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 Filed under: Adventure Racing | with 3 views  Adventure Racing is a global year round sport. If it gets a bit cold and wet in the northern hemisphere you simply fly down to race in the southern hemisphere – so simple (I wish my bank manager saw it that way as well). With only a break of two months since winning the adventure racing world champs in Portugal, Team Helly Hansen Prunesco are back in action and are currently down in Patagonia to compete in the Wenger Patagonian Expedition Race (except Patagonia is cold and wet all the time).
The WENGER PATAGONIAN EXPEDITION RACE® is a true expedition, taking teams of four through lands previously unknown to the human eye. Racers receive minimal assistance as they traverse through the pristine southern Patagonia by means of trekking, climbing and related rope work, kayaking, mountain biking, and backcountry navigation. They often cover hundreds of kilometres without seeing a soul.
In deed, this race is one of the last true expedition races left today and is what the sport is all about – human endeavor in the face of epic adventure (330km mtb, 220km trekking, 60km paddle non-stop all split over 9 stages). Helly Hansen Prunesco won this event last year and so will be hoping to defend their title, which has never been achieved by any team yet over the 7 year history of the race.
The race starts tomorrow (9th February) and should finish by the weekend. As well as Helly Hansen Prunesco, there is another UK team racing – Team Fast and Light…..good luck to both teams and if you have a minute free during work then you can follow them here.
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Filed under: Training | with 5 views  I had a bit of a lazy weekend. Not to say I didn’t try to do something active. It was just one of the few days every year that I don’t feel guilty hanging around the house on Saturday & Sunday afternoon. My excuse – The Six Nations rugby was on and it was nice to sit in front of the TV to watch a sport that had left me with some great memories since I last played when I was back at school. That’s not to say there were no events on over the weekend. The NI Orienteering Night Championship was being held on Saturday evening; however, located down in Castle Archdale Country Park near Enniskillen, it was just too far to justify a 45 minute run to the wife, especially when she was trying to catch up on school reports and needed the kids ‘out of her hair!’. FERMO were also organising the 3rd round of their Frostbite series on Sunday morning and it was oh so very tempting to go down and stay over, but with ‘school reports’, ‘kid’s football on Sunday morning’, it was simple not to be …….so rugby was a good distraction.
But it was not all doom and gloom on the training front. I have found over the years the best and most enjoyable training is the training you don’t expect to get done – the training you can squeeze it in when you never originally planned to do. Examples include: taking the train into work and then running home; sneaking out for a quick hour’s blast on the bike while your wife watches a double bill of Coronation Street; leaving your running gear in the car and stopping at Carinwood on the way home to do a quick loop of the forest – the wife never needs to know about that one  . So on Sunday when I take Scott to his footy practice at Newforge, I have about 70 minutes to kill. Most of the other parents sit in their cars and read the papers (or sleep), but I would be pulling my hair out after about 10 minutes if I had to do that. The good thing about Newforge is it is situated right beside Clement Wilson Park and more importantly Belvoir Forest. Sunday football training means I can get a good 10km run around the forest before I need to collect Scott. Usually when I do go home I still have time to take the bike out of a couple of hours, but yesterday the matter of watching Scotland and France was too tempting and the bike got a quick maintenance check and wash instead.
Sunday’s MotionBase Route
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Filed under: Orienteering, Trail/Fell Running | with 37 views  Entries finally opened for the inaugural Achill Mountain Marathon. Held over the first weekend of May, the event will follow a traditional mountain marathon format in which participants (solo or teams of two) navigate their way around a two-day course on Achill Island. The midway camp will be in the same location as the start location therefore removing the need to carry your tent, sleeping bag and food each day. At the overnight camp on the Saturday night there is planned a marquee with hot food and traditional music.
There will be the usual Elite, B and C classes, but the solo option is only open to elite runners. Distances have not been confirmed for each class yet, but I would expect them to be slightly longer the Mourne Mountain Marathon, only due to the fact that you do not have to carry over night gear – or am I just hoping for this  . Check out the website for more details.
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Filed under: Orienteering, Training | with 19 views Sunday’s orienteering event was the 9th round of the BAOC NI ML (Military League). The event also incorporated the QUOTC Championships. Even though it was an NI ML event, entries were open to anyone – your result simply didn’t count towards the league.
It was a lovely morning and after my run up Cave Hill I [read more...]
Filed under: Trail/Fell Running, Training | with 20 views I wasn’t expecting to get much done on Sunday. There was another orienteering event in Belvoir forest, but I wasn’t sure if I could make it due to Scott’s football training at Newforge. However, with the news on Saturday that all the footy training was cancelled for Sunday, I quickly reorganised my Sunday morning and [read more...]
Filed under: Orienteering, Race Reports | with 18 views This might have been the first Spring Cup event of 2010, but there certainly was no hint of spring in the air just yet. The overnight snow had cancelled all of the kid’s football fixtures for that morning – I drove over to the Woodburn pitches for 09:30 and the league only cancelled the matches [read more...]
Filed under: Orienteering, Training | with 23 views It’s a long old drive from Bangor down to Castlewellan, especially straight after stressful day at work [if only ]. Two hours travelling for a 45 minute run does not equate as being ‘well worth the trip’, but then again if you thought like that all the time would you ever leave your TV [read more...]
More good news on the digital map front. Mapyx Quo has just release their range of 1:25000 digital maps of Northern Ireland. The series include the Glens of Antrim, Mourne Mountains, Sperrins, Strangford Lough and Lough Erne. Even better news is that Mapyx Quo have their January sale on and are offering 25% discount on [read more...]
Filed under: Race Reports, TrailQuests/MTBO | with 37 views The final round of the Dromara CC Trailquest Winter Series took placed yesterday and it was expected to be a hard fought race between the top four teams in the series standings as only 7 points separated them. ‘Retro Grouch’, ‘Nocturnal’, ‘The Losers’ and ‘Who the fox is that?’ had it all to play for, [read more...]
The Event Team at Causeway Coast AR have decided not to run their popular 1 day adventure racing series for 2010.
The main force behind the events Ivan Park and Steve Curry have agreed that after 4 years it was a good time to have a break from organising races. This will also give them time [read more...]
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Adventure Racing is a global year round sport. If it gets a bit cold and wet in the northern hemisphere you simply fly down to race in the southern hemisphere – so simple (I wish my bank manager saw it that way as well). With only a break of two months since winning the adventure racing world champs in Portugal, Team Helly Hansen Prunesco are back in action and are currently down in Patagonia to compete in the Wenger Patagonian Expedition Race (except Patagonia is cold and wet all the time).
February 8th, 2010 | 
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