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ARC Overnight Adventure Race - Haliburton - June 7-8, 2003

Post Race Review

 

 The Start
In the early morning hours of June 7th, 2003, participants in the ARC Overnight Adventure Race at the Haliburton Forest in Ontario, were greeted by cloudy skies and an on-again/off-again drizzle. Despite the rain, everyone was eager for the start of the race that would take them on a 24-30 hour non-stop journey through the spectacular lakes, trails and wilderness that make up the Haliburton Forest.

The ARC Overnight Adventure Races are the next step in adventure racing for participants who want to challenge themselves over an extended period of time, with the addition of night travel and navigation, and a fixed rope component in the race.

The race started at 7am sharp, as the teams ran up the North Road, on their way to between 5 and 10 hours of trekking in some of the thickest and wettest woods in the Haliburton Forest.

ARC Enduro Adventure Race Photos

 Trekking
The first two CP’s on the trek section of the race course were unmanned and located near or ‘in’ beaver ponds, and at one location, a team member was required to swim out to a sign in the middle of the pond to recover a code that was then written into their passport.

Checkpoints three and five were manned with volunteers who had hiked into their locations and had camped with the bugs until the teams found them as they made their way to the first Transition Area at CP8.

 Biking
The bike ride started off on some of the dirt roads within the Haliburton Forest, but before long teams entered the single track riding for which the Haliburton Forest is famous, however this year with all the rain that the area had experienced this spring, these trails were extremely wet and muddy.

Most of the teams spent between 3 and 5 hours on the bike before they reached TA2/CP12, where they headed up the Lookout Trail to the start of the fixed rope section of the race.

 Rappelling
At the top of The Lookout, teams were not only greeted by a spectacular view of the Haliburton Highlands, but also the start of a double rappel to the bottom.

The first rappel was approximately 120 feet and the second rappel was over 150 feet, making this one of the highest rappels in any wilderness adventure race in the province. And it was even more challenging for the teams that arrived at the top after dark, as they had to feel their way down the rocky descent.

 Night Biking
After the rappel, the teams were back onto their bikes for another 3-4 hours of biking at night as they traveled east to west across the Haliburton Forest.

The last leg of the ride was on the Kendra Trail which is not only the most difficult biking trail in the forest, but also one of the muddiest; and this caused the teams to carry and push their bikes for long stretches until they reached the final Transition Area at Stocking Lake.

 Paddling to the Finish Line
The final section of the ARC Overnight Adventure Race was a long paddle and portage on a combination of small secluded lakes, large open water lakes and meandering marshland.

The upper section of the paddle brought teams down south from Stocking Lake and through Base Camp, while the second section of the paddle consisted of a loop that took teams east to The Lookout, where they had rappelled about 10 hours earlier, and then back to Base Camp on a series of more northerly lakes, before they traveled on foot to the finish line.

The top Coed team (Hardwood Hills) finished in a time of 24hrs. 53mins., followed by Team Wilderness Plumbers and Team Vigormotis.

The top Open Male teams were Team Boohai and Team Hack Attack.

Congratulations and thank you to all the Teams and Volunteers that participated in the ARC Overnight Adventure Race.

A special thank you to all the sponsors and supporters of the race, including:

Haliburton Forest, Soles Custom Footbeds, Superstands, Vector Bar, Rub A535, Naya and Ford of Canada.

For complete ARC Enduro Adventure Race Results


 

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