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07-Sep-2010 11:52:26 |
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Tom Gibbs Team Helly Hansen Prunesco ARWC World Champions 2009 |
| 15-Dec-2009 15:29:49 |
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Reprinted in part thanks to sleepmonsters and Tom.
Note: the event (the ARWC 2009) was different from other Adventure Racing events in that the winner would be the team who had the most checkpoints. If there was a tie on this then bonus checkpoints became important, and if there was still a tie - then the first team home would win. In the end Helly Hansen were clear winners by two checkpoints
Tom Gibbs Team Helly Hansen Prunesco ARWC World Champions 2009
Hello to you all and thanks for the tremendous support from the UK and around the world.
You never know we might knock a football story of the news for 5 seconds.
I thought I'd try to explain some of the decisions that we made on the course.
1) At the start a lot of teams thought the course was clearable. If it was then you couldn't afford it miss out any early controls or bonuses. We aimed to clear the first few sections. The harder to get Bonus on the first long bike was the only one we debated and were very close to ditching - in hindsight we should have (along with the bonus on the Prologue)
2) We missed the bonus on the 2nd bike by mistake - nav error by myself that we didn't realise until near the bottom of the hill.
3) We had to make sure we were inside the cut off on the 1st long paddle. We decided to ditch 1 CP and 1 BP to get in in time. This turned out to be a good call.
4) The transition at the end of this paddle was our key moment. We set out the maps to see the next 2 legs (650km trek, 160km bike) and we knew we couldn't do it all before the cut off. The run was very linear so that only left the bike as having opportunity. We worked out we could cut 3 Cp's and 80 km off the route with an easy 35km ride on road. A quick look at a road atlas showed us the key town name we had to head too. No other team did this in transition and I think it is where our victory charge started.
5) We made a great call to avoid the short paddle and Jumar choosing instead to hike up the road to the next CP. This saved us hours.
6) We overslept in our next sleep getting 4 hours instea dof 2 - this was the best thing that could of happened to us. We were on fire after that running past Nike, Orion, Lundhags etc and putting 2.5 hrs on NIke by the end of the 60km trek.
7) We were now well infront of cut off's and able to take charge of our race an put pressure on Nike. On the next paddle we pulled back 1 Cp (and probably should of got the other one as well) and got the BP as well. We did the latter so that if
8) We kept hearing that Nike were going to miss cut=offs, then the next thing they had just made it, it was very hard going from thinking you could win to being back in 2nd place.
9) We got to the last longish trek 2hrs before cut-off and had a cut off of 6pm to do the last CP, we were outside this so settled for 3 CP's. At the time we assumed that Nike were doing similar and we had pretty much accepted 2nd place. Though we had a feeling that the race wasn't completely over.
10) Arriving at the last long bike to find out what Nike had done was amazing. We needed to know exactly where we stood before leaving the transition. As we left in the knowledge we had a 2 or 3 lead from Nike and Lundhags I felt very mentally tired and suggested we go back and get an hour's kip to make sure we would make no error's to the finish. Michael from Team Explore told us "You cannot sleep. You are leading the World Championship !". That was exactly why we slept.
11) We decided to drop the last bike CP. It wasn't hard, it was just that we had no idea how long the last stage would take us and we couldn't afford to be late over the line and miss both CP's.
12) Up until a 200m to the finish we still didn't know if we were truly in the lead as no one would say definitively that we were. and finally Yes the boys did cry on the finish line.
have be AR'ing for 12 years, and have always wanted to win a big, big race. After the disappointments of Sweden and Scotland I thought I would never again have a chance of winning the title. This has been a dream come true and probably the most demanding week of my life.
I still cannot believe that we have won, beating so many good strong teams in the process. I think I know now what Olympians feel when they win Gold.
Tom Gibbs
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