sprint event for the year at Cattai National Park. Expectations were
high. The Dan, Al and Myself made up Deceptively Slow for this event.
The race started (leg 1) a little late and in a line start for the
kayaks. It was a washing machine start, and the narrow inlet saw a
bottleneck situation. Leg 2 was a rogaine section that required a
points collection of 250 points before the 3rd leg could begin, on our
return to the kayaks it was good to see a good number of kayaks still
there. After running through the bush it was nice to rest the legs for
a bit for the paddle back to TA3. Leg 4 (TA3 to TA4) was line course
collecting 4 controls back to the bikes (TA4). After a bit more bush
bashing the heat of the day could be felt, we arrived at TA4 (the last
leg of the mandatory legs). Buoyed by the news that we were the 25th
team to get on the bikes we were confident on getting to do the bonus
leg. Our confidence was short lived! with in 10 minutes we encountered
our first puncher. First Al, then myself, then Dan! By the end of the
day, we had experience 13 punchers between the 3 of us. and lost at
least and hour in the race. We weren't the only team to experience
some bad luck, the road was littered with teams and upturned bikes
busily working on tyres. It was very frustrating. We eventually, got
going and finished the race (there were a couple of stops to
re-inflate a tyre every couple of kilometers). :-)
It was disappointing and plain bad luck too. But then that's all part
and parcel of racing.
Unfortunately my GPS battery died in the ride section (Nth/West) of the course.
