The Keen Great Ocean Road Adventure Race

Well after a few years of slugging it out against each other this year Gordon Walker and I decided to join forces for the inaugural Keen Adventure race in Australia. The race director is none other than Australian Sporting Legend John Jacoby. John is a 3 x winner of the Coast to Coast, 4 x World Marathon Kayaking Champion and also a hugely experienced Adventure racer with wins in the Raid, Eco Challenge and a host of other international events.

With such a hugely experienced racer in charge of setting the course and one who I knew has an aversion to crappy courses Gordon and I were looking forward to the prospect of a fantastic race. Added to this was the fact that this would be Gordon’s first outing in a true Adventure race with all of his previous racing being purely Multisport.

We were incredibly lucky to have the help of Andrew Connelly who works for race organisation. He had found us a support crew, who just so happened to be a wizard on the bikes, organised our accommodation and generally made things a whole lot easier than if we’d had to try and get organised our selves. The tone for our week was set though when we were driving down to the start in Port Campbell when we found out our ski which was suppose to be at the start was in fact still in Melbourne, 2 hours drive where we’d just come from. 

Just prior to arriving in Port Campbell we stopped to see the 12 Apostles, huge rock pillars left where the sea had eroded all the land around them leaving just a stack of rock in the surf. The main topic of discussion though was the size of the surf. We were looking at it from close to 100m above the water level and it looked huge. Trying to imagine how big it would be if we were sent out in conditions like that was hard to comprehend. The conversation was a touch more muted for the final few kilometres to the race HQ and the surf rolling through into the small bay of Port Campbell didn’t do anything to quell the thoughts of getting a total hiding on the ski.

We had planned to do a small paddle to test our craft and our skills before the race and with 15 minutes until the start it finally arrived, strapped to roof of our support crew Peto’s Ute, with the ski being 8 metres long it was a sight to see. We managed to sneak out for 5 minutes, although we dared not venture too close to the huge waves at the entrance to the harbour – plenty of time for that in the race!

Day 1 – The Prologue

Set for around 2 hours we all started with everyone jumping off a pier ready for a mad dash swim to a rock cave to collect a control before heading back to the beach. Once on the ski we quickly caught and passed all the teams except for Guy Andrews and Darren Clarke in team Anaconda. We were so caught up in the racing that for a short time we were almost oblivious to the 4 metre high waves breaking only metres from our line. We passed the first marker fine but then over shot the second in our pursuit of the front team. The buoy had been moved due to the huge waves but with such big waves it was almost impossible to see until you were right on it. We doubled back and managed to again pick up most of the teams in front and hit the final regaining section in second place. We used our speed on foot to make good time through here but messed up tactically by not collecting one of the closer controls ending up down in about 5th place, almost 9 minutes behind the first team but more importantly 14 minutes in front of team Anaconda  who we perceived as our biggest competition.

DAY 2

The first of the longer days and as dawn broke it seemed that the surf had calmed down from the day before and that we would be in for an easy paddle from the spectacular Bay of Islands back to Port Campbell. Well within 2 minutes of the start we were taken out Buy a team who had been flipped buy a wave outside us, we scrambled back on only to have the same thing happen minutes later. Luckily in both instances we avoided any damage to the boat or ourselves unlike several teams who ended up with broken boats. Once we exited the bay we suddenly encountered more huge surf. With a plethora of reefs protecting the bays and landing points the trip into the first control of the day was an experience to say the least (we were sh**ing ourselves). At one stage we were surfing on a wave straight towards a wave coming in the opposite direction. We managed to slip through a small gap and spent the remainder of the paddle in awe as we watched house sized waves roll past us, often breaking within metres of where we were. The remainder of the day saw us running, Coasteering and Mountain Biking through some spectacular coastal regions. Yo-yoing back and forth between great speed but being hampered by some big mistakes to see us finish 9 minutes behind Anaconda who had some problems of their own in the last bike.

DAY 3-4 The Long section

The next section saw some weary looking individuals at the start line after having much less sleep and down time having finished much later in the evening the previous day. On the bikes and with only a few kilometres until the rope section we decided to try and make a break from the other teams and avoid any delays at the ropes course. Gordon powered away out front and the other teams we gone in a flash. Gordon was looking a bit apprehensive when he saw the ropes set up – an abseil off a tree top tower, over the railing of a suspended walkway in the trees, before traversing along underneath the walkway to a final abseil – but managed great considering his massive lack of experience and before long we were back on the bikes. The rest of the section went smoothly and we arrived at the next TA with 25mins in hand. A short paddle to a swim where we had to repeat due to a forgotten bib and it was off to the start of the major hiking section in the race. Here we started well and it looked like we were going to get through the section much faster than anticipated but once it was dark we ended up in a very dry and very confusing river system. It’s not a good sign when you reach a river you’re aiming for and it’s flowing the wrong way! Luckily for us we were less than 50m from where we needed to be. After a bit of back and forward trying to ensure we were in the right place we headed off on a creek heading in roughly the right direction. There were plenty of anxious times over the next hour as we walked up this tiny creek wondering if there could possibly be some falls at the top. Finally reaching the CP was a huge relief that was short lived as Anaconda had closed to only a few minutes behind. The scramble out was pretty hairy and steep but once on top and back on a track we were looking forward t getting back on the bikes.  The biking section had some sublime single track in it and everything was going well until I managed to snap my derailleur hanger off, twist my chain and mangle the derailleur. 30 fruitless minutes trying to put in a single speed setup but the chain was too twisted so on with the running shoes and off we went. The single track was still great fun with no chain on the down hills and I found I didn’t lose too much time on the twisty sections. Anaconda meanwhile had passed us while we were fixing the chain but surprisingly 45minutes later they caught up with us on a flatter section, after obviously having issues of their own. The next few hours we managed to stay within touch, often getting a lead up the hills and then getting caught on the flatter sections. With only a few kilometres to go we hit a flat road section after we had both missed a turnoff and they got away but a few minutes on us. The final section on our long day and after a bit of food the challenge was simple. To make sure we were as close to Anaconda as possible to preserve as much of our overall lead as possible. Starting 9 min behind we dug deep, our surfing skills now much improved and by the last CP we were only 4 minutes down and still in the overall lead. Surfing towards the finish we had closed right up on Anaconda and hit eh finish a mere 24 seconds behind after 30 hours of racing.

Final Day

Starting the dark with a Rogaining section we headed off 5 minutes in front of the rest of the field and by the finish had extended our lead to just over 11 minutes, only to lose 8 of it by forgetting to take the our control card. Back on the bikes and we were following rally style notes with maps basically obsolete. We had a few issues early and Anaconda slipped past us once again, in true AR style though we were to see plenty more of them before the day was through. Back on track and once again in front we studiously made our way through some more fantastic single track before we saw Anaconda again for the last time. We were both searching for the last CP and heading in opposite directions. We found the CP shortly after but had no idea if Anaconda had already found it or not? The next 30 minutes of riding we flogged ourselves along an open ridge, on the trail map it had been hard to tell how much up and down it was to have and I couldn’t help thinking maybe we should have taken the valley track, even though it was significantly longer. On hitting the TA it was with a fair amount of surprise that we learnt were still leading and after smoking the short Orienteering course we were off on the last ski leg before Anaconda had even reached the Orienteering TA. We enjoyed some more great surfing conditions as we paddled past Bells beach and up towards the finish in Torquay. We headed wide into the finish and caught a great wave to finish – crossing the whole bay and ran up the beach to win the inaugural Great Ocean Race.

For us the race had been filled with highs, like catching a massive swell out the back of Bells beach (the one immortalized in the movie Point Break), some ripping single track, spectacular scenery and an incredibly well run race; as well as few lows, mainly brought upon by ourselves, well in fact me! A broken derailleur 30km from the TA wasn’t a good look and although the nav was generally good the mistakes were generally major thus resulting in large time losses. For Gordon he tripled his longest day of racing ever and raced strong and smart all week. I made more mistakes navigating than I wanted but it was also a great learning experience for me to try and navigate at such a high pace.

Hopefully John and his crew organise another instalment of this race, it is definitely a must do race and so close to NZ is an ideal opportunity for Kiwis to experience a world class event without the expense of travelling to the other side of the world.

For full results go to www.keenadventurerace.com