Competition Heats up for Race 3 of the ARWS Africa Series

Excitement is building for the third event in the 2021 series.

Expedition Africa 120 km Adventure in Parys will take place on Saturday 29 May 2021 at Hadeda Creek. The host venue Hadeda Creek is a stunning venue situated on the banks of the Vaal river. Hadeda Creek offer world-class facilities to our athletes and the luxury tented camp with breathtaking views of the Vaal river is perfectly suited for Adventure Racing. Teams will gather on Friday night at a massive bonfire, sampling the finest braai cuisine on offer while being entertained with an explosive display of fire dancing.

The top adventure racing teams in South Africa will convene in the Parys – Vredefort Dome area, an area made for adventure. Teams will kayak, trek and mountain bike through the Dome area on a 120 km route with an expecting winning time of 12 hours and with the last team expected on Sunday morning at sunrise, ready for a hearty breakfast at the host venue Hadeda Creek.

To improve their standings on the ARWS Africa series log for 2021 will be the goal for most team’s next weekend. The top three teams, DSV Cyanosis, Songlines and Pinegold will all be at the starting line. All three teams will be giving it all to cement their place in the top three. Any mistakes by these three teams will put their position in jeopardy, so tunnel vision towards the end goal will be the order of the day.

Team Jabberwock will make a welcome return, after they unfortunately had to miss the Swellendam event at Kam’bati River Resort and will be racing all out to make up for lost ground in the series.

Fantastic news is that one of our strongest teams in South Africa will once again make their appearance at a ARWS Africa series. Team Red Ants Adventure Racing needs no introduction and team captain Brian Gardner will lead his team of experienced adventure racers to the goal of unsetting the other top teams’ stranglehold on the top of the log.

The rest of the top ten rankings could be re-arranged if teams, Addicted2 Adventure.co.za, Truffle Hunters and the youth team Balega puts the hammer down.

Teams of 4 are allowed a 7-member squad for the year and teams are utilizing this squad system to the maximum to gain position on the log.

The focus is on the mixed teams of four. One of these teams will be crowned the South African Adventure Racing Champions at the end of 2021 and will win a free entry to the ARWS World Championship in 2022.

Although the focus is on this category, champions will also be announced in all the other categories – male teams, male pairs, mixed pairs and female pairs at the end of the year, with a free entry up for grabs to an event of their choice in 2022.

A little-known fact is that teams of two (pairs) can also use a squad system to maximize attendance to the series (a squad of three athletes are allowed for the year).

The log is still wide open in the pair’s category and it all depends on who will attend the event in Parys. Visit the ARWS -Africa 2021 log here http://www.expafrica.net/

Expedition Africa 120km Swellendam

Youth and Experience at Expedition Africa Swellendam

Press Release / 06.05.2021

The second leg of the Adventure Racing World Series – Africa is due to start in 2 days’ time at the Kam’Bati River Resort. 

It’s the second event of 6 in the series, and has received fantastic support with 50 teams (pairs and 4’s) due to race at the first Expedition Africa 120km race in the Western Cape.  Among them are 6 Youth teams (all 4 members under 25), so this is the strongest youth entry seen at a race in South Africa.

The venue at the Kam’Bati River resort is situated on an Overberg farm called Jubileeskraal, approximately 20km west of Swellendam.   The Sonderendriver and Breede rivers meet on the property, which is owned and managed by the Badenhorst Family, and given the unprecedented heavy rains and floods in the last 24 hours this has presented the Race Directors with the challenging task of working out a last minute plan B in case the Breede river is not safe to paddle.

Most of the top teams from the first race in Bronkhorstspruit in April have returned seeking series points and the focus will be on the mixed teams of four competing to be crowned the South African Adventure Racing Champions at the end of the year in Lesotho. (They are ultimately racing to win the coveted entry spot for the World Championship in 2022 in Paraguay.)

Cyanosis Adventure Racing, Pinegold, Balega and Addicted2Adventure held the top spots after the first race, and are all entered this time around.   Winners and series leaders Cyanosis will field a different team, captained for the first time by Tracey Campbell.

Also racing are Team Songlines, who lead for the first half of the race in April, but due to a navigational error missed the top spot and finished 6th.  The team consisting of Lance Kime, Owen Gandar, Tamika Gandar and Kelvin Trautman raced a few times together last year, but under a different team names. The consensus this year was that they would make their partnership a little more formal and so Team Songlines was born.   

It’s an interesting team name. A Songline marks a route across land, sea and sky and has been used by Aboriginals for generations to find their way. The melody of these songs is said to describe the contours and features of the landscape, which the team thought was marvelous way to think about navigating their way around an adventure race course. It’s a very special meaning and name, and they will be keen to re-establish themselves at the front end of the field to gain valuable points towards the rankings. Let’s see what this team will bring to the table in Swellendam.

Team Truffle Hunters are also attending with the goal to break open a spot in the top five. They are among a big group of Cape-based teams that did not travel up to Gauteng in April, so will be looking to register their first points.

The race is due to start at 7:30 am on Saturday and there will be live tracking at www.expafrica.live.

https://www.sleepmonsters.com/races.php?article_id=10948

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