs which we had to get in order. Our time was running out, but we wanted to make
sure we got all of th e CPs so, as a team, we helped each other out of
transition into our PFDs and got on the water ASAP. The ramp was steep and we
were pretty tired, but at least we did not fall in on entry to the water….. Alina and Del set the pace, as we approached
CP 22…. The description was base of two trees NE side of bridge – no flag. Del got out had a look and could not find it,
there was another team looking too. We
went under the bridge and looked there….but nothing. Kim got out and had a run around on the bank
and even thought about going under water to have a look….but there was nothing
that resembled a punch anywhere…..so after much stuffing around and then trying
to get the camera out to take a photo another few teams came across a CP with a
flag on the complete other side of the bank….we were NOT impressed…..we had
wasted so much time! Anyway we go the CP
and paddled out of there quickly. It was
a long way to CP 23, however we were thankful it was easy to spot. The final CP of the leg was out on a small tidal
headland and we were allowed to run to it. Jan wanted to paddle and the rest of us did
not mind. We opted to trek the distance
in the hope that we might just warm up a bit before we get back on the bikes. So with CP24 in the bag, now we just had to
ride back to TA 1 and get ready for the final trek. It was now looking like we
were going to finish well before the cut-off! That made us go even faster!
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| Lucky the tide was low enough....we could walk out to CP24 on the headland |
Just as we were transitioning
back to the bikes, it started to rain again, so we just kept on all of our wet
weather gear and rode off. As there were
no CPs to find on this leg we got to TA1 in what seemed like just minutes and
transitioned onto the final trek.
At TA 1 we had box A where we had
packed some nice dry shoes and socks….it was a bit of a luxury to have dry
shoes, but to be honest, it barely mattered as we had just 8km to go, were had
toughed out the hardest parts of the course and we were excited to be almost
home. Alina and Jan had the maps for the
leg we enjoyed the run-up Racecourse Beach…. yes, we were still running! CP 26 was on the beach and then we had a
coasteer to CP 27 which were both easy to find. Finally, the sun was starting to shine, and
the skies were clearing from grey to blue…we were starting to warm up for the
first time in the race. We planned a
route that would take us back through near CP H which we collected on Leg 1, so
after we hit familiar ground, we gave ourselves a few high fives!
The Mountain Designs Wild Women
ran across the finish line around 9.27am on Sunday morning, in a time of
22hours and 27 minutes (the extra hour was due to the change from Daylight
saving) and finished the Terra Nova 24hr hour race in 4th place
overall, 1st women’s team and 1st 4 person team. This was
a great achievement for the team not only because we are an all-female team,
but because all of us were over 40, 3 of us were over 50 and one of us was over
60, proving that the human body is capable of so much, and that skills and
experience in the sport definitely counts for something!
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| Mountain Designs Wild Women - Finish line smiles! |
Finally on behalf of the team, we
just wanted to thank Wild and Co, their staff and volunteers for another
challenging event. In Australia, we are
just so lucky to have events that range from 6 hours to 6 days to give us that
opportunity to find out who we really are and what we are made of, and how we
cope when the going gets tough. Adventure
racing certainly takes you to places you may never otherwise see or experience!
Mountain Designs Wild Women
Kim Beckinsale Alina Mcmaster Del Lloyd Jan Leverton
Photo Credits
Tom Landon Smith
Written by
Kim Beckinsale
Edited by
Jan Leverton
